The Phillies walked the tightrope all Wednesday night. It is not a sustainable way to win a baseball game — in October, June or March. They asked for one more Houdini Act in the sixth inning of Game 4.
Francisco Lindor denied it and ended the Phillies’ season.
The Phillies are going home, staring down an offseason that will feel even longer than the last two — and not just because it actually will indeed be longer, the team continuing a 2009-2011-style devolution that’s seen them get eliminated one round earlier with each progressive October. Their bats once again could not muster anything, chasing and whiffing and wasting their way to one run on three hits and this core’s third loss in three elimination games.
The game swung when Jeff Hoffman, who’d just gotten two high-stress outs in the fifth, went back out the following inning, loading the bases with a single, walk and hit by pitch, spiking two wild pitches in the process. He lacked velocity and, to an even greater extent, command, perhaps in part because he sat through a lengthy top of the sixth that included two pitching changes, all after warming up three separate times throughout the ballgame. Many aspects of the Phillies’ meltdown this October have not been Rob Thomson’s fault, but Hoffman’s leash was questionable at best.
It all set the scene for Lindor. Carlos Estévez came on for Hoffman and served up a grand slam on his fourth pitch.
Speaking of wasting, the disaster inning negated one of more improbable outings you’ll see in the postseason. Ranger Suárez danced around danger throughout 4 1/3 innings of scoreless baseball — a line that stayed scoreless because Hoffman escaped disaster himself in relief of Suárez in the fifth.
A run already in, the Phillies had runners on the corners in the fourth with one out and could not score. Bryce Harper led off the fateful sixth with a double and did not reach third. They threatened in the ninth; Edwin Díaz walked the first two Phillies before the next three came up empty. The offense fell flat on its face for the third time in four games.
It’s exactly how they crashed out a win shy of the World Series in 2023. And so a second straight postseason ends painfully early.
This time, it was earlier.
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Barbara Jean Cravero
October 9, 2024 at 8:34 pm
The Phillies became a different team after the All Star Game. It’s like a spell was cast on them after that game. This was the team that was ranked number one week after week in the MLB rankings. So it does not matter where rankings are or how many sportswriters call the World Series…. Baseball is always a surprise in October.
Jeff O
October 9, 2024 at 10:44 pm
Went downhill right after London and the release of Whit Merrifield. I wonder