"That," Manuel joked after his virtual night off, "was great managing."
He said he could see from the first inning of the Phillies' 4-0 victory that Halladay had no-hit stuff. But knowing how seldom this kind of lightning strikes twice in a baseball season, it wasn't until the sixth inning that he started thinking his ace might get another one.
"After about the sixth inning, things got real quiet," said Manuel, "kind of like it did in Florida [for Halladay's perfect game in May]. People just stayed in their seats and sat there and watched the game. He went down in the dugout, sat in his chair and didn't say a word. Then at the end of the inning, he'd go back out on the mound."
The worst moment for the manager came on the final pitch of the win that gave his Phillies a seventh straight victory in the opener of a postseason series. Catcher Carlos Ruiz had to separate Brandon Phillips' swinging bunt from the Reds second baseman's discarded bat before throwing him out at first.
"I saw Chooch kind of groping for the ball and I was kind of pulling for him to pick it up," said Manuel. "If I'd have been catching, I'd have probably picked the ball and the bat up and thrown them both."
Manuel's last-second angst was understandable. Though he's seen almost everything in a baseball career that's spanned nearly half-a-century, two continents and nearly every job imaginable, he'd never witnessed anything like the performance that enraptured the 46,411 fans.
"Tell you what, I've been in baseball 50 years and that's the first time I've seen a guy throw two no-hitters in a year," he said.
A man who doesn't typically gush, Manuel's postgame review of Halladay's performance was as compact, effective and laudatory as the pitcher had been.
