Toward the end, gripped by the team's ineptitude, absolutely underwater, the Flyers' coaching staff took the players into the locker room a couple of hours before the fourth game of the series in Ottawa and attempted to install a new system.
It wasn't a tweak . . . it was a whole new deal, not something they had never seen because other teams used the system, but something they had not done any real blackboard work or on-ice work preparing. It was early evening, they were getting ready to let the fans into the building, and the Flyers were trying to reinvent the wheel.
The players smelled panic. The Flyers did not score that night. The team mutinied on coach Bill Barber after the series ended. Barber was fired.
The point of the story, as the Phillies and Tampa Bay Rays prepare for tonight's Game 3 of the World Series, is simple enough:
Major surgery is not the answer. Extensive batting order gymnastics would be a mistake. A tweak would be appropriate, nothing more. After all, despite 1-for-28, despite everything, the series is tied at a game apiece.
"I think it's a matter of the guys relaxing, and definitely we've got to cut down on our swings some," Phils manager Charlie Manuel said. " . . . Looks to me like we're trying to hit the ball out of the yard."
At the same time, Manuel probably should do something - tinker with the batting order, at the very least. One change could be the flip-flopping of Jayson Werth and Shane Victorino between the No. 2 and No. 6 spots in the order. Manuel has done it a lot, often simply by feel.
A better tweak, though, might be to split up his two big lefties, Chase Utley and Ryan Howard.
