Major League Baseball

Paul Hagen: Phillies' Oswalt still looking for quality start

Published Oct. 9, 2010 11:11 a.m. ET

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ROY OSWALT didn't expect to throw a no-hitter, which is good considering that Reds second baseman Brandon Phillips hit the second pitch he threw over the fence in left. Pitchers like it when batters hit the ball at someone. Phillips hit it at someone who had paid for his seat.

Oswalt did hope to hold the Reds down and pitch deep into the game. Didn't get that, either. Lasted just five innings, gave up a couple homers, four runs, three earned. Which would be a little disappointing if the Phillies hadn't rallied for a 7-4 win to take a commanding lead of two games-to-none in their best-of-five National League Division Series against the Reds.

To be fair, the expectations were probably artificially high for Oswalt last night. He had pitched so well recently (1.41 earned run average in his last dozen games of the regular season), so well in his career against Cincinnati (23-3), so well at Citizens Bank Park (9-0 in 10 starts) that actually playing the game almost seemed like an afterthought.

It wasn't, of course. The Phillies were down by four runs when he left the game for a pinch-hitter in the bottom of the fifth, only to come back and win with the help of a literal comedy of errors from the Reds.

It's a useful reminder, as if the Phillies needed one, that nothing can be taken for granted. Especially in the postseason.

"I was a little rusty, probably the first three innings. Bad, bad pitch selection to Jay Bruce [who led off the fourth with a home run]. I knew better than to throw [a slider]. I really didn't get going until about the fourth," he said.

"You throw out of the bullpen, you throw an inning against the Braves. But when the game's not really countin', you're just kind of throwin'. But I felt better as the game went on. I felt like I could go two or three more quality innings. I was trying to throw a quality start. I knew I wasn't going to go out there and throw a no-hitter."

Everybody, including Oswalt, anticipated a better performance last night. And will the next time he pitches, too.

Heroes

J.C. Romero, Chad Durbin, Jose Contreras, Ryan Madson and Brad Lidge combined for four shutout innings, allowing just one hit. The Phillies have to be especially pleased to see Lidge, who got the save, continue the roll he ended the regular season with. In the last 2 months he had an 0.73 earned run average.

Goat

Cincinnati's defense. The Phillies are batting .203 as a team after the first two games of the NLDS, but so what? Roy Halladay pitched a no-hitter in Game 1 and last night Cincinnati self-destructed with four errors that led to five unearned runs.

Roy Halladay is capable of shutting down even the best hitting lineups. But in Game 2 the Reds looked very much like a team that hadn't been to the postseason in 15 years. Which, come to think of it, they are.

The turning point

The Reds had everything going their way going into the bottom of the fifth. They led, 3-0. The sellout crowd had been stilled. Cincinnati starter Bronson Arroyo seemed to be in complete control with a runner on first and two outs.

Then it happened.

Consecutive grounders to second baseman Brandon Phillips and third baseman Scott Rolen were booted, loading the bases with two outs. Reds manager Dusty Baker left the righthanded Arroyo in to face the lefthanded-hitting Utley, and the second baseman singled in two runs.

The Phillies didn't take the lead for good until the seventh, but that opened the door for the defending National League champions and they walked right through it.

Did you notice?

* That Roy Oswalt had already thrown 42 pitches after just two innings last night?

* That this is just the second time in franchise history the Phillies have won the first two games of a postseason series? The other occasion: 1980, when they beat the Royals in the first two games of the World Series at the Vet . . . and went on to win the first world championship.

The odd stat

Chase Utley has made 926 regular starts at second base for the Phillies and averaged one error for every 10.77 games. With two errors in the second inning last night, though, he's now been charged with five errors in 34 postseason games, an average of one for every 6.80 games.

Question of the night

To Reds manager Dusty Baker during his pregame availability: "How important is it to beat Oswalt tonight?"

Let's see, beating Oswalt would have meant bouncing back from being no-hit in the opener, evening the best-of-five series at a game apiece and seizing the homefield advantage going back to Cincinnati for Game 3 tomorrow night.

Losing would have meant being pushed to the brink of elimination and having to face Cole Hamels, who has been dominant lately. Hmmm. That's a real puzzler.

Scouting the umpire

According to baseball-reference.com, here's how tomorrow night's starters have fared with Sam Holbrook behind the plate: Phillies LHP Cole Hamels: 0-0, 3.86 in two starts, .264 opponent's batting average, 1.071 WHIP. Reds RHP Johnny Cueto: 0-0, 4.50 in one start, .304 opponent's batting average and 1.500 WHIP.

Cheese wheeze

Joe Morgan was a big part of the Phillies' 1983 Wheeze Kids. But he made his mark as a member of Cincinnati's Big Red Machine teams and there's no question where his loyalties lie.

The Hall of Famer, now an ESPN announcer, has been at The Bank for the first two games of the NLDS and has spent most of his time on the Reds side of the field, going so far as to work with second baseman Brandon Phillips in the dugout.

"It's an honor," Phillips said yesterday. "Just having him around, [talking about] how he was in the playoffs and how they won the championship so many times . . . Just his presence, period. It's a good feeling and it's an honor to have him around during the playoffs."

Send e-mail to hagenp@phillynews.com

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