Phillies news & links — Chase Utley is still our king

As our stars of tomorrow start to shine brightly (I LOVE YOU RHYS), our stars of yesteryear are still being awesome and doing things. And there’s one in particular I want to talk about this morning.

Chase Utley holy crap this play

Chase Utley, now of the Dodgers (::weeps::) made a play that preserved a perfect game last night, and holy crap it’s amazing.

Chase is probably feeling that this morning, because he’s 38 now, but HOLY JESUS THAT PLAY. Sadly, the Dodgers offense forgot how to hit, and starting pitcher Rich Hill lost his perfect game bid on an error in the ninth, and in the tenth he gave up a giant lead-off home run. Womp Womp. But now let’s talk about another former Phillie who did nothing but got mentioned last night anyway.

Cliff Lee, still a pitching badass

Rich Hill almost did something last night that hasn’t been done since 2012. Almost. Rich Hill and the Dodgers were involved in an extra-innings 0-0 game against the Pirates last night. Hill had a perfect game through eight and the Dodgers hadn’t scored. He lost the perfect game when Logan Forsythe booted a ball in the ninth, and the Dodgers still didn’t score. And so under 100 pitches, manager Dave Roberts sent Rich Hill out to pitch the tenth. And he promptly gave up the game-losing home run.

What does this have to do with the Phillies? The last time a starting pitcher recorded an out past the ninth inning, it was Cliff Lee.

Cliff Lee, on April 18, 2012, threw 10 scoreless innings in a game I still remember really, really well. Here’s a highlight reel:

And in case you’ve got a few hours to spare, here’s the full game.

Sigh. I miss you, Cliff.

Rhys Hoskins is awesome

This is going to become a theme of the morning links, I suspect. What awesome thing did Rhys Hoskins do last night? HE DID THIS.

This is a phrase I don’t like to use much, but I can’t figure out another way to say it: that was a big boy home run. Holy shit. A laser shot to the second deck. What does that mean? Allow Twitter to tell you.

Guys, this is actually happening. It’s actually happening!

Phillies Pride Night gets reviewed

The amazing Cole Altmann, friend of the site, wrote up a fanpost on her experience at this year’s Phillies pride night, which fell on the second game of Tuesday’s doubleheader. It was the second ever official Phillies Pride Night, though they’ve had a unofficial pride nights for about a decade. Read Cole’s fanpost, because it tells you everything you need to know, and it’s just... so Phillies. So very Phillies.

The 1961 Phillies were really, really bad

I went on a podcast called This Week in Baseball History, hosted by the amazing Mike Bates and Bill Parker, to talk about the 1961 Phillies. Those Phillies lost 107 games and endured a 23-game losing streak, and holy crap was this fun to learn about and talk about. The 1961 Phillies were bad, but the teams from 1918 through 1948 were a special kind of futile. I talk about those teams, the 1961 Phillies, and I even get into 1964 a bit. Give it a listen, I bet you’ll love it.