Franco Bombs the Bronx

The New York Yankees hadn’t seen much of Phillies rookie 3rd baseman Maikel Franco before tonight. After his performance in tonight’s 11-8 Phils victory at Yankee Stadium, they hope to never see him again.

Franco went 4-5 with 2 homers, 5 rbi, and 3 runs scored to front a Phillies attack that scored in double digits for the 2nd consecutive game and snapped a 12-game road losing streak, the franchise’ longest since 1999.

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He began his onslaught in The Bronx in the very first inning, blasting a solo homerun to left center off Yankees’ starter Michael Pineda. The Yanks answered immediately, scoring twice on Phils’ starter Kevin Correia on four hits in the bottom of the frame. Only a fine throw from Domonic Brown to nail Carlos Beltran at the plate kept it from being worse.

Correia would last just 4 innings in this one, allowing 8 hits and a walk, and yielding 5 earned runs. However, Pineda was even worse, allowing 8 earned runs on 11 hits and a walk in just 3.1 innings.

In the top of the 3rd, the Phillies jumped back on top with a 3-spot, highlighted by a 2-run single off the bat of Ryan Howard. Then in the top of the 4th, the Phils blew it open, scoring 4 times. Cesar Hernandez ripped a 2-run double, and Franco a 2-run single to bring those runs home.

The hosts answered immediately in the bottom of the 4th, getting back in the game when Brett Gardner blasted a 3-run homer to right center off Correia, making it an 8-5 game.

With the game tightening up, the Phillies, and more specifically Franco, showed that the fireworks were not over. He blasted a no-doubt-about-it 2-run homer to left center, pushing the Phils lead out to 10-5.

On the mound, Jake Diekman relieved Correia and settled things down a bit. Though he walked 3 batters and allowed a hit in two innings, he kept New York off the scoreboard, blowing a 3rd strike past Alex Rodriguez to end the 6th and highlight his outing.

In the bottom of the 7th, longtime Phillies killer Brian McCann led off by drilling a solo shot out to right field off reliever Elvis Araujo, cutting the Phils lead to 10-6. Araujo allowed nothing else, and then in the bottom of the 8th, Ken Giles allowed nothing at all.

With two outs in the top of the 9th, Freddy Galvis ripped a one-hop ground-rule double into the stands in right field. The smash gave him a 3-hit night. Ben Revere followed by chopping a single to left for his own 3-hit night, scoring Galvis and making it an 11-6 game. Those two knocks raised the team total to 17 hits, a new 2015 season high.

Jonathan Papelbon came on in a non-Save situation in the bottom of the 9th, as the team wants to feature him with the trade deadline now just weeks away. As somehow seems to frequently happen to closers coming in with big leads, his appearance wasn’t clean. The Yanks scored twice, including a pair of doubles, before Paps finally closed the door on an 11-8 victory.

The teams will get back at it on Tuesday night with a 7:05pm start. Sean O’Sullivan will try to stretch it out for the Phillies at least another inning or two longer than Correia, and his counter-part with the Yankees, C.C. Sabathia, will try to be much more effective than Pineda.