May 31, 2026
William Liang/Imagn Images
Bryson Stott did not get a hit on the Phillies road trip to California until his last at bat of the trip.
It's hard to win baseball games when you can barely hit the ball.
The Phillies somehow managed to do it in San Diego, scoring just 10 runs over three games and leaning on a dominant starting pitching staff to sweep a big series out west. They couldn't do it in Los Angeles, dropping two of three to the defending World Series champs.
After falling Friday 4-2 — they had just three hits — the Phils came back to win in a 4-3 nail-biter Saturday. Andrew Painter wasn't able to continue the solid starting pitching on Sunday, as he was knocked out the series finale after 3.1 innings. The Dodgers pummeled Philly 9-1 as the Phillies were shut out and held to just five hits.
They scored seven runs in the series, and 17 on the entire road trip — but somehow return home with a 4-2 record in California.
A much-needed day off is ahead Monday before the Padres fly to South Philly looking for revenge.
Here's a look at some winners and losers from the series setback:
Bryce Harper
The pickings are slim when your offense is this bad, but Harper has continually found ways to reach base — he actually has passed Kyle Schwarber and Brandon Marsh for the top on base percentage on the squad this season.
He started the decisive 2-out rally in Saturday's win, hitting an RBI single in the eighth inning. He reached base three times in the game and walked on Sunday as well.
Don Mattingly calling on Edmundo Sosa
It was delayed gratification for the Phillies manager in Saturday's late night win, as Mattingly made the bold decision to pull lefty outfielder Brandon Marsh — who was hitting .323 when he was on deck to hit (among MLB's leaders) — for bench player Edmundo Sosa. He wanted to get a righty-lefty match up. The move came with the bases loaded and one man out. Sosa struck out, as the Phillies failed to score at all from the golden opportunity.
Marsh still has splits that favor hitting right-handers (hitting .338 against righties) but he has respectable numbers, .268, against southpaws. It was a bold and seemingly overly meddlesome move.
Two inning later, however, Mattingly's substitution paid off. With two out, Harper got things started with his RBI single. Sosa then blasted a two-run homer to put the Phils up 4-3 off of flamethrower Tanner Scott — another lefty hitter. The move panned out, and led directly to a Phillies win.
Zack Wheeler
No one is perfect, even Phillies' ace Wheeler, who returned from serious offseason surgery and has resembled his All-Star self since his return. Quite oddly, after surrendering just one home run over his first six starts he gave up four solo homers to the Dodgers Friday in a 4-2 loss.
For many pitchers, giving up four runs over six innings isn't a bad showing. But for Wheeler and his high standards, it's a stinker of a start. Add to that the futilely bad Phillies offense — a unit that hasn't scored more than four runs since May 18 (more than 10 games ago), and you have a very low room for error for Phillies pitchers.
Adolis García
Eventually, the Phillies are going to probably need to admit defeat on this signing. García showed a little power early in the season, but he went 0-for-17 on the road trip. Part of why García is still trotting out to right field every day is because the other options aren't any better.
Felix Reyes, Otto Kemp and Dylan Moore have already been failed experiments. Stewart Berroa was called up this weekend and had an RBI Saturday, but he has a .178 career batting average over his 32 MLB appearances.
If the Phillies want any chance of competing for a World Series they need to figure out right field.
J.T. Realmuto
Though he hasn't been lighting the world on fire, Realmuto remains one of the best defensive and pitch-calling catchers in the game, and he got hurt early in Sunday's game and did not return.
J.T. Realmuto is out of the game after getting hit by a pitch on the left wrist earlier.
— Paul Casella (@Paul_CasellaMLB) May 31, 2026
It's been a brutal series behind the plate for Realmuto, who also took a foul ball off the mask last night and was hit by Ohtani's backswing. pic.twitter.com/TLRgFEhMwR
| Catcher | Innings | ERA |
| Realmuto | 329.0 | 3.50 |
| Marchán | 145.1 | 4.71 |
| Stubbs | 44.0 | 4.91 |
Realmuto is fourth in the entire NL in innings caught so far this season. The 35-year-old is the only backstop in the top 20 (of all MLB catchers) above 32 years old.
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