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With Ryan Howard and Chase Utley both on the bench with a day off today, I'm not sure what result we should have expected. Though to be fair, this is probably what would have happened with them in the game anyway.
Yeah, the Phillies lost again. If you're surprised, allow me to congratulate you on finally waking up from your coma, which you probably fell into back in September 2011, or perhaps just two weeks ago when the Phillies swept the Braves. Because there is nothing surprising about the Phillies losing.
The Curse of the First Inning struck again today. A.J. Burnett struck out the first two Pirates he faced, and then allowed three straight batters to reach. Two singles and a double made the score 2-1 early. Burnett gave up just one more run in the third inning and went seven total, striking out seven and walking two. That is not a bad start. But when your offense can't scare up more than one or two runs of support, it's not enough. That's not a judgment at all. It's just a fact.
The 8th inning was the weirdest. Justin De Fratus continued to pitch questionably, and with Andrew McCutchen batting he hit a ball to left center that just missed going out of the ballpark. It didn't miss going off a fan's hand while Ben Revere gave chase, however, and Revere flattened himself along the outfield wall in weird, reaching Spiderman jump. McCutchen got to third on the play, and the runner on second scored. The play was reviewed and even though the fan touched the ball, it was determined to be a ground rule triple, somehow. Essentially the umpires have the power to decide what happens after fan interference, and they decided that the fan touching the ball didn't make a difference. Everyone stayed right where they were. It didn't matter, because the Phillies were going to lose anyway. Jake Diekman was brought in next, and then *he* had some trouble as well, allowing a run on a hit and two walks. One of those walks was to Michael fucking Martinez, so there's that.
The Phillies were held to four hits today, which is just… let me paint you a picture. Imagine rock bottom. Now, below that is 50 feet of crap. Right underneath that is the subbasement of shittiness. The Phillies are currently on the elevator between rock bottom and the subbasement of shittiness. And the elevator is going down. They scored their first run in the first inning, on an error. Pedro Alvarez absolutely airmailed a throw from third base and failed to get Jimmy Rollins out, so when Rollins scored from second on Marlon Byrd's single, the run was unearned. The only other run was from yet ANOTHER Marlon Byrd solo home run. I'd say move him somewhere else in the lineup, but when no one else is getting on base, it doesn't matter where he hits the homers. They're all going to be solo shots.
In this series with the Pirates, the Phillies had only 11 hits. 11 hits total in three games.
They were swept by the Pirates for the first time since 2002.
Pirates sweep the Phillies, who have lost 13 of their last 16 games. Phillies are 1-5 on this road trip.
— Todd Zolecki (@ToddZolecki) July 6, 2014
This is the first Phillies team to lose more than 50 games before the All-Star break since the 1997 team. The 1997 team lost 94 games.
— Ryan Lawrence (@ryanlawrence21) July 6, 2014
You know what? No cute animal video today. The game was dark, and so the recap's gonna end dark. ROSCHER OUT.