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\nJustin Crawford slides safely into second base in the ninth inning against the Chicago Cubs. (Sage Zipeto \/ Getty Images)<\/p>\n
CHICAGO \u2014 It should have been a good thing, the bases loaded in the second inning. Even better that it was a result of hits from Adolis Garc\u00eda and Bryson Stott, Phillies batters who have struggled in recent days. The score was 0-0. Anything, seemingly, could happen.<\/p>\n
Then Rafael March\u00e1n, who likely would not have played if not for J.T. Realmuto\u2019s battered back, quickly found himself in an 0-2 count. He worked it full, then fouled a pitch that looked so much like a swinging strike that fans at Wrigley Field resoundingly cheered and assumed the inning was over. The next pitch, a splitter low, was swung on. Inning over. About two hours later, the Phillies extended their losing streak to six as they fell 5-1 to the Chicago Cubs.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s not where you want to be,\u201d Bryce Harper said. \u201cObviously, it\u2019s not where we thought we were going to be starting the season. But we can\u2019t really think about that. (We\u2019ve) got to flush things as quick as possible.\u201d<\/p>\n
But the Phillies are getting little reprieve as their stretch from hell continues. The two teams that battered them last week, the Cubs and Braves, are on deck again this week. And the first of a four-game series against the Cubs was not too different from the worst of what took place at Citizens Bank Park last week.<\/p>\n
The Phillies spent the rest of Monday\u2019s game searching for what they strung together in the second \u2014 an issue made all the more important considering Aaron Nola gave up four runs in the fourth and lost much of his command.<\/p>\n
Innings with a few hits followed by quick, quiet at-bats have become a recurring theme. There was a slight difference in the Phillies\u2019 offense on Monday, though: The middle and bottom of the lineup got on base. Justin Crawford drove in the Phillies\u2019 lone run with a double to left-center. Garcia kicked off what could have been a big inning in the second. Alec Bohm, 8 for his last 58, walked \u2014 just the third time he\u2019s done so during a difficult month on and off the field. Still, the Phillies\u2019 four through nine hitters went a combined 5-for-21 with three walks (two of them to Crawford). It is imperfect, but was better than what the group did Sunday: 2-for-21 with two walks.<\/p>\n
There are difficult choices to be made when the inconsistency is this far-reaching. Take the eighth inning, when left-handed hitters Brandon Marsh and Bryson Stott both faced a lefty \u2014 Stott with two runners on and two outs. Manager Rob Thomson decided to keep both in because there was a righty ready in the Cubs\u2019 bullpen, and he preferred to stick with batters that were hot. Marsh flied out and Stott popped out.<\/p>\n
Those were routine plays. But it did not help the Phillies that, throughout the night, the Cubs\u2019 defense made multiple spectacular diving catches. Nico Hoerner turned a play on a ball Kyle Schwarber hit 100 mph in the seventh. Matt Shaw dove and came up with a 97.4 mph line drive Trea Turner sent to right field in the ninth.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe hit some balls hard tonight,\u201d Thomson said. \u201cWe had some chances.\u201d<\/p>\n
Said Harper: \u201cA couple guys here and there had some pretty hard-hit balls the last couple days, and they haven\u2019t fell. That\u2019s part of the game. Obviously, we\u2019ve got to win. We know we\u2019ve got to be better. We\u2019ve got to win.\u201d<\/p>\n
\nJustin Crawford slides safely into second base in the ninth inning against the Chicago Cubs. (Sage Zipeto \/ Getty Images)<\/p>\n
Those plays don\u2019t excuse or explain six straight losses. The Phillies know that, even as they factored into Monday\u2019s loss. Much has been made of the Phillies\u2019 batting average on balls in play (BABIP), a number that sat at .265 entering Monday\u2019s game \u2014 fifth worst in MLB. Several balls that might have been hits in another scenario have not broken the Phillies\u2019 way \u2014 a trend that\u2019s likely to reverse at some point but is not enough to explain why everything is going so poorly.<\/p>\n
The frustration was not as visible Monday as it was over the weekend at Citizens Bank Park, which featured multiple helmet slams. The energy remains high in the dugout, Thomson said, and players are still enthusiastic and prideful.<\/p>\n
Still, the Phillies are 8-14 \u2014 a figure that would have been unfathomable just a few weeks ago. Their issues are widespread: starting pitching, defense, offense, etc. Amid it all, does Thomson feel like something needs to be said to the team?<\/p>\n
\u201cWell, I\u2019ve been saying a lot, so,\u201d he said. \u201cBut I keep that in the clubhouse.\u201d<\/p>\n
Citizens Bank Park, its boos and thinning crowds, is out of the picture until the Phillies return on April 28. Perhaps the trip will be enough to get them back in their groove. But what they showed during the first of seven games was not too inspiring.<\/p>\n
The Phillies lineup endures another bruise. They will try again tomorrow.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"CHICAGO \u2014 It should have been a good thing, the bases loaded in the second inning. Even better…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":680249,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2397],"tags":[5,4,144,25,4216,40],"class_list":{"0":"post-680248","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-philadelphia-phillies","8":"tag-baseball","9":"tag-mlb","10":"tag-philadelphia","11":"tag-philadelphia-phillies","12":"tag-philadelphiaphillies","13":"tag-phillies"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@mlb\/116442185526681555","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/680248","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=680248"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/680248\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/680249"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=680248"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=680248"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/mlb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=680248"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}