June 01, 2026
Denis Poroy/Imagn Images
Cristopher Sánchez is the Phillies' MVP right now, and a seemingly ever-increasing Cy Young favorite.
The Phillies are coming back from a West Coast road trip having won four of six against the Padres and Dodgers, and at face value, that's great.
You sweep the Padres and then take one off the defending champion Dodgers while both are gunning for the top of the NL West, and that's a definite early-season victory nine times out of 10.
The thing is, the Phillies did it playing with visibly concerning signs.
Their starting pitching, led by the ever-improving ace Cristopher Sánchez, remains brilliant. Their bullpen, though, remains shaky, and at the crux of all of the worry, they're not hitting – again – with some just abysmal output from their right-handed bats as they still face a climb up the standings at 30-29.
In a lot of ways, it's the same old story that has stopped the Phils short year after year in October, just maybe at its most infuriating – or defeating – because fans are seeing it all again, just earlier in the calendar and maybe already knowing, deep down, that this isn't suddenly going to all work when it counts because we've seen it all before.
But maybe the national viewpoint sees the Phils differently?
Here's a look through the latest wave of MLB power rankings...
For all the veteran hitters the Phillies have, it has been their pitching that has gotten their season back on track. They’ve been particularly outstanding on the road: Before their 9-1 loss on Sunday, they had won 11 of their past 13 road games, posting a 1.68 team ERA. [MLB.com]
Starting pitching is keeping the club afloat and masking a lot right now. Sánchez and co. can probably continue to do so for a while, but the bats, especially from the right side, have to carry their weight.
Even with a 9-1 loss on Sunday, the Phillies still finished 18-10 with a plus-19 run differential in May. No one on the planet is pitching better than Cristopher Sánchez right now, as he is working on a 44.2-innings scoreless streak that goes back to his final start in April. His next start is scheduled for Wednesday against the Padres. [B/R]
Who knows where the Phillies would have been by now if they hadn't gone on that post-Rob Thomson firing tear, which pitched them some pretty favorable matchups along the way until the fortune turned this past week.
You take a 4-2 trip to Petco Park and Dodger Stadium every single time. That's a big success. [CBS Sports]
You do, but you can't disregard how either. Starting pitching is a strength, but if the Phillies lean on it entirely while getting next to nothing from their bats in October, they lose. We've seen it all before.
Wrote Buster Olney among ESPN's baseball panel last Thursday:
Kyle Schwarber has 13 homers in the past 31 days, with 361 in his career – and incredibly, he has put himself in a position in which he could approach 400 by the end of the season. Given that Schwarber is 33 years old, 500 – or even 600 – home runs might be within his grasp, because of what he has done since he joined the Phillies. At the end of the 2021 season, Schwarber had 159 homers in his career, and over the past four-plus seasons, he has mashed 202. [ESPN]
Kyle Schwarber is awesome.
For as much as you worry about the rest of the Phillies' lineup, you never have to think much about him. His eye is still sharp, and he can still get a hold of a baseball and launch it way into the seats fairly regularly.
Those multi-strikeout games are painful when they compound with other struggles throughout the lineup, but with the unique kind of hitter he is, you just have to take those as they come.
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