Burrell, Rowand Homer as Phillies Club Pirates
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Phillies starter J.D. Durbin went 6 innings on Friday giving up 3 runs on 4 hits and walking 2, but the Phils offense broke the game wide open with 4 runs each in the 5th and 6th innings against Pittsburgh lefthander Tom Gorzelanny and Pirate reliever Shane Youman. The Pirates made things closer scoring 5 late-inning runs on the Phils “dynamic bullpen trio” — Clay Condrey, Jose Mesa and Mike Zagurski but the Phils prevailed by an 11-8 score.
With the win, the 2nd place Phillies, who are now 9 games above .500 and have won four of last five, remained 3 games behind the NL East leading Mets who won and took a 1 1/2 game lead on the 3rd place Braves who lost and tied for the NL Wild Card lead with the San Diego Padres who also lost.
The AP report for Yahoo sports notes the contrasting sentiments of starter Gorzelanny’s frustration with his outing and Durbin’s satisfaction with the Phils’ win, his 5th win since joining the club ;
“This whole game I wasn’t hitting my spots,” said Gorzelanny, who shut out San Francisco on Sunday and had a team-high scoreless innings streak of 14 1-3 innings snapped Friday. “I made a bunch of mistake pitches and they took advantage of them.”
“You don’t have to be perfect,” said Durbin, who is with his fourth organization this season, having been waived three times. “Going out there and giving six innings and three runs, this team is going to win. It’s evident.”
AP recaps the scoring in the game;
Jimmy Rollins had three hits and scored three runs, and Tadahito Iguchi reached base three times, had two RBIs and scored twice for the Phillies, who had 16 hits.
Matt Kata, Ronny Paulino and Jose Bautista each homered for the Pirates, who have lost four of five and have the worst record in the National League (50-70).
The Pirates scored in the first inning when Nate McLouth scored from first on a Freddy Sanchez single to right.
The Phillies tied the game in the second on doubles by Rollins and [Pat] Burrell, who went 3-for-3 with three RBIs.
Sanchez drove in another run in the third on a sacrifice fly. He has reached base safely in 18 straight games.
Kata’s third home run of the season and first with Pittsburgh came while pinch-hitting for Gorzelanny and got the Pirates to within 5-3 in the bottom of the fifth.
Burrell’s home run in the sixth inning was the 1,000th hit of his career. The two-run shot capped a four-run inning and put Philadelphia ahead 9-3.
“It’s nice, but then you look also at guys that have 3,000,” Burrell said. “It’s nice, but it seems like a small number compared to some of the other guys.”
The Phillies also scored four times in the fifth. Rollins and Iguchi hit back-to-back doubles, and three batters later, [Aaron] Rowand hit a three-run homer to right-center, his 20th.
The fifth was the final inning for Tom Gorzelanny (11-7). The lefty had allowed as many as five earned runs only once since June 14, but Friday permitted five and nine hits with two walks in five innings, striking out three.
Paulino’s solo shot, his ninth, came in the seventh and Bautista drove in Jason Bay with his 10th homer and third in his past five games — in the eighth.
http://sports.yahoo.com/mlb/players/7770 Chris Coste had three hits and two RBIs for the Phillies, who had scored only nine runs in winning two of three games in Washington this week.
The Phils let a laugher get interesting in the late innings as reliever Clay Condrey gave up Paulino’s one out solo shot to centerfield in the 7th inning followed a single and a double putting runners at 2nd and 3rd base with two out. But he got Freddie Sanchez to gound out to shortstop to end the inning.
Then Mesa replaced Condrey to begin the 8th inning. With one out, he walked Jason Bay who was driven in on Bautista’s homer to leftfield. Mesa then got grounder to shortstop and fly out to center to end the inning.
Zagurski, who replaced Mesa to begin the 9th inning, gave up a single and a double and found himself with a none out and 2nd and 3rd base situation. McLouth and Sanchez each grounded to 2nd base driving in runs to cap the Pirates’ scoring.
For the boxscores and recaps on this and all of Friday’s games, click here.
Saturday’ game two is a battle of veteran lefthanders as 44 yo Jamie Moyer, going for his 12 win, opposes the younger 35 yo Paul Maholm. In Sunday’s finale, newly acquired Kyle Lohse faces Ian Snell.
Following the Pittsburgh series, the Phillies return home to Citzens Bank Stadium for 10 all-important games. It’s clutch-time as the Phils host the Los Angeles Dodgers for 3 games beginning Tuesday, followed by 3 games with the San Diego Padres next weekend, followed by a climatic 4 game confrontation with the NL East leading New York Mets.
For the scores, boxscores on all of Saturday’s games, click here.
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