1992 Bowman #587 Chad McConnell

Braves 6, Phillies 1
Game 100 - Friday Night, July 27th in Atlanta
Record - 45-55, 5th Place, 14 1/2 games behind the Nationals

One Sentence Summary:  Fresh off his new contract, Cole Hamels pitched poorly in a 6-1 loss against the Braves.

What It Means:  Prior to the game,  General Manager Ruben Amaro, Jr. frankly stated that the Phillies would need to win this series in order to convince him not to start trading off players.  So the next two games are extremely crucial.

What Went Wrong:  Hamels walked a career high six batters and the Phillies managed just a lone first inning run against Braves starter Ben Sheets.

Featured Cards:  I made the right choice last night by largely ignoring the Phillies game and watching the Olympic Opening Ceremonies instead.  I'm a sucker for large televised spectacles, such as last night's ceremonies, and I enjoyed the happenings from London much more than the happenings from Atlanta.

From Wikipedia, so it must be accurate, baseball had been an exhibition sport at the Olympics since the 1904 Summer Games.  At the 1992, 1996, 2000, 2004 and 2008 Summer Games, baseball attained official medal status, only to be voted out of the 2012 games.  It seems that one of the major reasons for baseball losing its spot in the Olympics is that its not an internationally popular sport.  It's also impossible for the U.S. to send its "best" team as participation in the Games would mean missing two weeks of the regular season for the Major League's All-Stars.

1988 Topps Traded #71T

So in the spirit of the Olympics, I thought it would be interesting to look back to the five official U.S. Olympic baseball squads and see how many future Phillies were on the rosters.  (This list includes players who reached the Majors with the Phils, and not Phillies farmhands.)  Former first round pick Chad McConnell never made it to the bigs, but I couldn't resist using his gold-foil bordered Team USA card from the 1992 Bowman set.  And I didn't include Mickey Morandini on the list below, since baseball was just an exhibition sport in the 1988 Summer Olympics.

Olympics (Standings) - Future Phillies (Years with Phillies)
1992 (fourth place) - Michael Tucker (2005)
1996 (Bronze Medal) - Travis Lee (2000-2002), A.J. Hinch (2004)
2000 (Gold Medal) - Ryan Franklin (2006), Roy Oswalt (2010-2011)
2004 - U.S. did not qualify
2008 - (Bronze Medal) - Lou Marson (2008)

Programming Note:  The Phillies Room is going on auto-pilot once again as the blog's management has decided to to go sit on the beach for the week.