What's there to say? The better team won the World Series.

The Phils met their match in the big, bad New York Yankees.

New York's baseball goliath battered and bloodied Pedro Martinez early and often en route to a 7-3 victory to clinch the storied franchise's 27th World Championship. Hideki Matsui led the offensive onslaught with six RBIs, including a two-run home run in the second that got NY off and running.

The game ended about 90 minutes ago and they juuuuussst stopped playing "New York, New York" on the one-year-old stadium's P.A. system. Hey, I like Frank as much as anyone, but talk about overkill....

The Phils lost the best-of-seven series in six games, which is nothing to be ashamed of, for sure.... especially against a 103-win team, the best team money can buy.

But let's face it: the Phillies' sore spots reared their ugly bats and arms in the series.

In Game 6, their on-again, off-again problem of hitting with runners in scoring position crept back into play. While the Yanks jumped out to a 7-1 lead off Pedro, the Phils left runners in scoring position in three of the first six innings and grounded into inning-ending double plays in two other innings.

In other spots during the series, the two pitchers who followed career years with off years, Cole Hamels and Brad Lidge, showed off their '09 form. But don't forget Phillies fans: without either of those two guys, you don't beat the Rays in the '08 Series.

Anyway, it's clearing out time. I'll end per usual in the postseason, with some sounds from the clubhouse.

Until next time...

CHASE UTLEY, the Phils' best player in the Series with a record-tying five home runs" "Obviously we didn’t accomplish our ultimate goal, but I’m proud to be teammates with everybody in this clubhouse right now.... I want to reiterate, we didn’t accomplish our goal that we set out for this season, but we got to a spot where a lot of teams don’t ever get the chance to be. For that we should all hold our heads high."


SHANE VICTORINO, whose ground out to second accounted for the game and season's final out: "We would have loved to win again for the city and for us, but unfortunately we didn’t."



RYAN HOWARD, on an offense gone cold other than the home run ball: "We didn’t capitalize on certain situations, getting runs home. They went out there and got hits in certain situations... It’s pretty simple. We just got outplayed."




BRAD LIDGE, on watching the Yanks celebrate: "It’s makes us remember last year when we were able to do it ourselves… it makes us realize how close we were this year. We came really close. I think everyone of us feels like we have the capability of doing it again next year and hopefully for a while afterward. We’re very proud of what we accomplished. We ended up a little short of the goal."




CHARLIE MANUEL, on what went wrong in the Series: "We went through the playoffs, we played real good, and all of a sudden when we got to the Series, and I give credit to some of the Yankees' pitching, but it seemed like our offense... kind of sputtered a little bit.
"But at the same time, their left-handed pitchers, I felt like did a good job on our left-handed hitting and stopped them, and that is a big part of our offense. But at the same time, I felt like they have a real good team, but they definitely deserved to win. They did things right when they had to. We just didn't play as good as we can, but at the same time, we also played a real good team who did a good job, and they've had a great season.
"Like I was telling our guys in there, that just makes us more determined to come back again next year. We've got a good team, and we love to play baseball. I'll tell you, the time I've had there especially about the last three years, it's been really enjoyable to coach and manage our team because of who we've got on our club. I'll tell you something, we will be back. As Mac Arthur said, I guess, we will be back."