Congratulations to the Phillies, been a long time for that city.
Maddon seemed to out-think himself for Tampa. I can understand going with Balfour or Howell until they had a chance to pinch hit for the pitcher, but beyond that the moves made no sense. If he was going to let the pitcher hit for himself, he may as well have gone with Price right from the beginning! Send a pinch hitter up, have Bartlett steal, now you have a runner on 2nd with only one out rather than two - two chances to get a hit to score a run. Also, Balfour vs Jenkins and Howell vs Burrell seemed to be unfavorable matchups - in both cases Price would have been the beter choice.
One last comment, I don't know that Tampa Bay 'choked'. I would just say they were outplayed and outmanaged. Choked to me is an over used word to point blame when instead we should be congratulating the winner; the Phillies simply outplayed them, just like the Giants outplayed the Pats in February. The term choked should be reserved for true gag jobs, visible in the eyes and body language of the players and the actions of the manager - such as the '86 Red Sox or the Bartman-year Cubs.
