Another Reason to Hate the Phillies!

It's no secret that I am an avid Phillies-hater.  I have bashed them many times on this blog, and even though they're a million games out of first place this year and they have a great catcher about whom I've said some nice things (see "Is Carlos the New Iván" on 5/24/12), they're still doing things to piss me off (Can I say that on here?  I guess so; it's my blog!).

The Phillies' most recent move that has upset me (as well as many other Washington Nationals fans) has to do with Nationals' outfielder, Michael Morse.  For those of you who don't know Michael, let me give you a little bit of a background on him.  Morse (known to his teammates as "The Beast") came to the Nationals in 2009 from the Seattle Mariners.  Last season, he led the Nats in home runs with 31 and finished the year with a .303 batting average.  While normally an outfielder, Morse filled in very nicely at first base for the injured Adam LaRoche during most of last season.  This year, he began the season on the Disabled List and returned in June to his familiar spot in left field.   Morse is currently batting .301 in the 65 game he's played, with 14 doubles and 11 home runs.

So in late July, Morse started hitting regularly; every day, in fact, and had himself a nice 10-game hitting streak by the time the Nationals were to play the Phillies on August 2nd.  Morse got a hit at that game, and in fact has hit safely in his last 22 games!  That sounds like a pretty good accomplishment, right?  I mean, he's no DiMaggio, but it's still a respectable streak.  Well, this 22-game hit streak does not exist, because on August 10 (more than a week after that August 2nd game), the Phillies requested that Major League Baseball review Morse's only hit from that game.  The Phillies argued that it was not a hit off their pitcher, Cole Hamels (who already had a "history" with the Nationals, since he had intentionally hit the Nats' Bryce Harper with a pitch in a game earlier this season) and MLB agreed.  So Morse's third-inning single was switched to an error by Phillies' shortstop, Jimmy Rollins.  How lousy is that?!  What the heck were the Phillies trying to accomplish by asking for a review?  Are they that bitter about being in last place?  Such sore losers, I tell ya!  So not only does poor Jimmy Rollins get charged with an error (thanks a LOT, teammates!), but Michael Morse's hitting streak ended at 10 games on August 2nd.  Luckily for Morse, he's been hitting ever since, and now has himself an 11-game streak going (which like I said before, would be a 22-game streak if the August 2nd hit hadn't been reversed).  Let's hope Morse's current streak ends soon, because if it continues, the controversial reversal of August 2nd will keep looming over Morse and may overshadow the tremendous job that the Nationals have done so far this season.