Phils take game 1
It's hard to know which of these three guys to love the most: Chase Utley provided the only offense on the field until the much-vaunted Yankees bullpen fell apart. Cliff Lee not only pitched like a god, he demonstrated incomparable style in his defensive play. Asked about his confidence, "Oh, yeah, I'm confident." Asked about his cool: "Yeah, I've always been that way." Charlie Manuel is the most human person in baseball: did you watch his press conference? Baseball inclines some observers to deep nuance, to tortuous feats of intellectualization. Charlie Manuel brings it all back to earth. Asked about Utley's headspace, and his "hands", Manuel replied: "Yeah, Chase had a good night." He added: "He has pretty good balance and rhythm right now, he kinda pushes from here, you know, and yeah, he can hit the ball when he does that."

Folks who have given the Yankees the slam dunk win, need to be wondering what the hell happened here.

Now, any given baseball team can win on any given day. The only team to shut the Yankees out at home this year were the Nationals, so let's not get ahead of ourselves.

But if nothing else goes right, Game 1 was a thing of beauty.