"But Fishman himself is sometimes out of step, such as starting “2001” when the rest are playing “Melt”, as on 7/15/99 and 7/26/99"

Both of those sound like they're on purpose as a spacey 2001-esque jam starts, Fishman starts the 2001 drumbeat and then the band drops in over it perfectly.

As for 7/12/96.. Those always seemed more like a "creative decision" - Phish doesn't really have an obligation to finish Slave and Bowie for us. I always really dug that show because they seem comfortable & willing to defy expectation. As far as I can remember, they didn't finish a single song in that 2nd set.

If you're going to mention the 1/4/03 just for the Friday (a song that Phish didn't realize everyone was going to dislike yet) then i'm surprised you wouldn't mention the first night of Superball..what was it, Bug, Horse-> Silent, Weekapaug, Joy, Zero, Show of Life? Not one of the finest moments in set construction.

For 2011 the "bad" has generally been encores starting halfway through the 2nd set and utterly inexplicable segues where you can't even believe the same person who was just playing those incredibly fluid guitar lines actually thought that "Twist" somehow fit over that jam despite being in a different tempo & key than the jam currentl...err formerly going on. For awhile it got to a point where I was swearing it was a joke, as the band was so much tighter than they were in the late 90s/early 00s.