Pitch Count

MAYBE it's just me, but there is something very wrong with Citizens Bank Park (and it's not the concession lines). Since when does the opening of a new stadium warrant the theft of another city's ballpark tradition? I'm referring to this sudden fascination with throwing visiting teams' home run balls back onto the field. Last time I checked, vines weren't growing on the outfield walls and the Phillies weren't playing home games at Chicago's Wrigley Field. Come on, people, the least we can do is be creative enough to come up with our own tradition.

8:05, Wrigley Field, Chicago. TV: Channel 17. Radio: WPHT (1210-AM); WUBA (1480-AM) Spanish. Phillies RHP J.A. Happ (8-2, 2.74) vs. Cubs RHP Rich Harden (7-7, 4.41) Phillies update: Happ grew up 2 hours outside of Chicago, spent 3 years at Northwestern, and lived in the Windy City in the offseason while preparing for a looming spring-training roster battle. Now, he returns riding the wave of the most impressive start of his career, a shutout of the Rockies in which he threw a career-high 127 pitches ... Happ's previous career-high pitch count was 112 ... Since replacing Chan Ho Park in the rotation, Happ is 6-2 with a 2.80 ERA and has held opponents to a .230 batting average.

Robert Person had his back turned when Larry Bowa emerged from the visitors' dugout in the bottom of the sixth inning yesterday. Like a quarterback looking to his right as a defensive end closes in from the left, the Phillies' starting pitcher didn't see it coming. He didn't see his manager shaking his left arm, motioning for lefthander Rheal Cormier from the bullpen. Person did, however, see the game immediately unravel for the Phillies after his departure. With a white towel on his head and a pained expression on his face, he watched helplessly from the dugout as the Boston Red Sox rallied for a 5-4 victory at Fenway Park.

SOUTH WILLIAMSPORT, Pa. - Alex Garbrick held Cumberland, R.I., to three hits before reaching his pitch-count limit, and Wyatt Koch added a key two-out RBI single in the fifth to lift Clinton County, Pa., to a 2-0 victory at the Little League World Series on Saturday night. A night after a tension-filled loss to Kentucky, the hometown favorites rebounded before another partisan crowd at Lamade Stadium. Rhode Island had the tying run at the plate in the sixth but didn't plate it and was eliminated.

CLEARWATER, Fla. - A tall, attractive woman stood in the shade of a beach umbrella on the third-base side of Ashburn Field clapping her hands while Pirates farmhand Luis Heredia went through the top of the ExtendedPhils lineup like a buzz saw. "Did you see my son?" Maria Heredia gushed. "He is only 16 and he has yet to give up a run this spring. " The poised, 6-6 righthander looked closer to 20 than 16. Somebody asked the mother of Luis Heredia if she knew he had just retired the Phillies' World Series-tested catcher Carlos Ruiz on a soft infield popup.

Pick off one batter, that's good. Pick off two, that's better. Pick off three? "That's phenomenal," Haddon Heights coach Eric Rosen said of the sneaky work of sophomore pitcher Nick Sciortino in Wednesday's Colonial Conference clash with Audubon. Sciortino pitched a five-hitter with 10 strikeouts as host Haddon Heights scored a 2-0 victory in a battle of division leaders. Sciortino also finished the game with a terrific defensive play, bouncing off the mound to field a chopper and get the runner at first by a half-step with the bases loaded.

The perjury case against Barry Bonds was put on hold for 3 months, with prosecutors telling a federal judge in San Francisco they plan to obtain a new indictment against baseball's home-run king. U.S. District Judge Susan Illston had told prosecutors on Feb. 29 to fix their original indictment because it lumped multiple allegations into too few counts. Illston said that prosecutors needed to drop some of the allegations from the indictment or add more charges. At a brief court hearing yesterday, Assistant U.S. Attorney Matt Parrella didn't say when the government will ask a grand jury for a new indictment.

J.A. Happ rarely loses, and the San Francisco Giants rarely hit. But on a night when the Phillies' offense again failed to appear, the Giants gave Happ his toughest game in more than a month. In defeating the Phillies, 4-0, last night at Citizens Bank Park, the wild-card contending Giants benefited from a shutdown debut by new acquisition Brad Penny. San Francisco has found uncommon success against Happ, who had his worst outing since he allowed five runs to St. Louis on July 24. An occasional loss from Happ is understandable, but manager Charlie Manuel struggled to explain an offensive slump that has lasted for more than a week.

Finding Dontrelle It was only one start for Dontrelle Willis, but it had fans conjuring up memories of the 2003 season, when Willis won 22 games and National League rookie of the year honors, showing the potential to be a superstar for many years. Pitching for Detroit, Willis allowed one hit in 6 1/3 innings against Texas on Tuesday night and picked up his first win since September 2007, while with Florida. Willis threw 100 pitches and left to a standing ovation at Comerica Park.

After finishing a homestand in which they lost nine of 13 games and saw their wild-card hopes suffer a major blow, the Phillies hit the road Tuesday night to begin a difficult 12-game trip. Manager Terry Francona hoped getting away from home would be a fresh start for his struggling team. It wasn't. The San Diego Padres, a team that will live to see the month of October, extended the Phillies' losing streak to six games by beating them, 3-1, at Qualcomm Stadium. The loss dropped the Phils 7 1/2 games behind the Chicago Cubs in the National League wild-card race, and put the club under .500 for the first time since July 3. With their playoff hopes rapidly fading, the Phils sent their ace, Curt Schilling, to the mound last night against the Padres Kevin Brown, winner of 10 straight decisions.