After watching the 1993 cult classic Groundhog Day yesterday, over, and over again, I couldn’t help but thinking that the movie was a bit of foreshadowing on the life we Phillies fans live today. Especially, when it comes to Ryan Howard.
Ryan Howard has officially played 1,460 regular season games in a Phillies uniform over 12 years. After doing my share of research on the subject, that’s longer than Bill Murray spends in purgatory Groundhog hell.
That’s 6,169 plate appearances, 5,376 at bats, 1,729 strikeouts, 1,410 hits, 357 home runs, a sustained Achilles injury, and all while still not being able to learn to stay off pitches thrown outside the strike zone.