With two outs and nobody on base, Maikel Franco saw three straight changeups from the pitcher nearly 20 years his senior. All strikes.
And then Bartolo Colon went with a high fastball, about belt high and 90-MPH, over the outer half of the plate. Franco swung through it.
The struggling Phillies third baseman then flipped his bat back to the dugout in frustration and prepared for another inning in the field.
Franco would finish the night 0-for-5 with three strikeouts. He's in a 3-for-30 slump.
The rest of the top half of Pete Mackanin’s ever-changing lineup was nearly as futile.
Thankfully for the first year manager’s sanity, the bottom half of the order did its part.
Freddy Galvis swatted a two-run homer early and then doubled to lead off the 11th. He scored the game-winning run on nine-hole hitter Peter Bourjos’ infield single with two outs as the Phillies avoided a sweep and handed the New York Mets a 5-4 defeat.
“I think that’s part of a good team – everybody has to do a little something,” Galvis said. “They’re pretty good hitters. Maybe the next game Maikel is hitting homers and doubles, Cesar (Hernandez) is getting on base. But, like I said before, that’s how we have to play – like a team. We have to help each other.”
While the top four hitters in the lineup went 1-for-18 with seven strikeouts, the bottom four hitters besides the pitcher, Galvis, Bourjos, Carlos Ruiz and David Lough, were a combined 9-for-18 with two doubles and a home run.
The 10 total hits gave the Phillies their first double-digit hit output in 15 games this season, the longest the team had gone without reaching double digits in his to begin a season in the modern era (since 1900).
Bourjos, who entered the night hitting .167 this season, was slotted in the nine-hole of manager Pete Mackanin’s lineup on Wednesday, behind the pitcher. It was the first time a pitcher didn’t hit ninth in a Phillies lineup since June 1, 1979, when Steve Carlton hit eighth and (future Mets manager) Bud Harrelson hit ninth.
Bourjos didn’t take it as a slight.
“You know what, I’d almost rather have the pitcher in front of me than behind me to an extent,” he said. “I kind of looked at it like that and stayed positive. I know I haven’t swung the bat well and that I’m better than I’ve been doing. … Tonight, getting a couple of RBI and helping the team win was nice. But obviously there’s still more work to be done.”
Bourjos was nearly robbed of an opportunity to drive in the game-winning run. On the pitch before his walk-off hit, Bourjos skied an 0-2 pitch down the third base line, behind the tarp. Two-time Gold Glove winner David Wright chased after it and nearly came up with a highlight reel-worthy catch, lunging into the crowd.
“You kind of expect him to make that play,” Bourjos laughed, “because it’s David Wright and he’s going to make the play.”
Bourjos hit the next pitch in the same direction – toward Wright – but deep enough in the hole that Wright’s throw wasn’t in time after going so far to his left to make the backhand stop.
“I didn’t feel comfortable until I touched the bag,” Bourjos said.
The Phillies didn’t just put a brief stop to the Mets stomping all over their backyard – the Mets have won 20 of their last 27 games at Citizens Bank Park – but they survived New York’s latest long ball attack.
The Mets hit two more home runs on Wednesday and clubbed 12 home runs in the three-game series. For a frame of reference: the Phillies have a total of 12 home runs all season.
The Mets nearly began their scoring on Wednesday with a three-run home run in the second inning, but it was ruled a ground-rule double with fan interference. The home runs the Mets did hit swung the balance in the middle of the game, after the Phillies had claimed their first lead of the series.
When Jeremy Hellickson took the mound in the fifth, he had a 3-2 lead thanks to a sacrifice fly from newcomer Lough (who also had two hits in the game). But three batters into the fifth, it was 4-3 Mets.
Hellickson served up back-to-back, one-out home runs to Yoenis Cespedes and Lucas Duda. Duda homered in all three games of the series, Cespedes in each of the last two games.
The Mets have hit 13 of their 21 home runs this season against the Phillies, and the last 12 of those in the last three nights. Heading into Wednesday, the 17 home runs the Mets had hit in their previous five games was the most they had hit in any five-game stretch in franchise history.
The Phillies, meanwhile, would just like to see a hit – any hit – from the guys they’re regularly counting on to get on base and drive in runs.
The four hitters atop their lineup – Odubel Herrera, Cesar Hernandez, Maikel Franco and Ryan Howard – were a combined 0-for-14 with five strikeouts before Herrera’s leadoff single in the 10th. He was left stranded on first.
The bottom half of the lineup would pick them up an inning later, though.
The other unsung heroes of the night: the Phillies bullpen. For the second straight night and the second straight Jeremy Hellickson start, the relief corps was asked to come into a game far earlier than normally expected.
Hellickson was not good. He allowed 10 hits in 4 1/3 innings. In his last two starts, he has allowed nine earned runs in 17 hits in 7 1/3 innings.
The first reliever up was Hector Neris, who looks more than comfortable in his second year in the ‘pen. He struck out six of the 10 batters he faced in 2 2/3 shutout innings and didn’t walk a batter.
“From his last two outings in the spring he showed real command and poise, and in the early part of the season, he’s been doing that every time,” Mackanin said. “We really like what we see from him.”
Dalier Hinojosa followed with two shutout innings. He struck out three of the seven he faced and also didn’t walk anyone.
Jeanmar Gomez survived a Travis d’Arnaud double and to pitch a scoreless 10th inning. In the 11th, Gomez struck out both Michael Conforto and Cespedes with the go-ahead run on second, turning the game back over to the bottom half of the Phillies lineup.
“It’s good to see Hinojosa back to what I think is his true form,” Mackanin said. “And Gomez did a great job. Those are the real positives we can take from this game, along with the win, obviously.”
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