Then, as his fastball control slipped away, he gave up two runs in the fifth, trying to throw even harder. He lasted three hitters into the sixth inning. Chase Utley singled and stole second. Ryan Howard doubled him in.
Then, into a swirling, punishing wind, Werth's triple made it 4-0 and ended Jimenez' day.
That's how it happened. When the ball was in the air, there was a chance . . . if centerfielder Dexter Fowler could maybe leap, pushing off the wall and up it (which he gracefully did) and come down with the catch (which he didn't).
In 5 windblown seconds, all of that passed over Jimenez' unlined, open face.
"I thought he hit it good. Then I saw Dexter running. I thought, 'He has a chance.' And he didn't catch it," Jimenez said.
"Werth thought it was gone. Everybody thought it was gone, including myself," Fowler said. "You get to the wall, you see the ball coming back this way [toward center] . . .
He felt it hit his glove.
"I almost thought I had it, for 1 second. Then I saw everybody else running, and I was, like, 'I missed it.' "
It was a rare Phillies hit off a Jimenez fastball. They couldn't touch it, generally. But, with a 3-1 count, Werth looked for it, and he got it, and ended the latest chapter in Jimenez' promising story.
Jimenez introduced himself to the casual baseball fan in 2007, when he started the clinching game when the Rockies swept the Phils out of the NLDS. Then, he was a 21-year-old rookie, option No. 3 on an upstart club.
Now, he's the No. 1 pitcher on a club that is expected to win. And he's 23.
Maybe, when he's 24, or 25, he won't start to overthrow his fastball when his foundation begins to crack.
