First Inning Haunts Lee, Phillies Can’t Catch Up

I wouldn’t even venture to say Cliff Lee had a bad night.  He had a couple bad pitches.  Lee’s final line was seven innings, five hits, four runs and seven strikeouts.  What really killed him was the two home runs he gave up.

The Phillies offense had 11 hits but stranded runners every inning.  They played catch up the entire game before finally losing 5-2 to R.A. Dickey and the New York Mets.

-Cliff Lee added two hits of his own.  He had three 2-hits games in 2011.  It was Lee’s first two hits of the season.  He had 15 hits last year; two of which left the ball park.

–Freddy Galvis hit his first major league home run tonight in the third inning of Dickey.  The rookie only has five hits on the season; two singles, two doubles and a home run.  Galvis also has the team lead with 5 RBIs.  His batting average is now above .200 (.208) for the first time this season.

-The Phillies had at least one runner on base in every inning.  They ended up stranding eight base runners; five of them were in scoring position.  Hunter Pence and John Mayberry Jr. each stranded three runners.

-As a team the Phillies struck out 11 times.  They are averaging six strikeouts a game which is slightly lower than their 2011 total of 6.31.  The Phillies are second to last in the Majors averaging just under three runs a game.  This was the fourth time in their first seven games where they scored two or fewer runs.  Not a hard equation to figure out.

-Lee surrendered three runs in the first inning.  He gave up only five first inning runs in 32 starts all of last season.

–Jim Thome collected his first hit this season.  Charlie Manuel had said getting his first hit would be important for Thome as he will be called upon to pinch hit throughout the season.

-Mets catcher Josh Thole was caught brain farting after Dickey laid down a sac bunt and was tagged out.  Thole must have thought the ball went foul because he started back to first base.  Lee threw to Jimmy Rollins who relayed it across to Galvis who tagged out a sliding Thole.

-This was the Phillies 208th consecutive sellout at Citizens Bank Park.