Who's on first? That was just one of the problems

As soon as Ryan Howard was ejected in the 14th inning late Tuesday night, Roy Oswalt stood up in the dugout and sprinted to the clubhouse. He put his spikes on, grabbed a first-baseman's glove, and ran back through the tunnel.

Jayson Werth saw the grinning Oswalt emerge and stopped the pitcher.

"No, no, you're not playing first," Werth said.

After Howard was restrained by Placido Polanco and second-base umpire Sam Holbrook, manager Charlie Manuel stood on the field, seeking an explanation, and only began to contemplate what would happen next. It set off a series of bizarre events in what ultimately resulted in a 4-2 Phillies loss to Houston in 16 innings.

The game ended at 12:27 Wednesday morning, five hours and 20 minutes after it began. A day later, Manuel was exasperated. He said he stayed up late into the night, thinking about everything that had gone wrong. Then he woke up early and arrived at Citizens Bank Park about 10 a.m.

"When you lose like that," Manuel said, "the game sticks with you for a while."

The teams combined to use 43 of 50 available players. Fifteen pitchers threw a total of 533 pitches. It was the second-longest game in terms of time at Citizens Bank Park and tied the longest in terms of innings.

That only begins to explain what happened.

"It was definitely . . . strange," Ibanez said.

When Manuel sauntered back to the dugout, he looked around.

"I was thinking about who would play first base," he said.

The manager didn't know Raul Ibanez had played 135 career games at first. He thought about using Jayson Werth - who played one inning at first in 2007 - but Ibanez volunteered his services.

Oswalt exchanged gloves and grabbed his normal one. He jogged up the steps of the dugout and slowly trotted to left field as the remaining fans from the season's largest crowd (about half the original) stood and cheered.

The Phillies didn't have much of a choice. Beyond Oswalt, the lone remaining players were starters Roy Halladay, Kyle Kendrick and Joe Blanton.

"Halladay was not going out there," pitching coach Rich Dubee said.

Kendrick was already in the bullpen, preparing in case the game went so long that his services were required. So it was between Oswalt and Blanton. The coaching staff chose Oswalt.

"He might move a little better" than Blanton, Dubee said.

Manuel's first thought was to put Oswalt at first base. Heck, he already had the glove.

"I was looking for an athlete, someone who could catch a ball," Manuel said. "You have to put somebody there."

Manuel met on the top step with Dubee and first-base coach Davey Lopes. Some of the players, like Shane Victorino, walked onto the field but stayed near first base. No one really knew where they could end up.

"It was a mess," Werth said.

Ibanez took his spot at first base - for the first time since 2005 - and began tossing the ball for infield warm-ups. He was using one of Blanton's gloves, which was bigger than his. Right before the 15th inning began, Mike Sweeney ran onto the field and gave Ibanez his first-baseman's mitt.

"I figured the game glove had a better chance," Ibanez said.

Righthander David Herndon, a Rule 5 pick rarely used this season, began his second inning of work with the bottom of the Astros order due up. His first pitch was an 86 m.p.h. change-up that Jason Castro hit to left.

Roy Oswalt had never played outfield in a baseball game. When he was growing up, he pitched and played shortstop when he wasn't on the mound.

But there was that one time, when he was 12 years old and his dad let him play in the local softball league. Every weekend, as Oswalt remembers it, 12 to 15 teams would gather at a field in his hometown of Weir, Miss. (population: 500 or so). So that counts, right?

"We shag every day," Oswalt said. "A fly ball is a fly ball."

True. Yet Oswalt said as he ran to left field to begin the inning, he had more adrenaline than he ever has on a baseball field - except when he made his major-league debut in 2001.

Oswalt became the first Phillies pitcher to play in the field since Bill Wilson played third base for one hitter in the eighth inning on Aug. 6, 1971.

"There's a saying in baseball," Ibanez said, "the ball will find you when you're not in position. The ball found him."

Castro's lazy fly ball floated toward Oswalt. He settled underneath it and made an effortless two-handed catch. The fans went crazy. Oswalt smiled.

"I mean, it's just a fly ball," Oswalt said. "Everyone makes a big deal out of it. We catch 50 or 60 of them a day in BP . . . 162 games for 10 years, that's a lot of fly balls."

Fifty?

"OK," Oswalt said, "I'd say probably 20 at least a day."

The only stretching Oswalt did was soft-tossing with Victorino before the inning began. He twirled his right arm through the air to get the juices flowing.

"Shane actually walked over there and said, 'If there is a high fly ball, do you want me to come over and catch it?' I said, 'Hell, no,' " Oswalt recalled. "This is what I've wanted to do forever, throw someone out at the plate from the outfield. I was hoping it would be fairly deep so I could tell these outfielders this is how you throw it."

Manuel said he wasn't concerned about Oswalt, who is making $15 million this year and next, injuring himself. Kyle Lohse played three innings of left field for the St. Louis Cardinals earlier this season and later went on the disabled list.

"I never think of someone getting hurt," Manuel said. "You could say anything you want to. He's your star player, he's this, he's that. He can get hurt walking across the street. He can get hurt going to his car. He can get hurt getting out of bed."

The pitching coach thought otherwise.

"You get a little edgy," Dubee said. "But you can't take a fan and put him out there."

Of course, Howard's ejection meant Oswalt was now batting cleanup, which presented a problem for the Phillies.

After Houston took the lead in the 16th, Brian Schneider and Jimmy Rollins made the first two outs of the inning. Polanco walked, which brought up Chase Utley as the tying run. But on deck was Oswalt. Astros manager Brad Mills chose to walk Utley to bring Oswalt to the plate against Jeff Fulchino.

That, undoubtedly, conjured images of Mitch Williams swinging the bat on an early July morning.

On July 2, 1993, Williams hit the game-winning single in the second game of a doubleheader against the Padres. The lefthander drove in the winning run at 4:40 a.m. This side of Joe Blanton's home run and Brett Myers' walk, it is one of the more memorable at-bats by a Phillies pitcher.

Oswalt had a chance at one, too.

He expected Fulchino to start him with a breaking ball, thinking Oswalt would be "ambushing" him on a first-pitch fastball. Oswalt took and it was a fastball.

"After that, I was trying to survive," Oswalt said.

On the fifth pitch, he grounded weakly to third. The game was over.

Afterward, Howard didn't talk to reporters. He chose not to do so again Wednesday night. His ejection put the Phillies in a difficult spot.

If Howard is still in the game, Utley is not intentionally walked. He bats as the tying run. Then, if he gets on, it's Howard's turn.

Plus, in the top half of the 16th, the Astros scored a tack-on run when Ibanez dropped a relay throw that would have completed a double play.

The fans chanted "Let's go, Oswalt!" as the pitcher batted in the 16th. It was the loudest the ballpark was all night. It ended in surreal frustration.

"It was," Manuel said, "a little bit different."