In the aftermath of their loss yesterday afternoon, the Phillies find themselves dead-even with the Braves for first place with nineteen games left to play in the regular season. Assuming the rain stops by this afternoon, the Phillies will send Roy Oswalt to the mound today to face Mets lefthander Jon Niese.
Niese has had a solid rookie season and memorably shut down the Phillies' lineup back on April 30 at Citizens Bank Park. But he has given up a lot of runs in his last three starts (one of them unhelpfully coming at the hands of the Braves), and could be running out of gas, as the Mets went out of their way to flip their rotation this week to give Niese an extra rest day. So the Phillies will be looking for a little payback. Incidentally, former Phillie Kyle Lohse will attempt to do us a favor against Tim Hudson and the Braves in the ESPN game tonight.
Discuss below.