Kyle Schwarber’s homer decides Ranger Suárez-Jesús Luzardo showdown in Phillies’ 3-1 victory over Red Sox

BOSTON — Ranger Suárez wore the same jersey number (55), warmed up to the same Kid Cudi track (“Mr. Rager”), and threw the same six-pitch kitchen sink.

Only this time, he did it all against the Phillies.

How strange.

But as much as some things change, others never do. Take, for instance, Kyle Schwarber crushing baseballs to the most remote regions in Fenway Park.

» READ MORE: Phillies face an ‘absolute animal’ in former teammate and friend Ranger Suárez

Schwarber did it again here Thursday night, smashing a cutter from Red Sox lefty Tyler Samaniego over the right-field bullpen to snap a scoreless stalemate in the eighth inning of a rain-delayed 3-1 Phillies victory.

“I’m just happy that I was able to put together a good at-bat there and connect,” Schwarber said, ever so modestly after his majors-leading 18th homer enabled the Phillies to become the first team since the 2005 Mets to win five consecutive series after dropping six series in a row.

“The biggest thing in that whole series was the pitching for us was lights out.”

Indeed, the Phillies continued their 180-degree about-face under interim manager Don Mattingly by giving up five runs in the three games. Such dominance from the mound covers all manner of warts, including that they scored only six runs themselves.

A matchup ordained by the baseball gods pitted the lefty the Phillies let leave (Suárez) against the one in whom they invested (Jesús Luzardo). It lived up to the billing, too. They dueled into the sixth inning, bending ever so slightly, never breaking.

“It was definitely fun going against Ranger a little bit,” Luzardo said. “[He’s] like a brother to me. He was having a good time and made it tough for us. But it was fun going against him.”

Suárez spent half his life with the Phillies, signing with them for $25,000 as a 16-year-old from Venezuela. He made his major league debut in 2018, pitched out of the bullpen before becoming a rotation mainstay, and saved his best for October, including a save in the pennant-clinching win over the Padres in 2022.

But Luzardo is younger and more durable. And rather than forking over a five-year, $140 million contract for Suárez in free agency, the Phillies gave Luzardo a five-year, $135 million extension to keep him off the market next winter.

» READ MORE: Over? History shows it’s not over for the Phillies’ season. Here’s what it took for others to turn it around.

Surely, Suárez was motivated to prove them wrong.

“Not really,” he said through a team interpreter. “I went out there just like another game. They had their plans, and now I’m here in Boston. I’m happy here.”

Suárez spent the week catching up with ex-teammates. Luzardo, who got close with Suárez with the Phillies last season, said they chatted for a while on the field earlier in the week, though “not much about baseball or facing each other.”

“Just more seeing how he is, family, all that stuff,” Luzardo said. “But yeah, I mean, we both knew we were going up against each other, so it was going to be fun.”

Luzardo was in and out of trouble for six innings. When Willson Contreras doubled in the fourth, he bounced around second base, motioning as if he picked up a tip from Luzardo, who in the past has had difficulty with tipping pitches.

Nothing but gamesmanship, the Phillies determined.

“Just trying to catch my attention,” Luzardo said. “I don’t think there was much to it.”

Said Mattingly: “We obviously saw it. I’ve been around enough that some of it’s real, some of it’s just to make you think they know something. And we’ve seen a lot of the same motions on different pitches, so it tells you they didn’t really feel like they had anything,”

Luzardo also got an assist from shortstop Trea Turner in the sixth inning. With a runner on third and one out in a scoreless game and the infield playing in, Turner dove to his right to smother Contreras’ grounder, then threw to first to freeze the runner.

“Big play,” Luzardo said. “Big, big play. I said he’s my hero. Saved me out there.”

Especially with how Suárez pitched. He left his previous start 11 days earlier with right hamstring tightness and was on a pitch count. But he retired the first 11 Phillies before Bryce Harper‘s two-out walk in the fourth inning and didn’t give up a hit until Alec Bohm’s leadoff single in the fifth.

“He’s a unique guy, where he’s got so many different weapons in the arsenal,” Schwarber said. “We know the sinker-changeup is a big pitch for him, but the cutter is underrated, the four-seam curveball. He plays a lot of different things off each and every different pitch, and he’s competitive with a lot of pitches.

“That’s why he’s always going to be a guy. It doesn’t matter how hard you throw, he’s always going to find a way to get weak contact and outs.”

» READ MORE: Justin Crawford sits again vs. a lefty, but it’s not a continuation of their Brandon Marsh strategy

After Suárez left, Schwarber decided it with his seventh homer in seven games.

And in Fenway, his personal playground. In 29 games in this 114-year-old ballpark, he has eight homers and a 1.139 OPS that ranks slightly behind Hall of Famers Frank Robinson (1.188) and Ted Williams (1.149) and ahead of Jimmie Foxx (1.099) and Lou Gehrig (1.088).

How’s that for company?

“Lefties or righties, it doesn’t seem to really matter if they make mistakes,” Mattingly said. “He’s a good gameplanner, so he knows what they’re trying to do. He’s pretty good.”

Some things don’t change.

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Ricky Bottalico spouts opinions each day on sports-talk radio and the Phillies' television pre- and postgame show. But before all that, he had a solid career as a relief pitcher, even representing the Phillies in the 1996 All-Star Game at Veterans Stadium. With the baseball world set to descend on Philly again in a few weeks, Ricky Bo joined "Phillies Extra" to re-live his All-Star experience. Watch here.

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