Cliff Lee So Close! But Phillies Still Walkoff Win in Extras

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Man, what a tough break for Cliff Lee who missed his seventh complete game shutout of the season by one strike when Jose Lopez belted a ball into the seats with two outs in the ninth to tie the game up at 1-1. Lee was trying to throw a cutter backdoor to Lopez, but it got way to much of the plate.

Thankfully for Lee and the Phillies, Michael Martinez worked a walk in extras and Ryan Howard got out of his funk by hitting the game winning RBI deep to left center after replacing Ross Gload who got the start at first but looked a bit hobbled.

As for having Ryan Howard as a pinch hitter, Charlie Manuel joked "He struck out the other day, it made me mad so I gave him another chance tonight."

"No, he's good. He's real good. He does a tremendous job."

Walk it off and bring the magic number down to 2.

[watch Howard's walkoff winning hit here]

As for Cliff, it's a damn shame he made that one bad pitch. He was filthy all night and had his curve working on point. As Manuel has said, when he has all of his pitches including the curve, watch out. Cliff's final line: 9.0 IP, 5 hits, 12 strikeouts, 0 walks. Filthy.

How about Lee's reaction after the game, sort of a "I don't know what to tell you!?" look to him. Look for the reaction at the very end of the video:

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