The Zo Zone

Mike Zagurski made sure to stop, look around and savor the moment last night in a 8-3 victory over the Atlanta Braves at Turner Field.

It's hard to believe that two weeks ago Zagurski was pitching for single-A Clearwater, or that he pitched for double-A Reading just Wednesday in a game in New Hampshire. But after the Phillies placed closer Brett Myers on the disabled list with a strained right shoulder -- the Phillies said yesterday there's no torn labrum or rotator cuff -- they purchased Zagurski's contact to take his place.

"Call him Bronko," Myers said.

Myers, of course, is referring to Hall of Fame football player Bronko Nagurski (who went to my alma mater, by the way).

Nagurski.

Zagurski.

Hey, as long as he gets people out.

Zagurski retired the side in the eighth inning, which is something fans have seen from the bullpen too little this season. But Charlie Manuel certainly showed his confidence in Zagurski when he told him to start warming up with the game tied, 3-3, in the seventh inning.

"I feel like I can do the job they're asking me to do and if they're willing to give me the ball I'm willing to take it and give it a shot," Zagurski said. "(Geoff) Geary made a point to tell me before I ran out there, 'Take a minute after you get out there to step off and take a look around because it'll be your only major-league debut.' When I got out there, my warm-up pitches were a little wild, but then I stepped off and it kind of cleared my head and I went back to work.

"I felt OK. When I threw my warm up pitches I was rushing. Everything was up. So when I stepped off the mound and looked around, I told myself, 'You better get the ball down and figure it out or you might not be here long.'"

There were 35,402 fans in the stands last night, 20 of them Zagurski's family and friends.

There were 3,506 fans in the stands Wednesday in New Hampshire.

"I'm not used to playing in such a nice ballpark," Zagurski said. "(In the bullpen) I was talking to the guys and they were giving me a little advice here and there. And we have scouting reports, so we were going over each hitter. And then when it came time to that point where there were a couple lefthanders I might face, Ramon (Henderson, the bullpen coach) told me what we try to do to guys and I went from there."

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Ryan Howard returned from the disabled list with a bang last night. He went 1 for 4 with a double, intentional walk, two RBIs and run scored. He hit the ball hard in his first two at-bats with nothing to show for it. Howard replaced Chris Coste, who the Phillies optioned to Reading at his request.

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If you're curious about the number 23 after Myers' reaction to getting hurt Wednesday, the movie The Number 23 created a number generator to check out.

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Having had three MRIs in my life, I know what MRI exams look like. You see the shape of the body part being looked at (knee, foot, shoulder, etc.) and that's about it. The rest is just random shadings and shapes inside the knee. So when a reporter asked Myers what his MRI results looked like, I laughed out loud because Myers took the question literally, "I don’t even know. It looked like a shoulder with a bunch of things on it."

Too funny.