The Phillies will send Roy Oswalt to the hill tonight as they look to close out the Cardinals in their best of five national league divisional series. The game will be on TBS on 6pm. If the Phils advance, it will be their fourth straight NLCS appearance. Oswalt is certainly a guy with a wealth of playoff pitching experience with a 5-1 career postseason record and a 3.39 ERA. While with the Astros, he also eliminated the Cardinals in 2005.
"It's funny, six years later and I'm kind of in the same spot," said Oswalt. "I'm back in St. Louis and trying to move onto the next round."
Oswalt last faced the Cardinals on September 17th, when he threw 7 scoreless innings and says he feels positive about this game and where he's at health wise right now.
"I feel like I can still compete," Oswalt said. "When you get to the point where you don't feel like you can compete, that's when you start doubting about pitching. I actually have a few more pitches than I did when I first started. I feel like I can do it another three or four or five years."
Lil Roy will be opposed by righty Edwin Jackson, who gave up five runs in five innings in his only career start against the Phillies (last season). Facing this lineup of lefties is never an easy task for a righty starter, which Jackson understands, but that doesn't mean he's afraid.
"They have a lot of depth in the lineup, and there's really no easy outs," Jackson said. "You just have to go out and be aggressive, but at the same time, you can't give them too much credit. You have to have confidence in your pitches, and at the end of the day, either you get it done or you don't -- there's no in between."