Game chat: Halladay, Hudson have at it in Atlanta

The Phillies are counting on Roy Halladay (3-0, 1.13) to snap their three-game slide when they continue their series with right-hander Tim Hudson (1-0, 2.84) and the Braves tonight.

Preview: Lately, the rotation and bullpen have been trending in opposite directions, with the starting five passing the bullpen in most categories, including ERA (3.66 rotation / 4.34 bullpen) and the number of walks-per-innings pitched (22 walks over 78 2-3 innings for the rotation, which leads the league, compared to 15 in 37 1-3 innings for the 'pen). Halladay is obviously the key to their success, averaging eight innings in his first three starts. ... While most of the bench is off to a quiet start, maligned-by-Beerleaguer reservist Juan Castro has been a pleasant surprise at short, showcasing a reliable glove and arm while going 8-for-25 (.320) at the dish. He's in the lineup again tonight, meaning recent call-up Wilson Valdez will again wait to take his first official cut with the Phils. ... Placido Polanco stayed ahead of Martin Prado for the National League lead in hits (23) by matching Prado's 2-hit night. With all due respect to Chase Utley, Polly's hot start is one of the stories of the season, and reminiscent of Raul's sizzling debut a year ago. With Jimmy Rollins reeling, the Phillies hope it will continue.

Injury updates: Brad Lidge joins Lehigh Valley for a rehab appearance tomorrow. Joe Blanton will start for Reading on Friday night.

Comments

[thePhaithful]

so the bighead steroid theories should be popping up pretty soon huh?

[jr]

After watching Reading the last 3 days don't see much help on the way. 3 day total 1 run 10 hits a zillion strike outs. Brown is out and Gilles managed to hurt himself,all by himself. Aumont,hard to gage,threw 91-92 but when hit was hit hard.
Flande probably looked the best,althoug he gave up alot of hits but only 2 runs,one thanks to his relief.

[MPNPhilly]

JW: Good analogy between Placido `10 and Raul `09. The bench, aside from Castro, is also in the same funk for precisely the same reason as last year: not enough ABs to keep them sharp. When you have a healthy starting 8 like the Phils do, that probably is unavoidable.

[GBrettfan]

Low scoring game? (At least unless our BP gets in the game. Kidding - well, half-kidding.)

[GTown_Dave]

jr: Remember, trading Cliff Lee for guys like Aumont & Troy ... er, Tyson ... Gillies was only meant to "... restock the Farm System". Rube never said they were gonna be able to contribute at the MLB level.

[Willard Preacher]

A zillion strike outs in 3 games? Now THAT is an impressive K/9.

[Phillies Red]

I have noticed that Polly has a bid dome piece.

[Phillies Red]

"big" that is.

[clout]

To follow up on Jack's point about the insistence of managers today that there must be a "closer," on the 1957 Yankees, 3 of their 5 SPs had saves. Five other pitchers also had saves. This was at a time when you had to face the tying run to earn a save so those were legitiomate high-pressure situations.

[yogurt]

Re bench woes:

Gregg Dobbs
April 2007 5/27 .185/.233/.296
May 2007 22/64 .344/.382/.656

April 2008 12/35 .343/.410/.571
May 2008 14/37 .378/.368/.514

April 2009 2/18 .111/.200/.111
May 2009 3/20 .150/.292/.300
June 2009 13/38 .342/.350/.658

seems as far as Dobbs is concerned if you give him the ABs he'll hit

[Jack]

Just like last night I thought Kendrick might surprise with actually a good start, I think Halladay might come down to earth a bit tonight. Hope not, but just a gut feeling.

[jhs]

After all of yesterday's Madson bashing, here some perspective. These numbers are 2007-2009 inclusive, for selected Phils:

Pitcher IP ERA ERA+
Romero 132.0 2.39 189
Halladay 710.1 3.08 141
Madson 216.0 3.13 141
Happ 201.2 3.21 134
Hamels 604.1 3.57 123
Lidge 195.0 4.02 109
Blanton 623.0 4.22 101

[GTown_Dave]

Great play by the Big Man! :-)

[John McGraw]

Re: Baltimore Chop. Somebody advise those two idiots on the TV broadcast Paul Blair and the 1960-70 Orioles have notjhing to do with the Baltimore Chop. I invented it over 100 years ago as part of my "Inside Baseball" strategy. Old Cholly manuel will remember. He used to carry my spitoon as a young boy.

And P.S.

That idiot Wheels never saw a game in Forbes Field. A fake, phoney fraud if there ever was one.

[GTown_Dave]

Run hard, dumbass. No Sorianos on this team.

[GTown_Dave]

Good hit, Raul! And for once the ground rule double bounce doesn't screw the Phillies!

[BobbyD]

Everybody hits.

I guess Charlie was lying again about getting his bench more work this year.

[BobbyD]

How many times din the past week have the Phillies had a scoring threat with the pitcher at the plate?

[GTown_Dave]

No outs. Runner on 3rd. No run. There's no excuse for that.

[GTown_Dave]

VIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIC!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Home Run Robbery!!! :-D

[Old Phan]

Brilliant play, Vic.

[NEPP]

What a catch!

[bay_area_phan]

Vic's catch is going to get a lot of air play tonight, after Halladay completes this perfect game.

[Old Phan]

First Rule of Perfect Games...You do not talk about Perfect Games

[GTown_Dave]

I wondered when Hudson would get around to giving Ryan an IW. Utley is now 4 hits shy of 1,000 for his career.

[NEPP]

Hell of a career so far for Chase.

[bay_area_phan]

Old Phan: Too many runners stranded already. This game smells like a loss.

Better?

[Old Phan]

BAP..that's more like it.

[kartracer]

I have a man crush on Halladay.

[bay_area_phan]

Is it my imagination or is Halladay an incredibly fast worker? Seems like he wastes no time at all between pitches.

[Old Phan]

Halladay just gets it done. He is a quiet master, and yes he works very fast.

[NEPP]

No, he's an incredibly fast worker...no screwing around, no shaking off Ruiz...just pitch after pitch after pitch.

[Spitz]

Its amazing how infrequently he shakes off Ruiz. He is confident that he can throw any pitch at any time for a strike, and he shows it.

[Shawn]

scrub heyward got so cuttered.

[Murgatroid]

They just showed Hudson's career stats on the Braves' network. They're almost identical to Halladay's. I guess I shouldn't be surprised because he had so many good years with the A's, but I don't remember him being that good.

[GTown_Dave]

Way to jinx the no-no, b_a_p.

[NEPP]

Listening to Smoltz talk pitching is just fantastic.

[sifl]

What an awful pitch to Chipper. Can we just trade Halladay straight up for Lee?

[Anthony]

I'm only 24 and other than maybe Maddux and Pedro, I don't think I've ever watched a pitcher as good as Halladay. He's beyond nasty.

[Spitz]

Anthony - even though he hasnt done it for anywhere as long, Lincecum is just as nasty.

[NEPP]

Schilling and Johnson were both this good when they were on ARI.

Pedro in his prime is the best pitcher I've ever watched go.

[Hope SE]

Anthony, NEPP: Lefty (Steve Carlton) was as good as any on them. In his prime, year after year, on some bad, and then good, Phillies teams, he stopped 'em every 4th or 5th day for well over a decade.

[GTown_Dave]

The Phillies have apparently decided to improve their LOB situation by not getting on base in the first place.

[NEPP]

I was too young for Lefty. He was retiring when I first remember watching games.

[Old Phan]

Carlton was one of the best I've ever seen.

[NEPP]

Pedro was simply unhittable for 6 straight seasons.

A guy like Lincecum wishes he was as dominant as Pedro was in his prime.

[bay_area_phan]

The Phillies' offense is starting to piss me off. 5 runs scored in their last 3 1/2 games combined.

[phlipper]

This feels to me like one of those games that feel to BAP like a loss.

Of course, he does say that pretty much every game.

[phlipper]

The thing that impressed me the most about Doc, seeing him at the Bank, was the smoothness/effortlessness of his motion.

I still can't believe that the Phils went out and got this guy.

[GTown_Dave]

What, no love for Grover Cleveland Alexander? Kids these days ...

[NEPP]

Lincecum in 08/09: 173 ERA+

Pedro from 1997-2003 (7 seasons): 118-36, 213 ERA+. Simply ridiculous. He didn't lose. You stopped what you were doing to watch him work.

[NEPP]

Great play by Castro and Howard.

[phlipper]

Ha! I should have checked the earlier comments - sure enough, BAP posted one of his "feels like a loss" predictions.

[Spitz]

This Castro cat is working out so far...

[GTown_Dave]

Hot damn! What a play by Castro/Howard! :-o

[NEPP]

Howard was pretty impressive there.

[NEPP]

1408 IP, 1761 Ks, 315 BB. 10 IBB (in 7 seasons?!?) 5.59 K/BB ratio.

[bay_area_phan]

phlipper: This "feels like a loss" comment was actually said in jest, since Old Phan had just chastised me for being too optimistic. To be sure, their offensive performance tonight does have a very "feels like a loss" quality about it but, with Halladay pitching, I can't quite bring myself to predict a loss.

Actually, I've had 4 mid-game "feels like a loss" comments this year & we lost all 4 games. So my feelings seem to be pretty accuate this year.

[NEPP]

Just like we drew it up...too easy.

[Hope SE]

Lefty from '72-'84: 13 seasons with Phils; 270 innings average/year; 3.03 avg ERA. Don't know the ERA+, but it can't be too shabby.

[Spitz]

NEPP - no argument that Pedro at his prime was better than anyone else in this era. Somehow, in 2000, he lost 6 games even though he had an ERA+ of 291 and a WHIP of 0.737. That season was amazing.

[NEPP]

Is Howard the most athletic "big man" you've ever seen?

[LwrSlwrGeorge]

Can't see or hear the game tonight - following it on Gameday. From what I can read, Doc is effecient, to say the least. Anyone with an eye on the game able to give a bit better description?

[GTown_Dave]

Man, Howard is taking a beating tonight ... from himself. Beautiful, compact swing from Werth.

[BobbyD]

Ryno's body taking a beating tonight.

[NEPP]

Lefty's numbers are incredible...top 10 all time. Top 3-4 LHP of all time.

[kartracer]

grounder up third base for Howard, love it! Athletic plays at 1st, swinging bunts up the 3b line, scoring from 1st on a double and a nice slide... Howard is the man!

[Murgatroid]

The Braves play-by-play man keeps complaining about how we've had 3 "check swing" hits in the past two days. It's getting really annoying, especially since there have only been 2.

[BobbyD]

Werth, really?

[Doohickey]

So, why send Werth there?

[Old Phan]

Howard seems like he is in the best shape he's ever been.

[NEPP]

Doc looks likes he's "on" for the first time all year. Not that his first 3 starts were bad.

[GTown_Dave]

Sending there Werth might have prevented a DP.

[GTown_Dave]

... not that it matters, considering how poorly the bottom third of the order has been performing.

[bay_area_phan]

Yeah, G-Town beat me to it. If Werth stays on third, that's probably a DP and the inning is over. Which it is now anyhow.

[Doohickey]

Cholly needs to send Castro to the plate without a bat so he won't swing at the first damn pitch with men on.

[NEPP]

Okay...the Braves announcers are STILL whining about the check swing. Get over yourselves.

[Old Phan]

The Braves announcers are channeling Bobby Cox

[NEPP]

Anyone else get the impression that Doc let the lead batter on base just to give himself a challenge there?

[Old Phan]

Doc-66 pitches in 6 innings.

[NEPP]

Wilson Valdez?

No dropoff there.

[GTown_Dave]

Old Phan: 66-6, eh? Well, now we know where Doc gets his skillz.

Dammit. Now Polanco is hurt.

[Dukes]

What happened to Polanco? Just turned on the game...

[Old Phan]

Mr. Placid-Left elbow contusion

[GTown_Dave]

Polanco: Left Elbow Contusion.

[bay_area_phan]

Meet the left side of your infield: Wilson Valdez & Juan Castro.

[Voice of Reason]

watching gamecast -- why did polanco get replaced?

[Dukes]

is it official that nothing is broken or are they just saying contusion for now and will know more later?

[GTown_Dave]

For those not watching or listening to the broadcast, Polanco was hit in the L. Elbow w/ a pitch early in the game.

[Mick in Houston]

Again, the Phillies batters have seen almost double the pitches the Braves have seen. 66 - 118.

They hit so much better when they are patient.

[NEPP]

Just out of Utley's reach...damn.

[LwrSlwrGeorge]

TY GTown

[NEPP]

Huge K there.

[timr]

Hallady has looked gassed here. Stuff getting hit hard, up in the zone. INteresting to see if he can get out of this inning.

[Mick in Houston]

And they still do that TomaHawk Chop, that is more than slightly racist.

[Old Phan]

Wow!

[NEPP]

I love Roy Halladay!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[George]

What a F@#$ING DP!?!?

[timr]

Beautiful play by Utley there. Wow!

[Zach]

Chase Utley YOU ARE THE MAN