MLB Playoff Diary: Rockies at Phillies

By Nando Di Fino

The Journal provides minute-by-minute analysis of today’s Game 1 of the National League Division series as the Philadelphia Phillies host the Colorado Rockies at Citizens Bank Park. Guest blogger Nando Di Fino offers commentary on the game and the TBS telecast. Feel free to email Nando with questions or comments during the game.

3:19: Cliff Lee singles to shallow center for Philly’s second hit of the game. And on a 0-2 count to Jimmy Rollins, Cliff Lee steals second! Cliff Lee is now your stolen-base leader for the postseason.

3:17: According to the TBS radar gun, Jimenez just threw a 99 mph fastball to Pedro Feliz, who grounds out on the next pitch. Carlos Ruiz then follows with a groundout of his own. To give everyone a little more flavor for the game here, they just did the “from the dugout” interview with Jim Tracy, and Snap’s “I Got The Power” was playing in the background. So just click here between innings, and it’s almost like you’re there.

3:13: Carlos Gonzalez grounds out to end Colorado’s half of the third. Feliz, Ruiz, and Lee (insert your own “law firm” joke here, I respectfully refuse to) are up for the Phillies in the bottom half of the inning.

3:12: Dexter Fowler pops one up to shallow left — the direction the wind is blowing, by the way — and Jimmy Rollins runs it down for a great running catch as he crosses over to foul territory.

3:10: Ubaldo Jimenez, who hit .220 this year — fifth-best among NL pitchers — leads off for the Rockies and strikes out. They then cut to David Aldridge who talks about Ryan Howard’s work on his defense this season. The man who helped him? third-base coach Sam Perlozzo. For Orioles fans reading, there is the answer to your, “I wonder what happened to Sam Perlozzo” queries. He managed Baltimore from 2005-2007.

3:05: Raul Ibanez grounds into a 6-4-3 double play, and the second inning is over, still tied, 0-0.

3:03: TBS shows a replay of the double play, but doesn’t do the fancy close-up or anything, so there’s no in-depth analysis of what Ron Kulpa, the third base umpire, saw. After Ryan Howard strikes out looking, Werth rips a single for Philly’s first hit of the game.

3:00: After Hawpe pops out to shallow centerfield, Clint Barmes skies one to Jayson Werth in right for the second out. Yorvit Torrelaba tags up and heads to third, where he is thrown out by Werth. The replay appears to show Torrealba safe, but it looks like he may have lifted up a leg on the slide after beating the ball to the base, and that’s what could have gotten him. Stay tuned!

2:56: Yorvit Torrealba hits one down the third-base line, juuuust past the glove of Pedro Feliz, and gets to second base. It’s the third hit Cliff Lee has given up so far this game.

2:55: Just for the record, I like George Lopez, but after what TBS did with the constant “Frank TV” promos a couple years ago, I’m going to keep a “Lopez Tonight” Watch during commercial breaks. We are at: 1

2:53: Jimenez gets Chase Utley out on a called strike three to end the inning. 0-0 with one inning of NLDS action behind us.

2:51: Shane Victorino flies one to left, and it’s caught by Brad Hawpe, but not before he had to battle with three major factors that will be getting him all day long: the sun, the wind, and the loud shouts from Phillies fans in the stands.

2:50: Ubaldo Jimenez gets Jimmy Rollins to quickly ground out to second for the Phillies’ first out

2:49: Just FYI, the announcing team for this game is Brian Anderson (who usually works Brewers games) and Joe Simpson (a former major-leaguer who works Braves games). David Aldridge, who we all know and love for his NBA work, is doing the Craig Sager role as the reporter.

2:46: Atkins skies one to centerfield. Victorino moves around under it, kind of like when your hand is shaky in a video game and you control the centerfielder, but he makes the catch, and we are done with the top half of the inning.

2:44: Troy Tulowitzki kind of nubs one towards Chase Utley at second. And this is going to be one of these games. Utley can’t get to it in time, and Tulowitzki is safe at first. Utley fires a dangerous throw to third to try and catch Gonzalez, and the ball is dropped. Blocked, but still dropped. Runners are on the corners now for Garrett Atkins.

2:42: Helton grounds to Ryan Howard, who steps on first after doing a nervous little shuffle with his feet, then throws to second to try to complete the double play. The ball goes just past Jimmy Rollins’ glove, though, and Gonzalez is safe at second. He doesn’t advance on the throw.

2:40: Carlos Gonzalez lines one to left for the first hit of the ballgame. In a strange almost-statistic, former power-hitter Todd Helton, up next, had just two more home runs than Gonzalez this season—15 to 13.

2:39: If last night’s theme was “Favre,” today’s is going to be “wind.” They’ve already taken a solid minute to do shots of the flags and go over what the wind will mean. Fowler’s out carried a bit more than it would have without the wind.

2:37: And we are off. Cliff Lee’s first pitch on this Winnie the Pooh-esque sunny, blustery day is a fly out to right off the bat of Dexter Fowler.

2:18 p.m. ET: David Aldridge is on the scene in Philly for the TBS crew, and is reporting that there’s a wind advisory in the area with gusts up to 40 mph, sustained at 20-25. The flags at the park look like they’re on the moon, just totally stiff in one direction. Ryan Howard told him when the wind picks up like this, a pop up hit to him could end up by Jimmy Rollins.

So this should be fun. first pitch in under 20 minutes.

Pregame: Now that all the “one-game playoff” nonsense is over, it’s time to get down to what really matters: more “Lopez Tonight” promos.

Er, sorry. It’s actually time for Philadelphia’s defense of its World Series title, which begins this afternoon at Citizens Bank Park. Casual fans with no rooting interest in this game will have to decide which way they want to cheer:

On one hand, there’s the fun group of Phillies, who smoked a cigarette in the dugout as a tribute to longtime broadcaster Harry Kalas after he passed away in April, starred in an amusing commercial for a sporting-goods chain after winning last year’s title, and proposed to reality TV contestants in July. The Rockies, on the other hand, had a surge of historic proportions after the firing of manager Clint Hurdle—who led his own surge of historic proportions in 2007—in May, they boast a resurgent Jason Giambi on their bench (1.035 OPS, 11 RBI in 19 games since being recalled), and they make it hard to root against them, with the comeback stories of Jim Tracy, Clint Barmes, Mr. Giambi, Huston Street, and Jason Marquis. They are much less hyper-link-able, though.

It’s boils down to this: Phillies-Rockies is basically an Adam Sandler movie versus a Frank Capra film. Which feel-good route do you prefer?

Today’s game will pit Cliff Lee (7-4 3.39 ERA with Philadelphia), the Phillies’ prize trade-deadline acquisition, against Ubaldo Jimenez (15-12, 3.47 ERA), a hard-throwing righty who has given up just two runs in his 11 1/3 career innings pitched in the NLDS and NLCS. Which way will you cheer? Which way will the game go? Find out at 2:37 p.m. ET for our coverage of the game and the TBS telecast.