Seen It Coming: Phillies 4, Mets 3

There's not a lot to take from today's 4-3 Phillies win over the New York Mets. The Mets have locked up the division and are playing for even rest at this point. And the Phillies roughed up (to be generous) a starter that probably won't sniff a playoff game in Bartolo Colon.

The Phillies are in very little danger of losing what had started to look like a disputed first overall pick; they're three games up with five to go, and their lineup reads like a computer generated squad from, like, Ron Gant's Baseball Action! 1995. The Mets' lineup was fairly normal, which might give some pause to a few faithful on the N heading back to the PATH train tonight from Queens, but frankly, we didn't learn much from tonight's win. The Phillies might not lose 100 games, but they suck a lot; the Mets won't win 100 games, but they're pretty good.

But oh, if you think that means that no one saw this particular nadir of success coming for the 2015 Phillies, then you got another thing coming, pal. Our old friend Nostradamus, that famous prophet of 17th century France we know so well, foresaw all of this, and the proof is below.

PROOF I (Century V, Stanza 16):

The Sabaean tear no longer at its high price,
Turning human flesh into ashes through death,
At the isle of Pharos disturbed by the Crusaders,
When at Rhodes will appear a hard phantom.

Clearly, Sabaean is referencing the San Francisco Giants' erstwhile GM Brian Sabean, who famously stole a soon-to-be-excellent Hunter Pence from the Phillies, leaving the outfield unsettled and open for the hell we have seen in Darin Ruf, left fielder. But now, with Sabean retired, and Ruf emplanted at first, the tear is no longer so painful, and Ruf's home run (referenced here in the second line) is the profit gained from this. The isle of Pharos (Manhattan), is disturbed by the Crusaders (the righteous Phillies), as the Fightin's take a 3-0 lead in the first. The hard phantom, of course, is the ghost of the Phillies' relevance, like King Hamlet urging them to murder their enemies. Pretty obvious one, really.

PROOF II (Century IX, Stanza 97):

The forces of the sea divided into three parts,
The second one will run out of supplies,
In despair looking for the Elysian Fields,
The first ones to enter the breach will obtain the victory.

Clearly this is a reference to Lucas Duda's first homerun of the game, but the interpretation of the first three lines are ambiguous. It could be a reference to the three parts of the first home run (eg Ruf, Odubel Herrera, and Aaron Altherr), in which case the "second one" -- that is Herrera -- "runs out of supplies" in as much as he runs out of space to catch Duda's centerfield blast. The catch would, of course, be Herrera's own paradise, his Elysian Fields.

Conversely, we might imagine this "three parts" to be a reference to the "out to sea" pitcher, David Buchanan, who gave up the homer. Buchanan is largely a three pitch pitcher, with his curveball making up a meager 12% of his thrown pitches. His fastball, changeup, and cutter all have negative pitch values, so none are exactly tremendous (again, out to sea), but his fastball is far and away the worst. And what was his second pitch of that at bat? A fastball up that was crushed, as he looked to the Elysian fields of the grassy centerfield of Citizens Bank Park.

But that all said, we know that the first ones "to enter the breach" can be the Mets -- who bat at the top of the inning, and won the battle here -- or the Phillies -- who scored first and would be ultimately triumphant.

PROOF III (Century X, Stanza 8):

Index & thumb will colour-amalgate the front
At Senegalia the Story to his own son
The Myrnarmee through several of the first front
Three in seven days wounded to death.

I mean this is painfully obvious as a reference to Aaron Altherr's run-scoring single and the neck-stiffness of Colon limiting his outing. I don't want to offend you all by laying it out there.

PROOF IV (Century XII, Stanza 52):

Two bodies, one head, fields divided in two,
And then to reply to four unheard ones:
Little ones for great ones, clear ever for them,
Lightning at the tower of Aiguesmortes, worse for "Eussouis"

The "two bodies" clearly refer to Duda's two home runs, born both from the "one head" of that big lug. The second home run divided the fields of Phillies fans -- those who root for development and wins and those who root for draft position -- in two, as Golden Boy Ken Giles gave up a shot to Duda to make the game a one-run affair. That said, the "four unheard ones" are the four runs of the game already deciding its fate, and the "little ones" -- the basement-dwelling Phillies -- turn out to indeed be "ever for" the great Mets in the way that MacDuff "is for" MacBeth.

The last line refers to Sal Eussouis, owner and bartender at Sal's Tower of Power on Flatbush and Aiguemortes, who unfortunately had a grid fry right after the homer. He's still waiting in the dark, assuming the game went into extras -- poor guy.

PROOF V (Century XII, Stanza 59):

The accord and peace will be broken everywhere:
Friendships poluuted by discord:
Hatred awakened, all faith corrupted,
And hope. Marseilles without concord.

And lest we forget though, the 2015 Phillies are a plague, cursing all they touch. The peace of a fanbase and a front office: destroyed. The friendships we may have casually though one-sidedly made with professional baseball players while watching the veterans of the 2008 World Series team slowly decline and fade: seriously in jeopardy. And the hatred of Mets fans is certainly awakened, as their faith and hope in home field advantage in the playoffs is deeply "corrupted."

Finally, the concord of Marseilles is an analogical cognate for the Treaty of Versaille, which famously ended World War I. The treaty was signed in 1919, and in 1919 the Phillies went a remarkable 47-90. Just a reminder that you didn't need Nostradamus to give you:

War is hell, and so are the Phillies.