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Another week, another reminder that Philly sports will never be easy.

The Phillies are all over the place, struggling to put together complete games, while the Flyers are starting to build momentum heading into the playoffs.

Frustration on one side, excitement on the other—and as always, we’re right in the middle of it.

Stick around for this week’s Question of the Week and your chance to be part of the show.

Transcript

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Welcome back to another edition of Brotherly Love Sports. I'm your host, Adam Curran, and tonight, guys, it is just me, no guest, but that's okay. I will keep it rolling. We will start with the Phillies. So going back to last week, they were having a rough stretch. Got shut out back-to-back games against the Giants, lost the series against the Diamondbacks, and didn't look particularly good. Surprisingly, lost all of those games by one run. The series probably should have been won by us, but you know, combination of inconsistent hitting, Bulpin not being able to hold a lead, just equated to, hey, we don't really want to win. It was unfortunate. Was at the game Friday night when they put up four runs in the first inning. Watching Marsh Bat fourth thinking, oh man, I don't know how this is gonna go. And then he jacks a three-run home run. And then I'm starting to think, well, maybe Topper knows what he's doing. Unfortunately, he left Luzzardo in one out too long. In the fifth inning, Luzardo was looking good, and then he just kind of fell apart. As soon as he got the bases loaded, Topper should have called somebody into the bullpen, start stretching, warming up, something. After he lets up those three runs, now somebody is 100% warming up and getting ready to come in. Lazardo was able to get the next two outs. He struggled to even get them. But after he painted the corner, struck out a guy, beautiful pitch, and Topper opted to let him try to get that third out. Like, no, at that point, he was knocking on the door of uh I think he was over 85 pitches. He might have been somewhere near 90. I don't recall. But as soon as he got that last strikeout, would have pulled him, stick somebody else in, let them get the last out. Instead, he leaves Luzardo in and he gives up the lead. And they go on to lose 5-4 because the offense wasn't doing anything else other than that first inning. It was utterly depressing. Which I think is why we find this team so frustrating to watch, especially early in the season. Because they went to Monday, and you thought they were going to absolutely rout the Cubs. I mean, they won 13-7. Don't get me wrong. Great for them to put up runs like that. A little concerning to see the pitching staff allow seven runs. You would, you know, I would have hoped for maybe a more 13-2 type of domination. But hey, I will take the fact that they were hitting that day. Only to turn around, put up four runs, and lose ten to four. The inconsistencies are appalling to say the least. And I shouldn't know that this early. That might just be an opinion, but the writing's on the wall right now, they can't string together good, consistent games. I mean, you look at the Rocky series. They opened up that series winning 10-1. Granted, you're out in Denver, the ball's going to travel, you're you're going to smack, smack it all around the yard. But to go win the first game 10-1, and then to barely eke past them 2-1 the following game, and then drop the the series finale 1-4, like that's uh against a team that you should have routed entirely. I'm not going to say they should have won every game, you know, in a 10-1 fashion, but there should have been you know significant dominance in that series. They the pitching staff should have shut them out or shut them down more than they than they did, which I guess to a degree they did. They the offense should have been more potent, I guess, is really where I need to go with that. Nonetheless, they're sitting in third place uh as of the time of this recording. They are currently losing to the Cubs five to one. Um happy Rob, Jackie Robinson Day to all who love the sport. The team just needs that edge. Uh Harper was looking like he was starting to come out of it a little bit. I did see his one at bat tonight. He had just missed a high fastball, and that that thing carried. So you know it's a warm day when it's really starting to carry like that. Gonna be good for us down the stretch. I hope it helps energize the hitters. Uh, but my confidence in their ability to be consistent just isn't there. The series against the Braves this weekend concerns me, especially because of the inconsistencies we're already seeing. The Braves are gonna pounce all over that. And I know it's a division rivalry game and they they play out a little differently. They are so unpredictable, especially early, early on. But I doubt the Braves are are gonna get hemmed up, barring some sort of injuries between now and then. Good news for us is though they're they're on a homestand. So hopefully the fans show up, get loud, ruffle the the Braves a little bit. The the biggest thing though is that our guys got to come out swinging. And at this point, I think maybe a more drastic shakeup to the to the current lineup is in order. Okay, I I've had some discussions with people, and and we talked about it a little bit last week. I wouldn't be upset if Crawford is moved to the top of the order, batten first or baton second. I love him in the ninth spot, the way he turns over the lineup, but even in the diamondback series, like the the game on on that Friday, and he hit a triple in the bottom ninth two outs, and all Trey has to do is just you know even get a ground ball out of the out of the infield, something. And he made weak contact on a on a pitch that he probably shouldn't have swung at anyways, and you know, boom, game was over. My point being is Crawford has been your most consistent hitter. So start putting him in places where people can do more with him. Like he should be in front of Schwarber if Schwarber's going to continue to bat second, or he should be in front of Harper as long as Harper's third. As of right now, I I'm leaning more towards it, should be Crawford, Turner, Harper, Schwarber. Or maybe Garcia if you want to break up the the lefty-righty matchup. I'm not saying that's the right move. Schwarzer should probably be the four hitter. Give him the more at bats just because Garcia hasn't really gotten things going. I don't know if he is. I hope he does, but we'll we'll see. After that, you got to figure out something to do with the rest of your lineup. Some people want to know why Sosa isn't starting more. It's because he's kind of a wash defensively at second base between him and Stott. And the longer he's in the lineup, at least from what I've seen, he gets exposed. Pitchers will eventually start to figure him out, and he his average will start to drop. He had a tremendous series of games when Turner got hurt last season. Don't get me wrong, but towards the end, when Turner was getting ready to come back, he was definitely dropping off. So I think he's a great utility player. I would be willing to just ride with him at second or third if by some chance Dombrowski can trade those guys away. Because I'm not happy with either one of them. Bohm can't even hit his weight. Stott, where we all keep waiting for that next step. And so far, that next step hasn't come, and I don't think it is coming. It's never coming, at least not on this team. They got a couple of promising prospects down in the miners. There's a there's a kid in double A that I like that is a natural third paceman. I'd like to see them work on developing him, and instead of training Aiden Miller to play third, you switch him over to second, and that becomes Stott's replacement. That's just my take. We'll see what actually happens. I I wish we could have have some more flies on the walls of management to hear any grumblings that's going on, but I guess that's part of the fun. You get to see what happens. Or part of your frustration and reasons why you drink and why we're all in an abusive relationship with Philadelphia sports. But enough about a team that frustrates the ever-living hell out of us. Let's talk about uh something a little more exciting. The Flyers are back in the playoffs. Monday, they had a tremendous game, with the exception of maybe one period. You know, sitting down watching that game, they were concerning in the first. They they were they were buzzing a little bit, but nothing nothing of great quality. And Carolina getting those two goals was like, oh man, they're they're really gonna make us sweat this out, aren't they? But no, they uh they stuck to their guns. They they it seemed to improve as the game went along and got the tie and goal that they needed, and almost like history repeating itself, almost. And this had essence of 2010. And for those that don't know what happened in 2010, in the final game of the season against the New York Rangers, they went through a shootout, and the Flyers came out on top and made a tremendous playoff run. So while there were obviously aspects that were different for this game, it was against Carolina, not New York, and it wasn't the last game of the season. Second to last, pretty close. It just felt similar. It feels like the team is coming together. They they have seemingly got better since they made some moves to bring on some younger guys. I don't know if the guys that they traded away could be considered trimming the fat, but things seem to be clicking. Guys are getting going, and Vladar seems to be getting maybe not hot is the right term, but he's starting to bubble. It it's a positive sign any way you look at it, and the way this feels could feel like they might just figure it out just enough to make another deep run into the playoffs. We'll see what happens because their first opponent on Saturday is the Pittsburgh Penguins, and we all know how much we fucking hate those guys. I just want to see Martone absolutely level Crawl because the town's gonna go nuts. Love that kid, love his energy. He is big, he moves well, he just has a great awareness of things going on around him. He's made some great passes and he's been able to just be in the right spot at the right time. To finish off the regular season, they beat the Canadians on Tuesday, 4-2. That almost felt like a tune-up game for some of the younger guys that they let play. They rested a bunch of bunch of the other guys. Surprisingly, Harrison didn't look bad. Now, I know he's probably not going to get used as much in the playoffs, and that's that's totally fine. You you need Flodar as your as your guy. You need him to be the one that's got the hot hand, and you just ride him to the playoffs. But you need to see a little more encouragement so that if something happens, even if the even if for some reason the Flyers just pour it on in whatever game, whatever the opponent, and they can, you know, swap out goalies, you you you still want to see Arrison perform well. There's been a lot of excitement, and it seems like a lot of fans are starting to come back to to the Flyers. I know in what one of the early episodes, John and I talked about how, you know, this it feels like there's only like seven, seven fans left, and we're we're two of them talk talking about them. Even listening to some of the radio shows like WIP or or The Fanatic. They they rarely spoke about them, except for maybe that one dude that was still a diehard fan that would call in and try to get try to get them to talk about a little bit. I felt like I heard more about the Eagles and Phillies. Naturally, they historically, or at least in recent memory, have been the better teams and the more exciting ones to talk about. Um they always seem to talk about the Sixers, even though the process has been a disaster, and uh I'll continue to say it that I don't care. I I don't talk to a whole lot of people that do care about them. But hey, teach their own. Everybody loves loves to see loves to see the winners. And playoff hockey is just something different. The the game seems to pick up. You you you truly get the the best talent out there. You're you're not always gonna see teams blowing each other out like the Flyers did against the Jets 7-1. Like those kind of games can happen, they are rare to happen. Uh the the last time I saw the Flyers absolutely crumble in a playoff game, I was physically there. And they were playing the Penguins, and they lost, I think it was 10-3 or 10-4. I think that that might have been the 2011 or 2012 season. It was it was depressing. That was uh not a good not a good time for anybody. Fun fact, I have been to exactly three playoff games in my life. One was for the Flyers, where they lost 10-3 or whatever, to the Penguins. One was to the Phillies when Roy Halliday was was pitching for us, and they lost in the first game of the NLCS to the Giants. I think that was also 2011. Uh, but they lost that game, and that was more thanks to Cody fucking Ross of the Giants, some no-name dude that got hot at the right time. In that game, he hit two home runs and the Phillies lost 43. And the other game I went to was 2013, Chip Kelly's first year of coach when the Eagles took on the Saints and the wild card, and Alex Henry couldn't kick to save his life, and they ended up losing that game 23-20. So, for all you fans, I have sworn off going to any playoff games ever again in my life. You're welcome for my service. The teams are gonna win from here on. That's how I'm gonna choose to look at this. So, John kind of I think started something last week with the question of the week. And I think I'm gonna keep that rolling. And I'll be sure to post this to Facebook. So if you follow me on there, uh you'll you'll see it posted sometime on Thursday. And if you don't follow me, please do. But for all those listening, the question I have is who was the most effective stealer in baseball history with a minimum of 100 attempts? I will reveal the answer next show. And if you happen to guess it right, on Facebook or you know, find the podcast contact info and shoot me a message, email, however you want to get in touch with me. If you guess right, you'll be entered in a chance to come on the show and you can voice your opinion. We can go toe to toe on what you like, what you don't like, and everything in between. That's going to do it for me here on the Brotherly Love Sports Podcast. If you like the show, share me with another fan. Like and subscribe, and I will talk to you guys next week.