June 17, 2015
A decent crowd of 26,162 was on hand Wednesday night at Citizens Bank Park, but many of it was rooting for the road team. There was plenty of orange in the stands to cheer on the same Baltimore Orioles team that had just pummeled the Phillies at Camden Yards the previous night. The roles were reversed not so long ago, and they could switch back sometime in the future. For now, though, only one of these two fanbases has something to cheer about.
Despite Freddy Galvis' three-run homer in the seventh inning, the Phillies lost their ninth straight game on Wednesday, 6-4. Kevin Correia got the start, and he received the loss because of one rough inning that included an untimely error by Galvis. Here’s what I saw:
1. Fourth-Inning Blues, Part 1: After a Galvis error (mentioned below), Correia walked a batter and allowed four hits, the last of which was a perfectly placed dribbler up the third base line by opposing starter Ubaldo Jimenez. The Orioles scored four runs in the inning, three of which came with two outs.
2. Correia pitched well in his Phillies debut on Friday night in Pittsburgh, but there is a reason why he was readily available. In addition to the fourth-inning woes, he gave up a couple of homers to right field. Snider hit a moonshot into the visiting bullpen. Only two of his six runs were earned, but at least some of his outing was Correia's fault.
1. Fourth-Inning Blues, Part 2: The Phillies had 2nd and 3rd with nobody out after a Maikel Franco single and Ryan Howard double. In true Phillies fashion, Jimenez then struck out the side (Brown-Rupp-Asche), which drew loud boos. As I wrote about on Monday, this is trending toward one of the worst offenses of all-time:
Phillies entered tonight averaging 3.03 runs per game, lowest average of any team in baseball since 1972.
— Todd Zolecki (@ToddZolecki) June 18, 2015
2. Chase Utley is a major part of the team’s offensive ineptitude, but he can still run the bases better than most at 36 years old. In the first inning, he scored a run all by himself: single, steal second, take third on the overthrow, and score on a wild pitch.
3. Galvis is back to using a bigger bat again, and it paid off tonight when he golfed a three-run homer to right field in the seventh inning. Before that, Jimenez was cruising against the Phils. Buck Showalter might’ve left him in one hitter too long.
1. As far as the bullpen is concerned, no news is good news. Jeanmar Gomez, Elvis Araujo, Luis Garcia, and Ken Giles only allowed one hit in four scoreless innings.
1. Some of the defensive metrics like UZR point to Galvis being an above average defensive shortstop (and they're good), but he’s booted too many easy chances so far this season. His 10th error came on a makeable play off the bat of Orioles left fielder Travis Snider to lead off the fourth inning, which helped lead to four Baltimore runs.
2. The Hose Report made an unlikely appearance in the form of Ben Revere in center field. In the second inning, Matt Wieters decided to test Revere by tagging up on a fairly shallow fly ball and he was gunned down at third base fairly easily.
You would imagine that the Phillies don’t want to see any more of the Orioles this season. They’ll get their wish, but not until they play a day game on Thursday afternoon right back here at The Bank. Sean O’Sullivan (1-5, 5.08 ERA) will be opposed by Bud Norris (2-4, 8.29 ERA), and first pitch is scheduled for 1:05 p.m.
Follow Rich on Twitter: @rich_hofmann
