Five Cuts: The Phillies followed the modern era success formula

World Series MVP Cole Hamels went 4-0 with a 1.80 ERA in five postseason starts. Doug Pensinger/Getty Images

1. On Sept. 10 the 79-67 Phillies were 3 1/2 games out of first place, had the same record as the Houston Astros and were only one-half game better than the St. Louis Cardinals and Toronto Blue Jays, three teams that didn't sniff the playoffs. But the Phillies became yet another team to prove what makes world champions in the era of six divisions and three rounds of playoffs: Staying in contention and then getting hot at the right time. Philadelphia, including the postseason, finished 24-6 -- the first time any Phillies team in franchise history won 24 of its final 30 games.

The Phillies rode ace Cole Hamels (6-1 in that stretch) and a lockdown bullpen (7-0) for more than half of their wins during that run to the championship. It was a classic late-season formula, especially when you essentially remove the fifth starter, middle relievers and most of the bench from the playoff equation. Philadelphia played 14 postseason games over 31 days, an entirely different pace from the regular season. The Phillies had 16 days off to play 14 games in October (accounting for Game 5, which took two days) after having 19 days off to play 162 games in the regular season.

The Phillies might not have been the best team for 5 1/2 months, but they were the best team when it counted. Their world championship, under the expanded playoff format, was well earned.

2. Sitting there listening to Rays manager Joe Maddon talk about his young team ("I believe this firmly," he said, "our guys are not going to be satisfied without playing in October from now on"), I was reminded what the youthful Rockies were saying last year, what the Tigers, with their young pitching, were saying in 2006, what the Astros, upon reaching their first World Series, were saying in '05, and so on. Sure, the Rays are young and you'd like to think that this postseason experience will make them better, but it just doesn't work out that way for surprise teams in the wild-card era. There's too much parity in the game to assume that a breakout team will continue a natural progression upward. There will be another version of the Rays next year.

I remember bringing up this trend to Rockies general manager Dan O'Dowd in spring training this year. "Totally different," he said of his young team, which he assumed still was on the way up. Not so. The Rockies dropped from 90 wins to 74. The immediate future for the Rays, despite their talent, is not as bright as you might think. The Rays are the eighth team in the past 12 years to win the pennant the year after winning 83 or fewer games. None of those previous seven surprise teams even made the playoffs the next year -- and, in fact, all of them were worse by at least seven wins. Here is what has happened to those recent surprise pennant winners in the year after they made the World Series:

3. Maddon, the unconventional manager, in Game 5 1/2 summoned flashbacks of ALCS Game 5, opening himself to criticism with the way he ran the game in defeat. Among his worst decisions:

• He lost the game without using his best arm, David Price, until his team was already trailing. Maddon said he didn't think it was fair to ask too much out of his rookie pitcher, but this is the same manager who brought him into ALCS Game 7 with the bases loaded in the eighth inning and his team holding a 3-1 lead.

• Maddon let left-handed pitcher J.P. Howell bat with the go-ahead run at first base with one out in the seventh inning. (Howell bunted.) The move made no sense because the bottom of the seventh was set up for a right-handed pitcher; the first four Philadelphia batters due up were right-handed, a switch-hitter, right-handed and right-handed. Pat Burrell, the first batter due up, was 0 for 3 lifetime against Chad Bradford, 2 for 11 against Dan Wheeler and a 41-point worse hitter against right-handers than left-handers. But Maddon somehow gave Burrell the at-bat against a left-hander. It was the key at-bat that was the beginning of the end of the World Series: Burrell doubled to set up the deciding run.

• Maddon relieved Howell with Bradford after Burrell's double. Then with a runner at third and one out, Maddon elected to play his infield in with Pedro Feliz due up. Maddon had a situation that called for a strikeout but he had a groundball pitcher on the mound. Moreover, Feliz was 2-for-6 against Bradford with no strikeouts. Maddon could have walked Feliz and had Bradford, a groundball pitcher, pitch to Carlos Ruiz, a double play waiting to happen. Ruiz grounded into 14 double plays in 101 at-bats with a force play in order. Instead, Maddon had Bradford pitch to Feliz. Bradford hung a breaking ball and Feliz drilled it for a tie-breaking single.

4. Besides Maddon, the Rays made critical mistakes in the close game. Jason Bartlett foolishly tried to score from second base on a grounder to second baseman Chase Utley with two outs in the seventh. Bartlett said third base coach Tom Foley waved him home. If so, it was a case of being aggressive without being smart. Foley has to get further down the line to buy more time on his send call. Only if Utley throws to first base can he send Bartlett home. If Utley holds the grounder, as he smartly did, he has to stop Bartlett. Even running all the way and even with a bad throw from Utley, Bartlett still was thrown out by a wide margin.

Another key mistake occurred after Carl Crawford began the eighth inning with a base hit off J.C. Romero with the Rays down a run. Crawford is one of the best base stealers in the game. Runners were successful 83 percent of the time stealing on Romero. So what does B.J. Upton, the next hitter, do? He swings at the first pitch, never giving Crawford a chance to run. Upton grounded into a double play. Another case of being aggressive without being smart.

5. The 3 1/2 -inning "game" turned out to be great theater for baseball. It began with two pitchers warming in the Rays bullpen (Grant Balfour and Howell) and none in the Phillies bullpen (Ryan Madson waited to get loose because his team was batting). It began with the visiting team taking the field first, and getting booed. There were three runs, seven pitchers and runners on in every turn at bat in this game within a game. Good stuff.

Still, the weirdness created by the weather will likely be what goes in the time capsule to capture this World Series. You had one game end at near two in the morning, one blowout and another that took three days to complete. There was not a single lead change over the entire Series. And for the fifth consecutive year, we couldn't get the Series even to a Game 6, which puts a crimp on real drama.

But none of that matters to Phillies fans. They saw a good show, even if it was cold and wet. And for anybody misguided enough to think that baseball should go to a neutral-site World Series, you should tell that to the 45,000 people who were still in the ballpark at almost 2 a.m. last Saturday, or the thousands of people who celebrated Philly's first major sports title since 1983 on Wednesday night in the streets of the city. Baseball is a fiercely local/regional sport. Its connection to communities is its lifeblood. To rip it away from communities in their proudest moments would be to break the game's greatest bond.