Tonight, another disturbance stood to spoil Martinez's effort: Tim Lincecum, the San Francisco Giants' ace and reigning National League Cy Young Award winner.

This time, Martinez's pride and guile came into play as he outpitched Lincecum in a taut 2-1 win over the Giants.

And on a night when the Phillies announced Brett Myers would be activated from the disabled list tomorrow and could work his way into a closer's role, Brad Lidge picked up his 28th save.

Martinez, out of baseball until the Phillies signed him in July, was the Pedro of old, the three-time Cy Young winner, in front of 45,156 tonight - the 59th sellout of the season.

"Kind of flashes back from the good old times," Martinez said after going seven innings, striking out nine, and allowing five hits without a walk. "As you know, I don't have the same power I used to have, but I've always said it's not about power. It's about hitting the spots and knowing what to do with it."

Martinez never rattled, even after Giants leadoff hitter Eugenio Velez launched his first pitch of the game into the seats in right-center. Quite the opposite. The way manager Charlie Manuel saw it, Martinez simply gritted his teeth and clamped down on the Giants as the Phillies took two of three in the series despite scoring only three runs.

"After that home run, he kind of reached back and kind of got fired up," Manuel said after the Phillies stretched their lead in the NL East to a season-best 81/2 games. "Pedro has a lot of determination. Actually, Pedro is a little bit different person than I thought he was. He's a mentally tough guy, a gamer, and he's cocky, but in a good way. He definitely knows baseball and he knows how to pitch. He has a tremendous feel for pitching."

If it seemed like old times for Martinez, it seemed like last season for the Phillies as Ryan Madson shut down the Giants in the eighth and Brad Lidge got the save, but not before jangling the nerves of the stirred-up crowd. Lidge has three consecutive saves since blowing one at Pittsburgh last week.

Martinez said Velez's leadoff homer was a wake-up call. It appeared he wasn't exaggerating. After Pablo Sandoval's one-out double in the first, Martinez struck out six of the next seven batters and took command.

All he needed was a little offense from his teammates, who have scored 12 runs in the last seven games. That's all he got, but it was enough.

Jayson Werth sent a 3-2 pitch from Lincecum into the upper deck in left for his 30th homer to tie it in the second, and Ryan Howard got his 113th RBI with a double that scored Chase Utley from first with the eventual winning run in the sixth. Utley reached when he was hit by a pitch, and his mad dash to the plate was another example of his alertness.

"It was off speed, a curveball or change-up," Werth said. "It didn't do too much. It was up. It was a good one off a guy like that. He struck me out later on with a pretty nasty change-up. I was capable of capitalizing on a mistake."

In the ninth, Lidge struck out Sandoval and retired Bengie Molina before things got interesting. Randy Winn chopped a single between first and second and Lidge walked Juan Uribe. But pinch-hitter Fred Lewis grounded into a fielder's choice.

In the end, the night belonged to Martinez, who is 3-0.

"It gives me a great sense of satisfaction to be able to do this, to show I'm still able to do it even though I'm not 100 percent there," he said. "Physically, I'm very pleased with the way I feel. I'm very happy. I wasn't tired. I didn't lose anything [as the game went along]. I hope to now make it a consistent thing for me. I want to help this team, not only today but in the future. This is September already. I really need to get it all together if I'm going to be able to help this team. Tonight was a big step forward."