Five losses in the last 24 hours for the city of Philadelphia. After underperforming and losing 6-3 yesterday the Phillies traveled to Buffalo to make up some games with the Toronto Blue Jays.

In the first game, Spencer Howard was on the mound. The kid pitched much better than he did his last two outings, going 3.1 innings with 5 hits and 5 strikeouts. He ran into a little trouble in the 4th and at the bases loaded, when Blake Parker entered the game and pitched well, getting them out of the jam.

Bryce Harper hit a first-inning homer and Andrew McCutchen added a third-inning RBI single for the Phillies. From there, Tommy Hunter and Deolis Guerra came in to close out the shortened 7 inning game and both let up a run. Just like that, the Phillies bullpen couldn’t bring it home and the Phillies dropped game one of the double-header.

Game two is where things got real bad. The Phillies jumped out to a 7-0 lead in the first inning. Andrew McCutchen hit a three-run double to cap off the frame after singling and scoring earlier. All seemed to be going well given the fact that Vincent Velasquez was on the mound and needed the run support.

Clear ’em, @TheCUTCH22! pic.twitter.com/ehU0WWAO2Z

— Philadelphia Phillies (@Phillies) August 20, 2020

The Phillies entered the 6th inning up 7-2 and then completely fell apart. Costly fielding errors from Didi Gregorious and Scott Kingery allowed Toronto to extend the innings and put up a whomping 7 runs in the 6th.

7 runs. The Toronto Blue Jays scored 7 runs in the 6th inning of a 7 inning game and came back from being down 7-2 to sweep the double-header and send the Phillies packing with a 9-12 record.

What a mess. On a road trip north where the Phillies could have easily won all 4 games, they walk away 1-3.

Aaron Nola (2-1, 2.05 ERA) will start tonight in the opener of a 3-game series in Atlanta. He has 37 strikeouts and only 4 walks in 26 1/3 innings this season. He will face Atlanta’s Max Fried who is the front-runner for CY Young in the National League. Just great. In 11 1/3 innings Fried has not allowed a run. He’s 2-0 with a 1.24 ERA and 28 strikeouts.

The Phillies will try to stop a 3-game losing streak after winning 4 straight.

Ring that bell, baby.