Carlos Ruiz Just Can't Get Any Respect

Poor Carlos Ruiz. Sure, the squatty Phillies catcher has been an offensive liability all season, but he was one of the only players to get an actual hit yesterday without the aid of shoddy Brewers' defense. Still, the man affectionately known as "CHOOCH" by his teammates was the victim of an unfortunate typo on yesterday's TBS broadcast. Those of you attending CBP for tonight's game should adjust your Ruiz fanclub signage accordingly. And, oh, yes...it's time to officially start worrying about Brad Lidge. Brad Lidge is "tired"? Good news for Milwaukee fans, though — C.C. Sabathia is not:

“Everybody who knows me and that’s close to me knows how competitive I am,” Sabathia said. “If I’m healthy enough . . . to pitch, they’re not going to tell me not to because I’m not going to listen to it. We’re going to end up getting into an argument.”

And in other cooch-related news, there's this amusing anecdote featuring a drunken Phillies cretin heckling some Brewers fans in the stands:

About three rows in front of them a Phillies fan was feeling no pain. He turned and gave the couple a piece of his mind. The Brewers fans ignored him My friend describes what happened next: "The subjects had an unknown projectile thrown in their direction." My friend is a lawyer. Forgive him. "I think it was a peanut. The guy in the Braun shirt didn't do anything. He was just being stoic. Kinda taking the lumps you might get if you go into enemy territory." In the ninth, the game tightens up. So does the obnoxious Phillies fan, described as an ordinary-looking guy in his 30s. A clean, well-lighted cretin. "Fielder is up, and we're all sitting there worried that he's gonna knock one out of the park, and that's when the Phillies fan starts acting up. You know when you toss a beer at someone, but hold onto the bottle so you just flick your wrist? He did that. He doused the guy with his beer. A full frontal, he gave. And the Brewers fan still didn't do anything. But the section of Phillies fans that surrounded the couple did. "A good half a dozen Phillies fans converged on this guy and just friggin gave it to him. He got no support for his antics. The whole section was pointing at him and berating him. They got him tossed out immediately." Afterward, my friend reports, a lot of people approached the couple to apologize.

If the Phillies lost, that apology probably wouldn't be as forthcoming. And that cup of beer most likely would have been some sort of animal urine that they smuggled in. Two more to go... Jumping back into the fire [JS Online] Good news: Lidge is now tired [Philly.com] The Polite Phillies Fans [Blinq]