Phillies not talking about Lee-Victorino confrontation
News blogs, sports blogs, entertainment blogs, and more from Philly.com, The Philadelphia Inquirer and the Philadelphia Daily News.
Phillies not talking about Lee-Victorino confrontation
Bob Brookover, Inquirer Baseball Columnist
ST. LOUIS -- If it's true that winning cures all, then the Phillies' 5-3, 10-inning win over the St. Louis Cardinals Friday night certainly served as a nice Band-Aid for the controversy that stirred in the visiting team's dugout at Busch Stadium.
Center fielder Shane Victorino and right fielder Hunter Pence each lost balls in the twilight during the bottom of the fourth inning, leading to a run that gave St. Louis a 3-2 lead.
When Cliff Lee returned to the dugout at the end of the inning, the Comcast SportsNet cameras caught the pitcher in the midst of a heated exchange with Victorino.
"They had a little heated words, that's all right," manager Charlie Manuel said after the Phillies won for the second straight night in St. Louis and their third game overall. "Baseball is baseball. It's good sometimes. There's nothing wrong with that. It was no big deal."
Manuel would not reveal the context of the exchange between Lee and Victorino.
"They just didn't see eye to eye on something," Manuel said. "That stays in here."
Lee, winless in seven starts despite a 2.82 ERA, also refused to discuss the incident.
"It's going to stay between us," he said. "I'm not going to talk about it."
Victorino waved off reporters seeking comment.
The bottom of the fourth started with the Phillies' center fielder immediately losing a David Freese fly ball in the twilight sky. The ball caromed off the top of the center-field wall and by the time Victorino retrieved it, Freese was on his way to third with a triple.
Yadier Molina followed with an RBI single that gave St. Loius a 3-2 lead after they had been down 2-0.
Matt Adams followed with a routine fly ball to right field that Pence could not pick up. The ball dropped in for a single, but Victorino kept the situation from getting worse by gunning down Molina at third base for the first out of the inning.
"I didn't see either one," Pence said. "I didn't see his or mine. It's just that twilight time. There's a good 10 minutes a night where the ball and the sky look the same."
Lee escaped without allowing another run and ended up pitching seven strong innings. He was asked if he was frustrated by the two balls that got lost in the twilight.
"It happens," he said. "Obviously when you have two in one inning, it's tough to see out there. You don't see that very often. It was just a fluky kind of inning. Fortunately, we were able to overcome it and win the game."
Buy Phillies tickets 
Naturally Lee would be upset with Victorino for not catching that ball and Pence too later. The outfielders simply didn't pick up the ball in the twilight. Nobody's fault, it just happened and will do so in the future.— Slower- Victorino has saved Lee way more runs than he ever cost him over the years. Lee is just pissed at being winless and let it show. — Grapost
- I'm sure it's nothing but it shows the level of frustration by the starting pitchers.— Phillies2008WSChamps
- Agreed. Said this a week ago - that the starting 3/5 have to be absolutely apoplectic about the play behind them - Lee winless in 7 starts with exactly 12 runs scored behind him the most frustrated. Victorino himself looks lost at the plate - pop-up with two guys on, ground outs, etc. No 'power of Koi' there.
To lose one ball in the night sky is understandable; to lose two back to back is simply unforgiveable.
This dugout and clubhouse is starting to fester and mold - the international standard of mediocrity cannot be their goal, but it may be their fate if they can't add by subtraction - soon. And interestingly enough, Victorino may now be one of the first out in order to shake things up simply by the play, or lack thereof, and interaction with 33 last night.— 24sDad - 2 back to back unforgiveable? It actually confirms the fact that the twilight had a lot to do with them not seeing it. — LancasterLouie
- Victorino is known to have boneheaded plays here and there, whether it be missing cut-off men for no reason, distracting hitters while he is jumping around on 2nd base, etc. I don't think he's too much of a "deep thinker". In this instance however Lee was wrong to go at Victorino for what was an obvious ball lost in the lights, which was only reinforced by the ball that Pence lost soon after. Are Cliff's teammates now allowed to get on him when he gives up hits that cost runs? I'm guessing with the way Lee went at him so quickly probably reflects the bad reputation Shane has for his sometimes mentally lazy play. If the Phils get to the playoffs this year I hope Lee has a better effort than last years playoffs (and the year before with Texas).You could say that Lee has come up small and kept his teams from winning the World series in the last 2 seasons. I hope his teammates didn't get on him for that. There are plenty of times to be upset with Victorino and Pence for their defense. This game was not one of them.— Sewellmatt
- I think Lee was just giving Victorino some encouraging batting tips.— jtj06
- cardinals damn clever to situate the phillies in the field during the 10 minutes when the sky and ball look alike to pence.— bubba church & granny hamner
- Right--the Cards were so smart 170 years ago when coming up with the rules of baseball, requiring the visiting team to bat first, knowing that, when night time baseball would come into the league, the visiting team would suffer. Genius! — bluehaha
- This comment has been deleted.— Quixote II
- Or maybe this was just a blog entry put up to provide up-to-the-minute updates to curious fans and was posted at 1:24am. Where are they going to get lip-readers and a crack audio forensics team at 1 in the morning, you pompous, self-important jerk? — frankiej
- Victorino did make two good defensive plays in the game. He nailed a Cardinal at third on Pence's miscue and he played the late inning ball off the wall well, and threw a perfect strike to Galvis to nail Molina with what would have been the winning run. He kept his head in the game. I thought what was mouthed by Lee was, "you ate my Butterfinger". Shane on the otherhand vehemently denied it.— rockinrob
- I thought it was "You sank my battleship!" — The Teacher
- Victorino's lazy attempt to go after the ball after it hit the wall certainly didn't help.— twpman
