Phillies starting pitchers have five of the 20 best games this season

The Phillies starting pitchers have been dominant.

Just how dominant? We can quantify it using a next level stat that rates a player’s game score. According to ESPN’s Top Game counter, five Phillies hurlers have had performances that crack the top 20. The Phils have played just 10 games. The rest of Major League Baseball has had 256 starts through Thursday afternoon.

So that means half of the Phillies’ starts make up 25 percent of the best starts in baseball this year.

Vincent Velasquez stands atop the list of game scores with a 97, earned Thursday in a 3-0 shutout of the Padres. He struck out 16 batters, walked none and allowed just three hits, all singles.

Jerad Eickhoff’s seven scoreless frames earlier in that same series cracks the top 10 (78), while Aaron Nola’s April 6 loss to the Reds (73), Velasquez’ six scoreless innings against the Mets (72), And Charlie Morton’s effort Tuesday (71) also make list.

The only starter without an entry in the top 20 is Jeremy Hellickson, whose ERA of1.54 makes up for his absence.

It’s plainly obvious that most of these scores will be bumped as the season progresses, but with the way the Phillies staff is performing new ones could emerge on the list as well.

Why haven’t these performances turned into wins? Well, the Phillies’ anemic offense is the No. 1 blame-worthy party. They have mustered just 26 runs in their first 10games. In contrast the Giants and Cubs each have scored 56 runs in fewer games, and 11 big league clubs have scored at least 40.