PHILS WIN
Hamels, Madson and Lidge are unhittable right now. Good pitching beats good hitting.
Think about this for a minute as if you were an opposing hitter against the Phillies: If you drew up a list of the 10 nastiest pitches in baseball -- maybe even the top five -- you might have Hamels' changeup and Brad Lidge's slider on it. Both pitches are so filthy that they can throw it when you know it's coming and you still can't hit it. Hamels threw 27 of his 39 changeups for strikes -- a ridiculous number -- and Lidge threw sliders on 13 of his 15 pitches. Poor Evan Longoria. The Rays third baseman was completely befuddled by Hamels' changeup, then looked equally lost when Lidge threw him four straight sliders in the ninth. It's hard enough to hit those guys with a history against them. It's extremely difficult to do so when seeing those unique pitches for the first time.
Hope the Phils get this series over with quickly so I can get some sleep. Too many 3-1/2 hour games that start at 8:40 can be tough on a guy, not to mention too much Tim McCarver.
1 comment:
I wrote a long and thorough retort early but it disappeared when I went to publish. Here are the highlights:
-Rays were the best team this season at home. That may be meaningless but probably isn't.
-Hamels is the best pitcher on either team, therefore game one was a must win for the Phils.
-Rays have the three next best pitchers, and have the edge in non-Hamel games as well as home games.
-even in a game one loss, Rays kept it close, thus forcing Madson and Lidge to work, which is meaningful in a long series.
I am rooting for the Rays, expected them to lose game one, but they lost it in the best way possible by keeping it close. On paper, Rays win the next two and head to Philly with momentum, making game four w/Hamels another must win for the Phils.
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