P HILADELPHIA - So much for a slugfest. This was a pitcher s duel. Jeff Francis held the league s highest-scoring team in check, and the Colorado Rockies took advantage of one shaky inning by Cole Hamels to beat the Philadelphia Phillies 4-2 in Game 1 of their NL playoff series Wednesday.
Making just the second postseason appearance in the franchise s 15-year history, the Rockies played like October regulars. Colorado posted only its second postseason victory, the other coming in 1995. Matt Holliday, his chin still cut up from the face-first slide that won Monday s wild-card tiebreaker over San Diego, hit a solo home run.
Colorado carried over its momentum from that victory, and won for the 15th time in 16 games. Francis, a 17-game winner, pitched six effective innings and stayed out of big trouble, mostly by shutting down the Phillies top trio of Chase Utley, Ryan Howard and Jimmy Rollins.
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