The Phillies are trying to kill me: Cardinals 6, Phillies 5 (12)

The Phillies are trying to kill me. I know they are.

Because otherwise, what are they even doing?

At one point early on, they had the lead. And then they gave it up in the ugliest half inning I've seen all year. There were errors all over the place, bad placement, crappy throws, missed catches, it had everything. Everything embarrassing, I mean. The kind of embarrassing where it feels like your mind is throwing up -- it's all involuntary reactions that feel wrong but you can't stop them.

They even came back to tie the game in the eighth inning. But with the go-ahead run 90 feet away and no one out, the Phillies couldn't get it across the plate. It's almost like they're doing this on purpose, prolonging the experience of them losing. Mike Matheny went out to talk to the umpires no less than seventy seven times tonight, making the game even longer with his constant questioning that also managed to seem sarcastic.

Ben Revere somehow kicked a ball over the outfield wall in center field. Yup.

If I asked you in April which member of the Phillies would be most likely to accidentally kick the baseball out of the field of play, I know you would have said Ben Revere. And you would have been right!

Chase Utley changed positions twice. He played first base for awhile and then went back to second, all "Yeah, I'm bored here." Freddy Galvis came into the game as a pinch runner for Ryan Howard and would spend time and second and third. Darin Ruf played first base and left field, but didn't start the game. So imagine a haze of confusion on top of everything, since I'm pretty sure even the players on the field didn't always remember where they were supposed to be playing.

The game stayed tied for three innings, until Ken Giles, pitching for the second straight night and for the second straight inning, finally got burned. He gave up a run on a walk, a single, and a sac fly, and the Phillies lost. They lost! After all of that!

And not only did they lose, they did it in extra innings.

This is the Phillies' 18th extra-inning game this season, tying them with the Marlins for the most this season.

— Bill Baer (@CrashburnAlley) August 24, 2014

Why, Phillies. Why.

And in case you may be under the illusion that this was an entertaining game, you'd be wrong. Multiple position changes aren't exciting. They have all the thrill and zazz of two dudes walking down a long hallway sort of at the same time, with a guy off to the side giving a piece of paper to another guy. The position change is like inter-office mail in the middle of a baseball game.

The Phillies have one more chance to win this series tomorrow at 1:35. Join me as I try to stop myself from going completely round the bend.

Source: FanGraphs