Phillies Struck Down by Thor’s Mighty Hammer
By Matt Veasey
Final. 2. 6. 5. 3
The Philadelphia Phillies dropped the opener of a three game series at home on Monday night to the New York Mets.
While I always am rooting for the Fightin’ Phils to win every game, I must admit, I’ve been hoping to get to use the corny headline that accompanies this piece at some point.
Frankly, it is wholly appropriate. New York Mets’ young ace right-hander Noah Syndergaard, nicknamed ‘Thor’ due to his looks and the thunder and lightning delivered by his powerful right arm, was typically dominant in this start.
Syndergaard allowed just five hits over seven innings, striking out eight and walking two, with 64 of his 94 pitches going for strikes in leading the Mets to a 5-2 victory.
The only dent in the armor of the 6’6″, 23-year old came in the bottom of the 3rd inning when Freddy Galvis lined a one-out double to center field, stole 3rd base, and then came in to score when Odubel Herrera rolled an RBI single to left.
That run tied the game at 1-1 after the Mets had jumped out on top of Phillies’ starting pitcher Jerad Eickhoff thanks to a 1st inning solo home run off the bat of veteran 3rd baseman and noted Phillies killer David Wright on the 6th pitch of the game.
Eickhoff settled down and matched Syndergaard most of the night. He went seven innings as well, allowing five hits while striking out nine and walking three batters.
“The guy is a bulldog out there,” Phillies catcher Cameron Rupp said, per MLB.com’s Todd Zolecki. “He’s just as tough as any guy on any roster. He’s going to go out there, he’s going to compete. He knows how to work, he knows how to pitch. He’s got No. 1 kind of stuff, and he’s shown it.“
With the score still knotted at 1-1, the visitors finally got to Eickhoff for the lead run in the top of the 6th inning. With two outs, nobody on base, and an 0-2 count on him, Yoenis Cespedes drilled a triple down the right field line. Lucas Duda followed with an RBI double, and the Mets had the 2-1 lead.
It remained a 2-1 game into the top of the 8th when the defending NL champions broke out their boom sticks. Reliever David Hernandez retired the first two batters, but again the Mets struck with two outs as both Duda to left and Neil Walker to right struck back-to-back solo home runs.
In the top of the 9th, Elvis Araujo faced Wright, and the man who our own Mike Azzalina highlighted prior to the game as his “Opposition Roadblock” for this series delivered, crushing his second home run of the game out to right field to make it a 5-1 lead for New York.
In the bottom of the 9th, the Phils got a run back off Mets’ closer Jeurys Familia. Rupp led off with a single, and new call-up David Lough followed with a double to right, moving Rupp to 3rd base. He would score on a ground out to first base, but that was the last whimper from this light-hitting Phillies offense.
Power was the recipe that won this game for the Mets. The power of Syndergaard’s arm, and the power that is present in their batting order. As currently constituted, the Phillies can match the former. But they have no real answer for the latter.
“We are a team that’s built on power, and when we hit homers, we win games,” Mets manager Terry Collins said per MLB.com writers. “Tonight, we hit homers.”
The victory moved the Mets back to the .500 mark at 6-6, pushing them a game past the now Phillies (6-8) for 2nd place in the NL East Division, three games behind the early-leading Washington Nationals.