Halladay's Up and Down Day Just Enough for a Win
Roy Halladay didn’t have his best stuff this afternoon against the New York Mets, but he didn’t need it. The offense finally picked him up, something we haven’t seen too often this year, in the Phillies 6-5 win.
Halladay was aided by a five-run third inning in which 11 batters came to the plate and chased Mets starter R.A. Dickey. Dickey lasted three innings, allowing six runs on eight hits, easily his worst start of the season. The Phillies are glad it came today, because this appeared to be heading toward a Mets series win early in the game.
Home runs by Jayson Werth and Raul Ibanez led the revival of the bats after a night off on Saturday. For Ibanez, his hot hitting continued as he moved his hitting streak to 16-games with a three-run blast off the batters eye in the third inning. Raul is hitting .407 during his streak, quite an impressive turnaround. Werth’s solo shot began the scoring for the Phillies in the second, as he lured Carlos Beltran into a collision with the centerfield fence. The ball carried and Beltran believed he had a beat on it until his face smashed into the wall, with the ball landing just over the fence.
Halladay was unimpressive, then super impressive, and then not-so-impressive as he gained his 14th victory of the season. Doc allowed two runs in the opening frame as the Mets showed some speed in the early going. He then cruised through the next four innings, at one point retiring nine in a row. In the seventh inning, his final, Doc ran into a heap of trouble as the Mets knocked him around for two more runs after he’d allowed a single in the sixth. It was not enough as Halladay was able to wiggle out of it. His final line of seven innings, nine hits, five earned runs, one walk and 10 strikeouts was sub-par by his standards. Still, it was enough for a win.
With the Braves beating the Giants 6-3, the Phils stay two back in the NL East but are now a half-game behind San Francisco in the Wild Card standings heading into an off day tomorrow.
