It's an arguement that has a certain degree of credibility. But there have been other noteworthy dates this year...
...On or around August 1st, Mike Lieberthal switched to a lighter 30.5 ounce bat. Since then, he has batted .323, 70-some points higher than his season average. Lieberthal is by no means an integral part of the offense, but right now he is making the Black Hole just a bit brighter.
...On April 30th, Jim Thome went down with an injury, and he would not return to the lineup until May 21st. During that span, while Thome was out and Ryan Howard was going through his big-league orientation, Bobby Abreu hit .414 with an absurdly high 1.486 OPS. He clubbed 11 homeruns during that span and prevented the Phillies from fading into oblivion.
...Since calling out his teammates on June 30th, Billy Wagner has walked the talk. He stepped up his performance as well [not that it was lacking previously]:
IP K ERA
pre-callout 35.67 34 2.27
post-callout 26.33 31 0.68
One date that changed absolutely nothing was June 13th, the day that Jimmy Rollins was awarded a contract extension...
BA OBP SLG
Pre-extension .263 .305 .383
Post-extension .262 .308 .374
Rollins is proving that sometimes the more things change, the more they stay the same.
