For 20 outs on Friday night, Mike Minor had the look of a pitcher ready to open the postseason, not just a seven-game road trip.
He out-dueled Cliff Lee and the Phillies to a 1-0 score and was one out away from making it seven scoreless innings when Darin Ruf singled and Cody Asche followed with a two-run homer on back-to-back Minor fastballs.
Lee dominated for the better part of eight innings – allowing only an Andrelton Simmons’ solo home run - and Jonathan Papelbon closed it to nail down a 2-1 win for the Phillies.
“I felt like it was one of my best games all year and that’s what (stinks) about it…. you get a loss and it’s because of you,” said Minor, who gave up four hits, struck out nine and walked one. “That’s what really kind of kills me too is I feel like if I’m going to pitch in the playoffs, I need to step up and I need to win these games.”
Asche and the Phillies did their best Braves imitation with a come-from-behind win (the Braves are second in the majors with 41). But the Braves’ magic number still dropped to single digits – nine – after Marlins phenom Jose Fernandez carved up the Nationals in a 7-0 win.
That was a little justice for the Braves, who felt Minor pitched more than well enough to win.
“He was dialed in tonight,” catcher Brian McCann said. “The only thing about that was the guy on their side was dialed in too. We knew it was going to be a pitcher’s duel coming into the game. The game was exactly how we all thought it would be; it was just we were hoping that we would have won 1-0.”
Until the seventh-inning sequence, Minor had bettered Lee by giving up only two hits on a pair of singles. Until Asche’s homer, no Phillies runner hadn’t reached second base.
“I came out there was attacking hitters, had all my pitches, throwing for strikes,” said Minor, who threw 71 of his 102 pitches for strikes. “Just brain lapse of just getting in a rhythm and just went after him again and threw one over the middle of the plate.”
By then, Lee had long found his rhythm. After giving up Simmons’ solo home run to lead off the third inning, Lee retired 18 of 19 batters. He struck out 10 to reach double-digits in strikeouts for the 26th time in his career.
When asked if that’s some of the best he’s seen of Lee, McCann said: “Nah, that’s the standard for him. When he gets locked in, there are not many pitchers better in the game. The way he just dissects a lineup is just second to none. Unfortunately tonight he was locked in from pitch one. That’s what he does.”
The Braves managed only two hits off Lee – the first a single by Chris Johnson in the second inning. After Lee hit McCann with a pitch in the fourth inning, he retired 13 in a row. Johnson, McCann and Evan Gattis all hit deep fly balls – Gattis for the last out of the game against Papelbon – but the park held them.
“One fastball I saw that caught the plate, I didn’t miss it,” said Simmons, who has two home runs in his past three games and 14 now on the year. “And after that he just went back to what he was doing which is just painting every single pitch, using his change-up, his cutter. He didn’t give us much to hit.”
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