Inside the Phillies: Cardinals bullpen was the key to victory

At some point during a baseball postseason, the story line is going to be about the bullpens, and Sunday evolved into one of those nights at Citizens Bank Park.

Twice during the regular season - once after the St. Louis Cardinals took three out of four games at Citizens Bank last month and again when the Cardinals clinched the wild-card berth on the final day of the season - Phillies manager Charlie Manuel gave his honest assessment of his National League division series opponent.

"They can hit," Manuel said. "They're a challenge for us. At the same time . . . at times they can be a little weak on defense, and the bullpen - they got talent in their bullpen; they got big arms - but they can be inconsistent. That's been kind of a weakness so far, but they do have a lot of talent, so you never know when their bullpen can be really good."

That's about as honest as a major-league manager is probably going to be here in the 21st century, and a Cardinals error by third baseman David Freese and a bullpen implosion led to a Phillies rout in Game 1. The Cardinals' bullpen ERA of 3.73 ranked 11th in the National League, and their 26 blown saves were the second most in baseball.

This, however, turned out to be the night when the Cardinals' inconsistent bullpen arms were good or the Phillies failed to step on the opposition's neck, as former Phillies manager Larry Bowa used to so colorfully implore.

Manuel also said this before the series: "We have to go in and play hard. It's pretty even."

Even is exactly what this series is after the Cardinals rallied from a 4-0 deficit and pulled out a 5-4 victory that stunned and silenced the crowd of 46,575, the largest in the ballpark's history.

The biggest unknown going into Game 2 was how Cardinals righthander Chris Carpenter would pitch on three days' rest for the first time in his career. He was dominant against the dormant Houston Astros during St. Louis' playoff-clinching win Wednesday, but it was immediately clear in Game 2 that this Carpenter was not that Carpenter.

Like Phillies ace Roy Halladay the night before, Carpenter dug his team a 3-0 hole in the first inning as the same two offensive heroes from Game 1 - Ryan Howard and Raul Ibanez - delivered again. Howard came through with a two-run single and Ibanez contributed an RBI single before the slumping Placido Polanco hit into a double play.

When the Phillies tacked on a two-out run in the second on the second double in as many innings by Jimmy Rollins and an RBI single from Hunter Pence, it appeared the Phillies and Cliff Lee were going to cruise to a 2-0 series lead and Cardinals manager Tony La Russa would be ridiculed for going with Carpenter instead of young lefty Jaime Garcia, who has glowing career numbers against the Phillies.

Carpenter lasted only three innings, but his final one was a perfect inning and a telltale sign for the Phillies.

Maybe the game changed the inning before when, under the guise of wanting to chat with Carpenter, La Russa went to the mound for a conversation with plate umpire Jerry Meals. Later, during a television interview, La Russa made it clear that he was less than thrilled with Meals' strike zone.

Did that make a difference?

All we can say for certain is that the strike zone appeared to be in St. Louis' favor the rest of the evening, with perhaps the most blatant case coming in the bottom of the fifth, when Chase Utley struck out looking at what should have been ball four to start the inning.

It would be too convenient, however, to blame Meals entirely for the Phillies' failures at the plate.

One night earlier, the Phils battered the Cardinals bullpen for five runs on seven hits after chasing Kyle Lohse from the game. They kept the pedal to the medal and celebrated an easy victory.

On this night, five Cardinals relievers combined to hold the Phillies scoreless on just one hit, with closer Jason Motte registering the final four outs.

At one point, the St. Louis relievers retired 11 in a row. The Phillies never got a runner to second base against the Cardinals bullpen.

The other relevant bullpen issue was that Manuel seemed tremendously reluctant to relieve Lee even when the lefty looked out of gas after 101 pitches and six innings. The manager said in the season's final days that he wanted to ride his aces as long as he could during the postseason.

On this night, he rode Lee one inning too long.

Allen Craig led off the seventh with a triple and scored the winning run on a single by Albert Pujols. When Lance Berkman followed with a hit, Manuel finally took the baseball from Lee.

The Phillies bullpen provided three scoreless innings after that, but by then, the damage was done and the series was even heading to St. Louis.