Major League Baseball

Bob Ford: This Roy produces in crucial situation

Published Oct. 18, 2010 10:10 a.m. ET

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There is Big Roy and there is Little Roy on the Phillies' pitching staff, and they didn't switch inseams in the National League Championship Series, but it was the little guy who picked up the team and put it back on its feet Sunday night.

Until the seventh inning, it was pretty heavy lifting as Roy Oswalt was forced to walk a thin edge without much run support from the Phils. He didn't replicate Big Roy Halladay's no-hitter in the division series, but he came pretty close, and pulled the Phillies back from possible oblivion following Halladay's Game 1 loss.

The final score was 6-1 and that sounds like an easy win to tie the series as it moves to San Francisco for the next three games. It was anything but, not that Oswalt seemed bothered. He went about his business coolly as always, working through his assortment of pitches and always coming back to the fastball that was exploding on the corners in this game.

He did appear anxious to get an insurance run to work with in the late innings, though. He picked his way carefully through the Giants' batting order holding just a 2-1 lead after the fifth inning. He allowed a hit here, got another pop-up there and dodged a bullet as the Amazing Cody Ross Home Run Show stalled on the warning track in the seventh inning.

Enough was enough, and Oswalt led off the seventh inning with a sharp single up the middle against tiring San Francisco starter Jonathan Sanchez. Oswalt borrowed one of Jimmy Rollins' bats for the mission, having tossed aside a Chase Utley bat that betrayed him with a ground-out earlier in the game.

Once on base, it got very interesting for Oswalt, who was sacrificed to second and then, after an intentional walk to Utley, took off for home on a Placido Polanco hit to center field.

"I had a good look at it, and as soon as he hit it I knew it was over the infield, and my first thought was to score," Oswalt said. That was not third base coach Sam Perlozzo's first thought. He saw Andres Torres field the ball cleanly, not too deep, and his thought was, "Stop." Oswalt isn't fast, but he had momentum and he ran right through the stop sign. The Giants saw and heard Perlozzo and cut off the throw, and by the time cutoff man Aubrey Huff turned and fired to the plate, Oswalt was in there.

"He was out by 10 or 15 feet, but Aubrey thought he was holding up," Giants manager Bruce Bochy said.

"I was halfway to home when I saw the stop sign and it was too late," Oswalt said.

That was entertaining, and productive for the Phillies, and it began a four-run inning highlighted by a slump-breaking double for Rollins - presumably using his own bat, too.

It was entertaining, but Oswalt's main contribution to the game was on the mound, and most of it long before he had that 6-1 lead. He left the game after eight innings - talking Charlie Manuel into letting him stay in to finish the eighth - and had allowed just three hits. He gave up a pair of uneventful singles and allowed the home run.

That proved to be more than enough for Oswalt, who took the 6-1 lead through the eighth inning and left the game having allowed just three hits, a pair of singles and the obligatory solo home run to Ross, who had a total of three home runs in four official NLCS at-bats after his homer to left in the fifth.

It was a great performance by Oswalt, and it included nine strikeouts and not a single Giants' runner reaching scoring position - aside from Ross during his trot. It wasn't a surprise, however. Oswalt has given up more than three earned runs in a start only once since July 30. He is 8-0 in that stretch over 13 starts, including Sunday's win.

The outing also straightened out a little curve in the road that appeared in the division series against Cincinnati when he allowed four runs, three earned, in five innings against the Reds and left the game for a pinch-hitter trailing, 4-0. The Phillies came back and won that one, but Roy wasn't the story. Against the Giants, until Rollins broke, Oswalt was just about the only story. Unless you count San Francisco third baseman Mike Fontenot's strange fielding habits.

"You're trying to make momentum come back on your side," Oswalt said. "But you can't get caught up in the moment of trying to get the momentum back on your side. You have to pitch your game. You hear a lot of stuff about guys pitching against you, like they're better than you, and that's kind of added fuel to the fire."

There is a fire there, even if it seems like the smoldering kind. Like Halladay, Oswalt doesn't seek out the center spot on the stage, but the little hill in the middle of the field is where you usually find it this time of year.

He climbed it successfully again, even if it wasn't perfect, even if it wasn't a no-hitter, even if the other guy is still Big Roy. Oswalt was big enough, in a game that was bigger than everyone.

Contact columnist Bob Ford at 215-854-5842 or bford@phillynews.com.

Read his recent work at http://go.philly.com/bobford.

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