Robbed!

So the "fightens" got jobbed last night in the nation's capitol -like what else did you expect- when my man Chase Utley hit a clear home run that hit the home run pole in that horrible excuse for a base ball park. The gutless or sightless-take your pick- first base ump called it foul, and shockingly, the Phils did not protest . Now here is the deal, the Phillies are now one game out of a wild card birth, and if they end up missing the playoffs by one game, folks here will be sick.

Now I must admit, that although I live in the city of "brotherly love" and have pretty much adopted all Philly sports teams, the Phils are my least favorite. I suspect, it has something to do with their history as it relates to blacks, and their penchant for putting a bad product on the field. Heck, like most black Philadelphians, I found myself cheering for the Blue Jays in that 1993 world series. I Just didn't like the Phillies make up of jolly rednecks, and their dearth of color. And when Joe Carter sent the "Wildthing's" pitch screaming over the wall, I was delighted.

But fast forward to this team. A team I like, and a team that deserves to at least make it to the playoffs since they have the best player in the National League this year in my man Ryan Howard. They don't deserve this, not when they have played their butts off to get this far. To not make the playoffs because of this call, would be a tremendous injustice to those kids on the team.

So back to the call. It was god awful, and it just goes to show why baseball needs to get into the 20th century and institute the instant replay like the other sports.-Even tennis has it for crying out loud! Now you know if that were the Yankees that got hosed like that, it would be all over the national news by now, and those umps would be in witness protection program somewhere. But it wasn't, and unfortunately, the only outcry you will hear is from Philly fans. And people in the rest of the country are tired of us now. We are kind of the boy that cried wolf, the rest of America just does not want to hear from a Philly fan, ever! We just have no credibility in their eyes.

Too bad, because what happened last night should never happen again even during a regular season game in July, let alone when a team is fighting for their playoff lives, with five games to go. Shame on you umps, shame on you MLB, and shame on the Philly's first base coach for not seeing the obvious. This one, like so many other disappointments for Philly's fans will hurt, but this time it wasn't some choke by the players, but instead, we can chalk it up to poor eyesight, or worse, a lack of guts.