Phillies continue mini-offensive

TONY CINGRANI profiles as the kind of pitcher who often gives the Phillies' lineup fits. Lefthanded. Funky delivery. Or, as Ryne Sandberg put it yesterday afternoon, "Throws from his shirt-sleeve." So when Cliff Lee took a half inning to find his rhythm and the Reds made enough of the opportunity to push two runs home, you might have felt like you were about to witness a game that you had seen many times before.

Reality, however, had something else in store yesterday at Citizens Bank Park. By the end of an 8-3 win, the Phillies had hit four home runs, three of them off Cingrani, two of them to start the game. Understandably, this left their manager quite pleased.

"I thought we did a nice job against a lefthander who can be tricky and tough," Sandberg said. "He's a guy that has deception . . . he's a little bit funky out there."

In short, the Phillies of the last 48 hours looked nothing like the team that had been shut out in their previous two games, and in four of their previous 10. One night after getting six extra-base hits in a 12-1 win, they had five against Cingrani, including back-to-back home runs by Jimmy Rollins and Wil Nieves to start the bottom of the first, and an insurance home run by Marlon Byrd in the sixth inning.

The leadoff homers from Rollins and Nieves were particularly impactful because they erased the 2-0 lead the Reds built in the first inning as Lee searched for his command and Billy Hamilton wreaked havoc on the basepaths (Hamilton swiped his 15th bag and, later in the frame, drew a throw that saved teammate Chris Heisey from a rundown between first and second).

"When it happens to us, you want a shutdown inning, you want to put the other team down, and us coming back with those two runs is just huge," said Nieves, who was making the first start of his career in the two-hole, and whose solo blast tied the game at 2-2.

Things turned a little hairy in the seventh inning when the first two Reds reached base, the second of them Hamilton. After getting Heisey to fly out, Lee saw his lead flash before his eyes when Brandon Phillips stuck his bat out and lofted a soft line drive over a leaping Ryan Howard at first base. Had it landed fair, it likely would have scored Hamilton from first. Instead, it landed a few inches to the right of the first-base line. Lee then got Phillips to ground out to shortstop for the second out, and Mike Adams came in to retire Todd Frazier to preserve the lead. That lead then exploded in the bottom half of the frame when Byrd singled home Rollins and Cody Asche hit a three-run home run, all with two outs, and all off lefty Manny Parra.

"I know we're a team capable of doing this day in and day out," Nieves said.

The numbers indicate that there is some truth to that statement. Byrd went 2-for-4 and is now hitting .296/.337/.491. His .828 OPS is 11th among NL outfielders, better than both Jayson Werth and Hunter Pence. Asche continues to swing a hot bat with a .259/.344/.444 line; his .788 OPS is tied for third among NL third basemen with at least 100 plate appearances. Rollins has a .359 on-base percentage and a .428 slugging percentage for an OPS of .787 that is fifth among NL shortstops. Chase Utley's .946 OPS leads NL second basemen. Carlos Ruiz's .809 OPS is fourth among NL catchers. That's five positions where the Phillies are getting production that is better than league average, four of them premium positions.

Lee threw 116 pitches, 81 for strikes. Lee allowed nine hits and a walk in 6 2/3 innings but held the Reds scoreless after the first inning. He struck out three.

Cingrani struck out seven and walked three and was charged with four runs on seven hits in six innings.

"I think good at-bats are contagious," Asche said. "Up and down the lineup, I think you saw that the last 2 days."