Phillies Reached This Infamous Stat, On This Day in 2007

On this day in 2007, the Phillies infamously made professional sports history.

The Philadelphia Phillies are among the oldest professional sports franchises in history.

Among, but not the oldest.

As such, on this day 14 years ago, July 15, 2007, the organization made history. As Baseball-Reference noted, the Phillies became the first professional sports club to reach quintuple digits in this statistic — not all-time wins, but rather all-time losses.

The 10,000th all-time Phillies loss was secured with a 10-2 home loss to the St. Louis Cardinals. The infamous Adam Eaton started the game and allowed six runs on 10 hits, one walk, and just one strikeout. Eaton also surrendered back-to-back home runs, the first to future Hall of Fame slugger Albert Pujols to give the Cardinals a 5-0 lead in the fifth inning.

The Phillies entered the bottom of the ninth trailing 10-2. A home run from Michael Bourn, as well as a two-out RBI double from Chase Utley, prevented the Charlie Manuel-led team from being shut out.

While this loss was a milestone the club would rather forget, it perhaps was the driving force for them to make their second-half comeback in the standings and jump the New York Mets — thus clinching their first postseason berth since 1993. 2007 would be the first of five consecutive division titles.

The Phillies would go on to be swept by the Colorado Rockies in the 2007 NLDS, another low point in their recent history, though the Rockies’ postseason didn’t end well, either. Again, however, the Phillies bounced back and won their second-ever World Series championship the following season.

Fast-forward just shy of a dozen years later, and the Phillies fell for the 11,000th all-time time during their 2019 season finale. Currently, the team has a 9,897-11,076 all-time record (.472 winning percentage). They have not had a winning season since 2011.

Barring an epic collapse this season, and a franchise-worst showing in 2022, the club surely will finally reach quintuple digits in wins next year. Still, the franchise has a ways to go (likely decades) until it can reach an all-time .500 winning percentage mark.