The season hasn’t exactly worked out as planned for the Philadelphia Phillies. Though there is plenty of time left this season, some glaring holes on the Phillies’ roster have been exposed this season, ones that could seriously limit the possibility of meeting the lofty expectations that surrounded them before the season. Make no mistake about it, though, the Phillies are still an immensely talented team and it’s still June. They will almost certainly be involved in the divisional race all season long but they need to start getting some production out of their marquee players before the talented and young Atlanta Braves open up too much of a lead in the NL East.

For starters, the Phillies have been without leadoff hitter Jimmy Rollins for much of the season. Though most assumed that the Phillies had enough firepower without him to continue to roll through the National League, they clearly need their catalyst back. Rollins is expected to return to the lineup very soon, which will hopefully be a tremendous lift. Moving Shane Victorino back to the two-hole, where he is ideally suited, will in theory get Chase Utley, Ryan Howard and the entire offense on the right track and also sell plenty of Philadelphia Phillies tickets.

But Utley and Howard also need to get going on their own terms as well, regardless of who is hitting in front of them. Howard’s numbers are starting to come around, and he is leading the team in RBIs, but his season has also been marred by inconsistency. Inconsistency has also been the problem for Chase Utley as well. With only 26 RBIs thus far this season, Utley is having his worst production year since very early in his career.

On the other side of the spectrum is staff ace Roy Halladay, who continues to be nothing short of dominant just about every start. Even though he recently had a hiccup against the New York Yankees, Halladay still has a 2.36 ERA and eight wins. Halladay also continues to eat up innings, which should keep the bullpen fresh throughout the rest of the season. With a strong start to the season, Halladay continues to be every bit the pitcher the Phillies hoped they signed before the start of the season and has an outside shot at the Cy Young if Ubaldo Jimenez cools off.

The rest of the rotation, though, has been all over the map. Jamie Moyer has put together a couple very dominant starts but has also been absolutely shelled in others. Cole Hamels picked it up a bit in May and June but still is too inconsistent for the Phillies to pile up the wins that were expected to be handed to the Phillies before the season. J.A. Happ has also been on the DL essentially since day one and reports are that the Phillies have even extended their hand to Pedro Martinez for a return after the all-star break. No matter how good cialis price Halladay is, the Phillies have to get more out of the rest of the rotation.

But the beautiful thing about baseball is that the length of the season provides plenty of times to overcome problems. Every team is going to have peaks and valleys, and the Phillies are certainly experiencing just that. After 62 games, the Phillies were just two games above .500 and sitting in third place in the division, which is a far cry from the great team they were expected to be. On the bright side, struggles early in a season can often make a good team much stronger down the stretch. The Phillies still have plenty of talent; now they just need to turn that into a few winning streaks.

Author Bio: This article about Philadelphia Phillies tickets was written by David James in association with StubHub, a leader in the sports tickets, concert tickets, theatre tickets and special events tickets market.

Category: Recreation Viagra Jelly and Leisure/Sports/Baseball
Keywords: Philadelphia Phillies, sports, tickets, baseball, MLB, entertainment