Phillies lose 6-4 to the Mets at The Bank with roster flaws all showing up at the same time
The Phillies lost 6-4 to the Mets on Thursday night at Citizens Bank Park and if you wanted a two-game stretch that perfectly captures everything wrong with this roster outside of the top three starters, the Marlins loss Wednesday and the Mets loss Thursday were the masterclass.
Painter got destroyed by one of the worst teams in baseball and was shipped to Triple-A the next morning. Nola couldn’t get out of the fifth inning for the fourth straight start while Juan Soto took him deep twice in three innings.
Alvarado blew a tied game in the seventh by giving up three two-out runs that turned a competitive night into another frustrating loss. Garcia is having surgery on his torn lat next week and is officially done for the year. Keller is on the shelf with elbow inflammation.
The Phillies have gaping holes in the rotation, the bullpen, and the outfield simultaneously and the trade deadline can’t arrive fast enough because this team is running on fumes everywhere except the top of the pitching staff.
Here’s the stat that should be tattooed on Dombrowski’s forehead until he makes a deal.
The Phillies are 27-13 when Sanchez, Wheeler, or Luzardo start and 13-22 when literally anyone else takes the ball. That’s not a split. That’s two completely different teams wearing the same uniform.
The top three are carrying a playoff contender and the rest of the roster is dragging it toward mediocrity every time the fourth or fifth starter’s turn comes around.
The Phillies have been surviving on the strength of three elite arms all season and the last two games showed exactly what happens when those three aren’t on the mound and the supporting cast has to hold things together on its own.
Aaron Nola, man. Killing the Phillies
Nola’s night wasn’t a disaster by the standards of what we’ve been watching from him all season, which tells you how far the bar has fallen for a guy who was an ace two years ago. Five innings, seven hits, three runs, 97 pitches, and two Juan Soto homers including one on a 1-2 cutter after Nola had gotten ahead 0-2 in the count.
Getting ahead 0-2 on one of the best hitters in baseball and then giving up a homer on the very next pitch is the most Aaron Nola thing that has happened all season because it perfectly encapsulates the problem. He can still get into favorable counts with his stuff. He just can’t finish hitters off when he gets there.
The fastball was actually better Thursday, touching 95 mph, which is encouraging from a velocity standpoint. But velocity without execution is just throwing hard and getting hit hard, and Nola gave up seven hits in five innings while running his pitch count to 97, which meant the bullpen had to cover four innings in a game that was tied at 3-3 when Nola left.
He hasn’t made it past the fifth inning in four consecutive starts and has only done it once in his last eight, carrying a 5.71 ERA that would be embarrassing for a fifth starter let alone a guy making $25 million who is supposed to be the veteran anchor behind Sanchez and Wheeler.
The Phillies need Nola to give them six or seven innings every fifth day and he can’t even give them five and a third without hitting 97 pitches and handing the ball to a bullpen that is already running on empty. That’s not a slump anymore and it’s not something the curveball-heavy approach is going to magically fix in the second half. That’s a pitcher who is fundamentally different from the guy he used to be and the Phillies have to plan accordingly at the deadline.
Alvarado’s 6.58 ERA Is a Five-Alarm Fire
Jose Alvarado entered the seventh inning of a tied game on Thursday night and proceeded to give up three two-out runs that buried the Phillies in a hole they couldn’t climb out of. A leadoff single to Carson Benge got things started before a stolen base and a wild pitch moved the runner to third, and then a single by pinch hitter Eric Wagaman gave the Mets the lead. Semien followed with a triple that plated two more after surviving a two-strike foul tip that Realmuto almost caught, and if JT squeezes that ball the inning is over and the game stays tied. Instead it bounced off the glove and Semien drove the next pitch into the gap to blow the game open.
Alvarado’s ERA is now 6.58 with 35 hits allowed in 26 innings and opponents batting .315 against him on the season. The fastball still touches 99.6 mph but it doesn’t matter how hard you throw when hitters are teeing off on everything you put in the zone. The man who is supposed to be the primary left-handed setup arm on a playoff contender is pitching like a guy who should be on a bus to Lehigh Valley, and the Phillies don’t have the luxury of sending a veteran reliever to the minors to figure it out the way they did with Painter.
Four runs in his last two outings, a .315 batting average against, and an ERA approaching 7.00 from the lefty setup man while Keller sits on the IL with elbow inflammation. The bullpen that was one of the best units in baseball under Mattingly for the first six weeks is suddenly springing leaks everywhere and the timing couldn’t be worse with the bottom of the rotation forcing the relievers to cover four or five innings every other night because Nola can’t get out of the fifth.
Garcia Is Done and the Outfield Is a Wasteland
Adolis Garcia is having surgery on his torn lat next week and his season is officially over, which means the outfield depth that was already the worst in baseball just lost its only right-handed power bat for the remainder of the year.
The man had three homers in five games right before the injury with the 429-foot pimp job against the Padres that felt like the moment his season was finally turning around, and instead of riding that hot streak into the summer he’s getting surgery in June while the Phillies try to piece together a right field platoon with Rincones, Hill, and whatever else they can find.
The right-handed outfield bat that Dombrowski needs to acquire at the deadline just went from a “nice to have” upgrade to a “the roster literally cannot function without one” necessity because the current options in right field are a left-handed hitting rookie with 12 Triple-A games, a .213 hitter acquired from the White Sox, and whatever warm body the front office can pull from the minor league system on short notice. That’s not a playoff outfield and everyone in the building knows it.
Dombrowski’s Trade Deadline List Is Three Items Long and None of Them Are Optional
The Phillies need a starter because Painter is in Triple-A with a 7.06 ERA and Nola’s 5.71 makes the fourth spot in the rotation a coin flip every fifth day. They need bullpen help because Alvarado is imploding, Keller is hurt, and the middle relief group is getting burned out by short starts from the bottom of the rotation. They need a right-handed outfielder because Garcia is done for the year and the current right-field options are emergency measures rather than real solutions.
Three needs with limited trade chips on a team that has been living off the dominance of three starting pitchers all season. Dombrowski has to prioritize which holes are most critical to fill because addressing all three before August is going to require either creative deal-making or a willingness to part with young talent that the organization would prefer to keep.
The rotation is probably the most impactful area to address because the 27-13 record with the top three versus 13-22 with everyone else makes it clear that finding a reliable fourth starter would change the win-loss math more than any other single move. But the bullpen is leaking and the outfield is barren and you can’t just ignore two of the three problems and hope internal solutions cover the gap.
Seth Johnson Was the One Good Thing Thursday
The rookie reliever came up from Triple-A and threw a perfect sixth inning with two strikeouts on triple-digit stuff that looked like it belonged at the Major League level from the first pitch. If Johnson can be a reliable middle-relief option going forward, the bullpen math gets a little easier because Dombrowski can focus his limited deadline capital on the rotation and outfield while Johnson and Duran anchor the relief corps around whatever Alvarado and Kerkering can provide.
Internal solutions mattering has never been more important for this organization because the trade chips are limited and the needs are extensive. Johnson stepping up would be the kind of development that allows the front office to prioritize the biggest needs instead of trying to fill every hole from outside. One good reliever from within the system could be the difference between Dombrowski making two trades or needing to make four.
The Weekend Schedule Is a Lifeline
Friday is off because of a World Cup match at the Linc, which gives the bullpen a day of rest that it desperately needs after Painter and Nola combined to throw just seven innings across the last two losses. Sanchez goes Saturday against the Mets and Wheeler takes the mound Sunday, which means the Phillies get their two best pitchers for the final two games of the series after throwing their two worst in the first two.
If Sanchez and Wheeler do what they’ve been doing all season, the Phillies split the series and head to Washington next week with the bad taste of Wednesday and Thursday washed out by two dominant starts from the co-aces. The top three have been bailing this team out all season and they’ll need to do it again this weekend because the last two games exposed every flaw on the roster in the most visible way possible.
Turner got plunked again Thursday, this time on the right calf by a Sean Manaea pitch, and left in the third inning with a contusion. His second HBP in a week after the wrist contusion on Monday, though he said afterward he expects to be available Saturday.
Bohm drove in two more runs and is up to 41 RBI, one more than Harper and two behind Schwarber for the team lead, continuing his emergence as the most improved bat in the lineup since Mattingly took over.
The flaws are real and the last two games put every single one of them on display at the same time. The rotation behind the top three is broken. The bullpen is leaking. The outfield is held together with duct tape.
The trade deadline is coming and Dombrowski has the kind of shopping list that keeps a general manager up at night because every item on it is urgent and the budget to address them all is thin.
The top three can carry this team far but they can’t carry it everywhere, and the last two games proved that the rest of the roster needs significant reinforcement before the Phillies can call themselves a legitimate October threat.
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