Phillies Notebook: Hamels frustrations, Sanabia’s spitball

The Marlins beat the Phillies, 5-1, Monday night.

After the game, things got interesting. Cole Hamels brushed off the local scribes and stormed out of the clubhouse. Apparently, he was mad about the continuing lack of run support his teammates are providing him — that, or losing to the 13-32 Marlins has to irritate anyone, even Cool Hand Cole.

The Phils moved to 1-9 this season in games started by Hamels (1-7).

“I think it’s a lot of tight ballgames, his contract,” pitching coach Rich Dubee said of Hamels’ being frustrated. “He’s an accountable guy just like Doc [Roy Halladay]. He’s probably one of the bigger faces of the Phillies, and he wants to be accountable for that, and not winning probably weighs on him, and I think losing Doc weighs on him. We’re down one of our aces and I think that’s weighed on him, too. Again, this is an accountable guy who wants to win.”

There was more controversy, too. TV cameras caught Marlins pitcher Alex Sanabia working on what looked like an illegal spitball. Right after Dom Brown launched a home run, Sanabia appeared to spit on the baseball and — after Brown slowly trotted around the bases — he finally threw the pitch.

According to the rule (rule 8.02), the pitcher shall not “expectorate on the ball, either hand or his glove.” Expectorate means spit, and Sanabia clearly did that. Still, he didn’t throw the ball until minutes later and only had two more strikeouts the rest of the game.

Anyway, you be the judge … photo courtesy of Big League Stew sports blog.

Sanabia appeared to launch a loogie onto the baseball Monday night.
Photo courtesy of Big League Stew, a Yahoo! Sports blog by David Brown