PHILADELPHIA — Bryce Harper exhorted a sense of urgency from the visiting clubhouse at Citi Field Wednesday night, after the Phillies were swept out of Queens by the New York Mets.
From the home dugout at Citizens Bank Park on Thursday, Rob Thomson didn’t exactly push for the opposite. But he did urge calm for a team that had won six of seven games before traveling to New York.
The urgency and resilience to respond to the latest trip to the Flushing House of Horrors, Thomson said, will come from within the clubhouse. He’s confident it will develop without need for the manager to prod it into existence.
“It gets back to the experience of the players. It really does,” Thomson said before opening a four-game set with Atlanta. “And I think you come in here, for me and the coaching staff, it’s coming in with a lot of energy and a lot of positiveness. They’ll feed off it.”
The positives from New York were nonexistent.
A bullpen obliterated in the opener Monday. A lead squandered Tuesday, then reclaimed by a Harrison Bader homer only for the team’s two most reliable relievers to blow up. Then a lineup bullied by rookie Nolan McLean in just his third major league start, a five-hitter in a 6-0 loss that made the Phillies dig into the satchel of buzzwords.
“Urgency” is what Harper came up with. Against the suddenly pesky Braves, it’s what the team will have to summon this weekend.
But it won’t fall to the manager to draw it out of them, in part because historically, he’s seen a veteran group not need him to proctor.
To that end, the Phillies promptly fell into a 3-0 hole Thursday night with Aaron Nola struggling in the first inning, then assembled a five-run answer in the bottom of the first.
“These guys want to win, and they want to perform, and they want to win a world championship,” Thomson said. “That’s what they play for, and a lot of these guys, they haven’t done that. Even though they’ve been paid a great deal of money, they haven’t won. So that’s on their mind. They want to get it done.”
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Thomson is continuing with the thought process that he has four starting outfielders and will rotate appropriately. Thursday, that left Nick Castellanos on the bench.
Castellanos was 0-for-9 in New York. Thomson expects him back in the lineup Friday with a favorable matchup against Braves starter Bryce Elder.
Thursday, Thomson went to Harrison Bader, who is 3-for-3 with a homer lifetime off Braves starter Cal Quantrill, in center. Bader is hitting .274 in 21 games as a Phillies.
Brandon Marsh was in left, Quantrill the kind of righty that the struggling lefty might be able to get going against. Max Kepler started in right.
Marsh is hitting just .250 in August (15-for-60), his lowest average for a month since his disastrous March/April start. He bunted his way on past a shifted infield in the first inning Thursday.
“He just needs to get back to the other side of the field,” Thomson said. “I think he’s a little bit in pull mode right now and there’s some swing and mess in there, but if he keeps it simple, gets back to basics, he’ll be fine.”
Kepler’s first inning home run was his 14th of the season and sixth hit in 25 career at-bats off Quantrill. It also raised his average in games he’s played in right field to .396 (19-for-48) compared to .199 in left.
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Atlanta and the Phillies at the end of August should have been a marquee series. Injuries decimating the Braves’ pitching staff have ensured it’s not.
But the Braves aren’t as bad as the 61-72 mark they’re saddled with indicates. They’ve won three of four and 13 of 18. With 15 homers and a .301 average in 67 games, Ronald Acuna Jr. looks back from his knee injury. Michael Harris II is hitting .324 over the last month after a ghastly first half.
The pitching staff is a shadow of what it should be given the injuries. But the Braves are not exactly the ballclub you want to see when you’re down.
“They’re swinging the bats well,” Thomson said. “They’re scoring runs. Their bullpen has been excellent. They’re not giving them much up out of the bullpen.”