The Best Thing That Happened This Week: Vincent Velasquez Made His Presence Known

Vince Velasquez reacts after striking out Wil Myers to end the Phillies 3-0 victory over the Padres on Thursday, April 14, 2016, in Philadelphia.

That really was the winter of our discontent, with the misery that was the Eagles and the Coach Kelly canning and the Sixers tanking and Joel Embiid’s junkets to Qatar and the rinky-dinky Hinkie circus. No wonder this was the City of Brotherly Glum by the time the Phillies’ season rolled round. That the Boys of Summer dropped their first four straight made us glum and glummer; weren’t we ever going to have a winner? Why did God hate us? Why were we stuck again with a bullpen that melts like water ice in August in every game?

But lo, through the clouds there appeared a glimmer of sunlight, as after that crappy-ass start our boys took two out of three from the Mets, then three out of four from the Padres, including, on Thursday, an absolutely awesome performance by 23-year-old right-hander Vincent Velasquez, who in just the ninth start of his nascent career not only struck out 16 — 16! — and gave up just three hits and no walks, but also pitched a freaking complete game, giving that shaky bullpen a total workaround. For once, we’ve got the phenom the whole country is talking about. When’s the last time that happened? “That was very fun,” Velasquez said after the game. You bet it was.