Another night devoid of clutch hitting for a Phillies team struggling to win on the road originally appeared on NBC Sports Philadelphia
NEW YORK — The Phillies won two in a row over the weekend in Atlanta but have now dropped three straight games on their NL East road trip, losing 4-1 to the Mets Wednesday night in another feeble offensive effort.
The Phils are 25-30, went 10-16 in May and have lost 17 of their last 22 games against the Mets.
They’re having a lot of difficulty away from Citizens Bank Park. The Phillies are 11-20 on the road and their pitching staff has a 5.52 ERA, third-worst in baseball.
They scored first Wednesday on an Edmundo Sosa solo home run to left field but Aaron Nola immediately gave it back, serving up a two-run shot to Mark Canha in the bottom of the third. Shutdown innings have been elusive this month. An inning later, Canha singled in two runs with the bases loaded and two outs.
Nola, like most of his teammates, has been inconsistent in 2023. He struck out a season-high 10 in seven innings in a win over the Cubs on May 20 and spoke afterwards about having felt in command of his full repertoire for the first time all season.
Then he was taken deep three times in Atlanta last Thursday and took another loss in New York. The Phils are 5-7 in his starts.
“They’re frustrated. They care a lot. They want to win,” manager Rob Thomson said. “Sometimes you try a little bit too hard, guys try to put the entire team on their shoulders. They’ve got to relax.”
It was another night almost devoid of walks for the Phillies’ offense, which has chased pitches at a higher rate than every team in the majors except the White Sox. The Phils have hit 56 home runs this season and 34 have been solo shots. They have one three-run homer (Alec Bohm on April 10) and one grand slam (Kyle Schwarber on May 20). That’s it. It’s a byproduct of a team that doesn’t take free passes.
“Everyone’s frustrated,” Trea Turner said. “It’s a matter of believing in ourselves, what we’re capable of, and playing better, getting the ball rolling. It’s kind of what comes first: having fun, playing better or both?”
Schwarber worked the Phillies’ only walk with two outs in the top of the sixth to bring the tying run to the plate in the form of JT Realmuto, who looked at a hanging curveball for strike one and chased the next two pitches out of the zone to tap out to third base. Realmuto has been in a huge rut the last two weeks, going 3-for-37 with 11 strikeouts, one extra-base hit and no RBI. He had hit .386 the previous three weeks. He’ll have Wednesday afternoon off.
The Phils had two on with two outs in the seventh but Turner also grounded out to third. He’s hit .193/.231/.348 in his last 38 games.
Their last shot came in the ninth when Brandon Marsh singled and Kody Clemens was hit by a pitch with one out to send the tying run to the plate for the third time in four innings. But Mets closer David Robertson struck out Sosa and retired Bryson Stott to end the game for a second straight night.
“Just got to find our stride,” Turner said. “We know it’s there. We know it’s going to come but we want to get this thing started and play better. It’s more frustration than anything. We’ve got a lot of talented guys in the clubhouse who can play better and we will. “
The Phils have scored one run in the first two games of this series. Kodai Senga and Carlos Carrasco had combined for 43 walks in 73 innings prior to the last two nights but issued just one in their 13 innings against the Phillies.
Salvaging a win in this three-game series won’t be easy when Taijuan Walker (4-2, 5.57) opposes Max Scherzer (4-2, 3.54) at 1:10 pm
The Phillies split their four matchups with Scherzer last season, homering three times in one of the games and pounding out 10 hits in another.
“We’re going through a tough time,” Thomson said. “I don’t think there’s a secret pill or anything we can take, they’ve just got to keep fighting, keep grinding.”