Hamels Sharp as Phils One-Hit Red Sox
By Editorial Staff
In my youth, I was not a huge baseball card collector. Most of my forays into the collecting world settled around cards with names that I found amusing. One player typifies my love for absurd names (No, not Dickie Thon): Oil Can Boyd. How the hell did someone get named Oil Can? His real name is Dennis Ray Boyd. My ten year old brain could not comprehend how this ridiculous nickname was deemed acceptable for print on something that could conceivably last for eternity. Looking back, I do not think ole’ Oil Can had the best judgement based on his institutionalization for his temper tantrum for missing the all-star team in the mid-eighties. But his name was OIL CAN….seriously!
Fast forward to the year 2011. Every time I see the Boston Red Sox logo, it reminds me of Oil Can Boyd. Today at City of Palms Park in Florida, the Phillies butted heads with the former employers of Oil Can.
Cole Hamels threw for the second time this spring and looked great. Cole allowed one hit and struck out three in four innings of work, even getting the opportunity to work out of a jam first and third jam in the third inning. Scott Mathieson, Michael Stutes and Juan Perez finished up the one hitter for the Phils. For all you mathematicians out there, that means that the relievers did not give up any hits for the remainder of the game.
Mike Cameron, who was rumored to be coming to Philadelphia for Joe Blanton earlier this year, mustered the only hit off of the Phils staff today.
The Phils did not exactly knock the cover off of the ball today, generating all their runs off of a two run double by Pete Larish. Luckily it was all they needed to secure the 2-0 win.
Some positives to take from today: Benny Fresh was 2-3 and is hitting a robust .375 for the spring and the pitching staff looked great including young arm Stutes and perennnial reclamation project Mathieson.
On to the negatives. The Phils did not pound the living shit out of Andrew Miller. Miller has always been a favorite punching bag of the Phils and they did not crush him with his new team. Perhaps they did not recognize the uniform. Figure on Miller ending up the year in double a ball again this year. Domonic Brown was 0-3 with a strikeout. I suppose that it is a good sign that he did not strike out multiple times, but I think we are all ready for him to break out.
Sweet Jesus. Oil Can Boyd is attempting a come back.