Rays Step It Up in Game 2

Maddon's Unconventional Moves Pay Off As Tampa Bay Evens Series With Phillies: Rays 4, Phillies 2

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla., Oct. 23 -- The guy with the funny glasses, as Joe Maddon was widely known to the sports world before the Tampa Bay Rays struck it big this fall (and "the guy with the funny glasses and the mohawk" after they did), leaned on the railing in his customary spot in the near corner of the home dugout Thursday night and defied The Book for another nine innings in the World Series.

Maddon, the Rays' gregarious and erudite manager, has no problem with the book, lower-case. He did, after all, name-check Leon Uris, Pat Conroy and Dale Carnegie during his pregame media session that very afternoon. But The Book, baseball's unwritten code of strategy, might as well be a doorstop in his candle-lit office.

However Maddon makes his moves -- a flip of a coin, a Ouija board, or a democratic poll of his troops among the possibilities -- it is impossible to argue with success, and Maddon's unconventional tactics were almost never wrong in the Rays' 4-2 win over the clutchless Philadelphia Phillies in Game 2 at Tropicana Field, which swelled and shook beneath 40,843 cowbell-wielding fans.

"This is how we play," Cliff Floyd, the Rays' veteran designated hitter, said. "I just hope no one has a heart attack out there. It gets so intense. Something's always going on with us."

Two games into the World Series, which is split at a game apiece as it heads to Philadelphia for Game 3 Saturday night, these things are apparent: The Phillies have a clutch-hitting problem (a staggering 1 for 28 with runners in scoring position in the series). Rookie lefty David Price (a seven-out non-save Thursday night) will have a large hand in the ultimate outcome. And Maddon is governed by no known orthodoxy.

Against the Phillies' pull-happy stars, Chase Utley and Ryan Howard, Maddon shifted his infielders around from pitch to pitch, as if they were halfbacks in the old Notre Dame Box formation. With his team at the plate in the fourth, a runner on third and one out, he called for a safety squeeze -- and when it didn't work, Jason Bartlett fouling away the bunt attempt, he called for it again. The second time, it worked, Bartlett getting the bunt down and Floyd crossing the plate with the Rays' fourth run.

"That's all Joe right there," Floyd said. "When I got the sign, I was like, 'You serious?' But these legs can still move a little bit. It was probably the first safety squeeze I've ever been a part of. But we scored a run on it, so it was huge."

In his handling of his bullpen to secure the final 10 outs, Maddon once again kept everyone guessing. He brought in his nominal closer, Dan Wheeler, with two outs in the sixth, in relief of starter James Shields -- who was working on a shutout at the time, albeit a shaky one, full of runners on base and danger narrowly averted.

Then, with two outs in the seventh, Maddon turned to Price, who, after first walking Utley, struck out Howard on an 89-mph slider to strand runners on first and second. Maddon left Price in the game to pitch the eighth, where he faced four right-handed hitters -- one of whom, Eric Bruntlett, homered to left.

"I was nervous -- very," Price said. "I usually don't even sweat out there, and my hat looks like I went swimming with it. [The World Series is] definitely different."

When Price jogged back to the mound for the ninth, he had a chance to close out the victory without having to go through Utley and Howard again. But a double by Carlos Ruiz, and a sharp grounder off the glove of Rays third baseman Evan Longoria -- ruled an error -- made it 4-2 and brought Utley and Howard to the plate one final time each, each representing the tying run. The situation might have been worse, except home plate umpire Kerwin Danley ruled an inside fastball missed Philadelphia's Jimmy Rollins, when replays -- and Rollins himself -- said it hit him.

But Price struck out Utley, and Howard grounded out to the right side -- directly into Maddon's overshifted infield -- to end the game. For the night, the Phillies were 1 for 15 with runners in scoring position, the one hit an infield single that failed to score the runner from second. This, after going 0 for 13 in their Game 1 win.

"I'm concerned about us hitting with guys on base," Phillies Manager Charlie Manuel said, "because it looks at times like we might be trying a little too hard. But we can fix that."

"They'll come," Phillies shortstop Jimmy Rollins said of the clutch hits. "We've done this before. I know we can work our way out of it."

In slow-starting Phillies right-hander Brett Myers, who never met a first inning he couldn't sully, the Rays had an opponent primed for a quick beating -- and a quick means of putting their Game 1 loss behind them. A leadoff walk to Akinori Iwamura and a single by B.J. Upton -- exacerbated by an error in right field by Philadelphia's Jayson Werth -- led to a pair of runs, both on RBI groundouts. Myers would last seven innings, but the damage was done.

"I gave them that first inning," Myers said. "Basically, I didn't do my job."

Shields, at 26 the elder statesman of the Rays' astoundingly young rotation, had something to do with the Phillies' offensive problems, performing his best work when the situation was most dire. In each of his last five innings of work, Shields faced situations with multiple runners on base, but each time he escaped, getting an assist from Wheeler in securing the final out of the sixth.

"I was concerned" about Shields, Maddon said. "They made him work for his outs. [He] worked his butt off to get to that particular juncture of the game."

Shields looked mystified, and more than a little miffed, when Maddon came out to yank him. But he ought to know as well as anyone that this manager is seldom wrong.