Big 8th Inning Boosts Phillies to Win Over Mets
By: Mike Reisman
When the Phillies start Cole Hamels, you can almost always expect two things. The first, is a great performance from the 2008 World Series MVP, and the second is a weak amount of run support from a Phillies team that just doesn't like to hit with Hamels on the mound. Tonight, both of these statements held the truth for all seven innings of Hamels performance.
The game started off poorly for Hamels, and it looked as though it might be a long game after the Mets jumped out to an early 1-0 lead on a Justin Turner single. They added a run in the 3rd on a Jason Bay single scoring Jose Reyes, and doubling their lead to two runs.
However, after that Hamels would be superb, allowing just one hit, and striking out five batters. However, his problem would be that his pitching counterpart, Mike Pelfrey, would be just as good if not better, striking out six, and allowing just three hits in his first seven innings. He allowed one run in the 4th on an Ibanez double, but other than that, he was fantastic.
Of course, these are the Mets we are talking about so something must go wrong, and it did in the 8th. Chase Utley started the scoring with an RBI single, and two batters later, Ryan Howard would hit a two RBI double to give the Phillies a 4-2 lead.
Ben Francisco would add a run in the 9th on a double scoring Domonic Brown, ending the game with a score of 5-2 Phillies. Cole Hamels got his 7th win, and his first at Citi Field.
Tonight was a good night for the Phillies, even though it wasn't a game where the Phillies scored a lot. No, this was a good game because although the whole team didn't do well, the players that had to do well did. One example of this was Chase Utley. Utley went 2-3 tonight with a double and a stolen base. The fact that Charlie and Utley were both confident enough to test Chase's knee means that he is definitely fully healthy, and hopefully he will start to put up the MVP-like stats he is capable of.
Another player with a good game tonight was Domonic Brown who went 2-4 with a double and a run scored. Brown has been unimpressive since returning to the major leagues, however, in the past three games he has gone 6-10, and has raised his batting average to .292, a good sign for a player who's average was an awful .210 last year.
Finally, what would this game be without Cole Hamels. Hamels pitched a very good game, which has basically been the story of his season. Hamels is 7-2, and his ERA is 3.01, despite his awful first game of the year. Without that game, Hamels has an ERA of 2.38, something pretty incredible considering that he has allowed more than three runs just once other than that awful first start. If Hamels can keep up his performance, something that he has proven is not out of reach, he may challenge the rest of the NL including Roy Halladay for the Cy Young award.
The Phillies finish off the series tomorrow at Citi Field at 1:10 as Vance Worley takes on Jonathon Niese.