Phillies Walk Out Of Washington With a Hard Fought Win Over Nationals

The Phillies picked their league-leading 18th shutout of the season in a game where the offense walked 13 times and knocked their magic number down to seven games, winning this game 3-0 and splitting the short series with the Nationals.

With the playoffs getting closer and the month of September resembling their July, the Phillies need to start stacking wins. Losing this game and series will only make the mission to make the playoffs that much more difficult.

The Phillies got the scoring started early by staying patient in the first inning and took the gifts the Nationals were giving. Washington starter Jared Simpson walked the bases loaded on three of the first four batters of the game, allowing Alec Bohm to drive one home with a single. The next batter, Bryson Stott, walked in a run, giving the Phillies an early 2-0 lead. In the seventh inning, Luis Arreaz hit a double to the wall, scoring Bryce Harper from first and extending the lead to 3-0.

Wheeler Keeps Rolling On

Zack Wheeler added on his second straight good start for the Phillies, going seven innings, giving up only four hits and striking out five. What made his outing even stronger is that he mixed pitches well and kept everything down in the zone. This alone is one of the biggest determining factors of his success this season.

Another determining factor is his control, which failed him in the stretch when he didn’t pitch well, capped off by his terrible outing in Seattle. He was right at 50% balls and strikes, and in this game he threw 91 pitches, with 58 of them being strikes. When Wheeler is throwing strikes low in the zone, he shows why he is still one of the best pitchers in baseball. He leaves this game three strikeouts shy of the 2000 career mark, and his ERA is back under three for the first time in nearly a month. With fellow starter Jesus Luzardo going on the IL earlier this week, this was the outing that the Phillies needed from him, and he delivered.

Clutch Hitting Continues To Slump Fightins’

The Phillies offense was not quite as clutch in the game. They had traffic on the bases all game, but only managed one hit with runners in scoring position, finishing 1-for-9 in this game. The one being the base hit by Bohm in the first that scored the first run of the game. This has been a recurring theme all season, and with less than two weeks to go in the season, this isn’t the time for this type of outpour.

The number of runners left on base in this reads more like a series stat, as in the two games they left 13 runners on base. This is an area that championship teams excel in, and if the Phillies have a desire to beat one of the two top teams in the National League, they will have to address this immediately.

Patience Pays Off

In a bullpen game, you can’t expect a ton of consistency from the pitchers, but the Nationals couldn’t have possibly expected the result that they got in this game. From the first inning, they had to expect that this was going to be an issue. Nationals manager Blake Butera, who is normally stoic in the dugout, had a growing level of frustration that stacked with each walk.

The Phillies ended the game with 13 walks total, the first time that has happened since 2001. The only difference in that game was that it was an extra-innings game. Though the Phillies didn’t get too much from their offense, it could have been much worse without the patience shown at the plate.

It is a real lack of faith from an offense when 13 walks lead to just three runs, but with Wheeler on the mound, that was all they needed. The Phillies are one of the more aggressive hitting teams, and to walk 13 times in this game it shows that they may be trying to change their approach at the plate amid recent struggles. Now they are off to New York to face the Mets and try to get their offense clicking again.

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