​By Jack Kerwin  |  ydkjack1@gmail.com

It's old. It's tired. It's “baseball.”

If ever a sport was so beholden to long-standing beliefs, whether they prove to be legit or laughable, that it loses sight of all else it is the creation of Abner Doubleday. Or, wait, was that Alexander Cartwright?

Hey, yo, whatever ... just so long as you don't rush either of them up to the bigs, or make some other rash move. Gadzooks. Scary stuff. The mind shudders.

Ugh, enough already with the kid-gloves, fear-of-change paralysis of analysis.

Fire the manager? Bring up a couple prospects? How outrageous ... it's only 49 games (and a 17-32 record) into a long season.

It's ridiculous, and perhaps no place does that ridiculous reach its highest level of, well, ridiculous than in Philadelphia, where the Phillies organization has made standing pat a staple for generations. With a hefty helping of clinging-to-the-past rationalizing an ingrained addition.

By the team, the media that covers it and the fans who support it.

Ugh, people, please stop the insanity. Your mindless, senseless regurgitation of absolute drivel blinds the entire fishbowl.

So much so that it somehow escapes all in it that the teams who do succeed out there, year in and year out, do not adhere to such silliness. The Yankees, the Red Sox, the Cubs, the Cardinals, the Dodgers, you think they “wait things out” or “hold off” on making moves? Ever?

Get real.

Not for nothing, but the one time in the last three and a half decades that the Phillies were a real factor, save for 1993's ultimate lightning-in-a-bottle experience, was when Pat Gillick was in charge and wasn't afraid to pull the trigger. He took some shots. Missed some and nailed a few.

Hello ... that's the only way you make strides – pro or con.

Relying on time, or the coddling of delicate athletic geniuses through the minors up to the majors in set sequence, has worked just so well for this club, hasn't it?

To compound the problem, “slow” isn't just a problem at the start. It exists for them at the finish, too.

You wanna know why the team blows serious chunks right now? Yeah, really ...?

Look no further than Chase and Jimmy and the Big Piece and Cole ... and Red Pinstripe Nation's inability to see the writing on the wall for years after the warranty ran out on those beloved players' value – not just anywhere else, but here, too.

All of them, if the Phillies were going to move forward following the World Series years of 2008-09, had to move on ... but those damn beliefs got in the way.

Oooh, better hold off. Let's not doing anything drastic. Give it some time.

Does anyone know how to differentiate reality from wishful thinking?

Hey, it's bad enough that fans do it. The fact the GM was just as bad ... has made things today pathetic.

Honestly, for all the hullabaloo made about the upper management shakeup a couple years ago, you couldn't ask for a better tribute to the old-school status quo than such “non-move” moves as signing Howie Kendrick and Michael Saunders.

What in the name of Ruben Amaro was that about?

(In your best Chip Kelly cheesing it up to the Wing Bowl masses, “Yo, Philly” ... and fade to black – just like the 2017 Phillies.)
​

By Jack Kerwin  |  ydkjack1@gmail.com

It’s a death knell.

The ultimate indictment.

Classic “writing on the wall” stuff.

When a team has reached the point of being lifeless. Just downright unwatchable, unfollowable, un-anything-able, it is done. DONE.

Cooked. Fried. Kaput.

Diehard Philly baseball fans and pro-Pete Mackanin media members can rationalize and juxtapose and supposition stuff all they want. The reality is, the Phillies don’t just suck. They’re dead.

When it gets to that point, changes need to be made. Pronto.

None of this wait-and-see, baseball-is-different-than-other-sports crap. Get a grip. Major league baseball is a business. Not just a business about winning, but entertaining … and, right now, not even the masochistic sorts out there can enjoy this daily submerge into the abyss.

With not a flicker of excitement, or even a little tease that things can turn around.

Entering Thursday’s series finale with visiting Colorado, Petey Mack’s troops had come up on the short end of the stick 20 times in the previous 24 games. That’s a standard of ineptitude that seems, well, almost impossible to achieve.

By accident, a baseball team wins one of every three or four games. Bumping that “up” to every six? Wow, that’s saying something … and it ain’t good.

For starters, at this point, anyone with a pen, pad, tape recorder, microphone or camera who comes rushing to the defense of the manager any time the possibility of him being canned comes up needs to knock it off.

Man up, get some balls and start calling the guy on the idiotic decisions he makes short-term and long-term on a routine basis instead of excusing him for not having the resources and that, really, ya know, his hands are tied.

We get it. He’s a good guy and you like him. Yo, leave that bromance silliness in the far recesses of your brain and focus on the task at hand: Judge him for what he is doing, not what you think he’d be doing under different circumstances.

Really, we’re up in arms that Odubel Herrera goes with the pretentious bat flip after a home run, but “Skip” is never held accountable for incorrectly yanking, or not yanking, a starting pitcher at certain, game-deciding junctures?

Not for nothing, but the crap-ass approach and general overall laziness the team seems to play with … well, let’s harken back to an all-time line from a great sports movie: Attitude reflect leadership.

Thank you, Julius Campbell of “Remember the Titans” lore.

Now, if only “hardass” Philly fans and media would get on board.

Thing is, until those two groups start living up to some modicum of their wildly overblown no-nonsense, tough-love reps, don’t expect anything to change.

Christ, they don’t even recognize the real problem. Starting pitching? Hell, who cares if they’re down 7-0 after four innings just about every night … when the most pressing issue is that they can’t even get on the goddam scoreboard until after the seventh-inning stretch.

That’s not just “losing” baseball. That is “boring” baseball, and with it the Phillies are kaput right now.

Unless Mackanin goes or prospects are brought up. Something. Anything. Just to pump a little life into the mix.

Eff the “gotta think about the future” BS. Most of the time it never gets here anyway.

Live for now … for once, Phillies.

What’s that, there is hope? You say they’re deadlocked at 1-all with the Rockies heading into the 10th inning at Citizens Bank Park right now.

Really?!!

Wow, just pinch me from all that excitement.

Zzzzzzzzzz …

By Jack Kerwin  |  ydkjack1@gmail.com

It’s been comical for a while.

Seriously, it has.

With all due respect to Michael Jordan and his ever-adoring, brand-sustaining fans, headlined by the likes of Screamin’ A. Smith and Charles Barkley, the days of picking apart LeBron James, his game, his comments, his facial expressions, and his part in the self-aggrandizing Decision seven friggin’ years ago every time the mere mention of greatness that our current day’s Number 23 inspires .... well, those days lost their legitimacy before they ever really started.

Yo, just give it a rest.

We get it. He’ll never supplant MJ as your guy. He’ll never win as many NBA championships. He’ll never overtake the universe as a jaw-dropping icon, known as much for his link to the fictional Mars Blackmon in commercials that skyrocketed the figure and Nike into omnipresent awareness among the masses as for anything he ever actually did on the court.

That’s fine. Stick with that … and stop reading at this point.

Because it’s reality-check time, and here it is:

LeBron’s better. Always has been.

Read again. Always. Has. Been.

Better passer. Better ballhandler. Better shooter from the floor. Better shooter from distance. Better rebounder. Better defender. Better all-around player.

Not just right now, when it’s becoming painfully apparent to even MJ’s biggest zealots that the King is moving closer to keeping the crown of “best ever” all to himself with a playoff run of late that defies description, never mind comparison. You know, until Sunday night’s abysmal, “Jordan remains NBA’s god”-ignited performance … that merely delayed what will be the inevitable: LeBron’s seventh straight appearance in the title series, and eighth overall.

We truly live in an ironic dichotomy anymore. On the one hand, you have the “anoint the newest, whatever is hot today as the greatest ever” crowd, and on the other, you have the “cling to the past, and be forever loyal to a previous standard” group, whether that standard has withstood the test of time, not to mention better, faster and more physical athletes, or not.

Most of the time, it is so silly and infantile. Just a complete denial of any and all evidence to the contrary of those beliefs.

It becomes a popularity contest, where people remain steadfast in supporting a player or a place in time … and screw the alternative, no matter how much it merits consideration, whenever “best,” or if you wanna go total cheese with “G.O.A.T.,” talk comes up.

Truth be told, not particularly a fan of James and wasn’t particularly one of Jordan, either.

But, in recognizing talent and what each brings to the basketball court, it’s kind of a hard to argue with the platitudes about either.

It’s just LeBron is better.

With Game 3 hanging over him like a “still gotta genuflect to Mike” albatross, and affecting his next performance Tuesday night for a half, James responded with a 34-point, 6-assist, 5-rebound tour de force down the stretch against Boston to give the Cavaliers an insurmountable 3-to-1 lead in the best-of-7 Eastern Conference Finals.

Would Jordan respond after such a sorry display?

Absolutely.

Just James did it even better.

Those who still debate such things share the same lunatic fringe with those continuously piping up about how Jordan was a more physical player than LeBron.

Yeah, way to keep it real, peeps.

Comical, indeed.
​

Lotta talk around Philly about what the 76ers should do with the No. 3 pick in the upcoming NBA Draft. Me? Would trade it to Chicago for Jimmy Butler, a former late first-rounder who has parlayed his late-blooming talents into one of the better careers currently going in the league now.

In addition, go get Gordon Hayward. A free agent, the 6-foot-8 forward has become an electric performer for Utah the last couple seasons, earning not only “best white player” honors in the game, but some serious cachet as one of the top rim-crashers out there.

Pair him with Butler, Joel Embiid, Ben Simmons and Dario Saric in an 8- or 9-man rotation that includes a more conventional point guard to Simmons’ 6-foot-10 version and, say, another shooter (am down with acquiring J.J. Redick), and head coach Brett Brown would have one of the best units in the league.

No thanks

One guy for the Sixers to stay away from … Kristaps Porzingis. Forget any whining he may have displayed with the Knicks. He’s window dressing that too often just gets lost as the glass gets foggy.

No 'right between the eyes'

Lotta ripping of the NBA for lack of competitive games this postseason. My biggest beef? Where the eff is Kevin Harlan with calling the action? He’s the most entertaining play-by-play we got, people.

Snoozefest

Anyone else as unenthused about this year’s available lottery choices? Markelle Fultz, Josh Jackson, Malik Monk? Zzzzz … You know for all the hype surrounding Lonzo Ball, he’s pretty “meh” if you ask me.

Gotta give it to him

If Kevin Love continues to perform as he has against Boston, posting 24.5 points and 12.8 rebounds per game while shooting 20-for-36 from 3, Golden State won’t be getting revenge on Cleveland.