May 09, 2015
In front of another decent crowd of 29,373, the Phillies and Mets took part in the second pitcher’s duel in as many nights. Unlike last night, the Phils came up short and lost 3-2 on Saturday at Citizens Bank Park. Here’s what I saw:
He isn’t picky. Throughout his seven-year career, Mets left-handed starter Jon Niese has flustered the Phillies whether they have been a juggernaut or doormat. Coming into tonight, he was the proud owner of a 2.92 ERA in 129.1 innings pitched against his division rivals.
That dominance continued, as the Phillies just couldn’t muster almost any good swings against Niese outside of one inning that included a costly error. He threw seven frames while allowing five hits and two runs, neither of them earned.
One bad pitch will put a damper on Aaron Harang’s outing, but the Phillies have to be thrilled with what they’ve gotten so far from the man who turned 37 years young today. The birthday boy signed a one-year deal for $5 million and has been every bit the innings eater he was sold to be. Not only that, but he’s doing this with a 2.38 ERA and 1.01 WHIP. Tonight, he gave them seven strong innings and only surrendered two earned runs.
“Harang was outstanding,” Ryne Sandberg said after the game. “One high fastball that he’d like to have back but everything else was down at the knees and quality.”
Ruben Amaro, Jr. has both taken and deserved a lot of criticism over the years, but give credit where it’s due: It’s still early, but the Harang signing looks very prudent for the position the Phillies find themselves in.
Hoooo boy. Juan Lagares was 0 for his last 16 heading into his fourth at-bat of the night. I gotta say, if you have to be in that prolonged of a slump, there are worse ways to break out of it. The two-run shot proved to be the difference (along with allowing a hit to Niese), giving the Mets a 3-2 lead.
“Any other hitter in that lineup is probably taking that pitch,” Harang said. “But from playing with Juan before, I know he was coming up and hunting a fastball, trying to do anything to change that game.”
“It was supposed to be a cutter down and away and I just totally missed my spot,” Harang said. “You could tell by the swing he took, he was looking fastball, looking for something hard and straight. I think if I throw that down and away or it’s just a straight four-seamer it doesn’t run out to the barrel and I might get him to pop it up.”
P.S. This was an A+ bat flip from Lagares, especially with the unintentional comedy of it only being the eighth bomb of his career:
Did Juan Lagares just flip his bat?...... pic.twitter.com/glY2zFaiFY
— Jas (@JasDodic) May 10, 2015
This one was absolutely flying until both teams ran into some trouble in the eight inning because relievers — Luis Garcia for the Phillies and Alex Torres for the Mets — experienced some control issues. Both times, they were able to get out of bases-loaded jams via the double play. The twin killing of Carlos Ruiz in the bottom of the inning saved the game for New York.
“I had a chance to turn around the game and I didn’t get it done,” Ruiz said, despite getting some of the better swings out of anyone in the order all night. Sometimes you just hit a ball pretty hard right near the guy.
Playing in shallow right field against lefty Lucas Duda, Cesar Hernandez had an easy chance to end the top of the fifth inning when Duda hit a routine grounder right into that shift the Phillies employed against him. The second baseman didn’t make the play, and Ruben Tejada (another Met who has historically done well against the Phillies) scored. Coming into the game, the Phillies’ .979 fielding percentage ranked 25th in the majors.
“It looked like it caught the lip a little bit,” Sandberg said. “Unfortunate play, routine ground ball bouncing like that. That’s an out right there.”
“When you play the shift, it’s kind of tricky… sometimes you get caught between [hops],” Freddy Galvis said. “It used to happen to me a lot when I was playing second.”
Harang was able to escape a bases-loaded jam with no further damage, but that run ended up being pretty costly.
Only an inning after Hernandez booted that ball at second, Dilson Herrera followed suit on Ben Revere’s grounder. The only difference was that the Phillies, thanks to some clutch hitting by Jeff Francoeur and Ruiz, burned the Mets for two unearned runs.
Chase Utley’s brutal start to the season is well-documented at this point — There’s no way it wouldn’t be, with a zero as the first number of his batting average and 91 at-bats already under his belt — but Ryne Sandberg had another reason to keep him out of the lineup: His career numbers against Jon Niese are baaaddddd. In 36 plate appearances, Utley has three hits (all singles), two walks, and two HBP’s, which is good for a .194 OBP and .094 SLG%. With those numbers over a decent sample, you could make an argument that Utley should’ve sat even if he was scalding hot.
“No, not necessarily last night,” Sandberg responded when asked if he thought Utley’s at-bats on Friday were good. “Up until last night, he’s had good at-bats as far as hitting the ball hard but it was Harvey out there who has pretty good stuff. So it’s tough to gauge, even though he handled [Harvey] pretty well about a month ago.”
Ryan Howard isn’t quite on fire, but he’s been swinging the bat pretty well recently with a .421 average in his last five games. He also got a night off because like Utley, Niese has had his number. The Big Piece’s career numbers against the lefty are 29 plate appearances, four hits (one homer), one walk, a .207 OBP and .269 SLG.
“It’s a chance for right-handers to get in there who have some better numbers against Niese and the allow a guy like Howard to hopefully keep his stroke and stay hot going forward,” Sandberg said before the game.
In the ninth inning, both hitters got pinch-hitting chances against Mets closer Jeurys Familia. Utley singled up the middle (up to .109 now, don't call it a comeback) and Howard flew out to the deepest part of the park.
Cody Asche continued to do some work in the outfield before the game, as the natural speculation is that that top prospect Maikel Franco (hitting .342 with a frozen rope homer on Friday) could be called up from Lehigh Valley sometime soon to play third base… In a bit of a change of pace to the recent ’93 Phillies news cycle, Darren Daulton threw out the first pitch representing his foundation, which provides financial assistance for those who suffer from brain illnesses… Lakewood outfielder Carlos Tocci (.359 AVG) and Clearwater pitcher Brandon Leibrandt (1.80 ERA) were respectively tabbed as the Phillies’ Minor League Player and Pitcher of the Month for April… Down in Clearwater, top prospect J.P. Crawford continued his torrid start with two hits and a walk.
