Crucial weekend for Phillies’ future

After the 102-game rain-delay and after the injuries, after the goof-ball rules changes and after so many irrational postponements, after playing games before mannequins and similarly mindless minor-league umpires, the Phillies are about to receive their answer.

By Sunday night, they will know if they have been able to make good on their initial promise to Bryce Harper.

By then, at the latest, they will be a playoff team and an organization headed in a reasonable direction, or they will have been re-branded as an inept operation unable to reach a postseason for nearly a full decade.

By then, they will know if they are in a position to benefit from their 13-year, $330,000,000 investment in Harper, or if the whole scheme was a quick publicity stunt.

By then, they will be winners, or they will be losers. Over-reaction? Over-statement of a situation in a once-ever season?

Over-sell of the importance of the weekend the Phillies are about to spend in Tampa?

Harper doesn’t think so. He doesn’t think so at all.

“I’m very excited to hope