I don't usually disagree with you, King Kaufmann, but Manny was the only guy who showed up for the game. Manny was there, the defense was absent. You can't expect a team to win when it's nine against one. I'm not a huge Manny partisan, but tonight he earned his money (and earned the money of the bush league infield, too).

So there.

with or without manny, the dodgers were exposed for what they in fact are: a team with little offense that relies on defense and pitching -- basically indistinguishable from the other handful of mediocre teams in the NL west. when defense or pitching breaks down, they're in trouble because they rely on too few players to generate runs.

the phillies have a real shot because they're hitting well and seem to be getting good pitching up and down the rotation, though the dodgers may not be a good gauge of that. we'll see, when the world series starts next month.

as for manny -- dollars to donuts says boras is already on the phone with cashman trying to work something out in new york. he'll use hank's impetuous desire to make a splash and shove it in the red sox's face to drive the price up, and either the yanks or the dodgers will end up massively overpaying.

I can't but fully agree with ham_loaf: I didn't see any slouching on Manny's part. I saw not enough other players dependably getting on base; I saw a crazy "who's the pitcher this second" in Game 4. I saw errors, too many, in Game 5 when it just was not the time for any of that nonsense. Game 5 I saw too many arguments "what was that last call?!" arguments with the ump which could've only been displaced frustration.

Bummer for us Dodger fans. But to place the onus on Manny is kinda weird. My 2 cents.

Very nice, King. Did you come up with that for this piece, or have you had that in waiting, looking for the perfect opportunity?

Watching Manny Ramirez play reminds me of sandlot or high school baseball where one person is so much better than everyone else on the field that it was like a man playing against boys. It's very rare to see that on the professional level of any sport.

However, Ramirez has the temperament of a boy. And the Dodgers, a team without its own personality, took his personality trait during the series with the Phillies, and failed miserably.

Their attempt to get even for the pitch thrown behind Ramirez's back was the stuff of boys. First, they picked on the smallest player on the field to throw at—a cowardly act. Then Manny was posturing like he was ready to fight someone, anyone, knowing full well that his own team would never risk losing him for the series.

The Phillies, meanwhile, stuck to business. This is a team of great baseball players and, more importantly, team players who have taken on the personality of the coach to play hard, to play at full throttle for 27 outs, to play the game the right way, and to sacrifice personal gain in order to win. That was never so evident as it was when Matt Stairs hit his game-winning two-run homer. Stairs replaced pitch hitter Geoff Jenkins when Dodgers made a pitching change. Jenkins never had his chance to play but he was the first person to congratulate Charlie Manuel after the homerun.

The Phillies are a team of home-grown talent augmented by veteran journeymen selected by Pat Gillick to fill in much-needed slots and Manuel to make the right moves at the right time. These players have a great deal of respect and knowledge of the game. They know their responsibilities and they are happy to fill them and be part of this special season. And this season is special.

I don’t think the Phillies have played to their offensive potential yet in the playoffs. I'm hoping they can maybe heal their bumps and bruises during the break and reach that potential against a tough AL ball club.

The Dodgers have a great young pitching staff and with the right moves can be a tough team for years to come. I don't think they need Ramirez or Boras to get back to championship-caliber ball.

...for gossamer dreads. bravo.

I've always admired the guy during his years with the Yankees, even when they lost the big one. I had thought that he got a rotten sendoff this year and was glad to see him take over the Dodgers, even though I wasn't happy about how they creamed the Cubs. But now that they got overrun by the Phillies I'm starting to wonder if maybe it's Joe, and not the players, who's at fault and who maybe needs to take a year off to recharge his champion-manager batteries.

Of course, he could always become a plumber...

"Oh, Dodger fans know about Manny's past. They've fallen for him fully aware of those old indiscretions."

I must disagree with this analysis, King. The Dodger fans could not know Manny fully because they only saw the carefree Manny-being-Manny manchild, the hitter savant. They have not witnessed the Manny/Boras boor who quits on his team in the middle of a pennant race claiming phantom knee injuries. They saw only the Manny playing for his contract but not the spoiled brat who so soured his clubhouse that his own teammates demanded his trade.

I am a Red Sox fan and always loved Manny, even through the end of the '06 season when he quit on his team through the last month of the season. He was the best right-handed hitter of his generation and a pretty good Fenway left fielder. However, when he threw his team under the bus in July of this year, he had to go. Sox fans rarely had a problem with Manny's hijinx (what Dodger fans think is his "past"); Sox fans were nearly unanimous in demanding his trade when he claimed injury prevented him from playing in a crucial series with the Yanks.

Caveat emptor to all those teams, and fans, who think they know Manny after seeing him for two months on the left coast. I praise his hitting prowess but would never want to be on a team with him.