Phillies news: Bryce Harper makes History, Bailey Falter optioned

The Philadelphia Phillies dropped their third straight game after being on a five-game winning streak. The Giants beat the Phillies by the score 4-3. Zack Wheeler was ok in six innings of work as he allowed nine hits and four runs, and struck out eight. Kyle Schwarber hit his team-leading tenth home run to bring the game 4-3 with two outs in the top of the ninth. 

The Phillies look to break this short losing skid in their Wednesday day game and series finale in San Francisco. The starting pitchers for the clash are Taijuan Walker (3-2, 5.75 ERA) and Ross Stripling (0-2, 7.14 ERA).

More Phillies News

• Including Tuesday’s loss, the Phillies haven’t been very good at winning games in San Francisco. The cold Bay Area nights are exactly how the Phillies are when going to Northern California. The team is 5-22 in their last 27 games there.

• In Tuesday night’s game against San Fran, Bryce Harper put himself among some Phillies’ greats. Harper batted in his usual three-hole in the lineup and tallied his 2000th regular season plate appearance in a Phillies uniform. Becoming the 109th Phillie to do so, he joins teammate J.T. Realmuto who was the 108th player to do so. 

• The Phillies made a slight change in the roster on Tuesday prior to the game. The club optioned Bailey Falter to Triple-A Lehigh Valley and called up right-handed pitcher Erich Uelmen. Manager Rob Thomson made sure to emphasize that this demotion for Falter is a break from the bigs to find what he’s been doing wrong in his struggles. 

• The Phillies have been a Jekyll and Hyde type of baseball team in the first two months of the season. It has been incredibly up and down. That fact makes it easier to get caught on the season’s roller coaster as a fan and react hysterically with every pitch. Over the past two weeks and change, the Phillies have only piled up games through winning or losing streaks. 

MLB News

• The New York Yankees are at the top of the news docket in the MLB today. First, there’s the continuative revealing of facts surrounding Aaron Judge’s accused cheating from Monday’s game against the Toronto Blue Jays. It turns out that Blue Jays’ pitcher, Jay Jackson, was tipping pitches and gave away what was coming. The situation is looking to be gamesmanship from the Yankees’ side as the first base coach relayed the message to Judge. Jackson can be shown here as he was not hiding his pitches well enough. 

• Yankees starter Domingo German was a culprit for having sticky stuff on his hand during his start last night. German was warned earlier this season in April but did not head to those rules. German is facing a possible 10-game suspension. Yankees reporter Bryan Hoch has more details here about how sticky German’s hand was. 

• Justin Verlander has been healthy for a short period of time. Verlander’s day in the rotation came up last night as the Mets were at Citi Field to take on the Tampa Bay Rays. It was his first start and he did not fare well at all. Even receiving some boo birds from the Mets faithful.