After a rough road trip, the Philadelphia Phillies returned home to Citizens Bank Park.
With hopes of turning their fortune around, they brought back to Philly the issues they experienced. Struggling with runners in scoring positions, starting pitching allowing too many runs early, and the inability to get clean innings from the bullpen.
The Phillies started the game off hot with a 3-run second inning. However, the tides turned quickly, and the San Francisco Giants never looked back.
Taijuan Walker loses his form
One of the brightest spots of this early season was Walker’s performance filling in for the injured Ranger Suárez. Through his first two starts, he had a 1-0 record and a 0.00 ERA across 10.2 innings. Tonight was a mixed bag that resulted in a dismantling of his numbers. He fought his way through five tough innings, and while the second inning was the only one where he surrendered any runs, it was a nightmare of an inning.
Walker allowed six runs on five hits in the frame, including two home runs. His throwing error on what could have been a double play ground out came before either long ball was struck. What easily could have been a quick inning with minimal damage turned into the difference in the game, as Philly would fail to match that score. Rob Thomson said postgame that he felt they could have turned two on that ball.
“That changes the entire Inning. I thought – other than that one inning where he made a couple of mistakes, hanging cutter and fastball he’s trying to go in and left it out over the plate – I thought he pitched pretty good, stuff was good.”
To further how weird things were, Walker got ahead of hitters all night long. He faced 22 batters and threw a first pitch strike to 17 of them. That usually is a sign of a deep outing and quicker at-bats. However, he also had seven 3-ball counts that drove his pitch count up. Thomson added that Walker “saved the pen, he grinded through 5 innings, it’s good.” All-in-all, Walker finished with 99 pitches, 62 for strikes, and allowed all of his runs (6 total, 4 earned) in that second frame. He still has at least one more turn in the rotation before Suárez is ready to return.
Offense warms up, still not hot enough
Philadelphia’s offense was facing off against right-hander Landen Roupp to start things off. Roupp had mixed results through his first two starts – a four inning, three run outing at Houston, and a six inning, one run game vs. Cincinnati. He hadn’t thrown more than 83 pitches in either start.
After the first inning, Philly had Roupp reeling after throwing 36 pitches in the opening frame. An RBI double from Trea Turner, an RBI single from Nick Castellanos, and an RBI fielder’s choice from Max Kepler pushed three runs across, and the fans and the team were feeling pretty good about themselves. They were sat down in order the next two innings, failing to capitalize on the precarious position that Roupp found himself in. Roupp got better throughout the night and found his curve ball – a pitch that gave the left-handers fits all night. He finished with 101 pitches over six innings.
The Phillies offense would only get eight more base runners scattered across the final eight frames. One was a Castellanos no-doubter in the fifth to at least add another run to the Phillies’ box score, but the offense couldn’t capitalize when they needed to. They went 1-for-11 with runners in scoring position on the day.
In the fourth inning, Kepler led off by beating out an infield grounder for a base hit. Alec Bohm followed up with a double that was ripped off the Giant sign in left-center, roughly a foot from a home run. With men on 2nd and 3rd and no one out, Johan Rojas, Bryson Stott, and Turner went down in order as the Phillies failed to push across another run.
What could have been an early night for the starter and a chance to over-expose the electric Giants bullpen (1.82 ERA coming into the game, good for 2nd in the majors), turned into an uphill battle. At times, it felt like Phillies hitters were trying to get everything back at once instead of doing the small things they did in the first two series of the season.
Other Phillies Notes
Max Kepler showed a ton of hustle, something that Phillies fans will pick up on quickly. He earned an RBI in the first by beating out a would-be double play ball. His single to lead off the fourth was a big-time hustle play, as well. He led off the sixth with a double and showed some fire both on the base paths and in the field. That is a great way to acclimate yourself to the Philadelphia faithful.
Rob Thomson noted during his post-game press conference that the fourth inning may have been too early to pinch hit for Rojas, but that in the sixth inning, there was an opportunity to do so. He didn’t because Rojas had good at-bats vs. the relief pitcher, Randy Rodriguez, but that is worth keeping an eye on. After Marsh was given some days off from starting before the game, the Phillies manager confirmed he was not an option to pinch hit that early. Marsh did eventually enter the game as a defensive replacement for the ninth after Kody Clemens pinch hit for Rojas in the eighth.
Losers in four of their last five, the Phillies look to stop their early-season skid tomorrow night. They will send Jesús Luzardo (2-0, 1.50 ERA) to the mound to face off against Justin Verlander (0-0, 6.92 ERA). If they can win tomorrow, they will set themselves up with a great position to split or win the series. A split of loss would be the first time they didn’t win one series in a three-series span since July 12 through August 4 – a stretch in which they lost six-straight series.
Mandatory Credit: Eric Hartline-Imagn Images
