Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, October 14, 1993 TAG: 9310140249
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: PHILADELPHIA LENGTH: Medium
Tommy Greene outpitched Greg Maddux and the refuse-to-lose Phillies again outplayed baseball's best team to beat the Braves 6-3 in Game 6 of the National League Championship Series on Wednesday night and win their first pennant since 1983.
Dave Hollins, Darren Daulton and Mickey Morandini had two-run extra-base hits off Maddux, and Morandini had an even bigger hit that didn't show up in the box score as the Phillies pulled off the impossible and kept the Braves from their third straight World Series appearance.
Only the third team in major-league history to go from last place to the pennant in one year, the Phillies - 30-1 underdogs just to win their division - will play the defending champion Toronto Blue Jays in the World Series beginning Saturday night.
"We never felt that way. All year long we never felt like underdogs," Phillies manager Jim Fregosi said. "It's been an amazing year."
"Ya Gotta Believe" was the Phillies' theme when they last won pennants in 1980 and 1983, but who would have believed this?
Maddux was 15-2 since July 7, and he had embarrassed Greene and the Phillies 14-3 in Game 2. But he couldn't win the biggest game of the season. Now there's no season left for the Braves, whose 104 wins are the most for a non-pennant winner since the 1942 Dodgers.
Greene didn't make it past the third inning of Game 2, but on the biggest night of his life, he made sure the Braves wouldn't make it to Game 7, where they beat Pittsburgh in both 1991 and 1992. Fooling the Braves with off-speed pitches mixed with his hard stuff, he figured out every hitter but Jeff Blauser, who had an RBI single and a two-run homer in the seventh when the Phillies led 6-1.
It was a cataclysmic loss for the Braves, who talked of nothing but winning the World Series after losing there the past two years - only to end up with nothing.
The Braves ended the divisional playoffs like they started them 25 years ago - with a loss. They were upset by the destiny's darling New York Mets in the first divisional playoffs in 1969 and, this time, by an almost-as-big underdog while failing to become the first team since the 1942-44 Cardinals to win three straight pennants. The playoffs will become a four-team, three-division format in 1994.
Maddux was the NL's best starting pitcher, losing only twice in 18 starts and not allowing more than two earned runs in his last 14 starts. But he wasn't the same pitcher after Morandini, the Phillies' second batter of the game, lined a shot off the fleshy portion of his inner right calf only to be thrown out by the second baseman.
Maddux sustained a deep bruise and internal bleeding that required treatment between innings, and while he didn't noticeably limp, he showed uncharacteristic wildness for a pitcher who averages fewer than two walks per start, with the next six pitches out of the strike zone.
Maddux, 6-0 after Braves' losses since the All-Star break, walked Greene on a 3-2 pitch to start the third, and Lenny Dykstra, the only Phillie with a hit in every game, singled to right.
Maddux almost got out of it, getting Morandini - a career .359 hitter against him - and John Kruk to pop up. But Hollins, only 5-for-28 lifetime against Maddux, coaxed another walk to load the bases, and Veterans Stadium was rocking like it was 1980 when Tug McGraw was about to close out the Royals.
Maddux fell behind 2-1 to Daulton and had to throw a fastball. Daulton pulled it down the right-field line for a double, and Greene and Dykstra scored standing up.
Hollins would have scored, too, but the ball bounced over the wall for a ground-rule double, saving the Braves a run when Maddux got Jim Eisenreich to fly out.
The Braves finally got to Greene in the fifth inning when he walked Lemke, who scored on Blauser's two-out single. Blauser got him again in the seventh with a two-run homer, and Greene was lifted for a pinch hitter in the bottom of the inning. He allowed five hits, walked five and struck out five.
Mitch Williams, the Phillies' Wild Thing reliever, had taken three wild rides earlier in the series, but this ninth was smooth sailing with the fans taunting the Braves with their own Tomahawk Chop. He threw a pitch behind Bill Pecota only to strike him out a pitch later and touch off a sea of celebration around the pitcher's mound.
Fans streamed through the mounted police guard to hug the Phillies and motorcycle police ringed the stadium as Dykstra and coach Larry Bowa hugged, wrestled and tossed each other to the turf as 62,502 fans chopped, chanted and cheered the Phillies' fifth pennant-winners in team history.
Fregosi stayed in the dugout and didn't join the on-field celebration.
"It's the players' game," he said. "I was so excited. I just like to watch it. They played all year long. I just looked at their faces and watched them react."
Keywords:
BASEBALL
by CNB