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Yes, I Watched The Whole Game

By Aaron Goldstein on 5.26.11 @ 1:50AM

The Philadelphia Phillies just defeated the Cincinnati Reds 5-4 in 19 innings.

I watched and kept score of the whole game. The game took six hours, eleven minutes to play.

The Reds actually took the lead in the top of the 10th on a Jay Bruce solo homerun. But Ryan Howard answered back with a solo homer to straight away center in the bottom of the 10th.

The game remained tied for another nine innings. The Phillies used all their available pitchers. So second baseman Wilson Valdez volunteered to pitch despite having never pitched professionally. He threw a scoreless inning in the top of 19th inducing two fly balls and an infield pop up with a hit batsmen thrown in the mix.

Poor Carlos Fisher. He pitched five and two thirds innings of great relief. But someone had to lose. With the bases loaded in the bottom of the 19th, Raul Ibanez hit a sacrifice fly off Fisher to score the winning run. Valdez ended up being credited with the win. I can guarantee you that when Roy Halladay took the mound at 7:05 p.m. on Wednesday evening no one thought Wilson Valdez would be the winning pitcher. He is the first position player to win a big league game since catcher Brent Mayne did so with the Colorado Rockies against the Atlanta Braves in 2000. And yes, I saw that game on TV too.

I was actually hoping the game would go 20 innings because this is the second 19 inning game I've watched on TV from start to finish. Back in 2000, I saw the Seattle Mariners beat the Boston Red Sox 5-4 in 19 innings. Mike Cameron homered off Jeff Fassero on the first pitch of the bottom of the 19th. Cameron, of course, is now a member of the Red Sox.

As for the Reds and Phillies, they have another game to play in less than 12 hours.

And now I must sleep.

View all comments (9) | Leave a comment

Clint| 5.26.11 @ 7:39AM

The Phightin's hitters are still workin' on gettin' their hittin' cranked up.
They can be World Series Champs again.

Dan| 5.26.11 @ 11:11AM

Clint, it's not going to happen.

Where's their run production going to come from. If you recall last year's playoff run, both Oswalt and Halliday LOST playoff outings.

One of their key and clutch performers they recklessly let get away from them, id est, Jason Werth.

They have the worst outfield in baseball, in the field and at the plate. And their management constantly puffs Domonic Brown as someone who is going to make us fans forget about Werth and all he could do for the team.

So for the Phils, all I see is wonderful pitching, ------------------------------------- which has NO room for error.

The Phils have scored less than three runs in roughly 25% of their outings this year. And they delude themselves that somehow the present injury-prone Chase Utley is going to step up and start driving home runs, ------------------ another thing that isn't going to happen.

When they lost Werth, his on-base percentage, his runs scored and his own RBIs, they lost the best protection for Ryan Howard possible, AND he was a right-handed power hitter in the lineup.

They're not going to go deep in the playoffs, I don't think they're likely to win the NL East, and they'll have to scramble just to earn a wildcard berth.

We're watching a slow-motion train wreck.

Clint| 5.26.11 @ 1:26PM

Utley & Victorino

Travis| 5.26.11 @ 12:10PM

Yeah but they are still leading the east wig much room to improve for the offense. It's not a matter of if but when they start hitting. The pitching is there we all know that. Dominic Brown is young and shouldn't be up yet. Not til mid way through the year but you work with what youve got. Victorino in the lineup with Utley back in the mix it could be a new team.
As far as them being the worst outfield. They are actually the best defense in the majors as of right now. I'm ok with the platoon in right field. Keep in mind the game two nights ago. A ten run outing is just a sign of things to come

Clint| 5.26.11 @ 1:28PM

There ya go Travis, Ya Beat Me To It.

BD57| 5.26.11 @ 2:26PM

Aaron:

Kudos to you for staying up for it all!!!

I checked out after the 11th.

Travis| 5.26.11 @ 9:09PM

And I think that today's outing against the reds showed we have offense building. A homer from utley was great to see, but who needs that when cliff lee is hitting base clearing singles and 2 run ground rule doubles with no out. I live in California in Giants country so I have to keep representing the phils on the west coast

Glen H| 5.26.11 @ 10:00PM

I heard this on the radio today:

The last player to start a game as a position player and end up the winning pitcher? Babe Ruth in 1921.

corey| 8.24.11 @ 6:03PM

i was sitting one seat behind the seat that Cammy's homer landed on in right field. Sat and watched the whole game. Had a feeling when Cammy came to bat, so I bent down to grab my vid camera & by the time I stood up, the ball was half way to its destination. I couldn't believe how many people were leaving the stadium in the 13th, 14th, 15th, etc innings. Did You Know, that Cammy actually came in the game in the 10th inning?? He ended up playing an entire game.