Era

For 74 years, the museum dedicated to the history of a city known for Benjamin Franklin, the Liberty Bell, and cheesesteaks was named for a radio-manufacturing magnate. Fred Ottaviano walked by, repeatedly. "I knew the Atwater Kent was about history, but I had no idea it was Philadelphia history," said Ottaviano, who lives two blocks away. "I never went in. " But on Saturday, Ottaviano and his wife, Pierrette, were among the 767 people who walked into the newly renovated museum to celebrate its grand reopening and new name.

Roy Halladay did not watch his 89 m.p.h. fastball fly Saturday when everything crumbled. An 8-2 Phillies loss to Atlanta was five batters old at crestfallen Citizens Bank Park. The silence was interrupted when that fastball, now a three-run Braves homer, smacked a large advertisement in right field. Bang. Only then did Halladay turn his head. It was difficult not to stare. Halladay threw 51 pitches, recorded five outs, and was charged with seven runs. Those images were later replaced by a somber Halladay verbalizing failure inside the Phillies clubhouse.

OUT OF ALL the bizarre factoids that offer themselves up during a season like 2012, few offer such a tidy explanation as this: It took nearly 3 calendar months before Cliff Lee walked onto the mound with a lead of greater than three runs. That might not strike you as impressive at first glance, but think about it: Teams pay closers tens of millions of dollars because of their ability to hang on to leads of three runs or fewer. They do so because those leads are considered tenuous, because the pitches that are required to protect them are considered "high stress" or "high leverage.

NEW YORK - Less than a week ago, as the Phillies embarked on this seven-game road trip through Houston and New York, manager Charlie Manuel declared that his team was "dead in" the middle of the National League race for the second wild card. After losing three of four to the Astros, the declaration was altered to "we're not dead yet. " It seems inevitable that some team is going to eventually serve as the anvil that crushes the Phillies' faded playoff hopes. Some would argue that is exactly what the Astros did over the weekend.

At Citi Field, New York. Monday at 7:10 p.m. LHP Cliff Lee (5-7, 3.36 ERA) vs. New York RHP R.A. Dickey (18-5, 2.68)   Tuesday at 7:10 p.m. RHP Tyler Cloyd (1-1, 4.95) vs. New York RHP Matt Harvey (3-5, 2.92)   Wednesday at 7:10 p.m. LHP Cole Hamels (15-6, 3.06) vs. New York TBA

STATE COLLEGE, Pa. - Sometime Saturday, amid the green mountainsides, the blue jerseys, and the still-white-hot anger of Penn State supporters, an old football era grudgingly, and ultimately unsuccessfully, yielded to a new. Throughout State College, and most notably among those gathered at Beaver Stadium for new coach Bill O'Brien's losing debut, the hope and optimism generated by a new chapter in Nittany Lions football had mingled with the ongoing...

Two years ago, Gov. Christie stood at a shuttered oil storage facility in Paulsboro and heralded a new era in which wind farms would line the Jersey Shore and the struggling refinery town would be revitalized by a new port and hundreds of new green-energy jobs. But to date, no projects have been approved and a system of ratepayer-funded subsidies that was supposed to get the wind operations off the ground still has not been agreed upon. "Early on, there was a lot of momentum, but now it feels like things have really slowed down," said Matt Elliott of the advocacy group Environment New Jersey.

STATE COLLEGE, Pa. - Penn State's nonconference football schedule mostly has consisted of winnable games over the years, usually including a Football Championship Subdivision (formerly Division I-AA) opponent and a sacrificial lamb from the Mid-American Conference. But when you look down the pre-Big Ten schedule this season, there aren't any games that one would consider a victory for the Nittany Lions merely if they show up. The Lions have a scary game right off the bat Saturday, taking on MAC favorite Ohio in the emotional cauldron that will be Beaver Stadium, the site of a new era with a different Penn State head coach for the first time since 1966.