Inside the Phillies: Brown earns more playing time in right

WASHINGTON - We are now only one day away from what should qualify as the new normal for the Phillies lineup.

After Shane Victorino gets breakfast and a few more at-bats with double-A Reading Thursday morning, the centerfielder is expected to have dinner in Pittsburgh and join his teammates for the start of a three-game series with the Pirates Friday night.

It will be the first time this season that manager Charlie Manuel has had full access to the hitters he hoped would be available when the Phillies reported to spring training in mid-February. We'd like to report that this remarkable event caused Manuel to do somersaults and cartwheels in the visiting clubhouse, but a 2-1 loss to the lowly Washington Nationals in the searing heat led to a more subdued reaction.

"That's going to be good," Manuel said after his offense scratched out only five hits. "That's going to make us better. Just like when we got [Chase] Utley."

It took two months to reach this point, and three players have been given an opportunity to seize control of the right-field spot vacated when Jayson Werth opted for fame and fortune here in the nation's capital.

Fifty-six games into the season, we have a right-field winner.

His name is Domonic Brown.

The rookie did not get a chance to start against Nationals lefthander John Lannan in the series finale, but after he nearly delivered a go-ahead pinch hit off lefthanded reliever Doug Slaten in the top of the sixth inning, Manuel made it clear that he's ready to expand Brown's playing time.

"We didn't bring Dom to the big leagues to sit him on the bench," Manuel said. "We brought him to the big leagues to get playing time. Will he play every day? Probably not, because we're still going to monitor him, but eventually he will."

With the Phillies facing three righthanders - Jeff Karstens, Charlie Morton, and James McDonald - in Pittsburgh, Brown figures to get three straight starts against the Pirates. The Phillies will next face a lefthander when they open a homestand Monday against Los Angeles Dodgers veteran Ted Lilly. That would be a good time to give Brown his first start against a lefthander.

"He's going to play and he's going to play [against] lefties at times, too," Manuel said.

Brown is undaunted by the idea. In fact, he seems undaunted by everything.