Did the All-Star Break Come at the Right Time for the Fightin's?

As baseball fans tonight sit down and watch their favorite players perform tonight, many of those fans whose teams are in contention right now might be debating if the all-star break came at the right time for their team. This debate is for sure occurring in the City of Brotherly Love. Some Phillies fans might already be hitting the panic button. But how is that different from any other year for the Phillies or for your Eagles, Flyers and Sixers.

Living out in Pittsburgh for the time being, I can't really catch all the Phillies on television. But I do try to see the highlights of the games. So when the Phillies came into town for a four game series against the Pirates, I thought it would be a great opportunity for me to catch a Phillies in person at PNC Park. I thought it was an great opportunity for the Phillies to make up ground in the National League East as the next series would be against the NL East leading Braves. But that wasn't the case, the Phillies lost three out of four in the series and then lost two out of three against the Braves.

After losing three out of four to the Buccos, I felt like the Phillies missed out on a great opportunity and I started to sweat after they lost the next series to the Braves. The only reason why I started to only sweat was because I understood the Phillies were injury rittled the whole first-half of the season and currently still don't Chase Utley and Placido Polanco back yet from DL.

The pitching wasn't as big as a problem as the offense was in Pirates series. The offense showed an inability to hit with runners in scoring position.

Now, since the Phillies were able to sweep the NL Central leading Reds with four games straight of late inning heroics, the break has come at just the right time. Polanco will hopefully try to give it a go against the Chicago Cubs, the first series out of the break. But it's most likely he will come back against the Cardinals in the series that follows the Cubs.

The Phils better come out of the gates fast against the Cubs and have a successful series because the Phils go to St. Louis for four games and then come home for four against the Rockies. The Phils get a break, sort of, when the Diamondbacks come in for three and then the Fightin's go to the Nation's Capital, Washington D.C., for three.

The Braves face a tougher road coming out of the gate. They have to face the Brewers and Padres for three games each at home. The Braves then have to go on the road to face the Florida Marlins, Nationals, and Reds for three games each. The Phillies have an opportunity to make more ground up before the trade deadline.