Philadelphia Phillies: The 2011 Cole Hamels Experience

Not too long ago, the Phillies fans and some of the players themselves, (paging Brett Myers), threw Cole Hamels under the proverbial bus for his comments after his disappointing Game three start of the 2009 World Series.  

Hamels was enduring the worst season of his young career and while his comments were misconstrued by the media, he did make the mistake of saying he wishes the season could be over, during the World Series.

Many of the Philly faithful conveniently forgot and overlooked the man's contributions in bringing a title-starved town their first championship since 1983. Hamels was dominant and put on a Josh Beckett-like postseason performance en route to the NLCS and World Series MVP awards.

The 2010 season was better for Hamels, but with the acquisition of Roy Halladay during the offseason and the trade for Roy Oswalt in July, people once again forgot about Cole Hamels. His win-loss record was nothing special (12-11) but after the all-star break, he was one of the three best pitchers in baseball.  

After midway through August, he was almost untouchable during the rest of the regular season.  

Hamels took his late season success into the offseason, along with a new, more demanding training regimen in order to improve upon a very solid year.  Coming into 2011, Hamels was in the best shape of his playing career and now had mastery over three pitches, his fastball, cutter and change-up, and he had a very serviceable curve-ball.  

Once again though, all of this was overshadowed by the Phillies bringing Cliff Lee back to Citizens Bank Park. Hamels was now seen as the fourth starter and while he was considered one of the aces, the only real expectation that fell on Hamels' shoulders was to pitch similarly to 2010.

Now, about three months through the 2011 season, the case can easily be made for Hamels being the best pitcher on the staff or at least tied with the Roy Halladay for the best.  

Hamels now sports a sparkling 2.51 ERA, a WHIP of 0.93 and a 9-3 win-loss record. Excluding his first start against the Mets, Hamels has been razor sharp in all of his starts and has really provided a devastating foil to Roy Halladay.  

Considering that Cliff Lee was not pitching as well as expected during the first couple of months of the season, Hamels' contributions are even more important for achieving the best record in baseball.

Hamels is now one of the favorites for the 2011 Cy Young award and is now back in as one of Philadelphia's favorites.