The Philadelphia Phillies took Game 1 of the NLCS, relying on a struggling bat to get them past a Los Angeles Dodgers team that was cruising behind a masterful performance by starter Derek Lowe. That struggling bat was Chase Utley, who hit a two-run home run in the sixth inning to give the Fighting Phils a 1-0 lead in the series.
Lowe had been great to that point. He had gotten all but one of the outs either on ground balls or strikeouts as he employed a sinking fastball and a very sharp slider. But when Los Angeles shortstop Rafael Furcal began the bottom of the sixth with a two-base error on a grounder by Shane Victorino, Lowe left a sinker out over the plate and Utley turned on it and sent it into the right-field stands.
“He was able to pull the ball. He got out in front of it,” manager Charlie Manuel said.Just that quickly, a game the Phillies couldn’t seem to grasp was falling into their hands. When Burrell also got a fastball he could drive and put the Phils ahead, Dodgers manager Joe Torre was out of the dugout and Lowe was out of the game. Just that fast, just minutes after Lowe had seemed indomitable.
Maybe it wasn’t exactly like Gibson in 1988, maybe Utley didn’t limp haltingly toward the plate, but there was a concern about his physical status coming into this series.
Bothered by a sore left hip for much of the second half of the season, Utley was just 2 for 15 in the division series against Milwaukee. His regular-season numbers presaged the trouble he has experienced recently. He had 23 home runs and 65 runs batted in before July 1 and 10 homers and 39 RBIs after it.
“I think when Chase Utley’s hip is bothering him enough where he can’t play, he’s going to walk in and tell me,” Manuel said earlier this week. “He ain’t nowhere near there yet.”
Apparently not. At least not last night.“It’s all about trying to put some hits together,” Utley said last night. “We had a runner in scoring position and I was just trying to get him over. No matter what, I was trying to get him to third base. I squared up a sinker and it went over the fence. For Derek Lowe, it was up, but it wasn’t a bad pitch.”
The Phillies need their stars to shine in this series, unlike last year when they were bounced in the first round. Utley had been fantastic earlier in the season and had really struggled as of late. But great players rise to the challenge in these games and Utley did just that Thursday night.
