When the Philadelphia Phillies overcame the New York Mets in the final 17 games of the 2007 season and won the National League East title, I attributed the outcome more to the Mets’ collapse than to the Phillies’ comeback ability. After all, if the Mets hadn’t lost 12 of their last 17 games, if they had lost only 10 of the last 17, they would have finished in first place.

Two more division championships and two N.L. pennants later, though, I am a believer. The Phillies are a really good team, maybe even good enough to beat the Yankees and become the first National League team in more than 30 years, since the 1975-76 Cincinnati Reds, to win two successive World Series.

I am not prepared to say the Phillies will knock off the Yankees, assuming the Yankees don’t squander their three games to one lead over the Angels in the American League Championship Series, but I think they are good enough to pull off that feat.

My appreciation for the Phillies grew last season and post-season, in which they lost only one game in each series for an 11-3 post-season record. By this year’s post-season they seemed certain to get into position to have a chance to defend their World Series championship. They are that good.

The Phillies are that good to a great extent because of Pat Gillick. He was the Phillies’ general manager for only three years, but moves he made during his tenure have been instrumental in the success of the team that had been a second and third-place team before his arrival.

That Gillick was available to replace Ed Wade as general manager was a result of his third “retirement” in nine years. Though at the time of his departure from Toronto (1994), Baltimore (1998) and Seattle (2003) he said he was retiring, Gillick was not to be taken literally. He demonstrated that reality by taking jobs subsequent to those so-called retirements.

Gillick solidified the Phillies’ lineup and pitching staff, adding right fielder Jayson Werth, third baseman Pedro Feliz, closer Brad Lidge, relievers Chad Durbin and Scott Eyre and starting pitchers Jamie Moyer and Joe Blanton.

His work was not an accident. He was the general manager of the Toronto Blue Jays when they won the World Series in 1992 and ‘93.

As it turned out, Werth was Gillick’s most interesting acquisition. Gillick was the Baltimore general manager when the Orioles drafted Werth in 1997. He was the Philadelphia general manager when the Phillies signed him as a free agent in December 2006.

He was a free agent because the Dodgers did not tender him a contract for 2007 after he missed the entire 2006 season with a wrist injury. Gillick signed him to a one-year contract for $850,000, of which less than half was guaranteed. It turned out to be one of the best signings in recent years.

It’s just possible that the non-tender decision flashed through the mind of Ned Colletti, the Dodgers’ general manager who made it, when Werth slugged two home runs, added a single and drove in four runs in the 10-4 pennant-clinching victory Tuesday night.

Werth has one of the most interesting ancestries in baseball. He is the grandson of Dick (Ducky) Schofield, who was a major league shortstop for seven teams in a 19-year career. He is the nephew of Dick Schofield, who was a major league shortstop for four teams in a 14-year career. He is the stepson of Dennis Werth, who played a variety of positions in a brief career with the Yankees in the early 1980s.

Werth has become an integral part of the National League’s most potent offense, one of four Phillies who hit more than 30 home runs and drove in more than 90 runs. But the quartet – Ryan Howard, Werth, Raul Ibanez and Chase Utley – is only part of a lineup that can devastate pitchers top to bottom: Jimmy Rollins, Shane Victorino, Utley, Howard, Werth, Ibanez, Feliz, Carlos Ruiz.

There is no lineup in the National League that can match it, and only the Yankees in the American League can. That’s what would make a World Series between these two teams a most attractive show.

The Yankees, according to the Elias Sports Bureau, led the majors with 51 victories in games they were trailing. The Phillies led the National League with 43 such wins.

Like the Yankees, the Phillies are a dangerously resilient team, seemingly able to come back from a deficit on a regular basis. And anyone in the lineup is capable of producing a hit to start a rally or fuel a rally. A team cannot go into the late innings with a lead secure in the feeling that it is safe.

If there is an Achilles heel on the Phillies’ body, it is their pitching. It does not come with a guarantee.

For example, Cole Hamels, supposedly the team’s No. 1 pitcher, last year was the most valuable player in both the World Series and the N.L. Championship Series and compiled a 4-0 post-season record with a 1.80 earned run average. This month, however, he gave up four runs in five innings against Colorado in the division series and didn’t last five innings in the clinching game against the Dodgers.

Cliff Lee, on the other hand, has turned into the staff ace. Acquired from Cleveland in July, Lee has a 0.74 e.r.a. (2 earned runs in 24 1/3 innings) in three post-season starts.

Lidge (right) has also blossomed this month but could still enter the ninth inning of World Series games with a question mark attached to his right arm. Lidge was perfect in the Phillies’ championship season, 48 saves in 48 chances, but lost his effectiveness this season. He squandered 11 leads in 42 save opportunities and had a 0-8 record and 7.21 e.r.a.

However, with careful use by manager Charlie Manuel, Lidge has rebounded in the playoffs, gaining three saves in three chances and allowing no runs in five appearances.

Besides Lee, general manager Ruben Amaro Jr., Gillick’s successor, added Pedro Martinez to the pitching staff, and Martinez pitched seven shutout innings against the Dodgers. Martinez also compiled a 5-1 record in nine starts during the season, validating Amaro’s decision to sign him.

Not that the son of the former Phillies’ infielder needed validation. Last December Amaro signed Ibanez as a free agent, and he might have been the best free-agent signing of the year. Some teams were scared off by the left fielder’s age – he turned 37 in June – but Ibanez showed no signs of age as he hit 34 home runs and drove in 93 runs as part of the Phillies’ quartet of crushers.

Now Ibanez and his teammates await the start of the World Series as the first National League team to be back in the Series as defending champions since the Atlanta Braves in 1996. The Braves lost their chance to repeat when the Yankees beat them in six games. The Phillies look forward to a different outcome.

Joe Torre was celebrated as if he were god-like when he managed the Yankees to four World Series championships in five years. Yet Torre was not perfect. His most glaring weakness was the way he used his pitching staff, particularly the bullpen.

Under Torre, a relief pitcher was susceptible to disappearing into a dark corner of the bullpen, not to be seen for weeks at a time. Relievers had to gain Torre’s trust. If they pitched ineffectively, they lost the chance to be called upon to work some of those innings between the starter and Mariano Rivera.

As a result, Torre overused the relievers he came to trust and wore them out. Rivera was an exception. He is one of a kind. He virtually always can be trusted, and he never wears out.

Joe Girardi, Torre’s successor, has become the anti-Torre. He doesn’t seem to have a reliever he doesn’t love and wants to use. It’s easy to get that feeling watching Girardi work his bullpen in this post-season.

He used seven relievers in the Yankees’ 11-inning, 5-4 loss to the Angels in Game 3 of the American League Championship Series. Two days and one game earlier, he also used seven relievers in the Yankees’ 13-inning, 4-3 victory.

Girardi, in fact, used seven relievers three times in a five-game playoff span. And he didn’t make those changes because his pitchers were getting shelled. He reached the nadir of his playoff pattern in the 11^th inning of Game 3 against the Angels Monday.

The game was tied 4-4, and Girardi had David Robertson start the 11^th in place of Rivera, who got out of a one-out, bases-loaded fix in the 10^th by inducing two ground balls.

Robertson had relieved twice in post-season games, allowing one hit and no runs in two and a third innings. In this game he retired the first two batters in the 11^th, leaving the Angels with only more out in the inning.

Howard Kendrick, a right-hand hitter, was the next batter, but Girardi didn’t let the right-handed Robertson pitch to him. Instead he summoned the right-handed Alfredo Aceves. Kendrick promptly singled to center and raced home with the winning run as Jeff Mathis drilled a double to left-center.

Overmanaging? Girardi wins the award hands down.

“We like the matchup with Ace better, the two guys,” Girardi said of his fateful decision to remove Robertson. “And it didn’t work.”

Why did he like the matchup better?

“It’s just different kind of stuff against those hitters,” the manager said. “And we have all the matchups, and all the scouting reports, and we felt that, you know, it was a better matchup for us.”

Obviously, Girardi was wrong, and his bad decision illuminated the brief and frequent use he has made of his relievers in the post-season.

Before he got to Robertson and Aceves in Game 3 he used three pitchers for a third of an inning each. In Game 2 he used the same three pitchers – Joba Chamberlain, Phil Coke and Damaso Marte – for a third of an inning each.

In the 11-inning Game 2 of the division series against Minnesota, Chamberlain, Coke, Marte and Phil Hughes pitched less than an inning each. In Game 3 Chamberlain and Hughes pitched less than an inning each.

Thus far Girardi has not undermined his or the team’s success with his pitching practices. The Kendrick and Mathis hits against Aceves might have been an aberration. But when a manager changes pitchers as often as Girardi has, he is very likely waiting for trouble to hit him in the face.

Another member of the Yankees, Alex Rodriguez, knows about post-season trouble. In three division series before this year’s, he hit .133, .077 and .267, a combined .159 (7-for-44). Fans and the news media let him know about it. 

But this is a different year and a different Rodriguez. Can all the A-Rod haters now leave him alone? Can they acknowledge that the guy is a pretty good hitter and stop bad-mouthing him for his inability to get post-season hits? Or if the Yankees get to the World Series and he doesn’t hit in those games, will they say “told ya so?”

Rodriguez has never played in a World Series so he can’t be criticized for not hitting in the World Series. But he has been plenty criticized for not hitting in the post-season series in which he has played.

No longer. Where would the Yankees be in this post-season without the hitting Rodriguez has produced? The Yankees won all three division series games and the first two league series games, and Rodriguez contributed timely hits in all of them.

In his first two times at bat in the first game against the Twins, Rodriguez made the last outs of innings with a runner at first each time. It was enough to get his critics talking their familiar talk. But in his third at-bat he served notice that this year was different, driving in a run with a two-out single and increasing the Yankees’ lead to 4-2. Two innings later, he delivered another two-out run-scoring single.

Rodriguez was 0 for 2 again in Game 2 when he stroked yet another two-out single, tying the game, 1-1. When he batted next, in the ninth, the Twins were ahead 3-1, and he slugged a two-run home run against their closer, Joe Nathan.

Following his pattern in Game 3, Rodriguez made outs his first two at-bats, then hit a game-tying home run in the seventh. In the ninth he walked and scored a run.

His cumulative work for the series: 5 hits, including 2 home runs, in 11 at-bats for a .455 batting average and 6 runs batted in, all team-leading figures.

A-Rod did not produce as lusty an average in the first three games of the league series against the Angels, but he gave the Yankees a 1-0 lead with a first-inning sacrifice fly in the first game and he clubbed a dramatic home run against Brian Fuentes leading off the 11^th inning of Game 2, tying the game, 3-3.

He hit another home run in Game 3, increasing the Yankees’ lead to 2-0, but the most startling result of his post-season efforts showed up in the ninth inning of that game. With two out, no one on base and the game tied, 4-4, Fuentes walked Rodriguez intentionally, an unusual strategy (purposely putting the potential winning run on base) and a striking compliment to any hitter but one given to very few hitters.

The Angels’ unusual strategy worked. Fuentes struck out Jerry Hairston Jr., and the Angels went on to win, 5-4, in 11 innings.

There is plenty of time left in the series for Rodriguez to hit some more meaningful home runs, which his detractors say he seldom hits, and there is time for Girardi to overuse his bullpen to the team’s detriment again. The critical question for the Yankees is which development will prevail.

Many club executives did good jobs this year. Brian Cashman of the Yankees could be executive of the year for spending the Yankees back to the playoffs. John Mozeliak of St. Louis and Ned Colletti of Los Angeles could be executive of the year for trading their teams into the playoffs.

Dan O’Dowd of Colorado could be executive of the year for making a managerial change that sparked the Rockies into the playoffs. Nolan Ryan could be executive of the year for changing the pitching culture in Texas, helping turn the Rangers into a contender.

But maybe the most legitimate executive of the year is one whose team didn’t make the playoffs. The Seattle Mariners are not and were not in the playoffs because they didn’t win their division championship or the wild card. They did not even finish second to compete for the wild card.

What they did, though, was show the biggest improvement in their won-loss record in the major leagues this season, 10 games better than the Yankees, the only team in the American League playoffs that improved their record.

The Mariners went from a 61-101 record in 2008 to 85-77 this year. It is, according to Elias Sports Bureau research, one of the seven biggest improvements in the last decade (* denotes playoffs):

• 2008 Rays  +31 wins*
• 2004 Tigers +29
• 2005 Diamondbacks +26
• 2000 Mariners +25*
• 2001 Angels +24
• 2005 Tigers +24
• 2009 Mariners +24

Jack Zduriencik is the architect of the group that transformed the Mariners from big losers into respectable winners. He has been the general manager for a year, and he has done a terrific job. How did he do it?

“Not having been here a year ago and probably realizing that the club underachieved in losing 101 games, there were probably a lot of things,” Zduriencik said. “There’s a whole new front office, a whole new coaching staff and some trades that were beneficial. The manager did a great job in the dugout. We changed the mindset, worked hard at it. We wanted to create an atmosphere where players wanted to be here.”

Zduriencik cited “tremendous leadership” from Ken Griffey Jr. and Mike Sweeny, a significant all-around contribution from center fielder Franklin Gutierrez and the closing success of David Aardsma. But he also acknowledged that the Mariners achieved their turnaround despite an offense that was weaker than last year.

“I sat here a lot of times scratching my head saying how did we win this one,” Zduriencik said.

The Mariners had the league’s lowest batting average (.258) and on-base percentage (.314), scored the fewest runs (3.96 a game), drew the fewest walks (421) and were next-to-last in slugging percentage (.402), total bases (2,228) and hits (1,430).

“Ichiro had a phenomenal year; he continued to do what he does – hit, hit, hit,” Zduriencik said, referring to Ichiro Suzuki, who hit .352, nearly 70 points higher than the next highest average, .283 for Gutierrez.

Russell Branyan and Jose Lopez powered the offense with career highs in home runs and runs batted in, 31 and 76 for Branyan, 25 and 96 for Lopez.

But it was the pitching staff that propelled the Mariners, posting the league’s lowest earned run average, 3.87, the only A.L. e.r.a. under 4.00 and nearly a whole run below last year’s 4.73. The Mariners also allowed the fewest runs, 4.27 a game; the fewest hits, 1,359, and the lowest opponents’ batting average, 247.

In their 162 starts, the team’s pitchers also had the lowest e.r.a., 3.89, and the lowest opponents’ batting average, .248.

The oddity of the achievements of the pitching staff is that the Mariners had only one pitcher with double-digit wins. Felix Hernandez won 19 games, and no other pitcher won more than eight. Hernandez, of course, had a great season and is one of the leading candidates for the Cy Young award.

His value to the Mariners is seen in their record in games he started, 25-9, and in games he started after they had lost, 15-4.

Erik Bedard was the No. 2 starter, but he suffered a shoulder injury, didn’t pitch after July 25, had surgery Aug. 14 and finished with a 5-3 record and 2.82 e.r.a. in 15 starts. He was actually on the disabled list twice, as were third baseman Adrian Beltre and catcher Kenji Johjima. Carlos Silva, who was in the starting rotation at the start of the season, missed more than half the season, as did outfielder Endy Chavez.

“We had an enormous amount of injuries,” Zduriencik said.

But the Mariners overcame them, and Don Wakamatsu, baseball’s first Asian-American manager, kept the players focused on winning games whatever the setbacks.

“The players really enjoyed playing for Don,” Zduriencik said. “We wound up third in the division and if you had been here the last day you’d think we had won. Players enjoyed playing here. Fans enjoyed watching us play.”

Where do the Mariners go from 85 victories?

“That’s a very good question,” Zduriencik said. “It’s going to be a challenge. I didn’t measure this season on wins and losses. I told the players that in spring training, but what was important was that the players played up to their abilities. The goal was to look at it at the end of the year and be able to say I’m proud of you.”

In his previous jobs, particularly with the Milwaukee Brewers, Zduriencik was instrumental in drafting and developing good young players, including Prince Fielder and Ryan Braun. Do the Mariners have future Fielders and Brauns in their system?

“Not immediately,” Zduriencik said. “I wish we did. We have some kids we like in ‘A’ ball, but there’s not a Fielder or a Braun.”

With so many other general managers responsible for their playoff teams’ success, it’s unlikely that Zduriencik will be named anyone’s executive of the year. However, it wasn’t long ago that he received that honor. In 2007, recognizing his successful efforts with the Brewers, Baseball America made him the first non-general manager to receive its major league executive of the year award.

DODGERS FACE (Mc)COURT BATTLE

My one meeting with Frank McCourt, owner of the Los Angeles Dodgers, was for breakfast the morning of an owners meeting in New York a few years ago. One of the subjects I recall that we discussed was Arte Moreno’s hijacking of the Los Angeles name for his Angels.

As I have written more than once, I think it is ridiculous for baseball to allow one team to appropriate another team’s city for marketing purposes. When I expressed that view to McCourt and asked why he didn’t fight Moreno’s brazen, presumptuous act, the Dodgers’ owner said he had more important battles to fight.

I got the feeling that McCourt was not a fighter. Now, though, we’ll find out how much of a fighter he is. He is about to become involved in a battle far more difficult and bitter than a geographical grab. Last week McCourt and his wife, Jamie, the Dodgers’ chief executive officer, announced that they had separated after 30 years of marriage. They said nothing about divorce, but that’s next on their agenda.

“This is going to be a messy divorce,” said a person who said he has known “for a long time” that the separation was coming.

Divorce is difficult enough without it being played out on a stage as big as the Dodgers and Major League Baseball. The McCourts’ play will be bigger and more dramatic than the one that led to the sale of the San Diego Padres. That one featured the divorce of John and Becky Moores and serves as a backdrop to the McCourt scenario.

A lawyer for Frank McCourt said McCourt events will be nothing like those that emerged from the Moores’ divorce, but he is either spinning fast or he is naïve.

“This is nasty,” said the person who is close enough to the McCourts to know what is happening, emphasizing the nastiness by adding, “Whew,” or some sound like that.

The initial issue seems to be ownership of the Dodgers. Frank’s lawyer has been quoted as saying that Frank is the sole owner of the team and is the control person for M.L.B. purposes.

“It’s a fair statement that he is the sole owner,” the person close to the McCourts said, “but that has nothing to do with what happens in court.”

Ah yes, court, where these things usually end up. “This will have to be determined in court,” the person said. “California is a 50-50 property state. This will be a difficult legal situation.”

The 50-50 remark refers to the division of property in a divorce. Unless Jamie McCourt signed a document rejecting any claim to the Dodgers, even in a divorce – and even then she could try to challenge it – it would seem she is entitled to half ownership of the team. But that will be up to a judge.

The McCourts were married in 1979, and the person close to them said they went together for many years before they were married. A photo of them from those years would be captioned “in happier times.”

ONCE UPON AN EARTHQUAKE

Twenty years ago George Steinbrenner called Fay Vincent and told him never to do it again. “He chewed me out,” Vincent recalled the other day. “He said don’t you dare go on television again without a tie.”

Twenty years ago last Saturday a 7.1 earthquake struck San Francisco and disrupted the 1989 World Series between the Giants and the Oakland Athletics, delaying Game 3 for 10 days.

Vincent, who had become commissioner the previous month after Bart Giamatti died, held a news conference the next day and appeared on the Today show with an open collar and no tie, a reasonable appearance given the no-lights circumstances at his hotel. I was impressed with Vincent’s nerve to go tieless.

One of his predecessors, Bowie Kuhn, was commissioner for 15 years and never appeared in public sans tie, even in the most casual of situations. Seeing Vincent without a tie told me something that I liked about him, and I like him to this day.

But back to the earthquake. As potentially dangerous as it was – my wife, who was at home, still gets chills when it is mentioned – the events of the next 24 hours turned the assignment into one of the most fascinating, if not the most, days of my career. It certainly was different from the game I had expected to cover.

I was in the auxiliary press box above the third base stands when the quake hit. Never having experienced an earthquake, I had no idea what the rumbling was about. It sounded like fans stamping their feet on the floor of the stands.

But a local knew immediately. “Earthquake,” he shouted.

The press box, hanging from the upper deck of stands, lurched forward. I was later told that if it had continued moving forward for a few more seconds, that is, if the earthquake had continued rumbling for a few more seconds, the press box would have kept going right off its mooring and crashed into the stands below. That’s the part my wife doesn’t like to hear.

Some reporters, locals, I would guess, thought quickly enough to race out the door of the press box. Not me. I was only a few feet from the door, but I stayed right where I was. Not that I had time to think, but I must have figured the story was in the press box and I wasn’t going to abandon the story.

Once the press box settled back where it started, I left and went down to the field, where the commissioner had remained at his box seat.

“The memory that has lasted the longest is two-fold,” Vincent said over the telephone. “Everyone involved in the earthquake – police, players, fans – everybody behaved very well. There was no panic. Everybody behaved well. It was a tough night.

“The second is of Isaiah Nelson, the police commander, who took charge. He came over and said this game should be canceled. We have a real problem. We have 53,000 people here, and it’s going to get dark. I said, okay, we’ll cancel the game. He said that’s great. He said you stay here, don’t leave. Stay visible right here in your seat, which I did, and we got through it.”

Twenty years later Vincent still praised Nelson for his cool direction in the disaster. He also recalled another incident involving Nelson.

“About six months later,” Vincent related, “he was on his motorcycle coming from Candlestick, skidded, went out of control and crashed. He hit the barrier that had been erected after the earthquake. That road had collapsed. They put up the barrier. He had forgotten about it and was going way too fast. He broke his neck and died.

“I wrote a piece about him for the Washington Post op-ed page. He hadn’t been given enough credit for being the unsung hero that night.”

I didn’t encounter Commander Nelson that night, but I spoke to the commissioner and any players and coaches I could find and returned to the press box to call in my notes to the news desk. By then, it was dark and the press box continued to be a perilous place, but the telephone was still working and there was one stadium light that I was able to use by stepping out of the press box, reading my notes, then going back to the phone.

When I finished my work at Candlestick, I somehow drove to the marina district to report on the fires and collapsed houses there. I incredibly found a payphone that was working and called in more notes. While I was on the phone, a young man, an out-of-town college student as it turned out, came by distraught because he wanted to call his parents to tell them he was all right but had no money to use the phone.

When I finished speaking with my office, instead of hanging up, I asked the young man for his phone number, punched it in on my telephone credit card, handed him the phone and left to go back to my hotel. There would be an early candlelight news conference to cover later that morning.