Philadelphia Phillies defeat Houston Astros 5-4 in season opener – MLB Update
The Philadelphia Phillies put in a tremendous effort as they managed to beat the Houston Astros 5-4 in their opening day game at Citizens Bank Park, Philadelphia on April 1.
The first pitch of the 2011 season was thrown by Roy Holladay against Michael Bourn. It ended up being a strike. The season had truly begun.
Holladay had Bourn in the centre and his control was impeccable for the rest of the inning. He was flared out to Shane Victorino. Holladay was on fire as he got pitchers on hitters, looking fierce and threw breaking balls in the dirt. Angel Sanchez and Hunter
Pence were struck-out by him towards the end of the inning which obviously left the Phillies’ fans delighted. Holladay managed to excite the crowd with his shutdown innings in the very beginning of the season.
Fans were hopeful of Roy Holladay opening the season with a no-hitter, but surprisingly Bret Myers was the one to break it up with the flare of the edge of the bat that fell between Wilson Valdez and Jimmy Rollins. Roy had five strike-outs within three innings,
but Myers did not back down and matched him with zeroes.
Even though it does not seem so, Holladay is human and gave up a run. The Astros managed a few hits together. Angel Sanchez dribbled through and Hunter Pence hit a double in between the right-centre, which put up runner’s to the 2nd and 3rd
base with nobody down. Carlos Lee ran out to Wilson Valdez as he met Bill Hall who grounded out to Valdez. This is how the first run of the season was scored.
The Phillies’ hitters were not doing a good job in making Brett Myer work. Holladay had thrown 101 pitches in 6 innings and Myers needed only 46 to get through his five. Jimmy Rollins was apparently the only one who managed a decent at-bat in the game. He
grounded out to the third after working the count full. The Phillies concerns about approach at the plate were seen in the field as well and failed to impress. Myers did not strike any one out but got a couple of easy ground balls and lazy pop ups, that weren’t
much trouble for the fielders.
Raul Ibanez looked terrible at the plate when he was unable to keep his shoulder in and kept pulling off. Even though a simple mistake, it needs to be fixed as soon as possible because the lineup cannot afford starting off like he did last year. Valdez and
Holladay lead the bottom 6th. The game stood at 1-0 Astros.
Charlie Manuel turned to bullpen in the 7th innings after Holladay was out of the game after six. Romero faced Brett Wallace and was quickly pulled from the game after he gave up a base hit. David Herndon was called next with hopes that he would
induce a ground ball double play. Sadly, Humberto Quintero’s flare dropped and two were put on Brett Myers.
The Phillies took their opening day match over the Astros 5-4.
Tags: