The Latest Night to Forget: Dodgers 4, Phillies 0

Remember this:

Okay, you're remembering it.  Get in there.  Really claw into that moment, deep.  I was hungover at a company retreat in Monterrey, California.  It was cloudy.  I was happy.

Are you there?  Good.  Really work that memory around in your head.  Really drive it into your brain.  I want you to be able to draw from that ecstasy while we do this.

You're gonna need it.

Charlie Manuel grabbed his Wawa bag and headed for daylight this afternoon. It was an emotional day that left everyone somewhat frayed by the time 7:05 rolled around, at which point our dead-eyed bunch of bed-shitters were going to be playing the searing hot Dodgers in a game that was definitely not going to make anyone feel better.

You just kind of wanted it to be different tonight, maybe get a reaction of some kind from the players.  While they're undoubtedly going through their own stuff, it'd be great to see that stuff get translated into an on-the-field message that tells us, "Hey. Hey, fans. We love you too. Hold us."

But it was the same lifeless bed-shitting that's lasted for over half of August now, and wow, is it starting to stink.

The Phillies would put runners on, then leave them there, in the same "flaccid yo-yo" offense that's gotten them nowhere for so long.  The top four hitters in the Phils' lineup had yet to record a hit by the eighth inning.  In fact, Zach Greinke only let two balls through off the bats of Darin Ruf and Cody Asche which, again, resulted in nothing.  On one play in the third, Chooch actually reached on an error, then got thrown out at second on a play that made Greinke do this.

[Billiam Baerson, esq.]

"How the f*** should I know?!" --that bat lying there

So you know that probably looked good on the other end.

Cliff Lee pitched well, giving up the Hanley Ramirez home run in the fourth, and a Mark Ellis RBI double in the seventh, which was raucously misplayed by Domonic Brown, who gave an encore performance of his dive-and-miss tactic that got him a concussion earlier this year.

The "Play of the Game" per TMac and Wheels was when a cameraman caught a foul pop-up; and hey, did you guys know Modern Family is coming to PHL 17?

In the eighth inning, Jimmy Rollins walked, and Michael Young followed him with a single. The cruel facade continued with a Dom Brown walk (after a Chase Utley strikeout) and the table was set for Darin Ruf to improve everybody's mood with a I'm not even going to say it because he struck out swinging and the Phillies' deepest threat of the night withered away into nothing like all the rest.

The Dodgers showed how easy run-scoring is in the top of the ninth, canceling out the phantom run the Phillies didn't score moments before.

The bottom of the ninth isn't even worth acknowledging, so I'll let this Fangraph do the talking.

You ever notice how these things start to look like mighty forests, burning into toxic wastelands....

Source: FanGraphs