Tuesday, April 19, 2011
Posted: 9:50 p.m.Updated: 11:38 p.m.
By Jim Salisbury
CSNPhilly.com
BOX SCORE
Sixteen games into the season, all that offseason hand-wringing over the Phillies offense looks completely justified.
This team cant hit.
At least not lately.
After reaching double digits in hits six times in the first eight games, the Phillies offense has ground to a halt.
MLB
The Phils have hit just .204 in the last eight games and averaged 2.9 runs in those contests. Five times over that span they have had one or zero extra-base hits. On Tuesday night they snapped a 20-inning drought without an extra-base hit when Shane Victorino smacked a third-inning double. Victorino was stranded on base, of course, because that was the Phils last hit of the game. They suffered an embarrassing 9-0 loss at the hands of the Milwaukee Brewers, and it seemed to hurt a little more than other losses because Roy Halladay was on the mound.
Halladay was not his razor-sharp best, but even if he was he might not have been able to save the Phils, who had just two hits on the nightVictorinos double and a bunt base hit by Jimmy Rollins with two outs in the first inning.
Its tough when you go 8 13 innings with just one hit, Rollins said. You have your ups and downs in this game. Hopefully were getting our downs out of the way early.
Weve built this team on pitching. Theyve done their part at times. Weve done our part at times. Lately weve been a little flat all around. The energy has been a little flat. That could be because were not tearing the cover off the ball. But weve got to win regardless.
Rollins added, We will hit. I dont question that.
Rollins has contributed to the Phillies offensive problems. In 16 games in the No. 3 hole, he has just four extra-base hits and one RBI. And thats with two guys hitting .300 in front of him.
Manager Charlie Manuel may eventually have to shuffle his batting order, but he doesnt have many options. This team is missing Jayson Werth, who has moved on to Washington, and Chase Utley, who is injured.
Jayson is not part of the discussion any more, said Rollins. Chase is a big part of the offense. He brings energy himself. But weve won games without him in the past. Its another challenge.
This game might have been different had Rollins liner toward the leftfield line found grass in the third inning. There was one out at the time and the Phils were down, 2-0. If Rollins ball had fallen in, the Phils would have scored at least one, and maybe two, runs. However, Milwaukee leftfielder Ryan Braun made a nice running catch for the second out and Ryan Howard grounded out to end the threat.
Defense was a big factor in this game. Braun made that big play in left and Carlos Gomez made a couple of brilliant running catches in center. Meanwhile, the Phils, particularly Howard, did not play good defense. The Phillies first baseman could not make a play on Prince Fielders glove-side grounder with two outs in the seventh and that paved the way for Milwaukee to score six times as it blew the game wide open and drove Halladay from the game.
Manuel said he didnt have a good view of Fielders ball, which Howard unsuccessfully tried to smother with a quasi-dive.
I didnt see what happened, Manuel said. It was a big hit. I didnt think was that hard hit. It definitely opened up the door.
Had Howard made that play, Halladays line would have looked a lot better. The righthander allowed 10 hits, but six of them were ground balls. A few feet here or there and he would have had more success. Thats not to say Halladay didnt make mistakes.
There were three or four pitches Id like to have back, he said.
One of them was a flat 3-1 fastball to Braun in the third inning. It didnt cut or sink and Braun hit it for a solo home run.
Former Phillie Randy Wolf beat his old team with one of his patented speed-changing efforts. Wolf stranded runners in scoring position in the first, third and fourth innings as the Phils went 0 for 6 with runners in scoring position for the game. The lefthander was also backed by excellent defense.
Wolf pitched a good game, Manuel said. At the same time weve got to improve our hitting. Ive said that the last few days. Weve got to start hitting the ball better. Early in the season we were getting hits. Now we cant seem to get anything going. Were counting on some of the guys who had down seasons last year to bounce back and some guys who havent played regularly in the past to come through.
Without mentioning names, Manuel seemed to be referring to Rollins, Victorino, Howard, Raul Ibanez and Ben Francisco.
The Phillies have lost two in a row for the first time all season.
The good news: They have Ace No. 2, Cliff Lee, on the mound Wednesday.
Its great, Rollins said of Lees turn in the rotation. If we score some runs for him, its great.
E-mail Jim Salisbury at jsalisbury@comcastsportsnet.com
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