PHILLIES NEWS

Ever since the Pirates opened beautiful PNC park the Phillies have struggled to play their best baseball in Pittsburgh. Those struggles continued tonight. Even against Dane McCutchen, a pitcher who came in with an ERA over 11.00, the Phils could muster 2 runs on 6 hits through 5 and a 1/3rd innings. Meanwhile Cole Hamels went 7 strong, allowing just 3 runs on 5 hits while striking out 8. Yet, he found himself uncharacteristically trailing 3-2 when he left for the night.

From there the Phils had a couple golden opportunities against the Pittsburgh bullpen to pull even. In the 6th inning Raul Ibanez reached base on a fielder's choice and stole second to get himself in scoring position for Dane Sardhina, but Sardinha flied out to end the inning. In the 8th inning Jimmy Rollins blooped a one out double just in front of a diving Andrew McCutchen. Ryan Howard and Ibanez, after Werth worked a walk, each had a chance to knock in Rollins and failed with a strike out on a questionable pitch, and fly out respectively. Finally in the 9th inning Sardhina led off with a single, and moved to second on a successful bunt by Wilson Valdez. Ross Gload followed with a ground out to move Sardhina 3rd. So that left it up to Shane Victorino to collect the tying hit but he was called out on another questionable strike three to end it.

So the Phils fall again in Pittsburgh but they should be able to rebound tomorrow at least with Jamie Moyer on the mound. They've got to figure out how to piece together a decent lineup without Chase Utley and Placido Polanco. If Greg Dobbs could just find his swing again they would be okay but that's a big if. At this point Polanco is slated to be out 3-4 weeks while Utley will need surgery for his thumb and will likely miss 8 weeks. Considering he's only out for precautionary reasons, you would think Carlos Ruiz will be back before either them. So if they just hang in there for next couple weeks they should be okay after that with Carlos and Placido back in the fold. They may want to think out bringing in another infielder though. At any rate even with all the injuries they're still 41-36 overall and within 4 games of the top of the NL East. That's something to be proud of at least.