Phillies not talking about Lee-Victorino confrontation
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.
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 
victorino is a punk as I witness every year at spring training (including flipping off a 13-year-old girl trying to get his photo). my guess, is that he probably said something stupid to make the situation worse.— Dish- Cliff was just asking Vic "What would you do for a Klondike bar?"— verve
- You can't catch what you can't see.
- Would love to read Marknpt's rationale for Cliff Lee not getting the win last night, or at all this year, since clearly botched fly balls are something he can control
- Lee should cool it. He's getting $24 million a year.— farley
- No big deal just a "family" argument. Lee was just letting his anger and frustration of being winless get the better of him and taking it out on somebody else. It's something we all do sometimes at home and on the job. It happens more than you know during every season. It just happened to be in front of the cameras this time.— Grapost
I wouldn't put it past the Cardinals remotely turning those lights in a certain direction. Call it what you will, but they use every advantage at home. Don't tell me you forgot last year's antics. As for Shane, since the talk with the Blue Jays, our Flyin' Hawaiian has been looking JP-4 instead of ^JP-6. Coincidence??— Homersez- I think the twig blight was a big factor but I also think the lack of focus on Victorino and Pence sometimes in the outfield did not help the situation. Lee has a right to be very frustrated for the way the team has played behind him this year. Victorino is a bit of a hot dog and likes to play shallow to show his speed but he has lost a step or two and too many balls get behind him for hits. This also,played into his miss be ause he had to run back and then look up again and could not find it. Victorino, Rollins are way past their prime and Phil's need new younger blood.— cu2ny
- Homersez-exactly how are they turning the lights. Does the manager have a remote control in his back pocket? I think you may be wee bit paranoid.
Maybe they revolve the stadium so the sun is only in the eyes of the opposite team.— Smoothellc - This team is gonna be in the basement for years to come.— Bardock
- "By the time Victorino retrieved the ball...?!"
He never retrieved the ball. Was this reporter watching the game?
Pierre retrieved the ball and Lee might have thought Victorino shouldn't have given up on it after it hit the wall.
It does make you wonder if this ups the chances of Victorino getting traded. The team might not be able to afford both him and Hamels, and Hamels is THE most important cog of the future. Shane is a terrific centerfielder and they are so important. But he is a bonehead. The other night he killed a rally by swinging at the first pitch after the batter before he was thrown four straight balls! After, he said he'd swing at that pitch all the time, which shows he doesn't understand baseball. The fact that Charlie backed him on that shows that all that talk of a new approach this year was BS on his part.
Remember worst to first in 93? Who would have thought first to worst in 2012! Man, that window closed fast. And Utley is at least partly to blame for not being honest about his health and not working on his knees in the offseason. Don't be surprised if we never seen him play second again. Sad.— VicM - I read all the comments so far on this subject - none mentioned Lee's propensity to make mistakes in the strike zone. It is not a mistake here and there and he gets hit. It is back to back, back to back, and back to back mistakes. He has a nasty habit of compounding a mistake he just made. He can be going along great for several innings, hitting his spots and then he loses it and misses everything for several batters in a row.
This has been going on for years with Lee. Last year against Toronto and the playoff game against the Cards being the most notable. There have been several others with the Rangers and the Phillies.When he gets lit up. he gets lit up fast.
If Victorino is going to be called out for mental lapses, what do we call Lee's funks ?— candidly - CU2NY-Victorino may be a hot dog-but the idea of playing a shallow centerfield is not new. Far more games are lost because of dink and dunk hits that drop in front of the outfield than by balls hit over their heads. Many CFer's play deep because the lack the ability to go back on a ball.
On your other point-I feel it is a mistake to think of Rollins and Victorino as "well past their prime...". It is likely that both of them have at least 2-5 good years in them.
Both of them have been table setters their entire careers-they really never have been capable of carrying a team and the pressure of trying to do so has affected their performance IMO.
As the team has shown over the last couple of weeks-when they stay within themselves and focus on driving the ball-instead of trying to hit a home run they play better.
I feel we need both of them in the lineup because we do not have many players that can go first to third on a base hit and even fewer that can score from first on a double.— Smoothellc - Everyday players view Pitchers as "Specialists" and Specialists, "Should be seen and not heard" !— Kookiesboy
- When I watched the play, Victorino did see the ball late, but chose (perhaps wisely) not to slam into the fence, but then stood and watched as the ball headed back to the infield, presumably knowing he would not catch up to it faster than the leftfielder (I believe), to which Lee, already frustrated over lack of support and perhaps over his less than brilliant location, took exception, keeping in mind as well that Victorino is already pretty hyper and seems to run his mouth. All in all, no big deal and not a sign, as some posters portend, of deep turmoil in the clubhouse.
Few posters have mentioned the moxie of Valdes, who kept pounding that 89-90 mph fastball in on right-handed hitters, before going with a high fastball on the outside edge of the plate to fan Holiday. He looks pretty good and will give Bastardo a blow.
As for the play by Galvis, it looked like he took that ball from Victorio on the short hop before wheeling and firing a bb right on the money to Ruiz who, fortunately, is not one of those wiry, thin catchers, so survived being crushed by Molina, then smiled, although at the very least, he had to have the wind knocked out of him.— chuckw
