Tough Times In The Desert

As good as the Phillies are, they are not going to win every series they play. So far this season, the Phillies have done an outstanding job of winning 2 out of 3games in their series, and this series loss against the Diamondbacks is only the second series they have lost all season. On Saturday, the Phillies did a nice job rebounding from Friday night's disaster and battled hard to earn a 3-2 victory. Nelson Figueroa did a very solid job of filling in for J.A. Happ. He pitched 5 innings and gave up only 2 earned runs. As good as Figueroa was, Jayson Werth was the hero of the night who hit 2 homers including the game winner in the top of the ninth. Rauuuuuuul also had a home run that tied the game in the 7th. There was not much offense on Saturday night, but the defense really held strong. The starting pitching and the bullpen both did their part to help solidify the win for the Phils. It was especially nice to see Raul Ibanez finally hit the ball. If he can get hot, he can really help energize this offense and help the Phillies score more runs. On Sunday afternoon, the Phillies lost a high scoring game by a score of 8-6. Kyle Kendrick got the start and was looking to repeat his strong performance last week against the Braves. He started the game strong by pitching 4 scoreless innings, but he ran into trouble in the 5th in which he gave up 5 earned runs. I think Kyle has the Cole Hamels bug, the inconsistency bug. He needs to string together some strong starts and start gaining confidence. On the offensive side on Sunday, Dobbs looked strong again by starting out the game with a 2 run home run in the top of the first. Wilson Valdez who is filling in for Juan Castro also had a strong offensive day with 2 hits. The Phillies offense battled hard in a back and forth game, but the bullpen just couldn't hold. For the Phillies, this is just their second series loss of the season. Looking ahead, the Phillies will face the San Francisco Giants this week and will send Roy Halladay to the mound on Tuesday. This will be a good early season test for the Phillies, and it will be interesting to see how they fare against a very good Giants team.