For the first two games of the National League Championship Series, the Dodgers will head back to Philadelphia, the site of a four-game sweep by the Phillies in late August that started a season-long eight-game losing streak for the Dodgers.
But memories of Philadelphia don't necessarily elicit negative emotions for the Dodgers, who were outscored 27-5 by the Phillies in that series. Because of the beatings they absorbed, the players say, they found out how much Manager Joe Torre believed in them. Or how crazy he was.
The Dodgers were outplayed by such a wide margin in Philadelphia that Torre called a team meeting in Washington, where they were about to start the next segment of their 10-game trip.
"You're going to win the division," Torre told them.
Um . . . OK . . .
"Where is this faith coming from?" pitcher Derek Lowe said he recalled thinking at the time.
But, Lowe added, "It was important to have our leader feel that way."
Because soon the players felt that way. They passed Arizona in the NL West, won the division title, swept the Chicago Cubs to win a playoff series for the first time in 20 years and punched their ticket to the NLCS, which opens Thursday at Citizens Bank Park.
Their faith in themselves will be tested again.
Before the NL division series opener in Chicago, the Dodgers said they weren't the same team that lost five of seven games to the Cubs in late May and early June. And they were right.
Manny Ramirez wasn't there in May. Casey Blake wasn't either.
The same isn't true of their previous encounters with the Phillies.
Ramirez was there. Blake was there.
The results were dead even, as the Dodgers won the four games at Dodger Stadium and the Phillies won the four at Citizens Bank Park.
What Torre might find disconcerting is how the Dodgers' pitching fared against the NL East champion Phillies, who secured their berth in the NLCS by beating the Milwaukee Brewers in four games in their division series.
Torre has long insisted that with or without Ramirez in his lineup, pitching will dictate the Dodgers' postseason fate. Pitching was what lifted them to their victory over the Cubs, as starters Derek Lowe, Chad Billingsley and Hiroki Kuroda combined for a 1.42 earned-run average in the three-game sweep.
