A Big Night Against The Mets
Phanatic Addict Saturday, April 30th, 2011
Let’s not go anointing Vance Worley as the second coming of Cy Young, but he sure was good enough last night to beat the New York Mets. Vance was erratic at times, but made big pitches when he had to, and was pretty effective. Worely went six innings allowing just two hits, and four walks. He struck out five, and didn’t allow a run. On 102 pitches, Vance threw 56 strikes, which isn’t exactly the greatest ratio, but as stated before, he didn’t allow a run, and that’s what matters. Vance has allowed just two earned runs over three starts in 16 innings as a starter in the majors. Worley had great mound presence through the night while working him out of a few jams. It was a pretty big night at the plate for Ryan Howard , who went 2-4 with six RBI. All six RBI came off the long ball. Howard smashed a 2-run shot in the bottom of the 4 th , and then a grand slam in the bottom of the 6 th . It was Howard’s 10 th grand slam of his career, and the 259 th of his career. Howard is now tied with Del Ennis for second place on the Phillies all-time home run list. The all-time leader is no surprise to anyone, Michael Jack Schmidt at 548. Anything is possible, but I’m not sure that Ryno is ever going to get to that mark. If it leads to a title and a few more rings, then I sure hope he does. There were a few other records set last night as well. Howard’s 27 RBI in April is a club record, and Placido Polanco smacked his 39 th hit in the month of April which is also a club record. Previously the record was 38 hits, by non other then Chase Utley who did it in 2008. The Phillies have feasted on Mets starter Mike Pelfrey who is just 1-3 with a 9.38 ERA at Citizens Bank Park. You can say the same for Saturday’s starter Jonathan Niese who will start against Roy Halladay on Saturday. Niese was bounced from his last start at CBP pretty early in a 11-0 loss in early April in which he also had the unfortunate draw of facing Halladay. The Phillies have now won 17 games in April which ties the franchise record. Today being the 30 th of April, and the last day of the month, gives them a chance beat that mark by one. Side Notes – Herndon – David Herndon has not looked good in his last few appearances. The Rule-5 pick of the Phillies in 2010 has given up 7 earned runs in his last four appearances. As it goes right now, don’t expect Herndon to come into a game when it’s on the line. Not until he figures things out . Injury notes – It looks as though a few Phillies on the injury front are making some strides. Most notably Jose Contreras will start throwing later this week, and Brad Lidge will begin a throwing program as well. Lidge still has a long road ahead of him, but this is a big step. Oswalt – RAJ seems to think that Oswalt will miss his next start, and said on Friday that the Phillies would consider flipping around the rotation with the off day on Monday. Brown – Domonic Brown has hit a couple of homers in his first few starts in Clearwater, and last night got two more hits. He is getting healthier, and the Phillies will have a decision to make with Domonic in the coming weeks. He’s hitting pretty well, so Charlie will surely be asking about for him soon. Likely though he’s going to head to Triple-A because he has seen pretty limited playing time. Brown only had about a week’s worth of at-bats in Spring Training before suffering his injury. Let’s be pals on Facebook! FOLLOW ME ON TWITTER!
