Carpenter completes the Phillies
Philadelphia Phillies banked most of his time to the timeless adage of baseball: pitching stops good good kick. He led them to 102 victories, most in franchise history. It would, they hoped, carry them to their second championship in four seasons.

But now, the Phillies finished, because the St. Louis Cardinals turned, that the guiding principle of the game. The Cardinals, who led the National League in runs scored, handled the Phillies' vaunted aces. They won the fifth game of their division series at Citizens Bank Park on Friday, because their own ace, Chris Carpenter, beat the Phillies in their game.

Carpenter sacked three-hit shutout to beat Roy Halladay and the Phillies, 1-0, and move to the NL Championship Series for the first time in five years. The Cardinals, who trailed the Atlanta Braves in 10 games in the wild card ½ race on Aug. 25, will continue its joy ride in Milwaukee on Sunday when they open the NLCS against the Brewers.

"All we can do is take our shot, and if someone is good enough to beat you, you little hat," said Cardinals manager Tony La Russa, who will manage in league championship series for the 12th time. "We have a good mix of talent, a lot of courage, a lot of heart."

Phillies struggled to find templates for an array of pitches Carpenter, burying one another in the dirt down into harmless groundouts. St. Louis pitching held the Phillies scoreless in 31 of the 34 final innings of the series.

Ryan Howard made last Friday, quietly ground a second base and crumbling about halfway to first base line, holding his left ankle in a seemingly serious injuries Achilles. Howard finished the series 2 to 19, he limped out of painful metaphor for the team, which finished its season in the fashion gradually Meeker: World Series loss in 2009, NLCS loss last season, and now defeated in the first round.

"Now I have anger," Phillies manager Charlie Manuel said. "I have an I-not-know. I just feel very empty."

This core is already the Phillies championship in 2008, but that was before the arrival of Halladay, Cliff Lee and Roy Oswalt, aces in search of his first call World Series. Adding jars have raised wages, and the fans bought every available ticket for the last two seasons and a half.

These Phillies have not got, like their predecessors, which makes them start to dominate. They were before the regular season, but not part of this series. Lee lost a 4-0 lead in Game 2, and blew a 2-0 lead, Oswalt in Game 4.

In Halladay, though, the Phillies began their most reliable pitcher, perhaps the best in the game. In a series of knife separation in October last year, Halladay is not affected the Cincinnati Reds. Last Saturday, he finished the game 1 victory on his retirement last 21 hitters.

But Halladay struggled in the first half of this game, allowing three runs and the game began with the same intensity. Rafael Furcal threw triple to deep right center, but Halladay was hanging Curveball to skip Shoemaker, who hit him in right field for a double.

"It was a terrible Curveball, but it was very good at-bat", Halladay said. "I threw a lot of pitches and really work. They went out of control at an early stage."

The Cardinals led, 1-0, and while they did not score again in the first place, they made their way through Halladay 32 steps. Soon enough, the cutter Halladay would have been cut and it would bite Curveball, and the Cardinals seemed to regret not adding to their lead.

But this assumes the Phillies would score from Carpenter, a former teammate of Halladay Toronto Blue Jays. When they were young, Carpenter said last week, they gathered together for a beer and talk about the mental side of pitching.

Both were winners of Cy Young, the master of his craft, and game five performance Carpenter - after allowing four runs in the first two innings Game 2 - left his friend in amazement.