May 2nd, 1993: Philadelphia Phillies (17-6) vs Los Angeles Dodgers (9-15)
Thank you Terry Much a Mr. Mulholland
An Introduction…
I’m the guy that decided the best way to cope with the present day Phillies was by watching the 1993 Phillies. Now that the 2021 season has begun, my attention has returned to the current Phillies, but as too the heartbreak of being a fan of this franchise has also begun, I’ve decided once more to go back in time and revisit the greatest season of baseball of my childhood, the 1993 Phillies. Thanks to the internet and more specifically the saint who runs the ClassicPhilliesTV youtube channel (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCWb6dGkCnKBlrQLJAjZ-4-w), I’m going back and watching every 1993 Phillies I can find just like if it was 28 years ago (but with the internet)... Previously I attempted to go day for day with every Phillies game in the month of June, which was a bold idea but proved to be futile. Now the plan is to start from the beginning of the season and attempt 1 game recap per week until we get to game 5 of the 1993 World series and then decide if I really want to torture myself with game 6. Come along for the ride to reminisce about the legends of John Kruk, Mitch Williams, and Darren Daulton, to mix the knowledge we have now, with jokes of how dumb things were then.
Where We Last Left Our Intrepid Heroes (and Villains)
The Phillies lost last night thanks to a poor showing from their offense against knuckleballer, Tom Candiotti, a classic Phillies issue. Since the beginning of time, the Phillies have had the most trouble against soft pitching junk ballers, there’s no specific metric to justify this viewpoint, but it’s true. With a 17-6 record, the Phillies are in first place in the NL East in front of the Cardinals by four games. This marks the first time the Phillies have been in first place at the beginning of May since 1964. As Larry Andersen is quoted in Macho Row by William Kashastus, “ Everything is breaking right for us, you watch any good team that wins. Good things happen. We’re a good ball club now, but a lot of this is like fate, too”
There’s little more to add about the 1993 Los Angeles Dodgers, they’re not very good, but still have an all time great manager. In 1992, their rookie first basemen Eric Karros had a .257/.304/.426 split and won Rookie-of-the-year, beating out Moises Alou and Tim Wakefield for the award. Karros scored 22 of the 24 first place votes mainly because he led all rookies with 20 home runs and 83 RBIs as well as games played, plate appearances, hits, doubles and runs scored. Yet even with the extended playing time he received (which a majority of the candidates were not allotted) Karros was only able to muster 1.0 WAR (wins above replacement) and 109 wRC+ (weighted runs created). In 40 less games, Moises Alou scored almost as many runs(58-63), while playing much better defense than Karros and earned 2.7 WAR and 129 wRC+ with a slash of .284/.328/.455. Tim Wakefield, the receiver of the other 2 first place votes, on the other hand went 8-1 in 13 starts for the NL East Champion Pittsburgh Pirates with a 2.15 ERA, 1.21 WHiP and 3.27 FIP, and though he only pitched 92 innings was still able to garner more WAR that Karros (1.2). This is all to say, that basic counting stats and media voting awards are dumb and have been dumb for a century.
Today’s Game:
It is Sunday, May 2nd, 1993, and the Phillies are playing their final game of the series against the cellar dwelling Los Angeles Dodgers. The game is brought to you on WPHL-17 Philadelphia with Harry, Whitey, Musser, and Wheels bringing you the color and play by play for the game. Dodgers’ stadium is half empty at the beginning of the game as Whitey comments “They come late and leave early”.
Watch for yourself at:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5tV1q2ccBlw
The Line-up
CF Lenny Dykstra .
2B Mickey Morandini
1B John Kruk
3B Dave Hollins
C Darren Daulton Leads the NL in Walks
RF Wes Chamberlain
LF Milt Thompson
SS Mariano Duncan 1-9 career vs Orel Hershiser
SP Terry Mulholland
On the Mound:
The Ace of the 1993 Phillies, Terry Mulholland takes the ball for the series finale. He’s 5-4 with a 2.41 ERA lifetime against the Dodgers, but currently (in May of 1993) Mulholland has only a 2-3 record with a 2.93 ERA. Harry opines in the Pre-show “Terry seems to be the pitcher that Phillies don’t hit for. Only 5 runs scored in Terry’s 3 losses”. A lack of run support has been essential to Mulholland’s entire tenure in Philadelphia, and has greatly muddled the fact that he’s one of the top ten Phillies starting pitchers of all time. With 54 wins, he’s only 1 win behind Roy Halladay and in fact Mulholland’s time in Philadelphia was pretty comparable to Doc’s when you look at the stats. The Hall of Famer Halladay, was 55-29 with a 3.25 ERA, 1.12 WHiP, and 3.17 FIP in his 103 Phillie starts while striking out 622 batters. Terry (with a full season of starts more) was 54-50 with a 3.69 ERA, a 1.21 WHiP, and a 3.46 FIp in his 137 Phillie starts while striking out 518 for some much worse Philadelphia teams. To summarize, let’s put Terry Mulholland on the Phillies Wall of Fame?
Facing the Phillies today for the Los Angeles Dodgers is former Cy Young Winner, Orel Hershiser. In 1988, Hershiser was arguably the greatest pitcher on the planet Earth (you should see the stats of Uglak Urjiujsi of Kashyyyk that year though), leading the NL in wins (23), innings (267), shutouts (8) and complete games (15) while finishing 3rd in ERA and winning the Gold Glove for his position. If you take a closer look you’ll find he had only an above average (but not great) 3.19 FIP and finished just 9th among NL pitchers in WAR that year with 3.9 (Danny Jackson had a 3.02 FIP and 5.2 WAR while finishing 2nd in Cy Young voting that year). Yet this was 1988, and the Cy Young was chosen by the narrative, and Orel Hershiser had quite the epic finish, ending the season breaking Don Drysdale’s streak of scoreless innings, by going 59 consecutive innings from August 30th to a ten inning effort on the last game of the season without allowing a run. But what really made Hershiser’s 1988 season Herculean was his run in the playoffs where he won NLCS MVP and World Series MVP for the champion Dodgers. While watching his warm-up for this game, it was hard to ignore the catchy tune played by Dodger Stadium organist and as any good Theatre Major would, I recognized it as “Master of the House” from the broadway show Les Miserables. Which I thought was weird, since this was 8 years after Les Mis debuted on Broadway, and it was Los Angeles, and this was a baseball game. Yet with some research it was found that the Dodgers’ organist, Nancy Bea, heard the soundtrack of Les Mis in 1988 and decided to play it during Hershiser’s warm-up. Then the previously mentioned scoreless streak began and thus no home start of Hershiser’s wasn’t accompanied by the anthem of the Thenardier’s. Even years later, anytime Orel is in attendance, Master of the House can be heard in Dodger’s Stadium, and you can buy the Orel Hershiser Master of the House organ version on ITunes.
Highs (Hopes) and Lows
HIGH- Early Leads- Top 1st and 2nd
In the first inning, Lenny Dykstra starts the game off with a single, moves to second on a ground out and scores on a John Kruk single (Kruk gets tagged out trying to stretch for a double) to make it 1-0. The next inning, the Phillies manufacture a second run after singles by Wes Chamberlain and Milt Thompson (“It has eyes!” says Harry Kalas in the way only Harry Kalas could), and scoring on a sacrifice fly by Mariano Duncan. 2-0 Phillies.
HIGH- The Floodgates Open- Top 3rd
Coming into today’s start, Hershiser is 4-6 lifetime against the Phillies with a 2.82 ERA, but that number shoots way up after the Phillies put up a touchdown in the third inning. It starts with a Mickey Morandini triple that was terribly misplayed by the left fielder Mitch Webster,
“That’s the problem with being an outfielder, you don’t have any one backing you up, so if the ball gets by you, you still have to go chase it down” laments Whitey on commentary. Morandini is knocked in by Hollins for his 18th RBI of the season, Hollins is then knocked in by Milt Thompson. Daulton (who was intentionally walked) comes in on a Mariano Duncan single, and then to add insult to (ERA) injury, Mulholland tops a nubber to Hershiser (former gold glove winner) who does a great job making the play on the ball, but Eric Karros (reigning Rookie of the year) can’t make the catch, and the Phillies score another run to make it 7-0 and send Orel to the showers.
“They didn’t really hit Orel hard” Harry tries to say to soften the 7 runs allowed by the three time all star. Dykstra then hits an infield single to score the 6th run of the inning and make it 8-0 Phillies, Lasorda goes nuts on the close call at first and even Whitey and Harry admit that Lasorda has a point, Lenny was probably out at first, but no replay so no dice. The next play is another close play at first, this time the ump calls an out, and Harry says, “And I don’t think he got that one right either” 8-0 PHILLIES
HIGH Bottom 3rd- Trivia Time
In the bottom of the Third inning, Harry brings up the trivia question of the day. Unlike how most broadcasts do trivia now, there was no fan interaction in the trivia portion in 1993, as there was no way for a fan to send in the answer. So the segment is mostly just a way to suck up some dead air on the broadcast as the commentators reminisce on the days of baseball past. The Phillies version of this tends to be Wheels being a know-it-all, but every once in awhile (more specifically on Sundays when Harry and Whitey do the 1-2-3 innings and 7-8-9 innings) it’s just Whitey and Harry blathering on about nothing, and it’s the greatest thing in the world. The question today is “Who is the only player to lead the league in RBIs for three years in a row?”, and its instantly recognizable that Whitey has no idea who the answer is and just starts listing off players and with every guess comes a quick decisive “Nope” from Harry Kalas. Some people like to be hyperbolic about an actor’s ability and say that they could watch so and so actor read the phone book, but for real, I could listen to Whitey name baseball players and Harry say “nope” for all eternity. “I can tell you a lot of guys it isn’t” Whitey says as he finally admits defeat, the answer was Cecil Fielder.
Mids- Offense- The Rest of the Game
In the 6th inning, Tim Wallach hits a weird backspin liner that is out of Mulholland’s reach and lands in front of Morandini for a single.
“That’s the funniest hit you’ll ever see” says Musser, “Yeah it was pretty ugly” adds Wheels. Then father of former WWE Interviewer/Ring Announcer Jojo, Jose Offerman knocks in a run to make it 8-1. In the top of the 9th the Phillies added another run with an Eisenreich double (he’s now 10 for his last 16 at bats) to score Kruk to once again make it an 8 run lead. 9-1 PHILLIES
Wild Rides
With an eight run lead and the 1992 leader in Complete Games on the mound, Jim Fregosi lets Terry Mulholland finish up the win for the Phillies. And pretty quickly he strikes out Jose Offerman, forces a fly out to Milt Thompson, and a ground out to Mickey Morandini for a 1-2-3 9th inning and a 9-1 win for the Phillies. Mulholland cruised the entire game, barely getting into trouble while scattering 6 hits and 3 walks over the 118 pitch effort.
Final: Philadelphia Phillies 9 (18-6) Los Angeles Dodgers 1 (9-16)
Words of Wisdom from Harry, Whitey, Musser, and sometimes Wheels
“I’m talking abut starlets, beach balls, halter tops!” Andy Musser talking about Dodgers fans.
Final Conclusions
The Phillies take the rubber match thanks to a beautifully pitched complete game by Terry Mulholland to two out of three while in Los Angeles. If you enjoyed this wonderful blast from the past please feel free to share, like, or comment on it. The hope is to have more people watching 93 Phillies games on youtube and talking about it. So hit me up @Kevin_Seamus on twitter or @loudphilliesguy on Instagram. The Phillies move north to unfriendly confines of Candlestick Park to play the Giants who are starting to build toward their 108 win destiny. We’ll have to skip ahead a few days to the May 5th game due to availability, but it should be a doozy.
