The life of a starting pitcher can be boring at times. They only pitch every fifth day, after all. For Cole Hamels of the Philadelphia Phillies, though, Thursday afternoon was anything but boring. Not only did Hamels start Game 2 of his team's NLDS matchup against the Colorado Rockies, but he also had to depart the ballpark early to be by his wife's side as she was in labor with their first child. Hamels had a relatively poor outing for his team, as he worked five innings and allowed four earned runs on seven hits. Give credit to the Rockies, who are too solid offensively to be shut down two straight days, but if Hamels was a bit distracted it would be difficult to blame him.
Shortly after he was removed by manager Charlie Manuel, Hamels departed Citizen's Bank Park to be by his wife's side. You might recall his wife, Heidi (maiden name Strobel) was once a contestant on the popular reality TV show Survivor and also posed in Playboy.
Wednesday, Hamels had discussed what an exciting time of the year it is right now for he and his wife.
"It's definitely exciting," 2008's NLCS and World Series MVP said. "I know starting the year, we knew that that sort of situation was going to come up. You can't really predict the right type of timing, but I knew one thing we could do was get to the postseason. So that was kind of the focus of my teammates and myself, and for my wife and I, to really expect any day now for our child, it's just a miracle in itself. I think it's going to be a fun, exciting time for both of us and for my teammates because we're a family ourselves."
Hopefully all goes smoothly for the Hamels family and their new addition.
The Phillies ended up losing the game, 5-4, and are now headed to Colorado with the series tied at one game apiece.
Philadelphia manager Charlie Manuel said he did not pull Hamels from the game because his wife had gone into labor, but he did concede that it could have affected his performance during a shaky start.
"I think definitely he was concerned about his wife. I know he was concerned about his wife, and probably his child, too.," Manuel said. "That's an exciting time, and that's a time that you really look forward to. I know it probably would have been on his mind."
