ESPN’s Baseball Tonight (BBTN) program is running a poll every day in August giving you a chance to vote on the greatest player of all time from each of the Major League Baseball clubs. Fourteen different teams have been voted on by the fans so far, with results such as Stan Musial as the greatest Cardinal of all time, Pete Rose for the Reds, Frank Thomas from the White Sox, and Philly favorite Joe Carter from the Blue Jays.

The way the poll works is the staff from BBTN pick who they believe are the top 10 players from each franchise and then the public votes on their top choice from those ten. The BBTN staff casts their own vote as well, and the top three from each group are revealed during each airing of BBTN.

The Phillies are scheduled for the August 25 airing and I thought the Hot Stove Philly nation should get its say in ahead of time. You can cast your official …

Shane Victorino’s stiff back has carried over to today.  Victorino, who exited in the sixth inning of last night’s 8-6 loss to the Dodgers has also been kept out of tonight’s lineup.

Victorino has said he aching lower back is feeling better, but he also said the same thing prior to yesterday’s game, when it was sore, but he convinced Charlie Manuel to give him the start.

“It was my fault for going out there. I was no help to my team,” said Victorino, who went 0-for-4 with three strikeouts before leaving Tuesday’s game after six innings. “I was trying to be a hero. It was a stupid thing on my part.  There’s being tough and being stupid.  If you can’t do it, you can’t do it. You have to understand what your body is saying, when it’s saying it can’t do it.”

Don’t be surprised if Victorino isn’t in the lineup tomorrow either.  The Phillies aren’t going to push him at this point, and will …

Tom Gordon’s season, and quite possibly career, is officially over.  On Monday Gordon visited Dr. Michael Cicotti and the news wasn’t good.  Gordon has an injury to his right ulnar collateral ligament and the flexor pronator muscle, which rests on the inside of his elbow, as well as irritation to his ulnar nerve (his funny bone). A small piece of bone has also detached from his medial epicondyle.

In laymen’s terms, Gordon’s ulnar nerve (commonly known as the funny bone), is compressed, and the bone that connects his ulnar collateral ligament(ligaments in the elbow that connect to the forearm), to his flexor pronator muscle (top of the forearm), has detached from the medial epicondyle (elbow).

To break it down in an even simpler form, without medical jargon, when this type of injury happens to a baseball player, namely a pitcher, they normally require Tommy John Surgery.

There are two ways to correct this.  The most obvious being surgery, in which Gordon would miss the remainder of the season …

The biggest problem for the Phillies over the past couple months has been a lack of offensive production and consistency, so it was nice to see them score six runs in the series opener against the Los Angeles Dodgers on Monday night. Unfortunately, the pitching, which has been the consistent stalwart all season, was abysmal, giving up eight runs to one of the worst run scoring teams in the league. Yes, the Dodgers have been a better offensive team since acquiring Casey Blake and Manny Ramirez, but are still not considered an offensive force to be reckoned with. The Boys In Blue came into Monday’s game riding a two game losing streak, to the Giants!

As a team, the Dodgers have scored 498 runs this year. That is 24 in the majors, better than only the Padres, Giants, and Nationals in the National League. And yet, the Phillies gave up eight runs to a team that scored 12 runs the whole series against San Francisco.

This team seriously …

Despite a sputtering offense, the Phillies remained in first place this week, two games up on New York Mets. The Phils’ offense continues to look lost, and at one point this week went 23 innings without scoring a run, despite facing less than stellar opposing pitching.

The Phillies lost two games to the Florida Marlins, who are just a half a game back of the Mets in the National League East standings, despite facing three pitchers with less than 20 starts between them this season. The Phillies’ offense got starting pitcher Jamie Moyer his first career loss to the Marlins, despite allowing only two runs on Tuesday. On Thursday they were shutout by Chris Volstad, who was making his fifth career start. Volstad didn’t allow a hit until the fifth inning, when opposing pitcher Cole Hamels lined a single to center with two outs.

The Phillies’ incomprehensible woes continued on Friday against the lowly Pittsburgh Pirates and Paul Maholm. Maholm went seven shutout innings and struck out a career high 10 batters, including five in …

Well on Saturday it was Chad Durbin who picked up the save for the Phillies, and yesterday is was Ryan Madson.  With Brad Lidge unavailable due to a sore shoulder, Madson entered the game in the ninth inning and retired all three batters he faced to pick up his fifth career save as the Phillies beat the Pirates 6-3.

Starter Jamie Moyer pitched six strong innings, where he allowed three runs and seven hits, but didn’t factor in the decision.  As it’s been in the entire month of August, the Phillies offense sputtered throughout much of the game, but got on the board when it counted.

In the bottom of the seventh, Tyler Yates entered the game, replacing starter Jason Davis (who fooled the Phillies for six innings), with a 3-2 lead.  Carlos Ruiz led off with a double to left field.  Greg Dobbs then entered the game as a pinch hitter for Scott Eyre.  Dobbs promptly doubled down the left field line (his 23rd …

Heading into last night, saying the Phillies were in a must-win situation was an understatement.  They were riding a two game losing streak, where they were shut out in both losses (a streak of 23 innings).  The pitchers were getting their job done, but the offense had been unable to bring anyone home.  Also, the Mets were heating up, winners of two in a row (and three of their last four), and were only a game behind the Phillies in second place.  Well the Phillies finally showed some life last night.  Behind the arm of Brett Myers and the bat of Jimmy Rollins, the Phillies beat the Pirates 4-2.

The Phillies got on the board early.  Rollins opened the bottom of the first ripping Ian Snell’s first pitch down the right field line for a triple.  He jogged home when the next batter, Shane Victorino, followed with a double to right field.  After Chase Utley struck out, Victorino scored when Ryan Howard singled to center field, giving the Phils and early 2-0 lead.

The score remained 2-0 …

I have to be honest.  The Phillies have finally left me speechless.  I really don’t want to sound like one of those stereotypical “Negadelphians”, but after watching last light’s loss to the Pirates, the taste in my mouth from Thursday’s loss to the Marlins has intenstified.

Despite a superb pitching performance by starter Joe Blanton, who pitched seven one-hit innings, the Phillies offense was never able to get it going against Paul Maholm (7IP, 5H, 3BB, 10K), Sean Burnett (.2IP, 1H, 0BB, 1K), Denny Bautista (.1IP, 0H, 1BB, 0K), John Grabow (1IP, 0H, 0BB, 0K), TJ Beam (2IP, 0H, 3BB, 0K), and Craig Hansen (1IP, 0H, 2BB, 0K).

It’s not like the Phillies didn’t have any chances, they left 13 men on base.  They just couldn’t get a base hit when it counted.

In the first inning Shane Victorino was left on third base when Ryan Howard grounded to second.  A rally in the second was squashed when Eric Bruntlett hit into an inning ending double …

The Phillies face off against the Pittsburgh Pirates in an all Pennsylvania series this weekend at Citizen’s Bank Park. The Phils come in looking to make up some ground after struggling this week against the Florida Marlins, losing two games, including being shutout on Thursday.

They currently sit one and a half games up on the second place Marlins, and two games ahead of the New York Mets, who won two out of three against the last place San Diego Padres.

The Pirates currently sit one game out of last place in the National League Central with a record of 52-62, whereas the Phillies have the opposite record at 62-52.

The series starts off Friday night with Joe Blanton (6-12, 4.94) going against Paul Manholm (7-7, 3.95) of the Pirates. Manholm has been the Pirates’ best pitcher this season, and has put together an impressive string of outings in the past couple months. That is with the exception of his last time out, in which he allowed five runs …

Cole Hamels entered yesterday’s start against the Florida Marlins with one thing on his mind: Getting a win.  Hamels has been marred in a career-high five game winless streak.  His last win came on July 3rd against the Atlanta Braves. This slump hasn’t been entirely Hamels’ fault.  In three of the five games, Hamels pitched at least seven innings and allowed only two runs.  Unfortunately the “potent” Phillies offense was unable to score any runs.

Well yesterday was no different as Hamels pitched six and a third innings, allowing three runs (two earned), but the offense was unable to drive a run home as the Phillies lost to the Marlins 3-0.

The Marlins got on things going early, when in the second inning Matt Trainor singled home Cody Ross.  Hamels kept the Marlins at bay until the sixth inning when Josh Willingham doubled home Jeremy Hermida.  The Marlins finished the scoring in the seventh.  After loading the bases because of a Ryan Howard error, Hanley …

I guess it only took one appearance by Les Walrond and J.A. Happ out of the bullpen for the front office to realize they need another left-handed reliever.  Today Scott Eyre is a Phillie.

The newest Phillie has struggled this season with the Cubs this season going 2-0 with a 7.15 ERA (although all but one of his nine earned runs came in a total of one inning).  A fan favorite in Chicago, Eyre “fell out of favor” with Cubs manager, Lou Pinella, and was designated for assignment (with those numbers, you’ll fall out of favor with any big league manager).

Eyre is happy to be moving on and getting new new opportunity in Philadelphia.  Expect to see him in uniform tomorrow when the Phillies take on the Pirates.

“I’m excited,” Eyre said. “They have a good team and they’re in a pennant race. It couldn’t have turned out any better for me.”

Now most people will look at this as a typical move the Phillies would …

Kyle Kendrick became the second Phillies pitcher this season to reach the double digit mark in wins, and Ryan Howard hit his 32nd home run of the season as the Phillies beat the Marlins 5-0.

Kendrick (10-5, 4.37), pitched six shutout innings allowing four hits and an uncharacteristic four walks.  Although it would appear this wasn’t Kendrick’s strongest performance of the season, I would disagree.  Despite the fact he had trouble locating his sinker, he beared down and pitched though every jam like a ten-year veteran; not a pitcher only making his 43rd career start.  When he did allow runners to reach base (every inning but the fifth), he refused to give in to the Marlins hitters, squashing any hope of a Marlins rally.  Most notably in the 4th.

After retiring the first two batters, Kendrick walked John Baker and Anibel Sanchez. Hanley Ramirez followed with an infield single. Jeremy Hermida stepped to the plate with the bases loaded.  Only to hit and inning-ending line …