Phillies’ bats go quiet against Guardians’ southpaw in series finale loss

It’s Memorial Day, the time of year when baseball front offices typically shift from gauging what they have on the roster to figuring out how to improve upon it.

Go ahead, then, and peek at the standings.

See the Phillies? They’re smack dab in the middle, after a 3-1 loss at home Sunday to the Guardians dropping their record to 26-27. They’re 10 games behind the division-leading Braves but only 3½ out of a wild-card spot.

It certainly isn’t great, but also not hopeless, especially given the 9-19 start that got their manager fired and the dominant 1-2 punch atop their starting rotation.

» READ MORE: Don Mattingly isn’t considering dropping Trea Turner in the Phillies’ lineup: ‘I think we count on Trea being Trea’

And their biggest weakness is clear, even through the holiday-weekend clouds and rain, whenever they face a left-handed pitcher. But let’s have interim manager Don Mattingly explain it.

“You feel like [Kyle Schwarber] and [Bryce Harper] are going to be who they are,” Mattingly said. “It’s really a matter of our other guys kind of being able to give us productive at-bats — with J.T. [Realmuto], with [Alec Bohm], with [Adolis García], [Edmundo] Sosa. Guys like that."

In other words, guys who bat right-handed.

The Phillies’ right-handed hitters have been inexplicably impotent against left-handed pitching. And it was on display again in the series finale against the Guardians.

Facing rookie lefty Parker Messick, the Phillies’ right-handed hitters — Trea Turner, Bohm, Realmuto, García, and Sosa — combined to go 1-for-13 with five strikeouts. The lefties — Schwarber, Harper, Bryson Stott, and Brandon Marsh — were 4-for-9 with one strikeout.

And because Messick kept Schwarber and Harper, in particular, from going deep, the Phillies didn’t score in 5⅔ innings against him.

It wasn’t until the seventh inning that the Phillies broke through. And even then, it was the left-handed hitters who delivered against lefty reliever Tim Herrin. Marsh led off with a triple, and after Turner worked a walk, scored on Harper’s sacrifice fly. Turner was left on third base as the tying run when Bohm grounded out.

» READ MORE: Rhys Hoskins’ injury was a sliding door moment in Phillies history. And it still ‘kind of eats at’ Bryce Harper.

Here, then, are the up-to-date numbers for the Phillies’ right-handed hitters against left-handed pitching:

Clearly, there’s a righty-hitting hole in the middle of the lineup. And if everyone else sees it, surely the Phillies’ decision-makers do, too.

“I think the more you talk about something and the more it becomes evident, then [the players] hear it and then they think about it maybe,” Mattingly said. “I’ve had guys in the past that, one year they’re killing lefties and the next year they struggle and you don’t know why and there’s no real true reason.

“I really do expect [the righties] to hit them. You expect those guys to be themselves, so yeah, in general, I do expect them to get back to that.”

Andrew Painter pitched well in defeat, getting into the seventh inning for the first time in his ninth career start. But two walks came back to hurt him.

Daniel Schneemann worked a one-out walk in the fifth inning and scored on Steven Kwan’s RBI single against Painter. In the sixth inning, Painter walked Chase DeLauter with two out and gave up an RBI double to Rhys Hoskins.

Watch the latest episode

As the Phillies continue to seek more production out of the cleanup spot, Rhys Hoskins is coming back to town this weekend with the Cleveland Guardians. Hoskins sat down with "Phillies Extra," The Inquirer's baseball podcast, to discuss his role with the first-place Guardians, his legacy with the Phillies, and more. Watch here.

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