After sitting out most of the previous month with a sore elbow, Cole Hamels, today's starter, has strung increasingly impressive outings together. His 116-pitch, 13 strikeout masterpiece last Friday had as much to do with the Phillies' first division crown in 14 years than anything that happened Sunday.
But while that was a big event, even a window into his competitive soul, the first entry of his national resume will be logged sometime after 3 p.m. today.
The bigness of the event, the bigness of the crowd will play a part, one way or another. There have been times this season, usually early in games, when Hamels has seemed to be within a pitch or two of unraveling. There have been other times, when the crowd seemed to ramp up his fastball and put added break on those offspeed pitches of his.
"Everybody's going to deal with this in their own way," Jamie Moyer was saying before yesterday's workout. "I think
he'll handle things very, very well. But will he maybe be wound up a little bit more than normal? Of course he will be. And I would expect that. And that's part of it. That's part of the maturing process in dealing with this. How you handle it. How you stay in your character and who you are."
No one is sure whether Peavy's performance Monday night was an inability to stay in character or just the result of a long season in which he logged 223.1 innings. "I think Peavy just ran out of gas a little bit," Phillies scouting director Mike Arbuckle said yesterday, and there seemed to be a twinge of hope as he said it.
Shut down with elbow stiffness for almost a month, Hamels has made three starts since his return, each monitored oh so carefully by the Phillies brass. For the season, Hamels, 15-5, has thrown 183.1 innings - but just 16 since Aug. 16.
