Roy Halladay Remains Unfixed, Phillies Lose 7-2

It was a big night for Roy Halladay, who had another chance to prove that he was Roy Halladay again, and go from a troubled former ace to a spectacular human specimen, transcending to a new level of human greatness in the course of four days.

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It didn’t happen, mainly because that’s not a thing that happens.  Mostly it was just walks and Mets runs and a hit batsman and all the other things that have become synonymous with Doc’s starts.

He threw a great first at-bat of the game, per usual, and it didn’t get better after that, per usual.  Much had been made over Halladay blaming Erik Kratz for his poor performance, and you have to assume that’s why Humberto Quintero was in there tonight.  It was not a good plan.

The second inning started the trouble – Marlon Byrd doubled with one gone, Lucas Duda was hit by a wayward fastball, and then John Buck homered everybody back into the dugout.  Lucas Duda singled in Daniel Murphy after he walked in the third, making 4-0.

Doc came out in the fifth, gave up a disturbingly immediate lead off double to Daniel Murphy.  This was exacerbated by Humberto Quintero’s mishandling of a pitch, sending Murphy to third because he was probably going to get over there anyway.  David Wright stepped in and singled him home.  What a cliche.

Chad Durbin started loosening in the pen, so that nobody’s vomit would come up so fast it would choke them.  Ike Davis singled, sending Wright to third, and that brought on the aforementioned Durbin.

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“Ruben Tejada battles back and comes up with a two-run single here in the fifth,” is a sentence Scott Franzke said after that, so it went pretty much how everybody on Twitter was envisioning.

It was the middle of the seventh inning – Matt Harvey still dominating for the Mets – when somebody showed up on Twitter to start a whole batch of rumors and theories and dumb ideas that won’t help anything.

“Just in case any of my fans or general managers of professional baseballing organizations are listening, I just thought I’d… I’d give a quick personal health update.”

So, with the “Roy Oswalt?!” blog posts on the way, Jeremy Horst set the ERA bar for the evening at 6.75.  He pitched two innings and struck out three, preceded by Chad Durbin, who pitched the fifth and allowed a hit and a walk.  Raul Valdes threw the seventh, allowing nothing but a K.

The Phillies offense did about as best as they could out there, getting on base, then spraying outs all over the place, managing to accidentally get Jimmy Rollins across the plate on a Ryan Howard sac fly.  In the bottom of the fifth, Laynce Nix led off with a walk, and then the rest of the hitters were inexplicably aggressive at the plate and all struck out.  

After a leadoff, four-pitch walk.

Eventually, the Phillies scored a second run, but how the hell does it matter.

When it all went wrong

Buck’s home run was the Big Run-Making Thing the Other Team Did Against Roy Halladay that crippled our hopes for winning the ball game AND hoping Roy Halladay is okay.

Hero

Scott Franzke, for telling Larry Andersen “Coldplay should write a song about you.”  A few minutes later he said “People probably hate us right now.”

Villain

Matt Harvey has the makings of a future NL East villain for years to come, pitching seven innings and striking out nine while allowing one run on three hits.  Now we know how people used to feel going up against Roy Ha–well, you know.

TBOH’s Thoughts