Message to Philadelphia Phillies pitcher Cole Hamels: After your poor pitching cost your team a World Series game, it’s probably not a good idea to say that you “can’t wait for” the season “to end.”  Or that you’re finding the season “mentally draining,” and you “just can’t wait for a fresh start.”

That’s not all the struggling starter said. In his postgame interview after Saturday’s Game 3 loss, Hamels continued in that gloomy Halloween spirit, saying that “there are 30 other teams sitting at home right now thinking the same thing.” Hmmm, maybe Hamels ought to start listening to the dad in that New Era baseball caps commercial after all. At least that gung-ho guy is more positive!

True, this is the first time in the last two postseasons that any team even won two games against the Phillies, and it’s also the first time the Phillies have even been behind in those postseasons. But being down two games to one in the World Series deficit isn’t that big a deal. No need for Hamels to get all Eeyore on the subject of losing.

I would have a bit more sympathy for Hamels, who got booed off the mound last night, if he didn’t go on New York sports radio station WFAN last winter to call the Mets’ “choke artists.” Given that the pitcher followed up a very mediocre (10-11, 4.32 ERA) 2009 regular season with a horrendous postseason (1-2, 7.58 ERA), I’d say the choke’s on him this time around.

The most surprising thing about the game was that it was Hamels - and not Andy Pettitte - who got knocked out first. While Hamels was lights-out against the Yankees for three innings, Andy Pettitte was pretty shaky early on, putting the Yankees in a 3-0 hole in the second inning. But while Pettitte settled down after that inning, Hamels fell apart. In the fourth, after being visibly upset over a ball four call to  Mark Teixeira, he gave up that instant replay homer to Alex Rodriguez. And in the fifth, Hamels unraveled further, most notably when he gave up a game-tying single to, of all people, Pettitte, and then a game-winning double to Johnny Damon.

Before the game, Hamels admitted trying that he “emulated” Pettitte when he was growing up, saying that “he’s always the kind of guy I’ve looked at and hoped to be one day in his shoes.” Too bad for him he didn’t pick up how Pettitte persevered in the game, despite such a rocky beginning.

In other news, it just figures that A-Rod, who was the first person to get a homer verified due to instant replay, hit the first postseason instant replay homer as well. And it’s also fitting, because it was Rodriguez losing a homer to to an umpire’s call last season was the impetus for MLB instituting instant replay for home run calls in the first place.

But while FOX had all this real drama happening in their midst, they were too busy pushing the “what’s wrong with A-Rod” meme to notice it at first. After the slugger went all of eight World Series at-bats without a hit, and had six strikeouts to boot, Fox spent A-Rod’s fourth-inning at-bat with MLB expert Ken Rosenthal weighing in on Rodriguez’s psyche. The reporter said that in speaking reporters Friday, “stayed on point like a politician, saying that he repeatedly needed to swing at strikes.” Bummer - here I was hoping Rodriguez would collapse in a heap, telling the press he wasn’t worthy to play in the World Series!

The journalist went on report that Rodriguez was ready to “pass the baton” to other Yankee batters, saying that an “0-for-0 night with four walks would be ‘perfect.’”As it turns out, Rosenthal ended up writing a very good postgame column for FoxSports.com using those observations (Rosenthal also smartly detailed how Nick Swisher’s revised batting stance proved to be successful.) But the problem was that his on-air commentary took place during - and distracted from - what turned out to be the most-talked at-bat of the game, A-Rod’s homer.

Then, later on in the game, Tim McCarver - who deserves credit for being the first to notice that A-Rod’s double was indeed a homer - went on some tedious tangent about bowling and baseball. Aren’t these World Series games dramatic enough? Why all the  manufactured drama?

Meanwhile, after the game, Phillies’ Ryan Howard, after running up nine strikeouts in his first three 2009 World Series games (the WS record is twelve), was overheard griping about the number of reporters at his locker after the game, saying that they were “like ants at a ——- picnic.” Maybe he - and for that matter, Hamels - ought to have paid some attention to how teammate Pedro Martinez deftly handled the media this October.

Photo by Studious Metsimus

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