Too little, too late: Mets 5, Phillies 4

It wasn’t Aaron Nola’s fault this time

Aaron Nola turned in his best start of the season but the Phillies bats’ late comeback wasn’t enough to overcome the bullpen’s struggles in a 5-4 loss. Nola allowed two home runs but left with the score at 2-0 in the sixth before José Ruiz allowed a back breaking three run home run to Francisco Lindor, his second homer of the night. Bryson Stott put a scare into the Citi Field crowd with a three-run homer in the ninth to cut the deficit to 5-4, but Bryce Harper struck out on three pitches to end the comeback attempt.

I’ve seen this before

The Phillies couldn’t get anything going off of Mets starter Tylor Megill who matched a career high with ten strikeouts. They didn’t get their first hit off of Megill until the third inning and it was on a 70 MPH, jam shot single that dropped into center field off of the bat of Stott.

But that bloop did start one of the Phillies’ best scoring chances of the night, as Trea Turner and Harper both followed with walks to load the bases with two outs for Kyle Schwarber. But Megill was able to get Schwarber swinging for his sixth strikeout of the night to end the threat.

That was about all the Phillies would get off of Megill, who finished 5.1 IP and allowed just the one hit, four walks, a hit by pitch, and struck out 10. Megill left with one out in the sixth and one runner on and gave way to Reed Garrett who got Nick Castellanos to pop up for the second out. Max Kepler then collected the Phillies second base hit of the night and their first since the third with a hard-hit single to center, but J.T. Realmuto struck out swinging on a pitch low and away out of the zone to strand runners at the corners.

Giving hope then taking it away

Realmuto did single in the Phillies first run of the game in the ninth after Kepler doubled to lead off the inning. Bohm followed with a single of his own to put two runners on and forced the Mets to bring in closer Edwin Díaz who retired Cal Stevenson on his first pitch. But Bryson Stott brought some hope with a three-run homer to center field for his second long ball of the season.

But there were to be no further dramatics, as Díaz struck out Turner and Harper on a combined seven pitches to end the game.

Slightly encouraging

It was a rough start for Nola who allowed a leadoff home run to Francisco Lindor in the first and was sitting just 88-90 MPH on his fastball. He allowed another home run, this time to Jesse Winker, to start the second and increase the deficit to 2-0.

Nola narrowly missed disaster in the third after allowing a single to Tyrone Taylor and a walk to Lindor. Juan Soto demolished a ball down the right field line that was originally ruled a three-run homer but was overturned to be foul after review. Nola then rebounded to get Soto to ground out and struck out Pete Alonso and Brandon Nimmo to end the inning.

Nola was much better from that point on as his velocity slowly rose to around 92 MPH. He was able to finish the sixth with the score still at 2-0 and was approaching 100 pitches, but manager Rob Thomson elected to send him back out for the seventh. Nola got the first out before allowing a single to Luisangel Acuña and a walk to Brett Baty. He was then replaced by José Ruiz who got Taylor to groundout to shortstop, but the Phillies were only able to get one out instead of the inning ending double play thanks to Taylor hustling down the line.

That hustle led to the three-run bomb from Lindor for his second blast of the night and a 5-0 Mets lead that ultimately proved to be unerasable.

Nola’s final line was 6.1 IP, 4 ER, 7 hits, two walks, and six Ks. It appeared he was in line for his first quality start of the season before Ruiz allowed all of the inherited runners to score on the home run.

Tomorrow’s matchup

Cristopher Sánchez (2-0, 2.96 ERA) will look to get the Phillies back on track against Griffin Canning (2-1, 3.43 ERA) of the Mets. First pitch is scheduled for 7:10 PM.