Game #2: "Surprise!"

Thursday, the Phillies continued their quest to become the 1st NL team since the '75-'76 Reds and the 2nd since the 1921-22 Giants to win back-to-back World Series.

"Finally," Rollins said, "We're here. Finally, the wins actually count for something. "Now it's 1 down and 10 more to go."

April 10th, 2009 Hamels debuted for the season against the Rockies. He was pounded that night for 7 runs on 11 hits in just 3 2/3 innings. "I'm concerned about him," Phillies manager Charlie Manuel said then. "He had a hard time locating pitches. He had a problem with his command, locating the ball where he wanted it."

Thursday, in his 2009 postseason debut, Hamels was unreliable, as he was all year. He struck out 5, including 3-in-a-row at one point, but yielded 4 runs on 7 hits in just 5 innings. As in his debut game for 2009, Hamels location was sloppy, his command questionable. In the 4th, Hamels surrendered a home run to Torrealba on a hanging curveball right over the middle of the plate. It was a big blow. It made the score 3-0 at the time, and the Phillies never recovered. With 1 out in the 5th, Colorado pitcher Aaron Cook singled off of Hamels by just sticking his bat out on a ball right down the center of the plate. That one seemed particularly irksome, like Hamels had decided to take a batter-off break between good pitches. It hurt the Phils, too, cost them the game, which was decided by 1 run, the same 1 run Cook scored when he crossed the plate later in the inning.

Torrealba hit 2 HRs in the regular season and none after May 6th. Cook batted .114 this year. Thursday, Mr. Hollywood made them heros at the plate. Where is his harem of trigger-happy fans shooting him past Steve 'Lefty' Carlton in the Phillies Hall-of-Fame now? Game 2's disappointing defeat unnervingly mirrored Hamels' regular season as truly as it contrasted with his potential, as witnessed by the world in October, 2008. If it was foreshadowing, it was damning.

More than a win, the Phillies needed the glorious Hamels of postseason '08 to show up in order to think seriously about contending for a Championship in 2009. A splendid Cliff Lee will not suffice for that goal. While Mr. Hollywood was early-exiting in the 5th en route to the labor room of his 1st child's birth (hopefully his wife gave birth better than he pitched), the true Hollywood display unfolded out West. Thursday in Los Angeles, Matt Holliday (the former Rockies MVP) all but handed the Dodgers their 2nd-straight NLCS birth when he dropped a routine fly ball in the 9th-inning to convert St. Louis' win into a Dodgers deciding 2-0 advantage in their best-of-five series.

No such handout from the Rockies, who turned pivotal double-plays, jammed the bases and generally dominated the Phillies all game long. If it weren't for Charlie Manuel's bizarre game of shuffle that starting pitcher, the Phillies might have been well out of the game. Who knows? Maybe it was worth burning up 8 pitchers in a Game 2 loss, when you're going for postseason broke.

"We were kind of taken aback a little bit when both starters got used," said lefthander Scott Eyre, who took over when Happ was injured and had to leave the game. "That just means that Pedro's starting Game 3, I guess. Or Blanton could come back. Or Happ got hit on the shin; he could come back. You just don't know."

The Phils Jack-in-the-Box starting rotation this season culminated in postseason schizophrenia for manager Charlie Manuel in Game 2 of the NLDS. You half-expected Manuel to shout "Surprise!" each time another starting pitcher came out of the bullpen. There was talk of his using starting pitchers in relief in the payoffs, but nobody knew he'd use 6 starters-- in 4 innings of 1 game.

When asked if he thought he'd be selected to start Game 3 in Colorado, unused starting pitcher Pedro Martinez replied, "I guess I'm the only one standing."

After almost 50 consecutive questions about his Game 2 pitching decisions, Manuel finally told the press: "You can write whatever you want to write, and you can voice your opinion and everything. But yeah, it can be done, and sometimes, those are chances you have to take. That's part of the game. Funny game. That's how you've got to play it sometimes."

"Hey, that's what makes the game great," said one of the Phillies starters-turned-relievers, Joe Blanton. "The chess match within the game."

When Blanton came out to start the 6th, you thought, 'OK, now we know, Happ, another lefty (the Rockies kryptonite) will be the Game 3 starter on Saturday'-- guess again. Happ came out in the 7th and all bets were off. Then, he was promptly struck-- and hard-- on the knee and left the game injured, without ever having recorded a 2009 postseason out. Worst case scenario? Only if he is unable to promptly return to his season-long dominance. From the looks of Hamels tonight, they'll need Happ as that supreme 2nd-starter to return to the World Series. Brett Myers and Antonio Bastardo were used Thursday, as well, but even that wasn't enough starters for the Phillies skipper. He wanted to surround himself with them.

Not only did Game 3's probable starters Blanton and Happ appear, but Game 1 star Cliff Lee was brought in-- to pinch run. I guess that stolen base the day before left an impression in the manager's mind. Some managers would covet and protect their Ace in the playoffs, especially if he had pitched 9 innings the day before. However, Charlie Manuel threw Lee on the base-paths like he was a minor league September call up. Even Happ's injury didn't back Charlie down from putting Lee in harm's way.

The last time 6 multi-start starters had appeared for 1 team in a postseason game was 1977. It was unique, it was flashy, eccentric, bold. Who dropped something funny in Chuck's drink? Prime suspect J-Roll gave a knowing grin after the game: "It was the beauty of October," he said with a laugh. "Or something like that."

What's not so pretty is the weather in Colorado, where the forecast for Game 3 reads:

High: 36 °F RealFeel®: 30 °F

Rather cloudy and much colder with a little snow, accumulating a coating to an inch.

And that says nothing of the reception the Fightin' will receive from the Colorado home crowd, before whom the Rockies are 51-30. Luckily, the Phils lead all of MLB with a 48-33 record on the road, because if they lose both weekend games in Colorado, they go home with last year's cake and icicles on their noses.