Don’t look now, but the Phillies’ offense has put together its best two games in over two weeks. They needed to be good on Friday night.
Interim manager Don Mattingly said pregame that his team knows it needs to “get it going a bit better” at the plate as the pitching was buying the offense time to get in sync. On Friday, it was the offense that uncharacteristically bailed out the pitching in an 8-6 win over the Chicago White Sox in the series opener at Citizens Bank Park.
“Up and down the order tonight, a lot of guys were getting hits,” Mattingly said. “We just kind of kept coming all night, but so were they. Tonight was one of those games where we needed it.”
“[Brandon] Marsh with the huge hit. I thought getting down early by two, and we strike right back to get in it was big,” the manager said.
The eight runs were the most scored by the Phillies since scoring 11 on May 15 at Pittsburgh. The offense put together double-digit hits for a second consecutive game for the first time since May 9-10.
The Phillies’ lineup tagged White Sox lefty starter Anthony Kay for six earned runs on seven hits in four-plus innings. The southpaw allowed just five earned runs over his previous 27 ⅓ innings.
However, the early offense did not allow the Phillies to cruise to victory. Once again, the Phillies found themselves in another close game, a recurring theme over the last two weeks.
The Phillies manufactured a pair of runs in the seventh to break a 6-6 stalemate thanks to a sacrifice fly from Edmundo Sosa and a wild pitch scoring Trea Turner from third.
Brad Keller and Jhoan Duran held the pesky White Sox lineup in check for the final six outs to secure the team’s ninth win by three runs or less over the last 12 games.
Brandon Marsh tied the game with a two-run home run in the second inning. Trea Turner gave the Phillies the lead on an RBI fielder’s choice before Alec Bohm smoked a two-run double past a diving Sam Antonacci in left field to make it a 5-2 lead.
“Marsh has a good swing number one. I think the experience for him, it’s really about gameplanning with lefties vs. lefties. He’s getting better at it and understanding what he’s trying to do against a guy,” Mattingly said.
Adolis García added another run in the fourth with his second homer in as many games. The outfielder has picked up a hit in each of the first four games in June, seemingly breaking out of a woeful 3-for-57 skid that plummeted his average below the Mendoza line.
“I think with him, it’s the fact he came in on the off day and hit,” Mattingly said about Garcia potentially breaking out of his skid.
“He started to get his feel back, and when you do something like that, and it works, and you start to get that feel, you kind of get back to yourself and forget what’s been going on. I’m happy for him. Not too many guys come in on off days to hit.”
On the mound, Jesús Luzardo was not extremely sharp in his outing, but he battled his way through six innings.
He gave up a pair of two-out runs in the second to put the Phillies in a 2-0 deficit while Randall Grichuk took the lefty deep twice. Derek Hill hit a solo homer in the sixth to make it a 6-5 ballgame.
The three homers allowed by the lefty were the most since he gave up three back on August 16, 2023, as a member of the Marlins.
“The home runs he gave up, I think he was ahead in all of those counts. They did a nice job against him,” Mattingly said.
“I always think he’s good. His stuff is always good. There’s times you are going to get hit and it’s going to happen to all of our guys. Jesus hung in there and kept going.”
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