Game chat: Polanco out again in South Florida

Juan Castro, and not Greg Dobbs, will start at third against a right-hander.

Preview: Placido Polanco continues to battle soreness in his left elbow joint stemming from an April 21 plunking at the hands of the Braves. Polly, who reportedly will have an MRI Sunday, sits for a second-straight game as right-handed aces Roy Halladay (2-2, 2.22) and Josh Johnson (5-1, 2.43) square off in the second of three from Sun Life Stadium. First pitch is 7:10. Beerleaguer: Interesting situation developing among the third-base pecking order. Juan Castro, who is hitting just .237 against right-handers, starts at third over Greg Dobbs. Dobbs, who has had a miserable season in ever possible way, has just one hit in his last 25 plate appearances dating back to May 5 and is hitting .133 on the season. Wilson Valdez gets the start at short and will hit second for a second-straight game, so it appears that Dobbs, who was once this team's top reserve, has moved to the very end of the trough.

[Jump to the newest comments]

Comments

[BloodStripes]

These bench guys are bloody awesome.

Cmon Roy!!!!

[GTown_Dave]

Beautiful grab by Castro on that wicked short hop! :-D

[MG]

Dobbs doesn't make that play . . . As for pitch counts this is the kind of game (1-0) where you let your ace stay. Not the against the freaking Pirates up a few runs with a rested pen.

[johnnysanz3]

Death to comcast!

[Old Phan]

Yea, that Pirates game killed him.

[johnnysanz3]

Death to T-mac and Comcast!

[Lincoln Hawkes]

Yeah, I'm fairly disappointed in Franzke for saying that. One of the beautiful things about baseball is it's dichotomy of being the most logical and numerical of sports while also being the most superstitious.

And hell, half the fun of a, uh, game like this, is finding ways to talking about it without actually talking about it.

24/27

[BloodStripes]

Don't worry crew. Franske has jinxed it about 20 times. Nothing is gonna stop the Doc!

[bay_area_phan]

This game feels like a loss.

[MG]

Old Phan - No need to rehash. It was dumb then and still was a poor decision. Like using your best knives to chop a ton of onions. Just dumb.

[Old Phan]

It's impossible to not talk about it.

[Kool Earl]

holly shuit Haldday hs a prefect game after 8. 3 motre outs!

[bake]

Over a hundred pitches now. Charlie should go to the bullpen for the bottom.

[Scott]

Pitching gems becoming something of a Saturday night tradition...

[Old Phan]

A victory is more important than a complete game. Bring in Baez!

[Scott]

If we're not going to score again, let's make it a quick and quiet inning. Get Doc back out there again in rhythm...

[MG]

You know this is a very well-pitched game when . . . 1 BBs and 17 Ks through 16 IP pitched, over 65% strikes with a bunch of swing & misses and first-pitch strikes.

You won't see a better pitched game all year. Love watching this kind of game. Too guys who are really good doing their thing.

[clout]

Pretty good game so far by Halladay, but his 64/39 strike/ball ratio could be better.

[bay_area_phan]

"If we're not going to score again, let's make it a quick and quiet inning."

The Phillies have that part of the equation down pat.

[GTown_Dave]

Old Phan: Baez is never an ingredient in my award-winning recipe for Victory.

[Lincoln Hawkes]

Of course you talk about it. Just without using a few very specific words.

[MG]

If people can't see the difference between bring at Halladay in a 1-0 game when he is only at 103 pitches, is cruising, and is on the verge of doing something historic vs. being down a run, at 121 pitches, and having labored the inning before I guess they don't watch much baseball.

[johnnysanz3]

Where the hell is contreras here?!

[BloodStripes]

Give 'em some more medicine Doc!!!

[Old Phan]

...gulp...

[johnnysanz3]

they're pulling out the stops now, bringing ex phillies in

[NEPP]

SIT DOWN!

[NEPP]

Not Paulino...not paulino

[MG]

Vintage Wes Helms PH. Called 3rd strike and a quick walk back to the dugout.

[LwrSlwrGeorge]

2......

[NEPP]

ROY HALLADAY PERFECT GAME!!!!

[LwrSlwrGeorge]

YES!!!!!!

[MG]

Nice play by Castro. Perfection! Only 28th game in MLB history.

[SmokyJoe]

Runs. We don't need no stinking Runs (OK, maybe just 1).

Halladay sure did help his WHIP.

[bay_area_phan]

Pretty good outing. But, man, is their offense putrid right now.

[philwynk]

Freakin' AWESOME.

[phlipper]

Yeah - but the Phillies could have had Cliff Lee.

[johnnysanz3]

yeeessssss, god dammit i go back to flyers game and chicago just scored =(

[MG]

Runs . . . who needs stinkin' runs when you have Halladay on the mound.

Fitting the last pitch was a cutter away.

[Old Phan]

Unreal!!!

[phlipper]

BAP - You didn't just complain about the Phillies offense after Doc pitched a perfect game. You didn't. Not even you would do that.

[Lincoln Hawkes]

The Doctor is IN!!!!!!!!!!

[BloodStripes]

Woooooooooooooooooooooooo!!!!

Yes Doc!! Phillies baby yeah!!!

[SEANOFDEAD]

WOWOWOWOWOWOWOW
WEEEEEWO

[GTown_Dave]

YES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! :-D :-D

[NEPP]

Cliff who?

[LwrSlwrGeorge]

One heck of a close-up of Roy's face during the last out. He never changed his look until he pounded the glove after the out was made.

This guy is unbelieveable.

[MG]

I have a feeling that marginal attendance tonight will creep up over the years . . . yeah I was at Sun Field Stadium for the Halladay perfect game.

[bay_area_phan]

MG: Those calls for the bullpen were jokes. Geez. I know people tend to take everything literally on Beerleaguer, but the intentional irony of those comments wasn't particularly hard to figure out.

[Murgatroid]

Yes! I was scared to death when Helms was at the plate. Charlie's decision to play Castro really paid off

[GTown_Dave]

On the other hand, the Marlins have become the second NL East team to be no-hit this season, & the Phillies have been on the verge of suffering the same fate a couple of times. This division sucks.

[vegas]

I love my iPhone!
A Halladay weekend!
What a down and up week!

[philwynk]

Larry Anderson points out correctly that exceptional plays by Valdez and Castro saved the perfect game. These two Beerleaguer-deprecated bench players are doing a fine defensive job for us (not to mention that both of these scrubs went 2-for-4).

I sure hope they post clips of those plays on MLB.com.

[Scott]

In his typical fashion, he gives the credit to Chooch for the game he called. The man is a total class act.

[MG]

philwynk - Castro made two plays (one in the 7th and that one to end it in the 9th) ranging to his left that Dobbs simply doesn't make. It really was the difference.

[bake]

Yeah, jokes, BAP, but with a nod to the brouhaha after Doc's 132-pitch effort two starts ago.

I do seriously wonder if his getting shelled and coming out early on Sunday did help him get his sh!t together. But I don't think you're going to hear him cop to that.

Anyway, sweeeeeet. Tomorrow's Moyer's turn :)

[LwrSlwrGeorge]

Pretty good outing. But, man, is their offense putrid right now.
Posted by: bay_area_phan | Saturday, May 29, 2010 at 09:24 PM

Good to know. I presume, b_a_p, that you will remind use that the pitcthing stinks when they win a game 22-21.

[Kool Earl]

BAP- you ar a whining wuss stfu

[NEPP]

Best game I've ever seen pitched. Thank you Roy....I mean, Mr. Halladay.

[clout]

Nothing better in baseball than a 1-0 game with 2 great pitchers.

[bake]

Too bad about that error. Has anyone ever pitched a 10-inning complete perfect game?

[NEPP]

Roy never plays the BoSox well...it wasn't a surprise that they handled him. Just like tonight is not a surprise. This is what a great player does. They come back and light somebody up after an off night. Roy just entered an elite inner circle. A great pitcher who ALSO has a perfect game. Yeah, its great that a guy like Dallas Braden got one too but this is so so much more cool as its always nice to see a potential HoF guy at his absolute best.

[GTown_Dave]

bake: Harvey Haddix pitched 12 perfect innings in a game in 1959 ... & lost.

[bake]

Ouch.

[Burt Lavallo, friend to all]

This has to be one of the weirdest baseball days I've ever seen. A perfect game, a pitcher knocked out by a line drive, a walkoff grand slam and then a celebration that injures the guy who hit it.

[Scott]

Thank goodness for that error. I spoke with my brother before the game and said that you just had to think there was no way Halladay would allow himself to be on the books for three straight losses. He did everything possible to bring us the victory.

[Lincoln Hawkes]

20 perfect games and we got two of them. Jim Bunning and the Father's Day Game, and Roy Halladay and the Stanley Cup game.

We might not have the most rings, but we can go toe to toe with anybody in history of the game.

[MG]

Thing that impressed me about Roy tonight the most:

- It was the way he used his 2-seem fastball & cutter to paint the corners. Just has a ton of movement and was every effective at keeping everything away from the left-handed hitters all night long & keeping right-handed hitters off-balance with a couple of called strikes on the inside corner along with a bunch of stuff away.

[philwynk]

GTown, I just noticed something about that Haddix perfect game that I'd never seen before:

The winning pitcher for the Braves, Lew Burdette, pitched a 13-inning shutout. He gave up 12 hits, but apparently they were scattered so there was no scoring.

Haddix and Burdette both pitched all 13 innings. Can you imagine what their pitch counts must have been?

THAT is a pitcher's duel.

[clout]

philwynk: Amen. Burdette was certainly around 175. I think Conlin wrote that Roberts pitched a 17 inning CG one time and estimated his pitch count around 300.

[GTown_Dave]

philwynk: No kidding! That has to be the (pardon the term) Gold Standard of Pitcher's Duels, at least in modern MLB history. Check out this ridiculous bit of trivia -

Murphy (via Twitter): "Another amazing stat: Halladay's was 6th 1-0 perfecto in MLB history. And in all 6 the only run has been unearned."

[Scott]

Classy of the Marlins to be giving Roy the pitching rubber from tonight.

[MG]

Honestly this game should have gone extra innings two because Maybin really let down Johnson tonight. That was an easy ball he just completely misjudged & misplayed.

There really weren't that many well hit balls by the Fish tonight but it was nice to see the Phils played so well behind him defensively tonight after the last 4 starts where his defense had failed him a couple of times each game.

[GTown_Dave]

The Box Score from the game clout referenced. Roberts went 17 innings, giving up 6R (5ER), 18H, 3BB, 5K, 1HR. Mercifully, he also got the Win.

[MG]

20th perfect game and not the 28th as reported by TMac at the end of the game. Just yet another 'minor gaffe' that TMac makes repeatedly during a broadcast.

[GTown_Dave]

MG: If his head wasn't so comically large & round I'd say that TMac himself was a minor gaffe.

[MG]

Dave - Didn't hear the radio call with Franske but you won't hear the call with TMac blabbering away in Phils' broadcasts in the future.