Phillies Crushed Under Thor’s Hammer
By Matt Veasey
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | R | |
| Phillies | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
| Mets | 0 | 0 | 2 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 6 | 1 | x | 12 |
The Philadelphia Phillies were crushed in the second game of a three game weekend series by the host New York Mets on Saturday night.
The Phillies went into their weekend series in the Big Apple hoping to not only play the spoiler against their NL East Divisions rival New York Mets, but also possibly begin to take a run at 3rd place in the division race.
After two nights of action, those were apparently only pipe dreams. The Mets have thoroughly dominated the Phillies each night.
On Saturday night, it was the power of the Mets lineup, but also the power of starting pitcher Noah Syndergaard that did them in, as the hosts crushed the Phillies by a 12-1 score.
Syndergaard (12-7) went seven innings, allowing just one earned run on two hits, striking out seven batters and walking just two in his second consecutive dominating outing.
For their part, the New York hitters were also displaying their power, ripping four home runs among a half-dozen extra-base hits, including a double by Syndergaard.
The Phillies actually got on the board first in this one courtesy of Freddy Galvis’ 14th home run of the season in the top of the 3rd inning.
Then in the bottom of the 3rd, Mets’ shortstop Asdrubal Cabrera blasted his 16th of the year and 3rd in the last two nights. The two-run shot came off Phillies’ starter Jeremy Hellickson, and put the hosts on top by a 2-1 score.
Hellickson (10-8) would toss his first truly poor outing in more than a month on this night. He surrendered seven hits and five earned runs in lasting just four innings, striking out four and walking three batters.
In the bottom of the 4th, Yoenis Cespedes completely destroyed a Hellickson offering, despoiting it well into the upper deck in left-center field for a three-run home run. His 26th longball of the year pushed the Mets lead out to 5-1, and effectively ended the competitive portion of the game.
The Mets poured it on with a six-spot crooked number in the bottom of the 7th inning. A two-run double off the bat of Alejandro De Aza, and a grand slam from Kelly Johnson, both off Phils’ reliever Michael Mariot, put the game out of reach at 11-1.
Neil Walker ended the scoring with a solo home run, his 23rd of the season, off Phillies’ reliever Severino Gonzalez in the bottom of the 8th inning.
The Phillies and Mets will wrap the series on Sunday afternoon, but the two clubs will still meet twice more this year. They will face off in 10 of their final 13 games, with the first four back at Citi Field, and then the season finale series at Citizens Bank Park.