What do you think of the Phillies in the first half?

Well, the results are finally in. Yes, I know I promised them last week, but hey, life gets in the way.

And the first person that posts a Jeff Goldblum gif and/or meme gets a recommendation for a ban.

Anyway, here are the results. I decided to take a different approach with these. Instead of just listing all of the names that I received, I decided to make some word clouds so you can see how often people wrote names in these cases.

First half MVP

It’s pretty obvious what we as a group think. We pretty much all see Scott Kingery as the team’s MVP in the first half, and for good reason. He pretty much saved this team with his unexpected results. Nice to see Jay Bruce getting some love in there, along with Andrew McCutchen and Rhys Hoskins. Strangely, someone seems to be missing....

First half LVP

This is also not really a surprise. I’m not even going to acknowledge the person who appears most often. Jake Arrieta and Nick Pivetta, two-fifths of the rotation, appearing that much pretty much tells the state of the starting rotation, doesn’t it? My favorite response: the letter “t”.

First half Cy Young

This one was actually closer than I thought. Looking at it, I thought that Nola would be the runaway, but the fact that many of you are acknowledging how big a part Hector Neris has played in the team being in playoff contention is genuinely refreshing, especially if you were to check Twitter. You’d think Neris stole a puppy or something.

First half Adam Eaton

Again, not a surprise. Arrieta and Pivetta have been equal parts disappointing this season.

Do the Phillies make a trade before August 1?

This one was interesting in light of Andy MacPhail’s comments about not wanting to trade away premium prospects this deadline.

Yeah, I think they do something, but what? Well glad you asked, my friend!

If yes, for what?

Word cloud time!

Pretty much everyone acknowledges that this team needs a starter and it’s hard to argue with them. The names you see there - Bumgarner, Ray, Stroman, etc. are all names we’ve heard of before.

Special shoutout to the person who mentioned Jake Diekman!

Which, if any, prospect gets called up and makes an impact?

Sadly the word “none” gets just as much mention as any one player. This is either a good thing or a bad thing. There really isn’t anywhere for someone to come up save Haseley, but it’s also bad because the team doesn’t have that guy who can come up and impact the race like a Ronald Acuna or Juan Soto did for the Braves and Nationals did.

How many home runs does Bryce Harper end up with?

Even in a season that feels disappointing to some (not me!), many of you still feel Harper will reach and go beyond 30 home runs. Positivity folks! I like it!

Do any Phillies finish in the top 5 of any major awards at the end of the season?

About that positivity....

And now the one you’ve been waiting for.

Do the Phillies make the playoffs?

Drum roll, please.......

Truly not what I was expecting. Would that change after Saturday night’s game? Well....

Thanks to everyone that responded! It was fun.