Kyle Schwarber’s Walk-Off Home Run Completes Phillies’ Six-Run Ninth-Inning Comeback To Secure Ninth Straight Win
Phillies first baseman Kyle Schwarber celebrates his walk-off home run with teammates. Monica Herndon / Philadelphia Inquier
Kyle Schwarber has the first Phillies walk-off home run in three years!
August has been a much more pleasant month of Phillies baseball compared to the previous disaster that was July. Philadelphia entered the month just four games above .500, just clinging to a wild card spot in the National League and eight games back of the Braves for the top spot in the East.
Despite being in a rough spot, the tide has changed, and Philadelphia has rolled off eight straight wins, bolting back to three games back of Atlanta and with an opportunity Sunday afternoon to sweep the Cardinals and secure their third straight series sweep for the first time since 2010.
The offense had been up, the pitching looked much improved compared to the previous months, and the Phillies were ready to close out St. Louis behind their ace Cristopher Sanchez on the mound. Unfortunately for Sanchez, despite allowing minimal runs over his 6.2 innings of work, the Phillies offense was quiet for the majority of the game.
Through the first eight innings, the Phillies combined for just four total hits and went 0-for-5 with runners in scoring position, scoring a total of zero runs. The offense was dog-walking through the game, just making it seem like they were accepting defeat and getting ready for their flight out to Seattle for their nine-game West Coast trip.
However, the Phillies didn’t hear a bell, and the Cardinals, despite taking a 4-0 lead into the ninth with All-Star closer Riley O’Brien on the mound, blew the lead thanks to a six-run outburst, capped off by a Kyle Schwarber walk-off two-run bomb. The homer was the first walk-off bomb for Philadelphia since 2023 and secured the team their ninth straight win and third consecutive sweep. It’s also the 22nd nine-game winning streak in franchise history and first since last May.
The Phillies were instantly put in a hole to open up the game, as the Cardinals tacked on a run just four batters into the game. Potential National League Rookie of the Year JJ Wetherholt led off the game with a weak grounder to second base that he was able to beat for a base hit, and advanced to second on a stolen base.
After an Iván Herrera strikeout and a Jordan Walker lineout, Sanchez nearly got out of the inning unscathed, but Alec Burleson smoked a single to right-center field, scoring the first run of the game.
The Phillies had nothing to show for themselves at the plate in their first two innings of at-bats, going down in order in the first and, despite a walk from Brandon Marsh, not recording a hit in the second.
In the third, Bryan De La Cruz got a hanging sweeper and smoked it on a line to left for the Phillies’ first run of the game, setting him up with the top of the Phillies order back up. Unfortunately for Philadelphia, Kyle Schwarber and Trea Turner both struck out, leaving De La Cruz at second.
Deja vu struck for Sanchez in the third as Walker led the inning off with a single, stole second, and came home to score on a single from Burleson, doubling St. Louis’ lead. One was all the Cardinals would score in the fourth, but an inning later they’d add another, this time thanks to the longball. José Fermín dug in to lead off the fifth and worked a great at-bat against Sanchez, eventually winning after smoking a ball deep to left-center field.
Down 3-0, the Phillies needed baserunners and quickly, but couldn’t find any success with any part of their order. They’d get runners on base like a single from Edmundo Sosa in the fifth and a double from Bryce Harper in the sixth, but both innings resulted in nothing for them.
Meanwhile, the Cardinals added on, with Ramón Urías and Pedro Pagés hitting back-to-back singles to put a runner in scoring position, and Wetherholt smoking a single of his own to right for a fourth run, knocking Sanchez out of the game.
With Sanchez done, the team had nine outs left to mount a comeback, but the seventh and the eighth provided no spark. Tim Mayza and Alec McFarlane were able to keep it a four-run game heading into the bottom of the ninth, and it was offically last chance time for Philadelphia.
Harper got something cooking with a leadoff double, but back-to-back outs brought J.T. Realmuto up with just one out left to play with. Realmuto did his job, smoking a single back up the middle, and Justin Crawford kept the line moving with a walk to load the bases and bring the tying run to the plate.
Edmundo Sosa was the next man up, and the third baseman did his job as well, smoking a ball down the left field line, clearing the bases, making it a one-run game.
De La Cruz was up next, needing just a single to score a speedy Sosa from second base. After falling behind early, De La Cruz smacked a groundball into left field for a base hit, tying the game at four.
With the game tied and the winning run at first base, Kyle Schwarber dug in with an opportunity to extend the Phillies’ winning streak to nine. Like De La Cruz, Schwarber fell behind in the count early but managed to work it back to 2-2.
On the sixth pitch of his at-bat, O’Brien left a 98 mph sinker up in the zone, and the Schwarbarian smoked a Schwarbomb on to Ashburn Alley in center field for a walk-off two run home run, comeplting the Phillies coemback for the 6-4 win.
It’s the first walk-off home run since June 2023 for the Phillies; coincidentally, it was Schwarber who hit that home run against the Dodgers. It’s also the first time the Phillies have come back from down four runs or more in the ninth inning since Bryce Harper’s walk-off grand slam in 2019 against the Cubs.
The Phillies secured their ninth straight win for their first nine-game winning streak since May of 2025. They now sit 2.5 games back of the Braves for the top spot in the National League East with 31 games to play.
Matt Brown
Matt has been a Philadelphia sports fan all his life and spent four years at Penn State University majoring in Broadcast Journalism and minoring in Sports Studies. He previously covered Penn State’s field hockey, men’s and women’s basketball, and baseball teams while writing for a Penn State blog called Onward State. He has written and edited for the Phillies, Eagles, and Sixers for Philly Sports Reports since October 2024 and wants to pursue a career in Sports Journalism.
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