I have read alot about Bowa and if people like him or hate him as far as the team goes and this should tell alot about today's game...
Battered, bloodied, fading and feuding, the Phillies were swept out of Florida after losing another laugher to the Marlins, 10-1.
But not before trying to heal themselves before they boarded their team plane for Chicago and three crucial games there.
Swept in four games, more than three games - 3 ? - out of first place in the National League East for the first time since May 1, the Phillies are a $93 million team decimated by injury, unrest and the world champion Marlins. Embattled manager Larry Bowa and some players called a quick postgame meeting with the doors closed for 35 minutes, the first of the season and the first since the famous tirade in Montreal 11 months ago.
This, after veteran reliever Billy Wagner, Rheal Cormier and Roberto Hernandez criticized the acidic, tense clubhouse and dugout atmosphere.
Apparently, the meeting was calm.
"Give and take," said Bowa, who, by his accounts and the players', entreated the team to ignore the rife injuries, speculation about his and his coaches' job security, and the lack of personnel help with the trade deadline looming tomorrow.
The players hear it all. They have grumbled about Bowa's heavy-handedness, even as he attempts to withdraw pressure. After Tuesday's loss, Bowa said they should be embarrassed and the players took umbrage. Yesterday, after Bowa addressed them maturely and professionally, they seemed salved.
"It was something that needed to be addressed, and it's over," Cormier said.
What needed to be addressed was multifaceted. The players see everything.
They see general manager Ed Wade, assistant GMs Ruben Amaro Jr. and Mike Arbuckle and Wade's special assistant, Dallas Green, powwowing in Clearwater, Fla., this week supposedly to pursue trade possibilities, but note the convenience of their convergence - a coincidence, Wade insisted.
Asked whether Bowa was on a shorter leash today, Wade replied: "Than he was 3 days ago? No. I don't think, all of a sudden, that people have to do daily job-status reports, just because issues like this occur."
At the meeting (if not on the field), several players took as good as they gave, including, as expected, Jim Thome, a recognized team leader, and, for the first time in his career, Bobby Abreu, suddenly infected with the leadership bug after seven seasons of standout play.
"It was necessary," Abreu said. "We talked about just playing baseball. We talked about getting rid of distractions. Tried to pump guys up."
Hernandez said, "It was about getting back to playing baseball."
Cormier said, "It was trying to clear the air about what's going on."
Wagner, the most vocal critic, was in Philadelphia having his strained shoulder examined, so his input and reflections were, regrettably, absent. Perhaps they weren't needed.
"Instead of calling a meeting like that," Thome opined, "we could just win a game."
Especially here.
Against the Fish, the Phils have lost 14 straight at Pro Player Stadium, 11 of 12 overall this season and 23 of the last 26.
The humiliating chant of the series was "We want doughnuts!" - a reference to the fact ticketholders get a dozen free Krispy Kreme doughnuts if the Marlins get a dozen hits.
Cholesterol levels in South Florida are rising.
Marlins fans got doughnuts in the opener Monday, an 11-3, 12-hit laugher, and yesterday, when the 12th of 15 hits came in the fifth inning.
Jeff Conine, licensed to kill Phillies, had hit the typical Paul Abbott solo homer to lead off the second, and then the end began. With one out in the third inning, Abbott gave up a bases-loaded double to Miguel Cabrera, who reprised his role from Tuesday as the game's winner, driving in Juan Pierre and Luis Castillo, the first runs of a seven-run inning, capped by Alex Gonzalez' first career grand slam.
Abbott left after the third with his worst outing since the Phillies picked him up from the Devil Rays' castoff heap. (He gave up nine runs in 3 1/3 innings in one outing with Tampa Bay.) It was the team's second-worst inning of the season; Abbott started the worst, eight runs by the Red Sox on June 25.
All of that pitching obscured the fact that the Phillies failed to score at least five runs for the seventh straight game. They have averaged 2.4 runs in those games, averaged 2.25 here. Yesterday's Ace of the Day, Dontrelle Willis, cruised through the seventh. The Phillies managed a run off him from Tomas Perez and Todd Pratt in the fifth to keep from getting shut out, then he got nine straight outs.
They didn't seem to be real tough outs.
"You're down, 8-0, in the third inning, it takes the air out of you," Bowa explained.
So, six innings later, he tried to reinflate some bruised egos.
And maybe save himself in the process.
