"We're going to fight and battle the way we have all season long," centerfielder Aaron Rowand said. "We've been behind the eight ball before. We just didn't get enough hits today."
That would be putting it mildly, which is also a decent description of how the Phillies' offense attacked Colorado starter Jeff Francis and the three relievers who followed him. Mildly.
"This team is not going to win many games only scoring two runs," leftfielder Pat Burrell said. "[Francis] is good, but we're pretty good, too. So the way I see it, we didn't make the adjustments in time. There's no excuses this time of year. We've just got to do a better job, period."
A fine suggestion. Otherwise, a postseason that took 14 years to reach could be over in the space of four days.
Yesterday's losing clubhouse was the last opportunity for the Phillies to pick their way deftly through the easy path of clichés and avoid the minefield they are laying for themselves.
After just one game of a playoff series, even if it is the hurry-up world of baseball's division series, there are no absolutes or musts or gottas. There is only the need to do a better job, to scratch and claw, to do what got them here.
At the same hour today, however, if the first loss is followed by a second, the mood and the language of the locker room will change. Lose two games at home in a best-of-five series and brave talk is just a mealy substitute for dead air.
"It's a good thing we do have another game here" right away, reliever Brett Myers said. "That's why it's huge to have the home-field advantage. They took the crowd right out of it today. It's hard to cheer when we're down. So, we have to get them early."
Even for an offense as potent as that of the Phillies, getting on the scoreboard early in a 3 p.m. start is a must. By the middle-to-late innings, the shadows turn average pitchers into good ones, and good pitchers into Cy Young.
