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Lee gives Phils a warm lift home
ATLANTA When all of the baseball poets sing their annual songs about the magical powers of Opening Day and also the arrival of the summer game, fundamental essentials types of nights they don't talk about.
The nights when the air rips through to your bone marrow, which makes it physically impossible to ever feel comfortably warm. The evenings when the mist reflects from the lights, creating an eerie Hound of the Baskervilles ambiance at times round the ballpark.
The occasions when the amount of people in the park could all drive their cars towards the park, leave at the same time and never create a ripple on the local traffic report.
This is not flowers and sunshine baseball that exist in towns around the West Coast. These are the nights which make the sport a grind and test a club's real character.
Throw in a nice, warm airplane waiting to take a group home to its own beds with a late afternoon game waiting the next day, and there is ordinarily a human element that kicks in.
On the other hand, Cliff Lee didn't look human on Thursday night. His eight innings of shutout baseball, holding the Braves to 2 hits and no walks while striking out eight gave the Phils a 20 win before 18,295 hearty souls on the 41degree drizzly night at Turner Field.
"It's still way early," Lee said. "We obviously might have enjoy having won all three. But the first two are behind us.
"All i was doing was looking to get a win under our belts. Hopefully, we are able to carry that into Philly."
Make no mistake: there's never a mustwin game on April 4,canada goose livigno parka. The sport follows the old "it's not a sprint but a marathon" formula that flows over 6 months. However this felt an awful lot just like a game in the Phils' needs to get,canada goose sale jackets.
Are you able to have imagined the panic level in Citizens Bank Park on Friday afternoon when the Phils were already three games behind both Braves and the Nationals using their top three starters all looking shaky in Atlanta?
For as much of a transition to some baseball town has had place over the past decade, there is still a football mentality that takes hold sometimes. Along with a goose egg against a division opponent might have looked really bad.
"Getting from here 12 is a whole lot better than going 03,parajumpers prix," Phillies manager Charlie Manuel said after Thursday's game.
When someone asked later whether it would help with the reaction at home on Friday,canada goose outlet, Manuel chuckled.
"Without a doubt, it will help," Manuel said. "We've got hope now."
Now, pressure continues to be taken off because Lee was simply masterful in mixing pitches and giving Braves hitters various appearances throughout the evening.
In reality, Lee is really a lefthanded version of what Roy Halladay is attempting to become in his reinvention. He is able to throw fastballs on the corners with pinpoint control, then unfurl a curveball which makes knees buckle.
After struggling with the first two innings at almost 40 pitches, Lee settled right into a nice rhythm after the third inning. Once she got the early lead within the second, thanks to a Ben Revere fielder's choice and a Chase Utley sacrifice fly, he was able to flow nicely right into a good groove.
"I was just throwing strikes and forcing them to swing their way on base," Lee said. "Obviously, it's nice to get a lead, and achieving a tworun lead doesn't cause you to worry as much about a solo homer (tying things up). But you still need to go out there."
Lee was this kind of pitcher for many of 2012 people just didn't recognize it, because the moments were lost in a string of nodecisions and toughluck losses that appeared to follow at just about every turn. Remember that Lee didn't get his first win of year this year until July 4 in New York.
If he pitches like this this season with a group which should have a better lineup from Nos. 1 through 8, particularly when they get Carlos Ruiz and Delmon Young in it come May then Lee could be in place to have a monster year.
"It's nice to obtain (the first win) taken care of earlier (than July 4)," Lee said.
The first is definitely the toughest. And because the layers of jackets were shed for shirts and ties to go to Philadelphia, you can tell this Phils team had passed its first test of the young season.
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