Moving

I love writing for this blog, and it will always be my baby, but it's time to let it go. I don't mean that I am done with this blog, no, I am just moving it over to a different site. Blogger has been great, but I don't get that much traffic. I'm not even sure that anyone even reads this blog, but I will be moving it over to sportsrantz.com. The reason I'm doing this is mostly because sportsrantz is like blogger only it's just for sports bloggers and it also gives me a chance to network with fellow bloggers. I do enjoy blogging, so I'm going to continue to do, only on a different site, but it will be under the same name. So go to I bleed black and orange to see what this blog is up to. I'm still going to leave up this site, but I will start posting over there once I fix some things with my taglines and get the site customized to black and orange!

Union drops game to fire

Greg Carroccio

While the Union haven't played as well on the road, they had one thing going for them, and that was that they had a home victory steak. Well tonight the Chicago Fire broke that record in a 3-1 defeat of the home team at PPL Park.

The beginning of the first half of the match was a struggle for both teams to get control of the ball. At the 34th minute, the Union broke the scoreless game. While Apu shot the ball, there was some confusion as where it was heading but eventually it bounced off defenseman Anibaba and went into the
net behind Keeper Johnson.

The Fire weren't going to be put out by the Union. At the 43rd minute, 12 yards from the goal area, Rolfe got past Union's goalkeeper MacMath. This called for a 1-1 even match, but the Fire weren't done yet. With two minutes added onto the half right before the break, on the corner kick Fredrich scored the second Fire goal to give them the one goal lead going into the second half of the match.

The Union were constantly at Johnson's goal but the keeper kept them out by making continuous saves. It was in the 56th minute of the match that the Fire secured their lead and their victory. Rolfe again scored again at a distance. He took the ball from the 18 yard line to corner it right past Union keeper MacMath. This would be the only moves that the Fire needed to make to win the match.

The rest of the match consisted of back to back play of the ball down each end of the pitch. Due to tight defenses and good goaltending at both ends no future goals were scored.

Phillies top cardinals

Via Philadelphia.Phillies.mlb.com

After three back to back games against the St. Louis Cardinals, the Phillies top them in two of the games, giving them two extra wins which will help their climb to the top of the rankings.

On Friday night the Phillies beat the Cardinals 3-1, but on Saturday the Cardinals dished it out too with a 1-4 win to defeat the Phillies. Today the Phillies pulled it out again with a victory of 7-8.

The Cardinals got on the board first. After Jon Jay walked he scored while teammate Matt Carpenter doubled on a line drive. Despite the early start for the Cardinals, the Phillies were on the attack  in the bottom of the first. As Utley was tripling on a line drive, Pierre and Frandsen scored consecutive runs. Utley scored later in the inning while Howard singled a ground ball.

With a scoreless inning and the Phillies up by two runs, the Cardinals had to get back on the board. In the top of the third inning Matt Holliday scored the lone Cardinals run. Despite the effort, this meant that the Phillies were still up by a run. The Phillies lead did not last for much longer especially in the 4th inning where the Cardinals tied the game up 4-4. Cardinals' Furcal and Jay both scored two runs for their team while the Phillies managed only a homerun by Howard early in the bottom of the fourth.

The next three innings were run less, but things began to get interested in the 7th inning which again led to a tie game. In the top of the 8th Cardinals Cruz and Frees scored on the same play and a moment later when the next batter Carpenter singled, Jays scored the third run of the inning. For the first time in the game the Cardinals had the lead, only not for too long. In the bottom of the 8th Kratz homered while Utley and Schierholtz were both on base, so that all three were able to score. These three runs crushed the Cardinals hopes to keep their lead.

Due to the game tieing there was some extra innings played. The 9th and 10th innings remained scoreless but in the bottom of the 11th the Phillies were finally able to get one run over the Cardinals. While Pierre singled on a ground ball late in the inning, Rollins scored the final run to win the game 7-8.

Haha What Are You Doing Phillies

It looks like we're back on the Phillies Roller Coaster. First their up and then they plummet down once again. After winning their home series against the Brewers late last month, the Phillies went on to lose three games in a row to the Braves. They got two more wins against the Nationals  but those three losess were not helping they dig themselves out of the bottom of the East rankings.

The month of August so far has not been good on the Phillies, they're going downhill right now, especially after last night's game. Since winning against the Nationals on the 1st of August, they lost again to the Nationals the next day, then lost to the Diamondbacks. The Phillies started to climb back up with back to back wins against the Diamondbacks, but then they lost it again when they lost to the Braves on Monday. On Tuesday they were able to beat the Braves 3-0, but last night just proves that they weren't ready to show up.

Last night the Braves beat the Phillies 12-6. Not a score that any fan wants to see. The Phillies tried to come out early with a run in the first inning, but then the Braves destroyed them in the second with 4 runs. The 3rd inning was scoreless and in the fourth only the Braves were getting on the scoreboard with an addition two runs.

With the scoreboard 6-1 in favor of the Braves, coming into the 5th inning the Phillies had to take drastic measures to not let the win slip away from them. So boom like that they managed to tie up the game by making 5 hits in the inning.

Unfortunately they couldn't continue the momentum for the rest of the game, but the Braves did. They put up another 4 runs in the 7th inning and 2 in the 8th, leaving the last inning scoreless. This led the Phillies to a depressing 12-6 defeat.

Union Moves Up The Rankings

Via philadelphiaunion.com

Since I've last blogged about the still budding MLS team, The Philadelphia Union have moved up into the 8th seed in the Eastern Conference. With 23 points they kept tieing with The New England Revolution but with 7 wins over NER's 6 they have managed to start climbing up the ranks.

Since winning against the Montreal Impact on July 14th, they have only won one match out of their last four. Following the victory against the Impact they lost to Aston Villa and New York in consecutive matches. Then they did manage to win against the New England Revolution, which allowed them to switch positions on the ranking board. However, the Montreal Impact got their revenge in the last match when they beat the Union in a shutout 2-0. So while they might be doing better, they still have their work cut out for them.

Their record has improved once again at 7-11-5, but it is too late to salvage another disappointing season? Probably since there are only two and a half months left in the season and they already are out of the running for the open cup. One also has to remember, that this team hasn't even been in existence for 5 years yet, so they are definitely some managerial and coaching kinks to be worked out before the team can really excel. Better development of the players' skills and assets will also be needed.

Or they just suck because they play in Philadelphia.

Phillies Do It Again

Exciting news for the Philadelphia Phillies, they are now on a four game winning streak and have swept the Milwaukee Brewers during their home series. Having the last three games all end in a score of 7-6.

The two teams tied the game up 1-1 after the second inning with a run for each team. But in the 3rd inning, the Phillies tried to show that this would not be a game that they would need to come back from. In the bottom of the 3rd Victorino scored while Utley doubled on a line drive. Two batters later Utley who had moved to the third base scored giving the Phillies a run lead over the Brewers. The Phillies increase the chances of coming out with a win when Utley doubled again in the 4th inning which allowed both Kratz and Victorino to score. This brought the score up to 5-1.

Despite the Philadelphia lead,  the Brewers weren't going to roll over on this game. In the top of the 6th, Weeks Homered the ball as the first Brewer up to bat. Later in the inning while Gomez was doubling Ransom scored but the Phillies were still leading by two runs (5-3). Then they managed to tie the game again in the 8th inning when Braun made a home run and Gomez scored to give them the extra run to match the Phillies scoreboard.

It was now the Brewers turn to attempt to comeback from a run deficit, but like their other games they could not follow through. The tie game at the end of the 8th led to a scoreless last inning, which meant that the game had to go to an extra inning.

The Brewers almost won the game back in the top of the 10th when Gomez scored, but when the Phillies came back they showed how they can finish games off. While Mayberry was on third waiting to score, Ruiz sent out a sacrifice fly ball and this allowed Mayberry to score and tie the game once more. The game would have went to an additional inning, had Pinch-runner Fontenot not replaced Kratz on the 3rd base. So when Rollins singled on the line drive Fontenot headed to the home plate and helped the team win the game 7-6.

Three Times The Comeback

While it might be too late in the season for the Philadelphia Phillies to have a complete comeback, they are again making some strides to get more wins. They may still be in the bottom of the East, but three consecutive wins is impressive.

Sunday's game against The San Francisco Giants, was not so much a "Comeback" but rather a push to get the win. The two teams were tied by the end of the 4th inning, each having gained a run in the 1st and 4th innings. The Phillies got another run in the 7th, but the Giants weren't too far behind them with another point scored in the 8th. By the 9th the teams still remained tied which forced them into extra innings. It wasn't until the 12th inning that the Phillies finally made a run to beat the Giants 4-3. It was a good game and a good win, which is something the team needs more of. They delivered even more in their next two games, this time in the form of epic comebacks.

In Monday night's game, the Phillies was looking off to a good start after the first inning as it was tied 2-2, but then the Brewers started to get a little crazy. Gomez scored a 3rd run for the visiting team in the 2nd inning to give them a lead. A one point deficit is usually not too hard to tie up, but then Gomez made a home run allowing his teammates Wolf and Aoki to score right after them.

At this point the game was 6-2, and most Philadelphia fans were probably yelling curses. I know I was having some choice words with my tv set. I'm not the type of fan that turns off the tv when a game is going south. The only time, I have changed it was in the Flyers-Penguins massacre that occurred right before the Flyers beat the team out.

So it was extra important and pretty awesome when the Phillies won it all back in the last inning. They managed to get a third run in the 7th, but it was the 9th inning where they really proved that they weren't done yet and they would finish the game off strong. While Howard grounded a single, both Rollins and Pierre scored. Ruiz was up to bat after Howard and he singled also so Utley who had gone to 3rd base in the previous play scored.This allowed them to tie the game, and then win it when Kratz scored during a fly ball. It was an impressive end to the game, and also showed the Brewers that they can't rely on their leads.

Then the Phillies did it again tonight.

Again it was a tie game after 1, with a run each, then the Brewers got back on top with successive runs in the 6th and 7th innings. This brought the game to 3-1, but it still gave the Phillies ample time to bring it back.Then the Brewers brought in the big guns in the top of the 8th. First up to bat was Gomez who made a home run, which was followed by another homer from Ramirez and then Braun scored after him. The 3 runs gave them a better chance to finish out the game, but that is what is wrong with Milwaukee's game plan, they have a hard time actually finishing.
So the Phillies brought it in the 8th inning, trying to redeem themselves once more. Kratz scored a homerun and Wigginton scored a run early on in the inning. This helped but the home team was still down by a lot. Then as the inning continued Ruiz doubled while the bases were loaded so Victorino, Utley and Fontenot all scored. This tied everything up and when Pence singled Ruiz got the finally say in the score by scoring the run to win the game. All the Phillies had to do was make sure that the Brewers couldn't score again, and Papelbon made sure of this.