May 03, 2016
Early this season, the Phillies have slapped together a 16-11 record despite a run differential that suggests they should be nowhere near that good. The last two nights in St. Louis didn’t help the run differential all that much, but they also won’t hurt where it counts, in the standings.
This team makes no sense, in a wonderful way.
Tuesday night’s game was a microcosm of the Phillies’ season so far. One night after losing 10-3 to the St. Louis Cardinals, the Phils knocked them off, 1-0. And as has been the case more times than not, excellent starting pitching was the reason.
"We've been on a pretty good roll," starter Aaron Nola said on the broadcast. "The Cardinals had some good hits last night and we came out tonight and played really well. Defense played well, and Howie's home run was really clutch."
We'll get to Ryan Howard later, because Nola was the story. He ran some deep counts, but his curveball was sharp as always. The Cardinals never really seemed to threaten the 22-year-old right-hander, who lowered his ERA to 2.93 and extended his scoreless innings streak to 20.
National League WHIP leaders
— Matt Breen (@matt_breen) May 4, 2016
1. Clayton Kershaw, 0.72
2. Jake Arrieta, 0.78
3. Aaron Nola, 0.83
4. Vince Velasquez, 0.89
MLB leaders in xFIP-, updated through today’s games.
— David Cameron (@DCameronFG) May 4, 2016
1. Syndergaard (47)
2. Kershaw (54)
3. Nola (64)
Philly may have themselves an ace.
Nola’s final line: 7.0 IP, 2 H, 0 ER, 1 BB, and 7 K on 111 pitches. And the distribution of outs was excellent:
| Out type | Number |
| Strikeouts | 7 |
| Ground outs | 10 |
| Air outs | 4 |
The only time Nola was in any sort of trouble came in the fourth inning with one (slow, Yadier Molina) runner on. Randal Grichuk lined a ball to right field that was slicing toward the corner, but Peter Bourjos made a nice running grab:
Bourjos with the gorgeous catch to save a run. pic.twitter.com/s9vHp9sH8M
— Phillies (@Phillies) May 4, 2016
"I feel like my command at times was good," Nola said. "As the game went on, I was getting behind batters a lot, 1-0 and 2-0. I had to make the pitch. I was trying to run two-seams low in the zone and trying to get them to roll over and I feel like I did that for the most part."
As Nola mentioned, the Phillies’ only run of the evening came on a mammoth 411-foot home run to right field off the bat of Ryan Howard, the 22nd of his career against his hometown team. Michael Wacha pitched eight strong innings for the Cardinals, and this was his only mistake:
✌️ #BigPiece https://t.co/tt6tL6THz8 pic.twitter.com/CUYgzbw1Yc
— Phillies (@Phillies) May 4, 2016
That was all the help Nola and the pitching staff would need. Like they have all season, the bullpen came in and shut the game down. Hector Neris and his unhittable splitter struck out the side and Jeanmar Gomez recorded his ninth save in as many tries.
That makes it six shutouts on the young season for the Phillies, which leads the majors.
Follow Rich on Twitter: @rich_hofmann
