They really count now

Phil Garner managed his rear off on Monday night at the Bank, showing how to use nine pitchers in nine innings because his scheduled started decided to pitch the night before on national TV. As a result, the Astros have climbed to within 1 1/2 games of the Cardinals in the NL Central, which is kind of amazing.

Actually, it's 1964 Phillies-type of amazing. The Astros, seemingly ready to shut it down, have made up seven games in seven days against the free-falling Cardinals. That's unheard of. The '64 Phillies didn't choke up seven games in seven days, did they? They certainly didn't have a "genius" manager like Tony LaRussa guiding the ship, either.

Nonetheless, the Cardinals, without their closer and half of their pitching rotation, are in a dogfight now. It may be better not to go to the playoffs where they will surely lose in the first round.

Meanwhile in Los Angeles, manager Grady Little has re-arranged his pitching rotation so that Greg Maddux and Derek Lowe will pitch in the last two games of the season on short rest. Maddux pitched in last night's victory in Denver, while Lowe is scheduled to go tonight. That means both pitchers will work on just three days rest in San Francisco in attempting to get the Dodgers into the playoffs.

Will Manuel -- who beat out Little for the Phillies managing job -- try the same thing this weekend in Miami with his two best pitchers?

"I'm sure we'll do some talking about that. I don't know what we'll do, but we'll definitely discuss a lot of things," he said before Tuesday night's game.

The idea would be to bump up Brett Myers, who pitched well despite Tuesday night's loss, as well as Wednesday night's starter Cole Hamels, who has never pitched on short rest ever.

On another note, former Phillies GM Ed Wade, now a scout for the Padres, was at RFK on Tuesday night watching the Phillies for the second night in a row. Though Wade has some insider knowledge on the Phillies, I'm not so sure he's the right guy to scout his old team. Seriously, Wade gave Pat Burrell a $50 million contract with a no-trade clause...

Speaking of Burrell, here's a fun stat: 14 of his 27 homers have come with no one on base and only three of them have come with runners in scoring position.