Halladay Leads Phils into Playoffs

This week, the Phils were visited by some past demons, haunted by ghosts of yesteryear.

A history of over 10,000 losses, the most in professional sports history, and former Phils pitchers J.A. Happ and Brett Myers stood between them and the playoffs the last couple days. The Phils sought 1 more win to secure their spot in the 2011 postseason. With 17 games left to play, you had to think the team with baseball's best record (95-51) would get one more win-- at least.

Then again, this is the same Phillies who in 1964 led the NL by 6½ games with only 12 games left in the season. They lost 8 in-a-row at home, then departed for St. Louis, where they lost 2 in-a-row to finish the season 1 game out of a playoff birth.

Wednesday, '03 & '10 Cy Young Roy Halladay took the mound against Bud Norris, a 26 year-old who has been in the majors for 2 years and who ranks 9th in the NL in BB (68).

A Phillies playoff birth was in the air.

However, the demons continued to harass the Phils, when Norris & 2 relievers held them to just 1 run and 1 walk, while striking out 7.

The man on the mound for the Phils, however, nickname 'Doc', had the cure. He made the meager 3 hits his position players supported him with stick and even added a hit of his own.

"We gave him a big cushion to work with," Charlie Manuel said, sarcastically. "We motivated him. We came out and got him one big run."

Houston's starter Norris stymied the Phils, who have scored just 9 runs in their last 5 games/46 innings (1.76 runs a game).

"The biggest thing I'm concerned about is we've got to score some runs," Manuel said of his often punchless squad.

The Phils secured a spot in the playoffs for the 5th consecutive year, which is unprecedented in the team's 129-year history.

Meanwhile, the praise for Halladay, who yielded no runs to confirm it was abundant and pervasive within his team and the opposition alike:

"Roy did a heck of a job," Phillies manager Charlie Manuel told reporters. "He had good command, especially (against) the young hitters. He threw them a lot of offspeed stuff. He didn't throw them a lot of fastballs that they could get to. Where he's putting the ball is what really counts, but that comes with a lot of preparation, and he's always ready."

"It really came down to us having the bases loaded in the second inning with nobody out and us not being able to get anything across," Astros manager Brad Mills said. "Against a tough pitcher we weren't able to get those runs across early."

"This was a tough one," Norris said. "Four pitches into the game and I am down 1-0. Roy Halladay is Roy Halladay."

Lately, there has been a lot of debate as to whether Halladay should start the playoffs, game 1, for the Phils. It may sound like an absurd question when you have the Cy Young defender in your rotation, but when Cliff Lee flashes months of almost unprecedented dominance within the modern era, it is a valid and understandable question among fans and baseball analysts alike. After all, Lee has won in the postseason like almost no one before him.

Lee is the only player in the history of baseball to have struck out the opposition 10 times or more 3 times in a single postseason (2010).

Lee went 7-0 with a 1.26 ERA in the 1st 8 playoff starts of his career.

He was named the National League Pitcher of the Month in both June and August.

One ESPN article had Lee ranked 8th All-time among postseason starting pitchers.

Yet, he pitches on the same staff as Roy Halladay. A point that's not lost on him.

"I want to be the pitcher of the month every month," Lee said, when he 1st faced reporters after it was announced he had captured the honor in August, after claiming it in June.

Then, when asked if he wanted to be the game 1 playoff starter, he shrugged, showing his characteristic stoic side, calm, unflinching:

"I don't really care at all," he said. "Whenever they want me to pitch, I'll pitch. That's it. It all depends on how the season finishes up and who's pitching when and who's in a better position at that time. We've obviously got the best pitcher in baseball, in Halladay, on our team."

It takes one to know one.

A recent study by the Sporting News determined Halladay to be the #6 best player in all of baseball.

Lee was ranked #19 in the same study, which quoted his former teammate, Rangers 2B Ian Kinsler: "His competitiveness is off the charts. We're all competitive, but Cliff just competes at anything—who can eat the fastest, who shot the biggest deer, random stuff. That helps him out a lot when he's on the field. And when he gets in jams, he's able to buckle down, slow down and put the ball where he wants it."

Lee is a marvel, one of a kind. There is no denying that. When he is 'on,' he is in full control like almost no other pitcher in the game today.

Yet, for each month like his impossibly immaculate June (5-0, 0.21 ERA) and August (5-0, 0.45), there is an April (2-2, 4.18) and July (1-2, 4.91) in the same season to balance the scales, just enough to make him human.

Lee and Halladay's stats are eerily parallel.

Cliff Lee: 16-7, 2.44 ERA, 210.2 innings pitched, 57 Earned Runs allowed, 211 S.O., 1.03 WHIP
Halladay: 18-5, 2.34 ERA, 219.2 innings pitched, 57 Earned Runs allowed, 211 S.O., 1.04 WHIP

Yet, Halladay's consistency is, perhaps, even more eerily unfaltering.

The highest ERA he has posted in a single month this season is 3.00 in May. He won 4 games in April, then 3 in each subsequent month: May, June, July and August. Steady as a master poker hand.

Halladay has walked 30 men this entire season, while allowing only 9 HR, despite playing the majority of his games in hitter-haven Citizens Bank Park.

To put that in perspective, his foremost Cy Young competition is teammates Lee (15 HR, 42 BB) and Hamels (15 HR, 41 BB), along with Ian Kennedy of Arizona (19 HR, 52 BB) and the Dodgers' Clayton Kershaw (13 HR, 51 BB).

Halladay's 9 HR and 30 BB are by far leading the pack, which means 2 things:

1) The consistency with which he displays control is unmatched.
2) In the postseason, when advancing to a title hinges on the wrong walk here or the killer HR there, Halladay is your man.

Ask Clayton Kershaw:

"I think Halladay, for me, personally ... he's the guy," Kershaw said in an LA Times interview on 7/3/11.

Kershaw said he admires Halladay's consistency, pointing to how the Phillies had won each of his past 8 starts at that time.

"There's a lot of guys having really good years, but day in, day out, what he brings to that team," Kershaw said, "You just know, that team, when he goes out there, they're feeling pretty good about their chances. That's definitely where I'd like to get to."

Last October, Halladay made good on the 1st playoff performance of his life. After 11 years of pitching for the lowly Blue Jays, Halladay had his 1st shot on the October stage for the Phils.

How did he respond?

Famously, against MLB's #1 ranked offense at that time, Halladay, on October 6th, 2010, threw a no-hitter. It was the 2nd time a no-hitter was thrown in the playoffs in the history of baseball and Halladay's 2nd no-hitter of the year.

Can anyone really doubt that he is the ace of aces? He has led the staff all season, as last season, from game 1, as their ace. Has he steered the ship astray? Not for a single month.

Regardless of the remarkable accomplishments of Lee, Halladay's assured reliability is arguably what has enabled Lee and propelled Hamels and Worley around him.

Wednesday, despite becoming the 1st team in baseball to clinch a playoff spot, the Phils shook hands and shook off any celebration after the game:

"That's the beauty of being here," Halladay said. "We expect to win," said Halladay. "It's a great mentality to have. There's business to be done and until that point, there's not a lot of celebration."