Philly riding high with Lidge rejuvenation show

Protecting that 8-5 Game 2 lead the other night, Lidge made Matt Kemp look helpless in one strikeout and then finished the game by making Nomar Garciaparra look as bad as you'll ever see a hitter look on another strikeout.

Towels were waving throughout the stadium like snow, cell phones were being held aloft to snap pictures and Lidge, who signed a three-year, $37.5 million contract extension with Philadelphia in July, was back doing what he was meant to do.

"Tough pitcher, man," Kemp says. "You can't really pick up the rotation of that slider. It looks like a splitty."

Big league hitters make their living by picking up the rotation of the red seams on the baseball, and then reacting. This way for a curve. That way for a slider.

But hitters find Lidge's slider as deceptive as a funhouse mirror. As Morgan Ensberg, Lidge's former teammate in Houston, told the New York Times' Tyler Kepner, what the hitter sees is a horseshoe-type pattern from the seams.

No rotation. And for most hitters this year, no chance.

"I couldn't pick up the spin," Garciaparra says.

Right-handers this season went 12-for-114 (.105) against Lidge. The Phillies were 79-0 in games in which they led after the eighth inning.

"When this guy came here. ..." Phillies broadcaster and former outfielder Gary Matthews says. "Most people don't realize, he came here with a good arm. That wasn't a bad arm. He only needed a change of scenery, like Manny Ramirez.

"The Phillies wouldn't be here if not for Brad Lidge. There's no doubt about it. He's the MVP, if not Ryan Howard. He's the glue who's held everything together."