It wasn’t Andrew Painter’s best start. It just wasn’t. In the four-inning, 90-pitch outing for the rookie right-hander, there was bad command, which led to hitters’ counts and good swings from the Giants offense.
That San Francisco offense might not have capitalized in the first. After back-to-back singles from Luis Arraez and Matt Chapman, he did not look ready for his mix quite yet. Rafael Devers popped up a slider in on his hands for the second out of the inning and Heliot Ramos couldn’t handle the power of the cut-fastball.
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Painter wasn’t the only pitcher that needed to work around base runners. The veteran sinker-baller Adrian Houser struggled against the bottom of the Phillies order in the third, allowing an infield single from JT Realmuto and walking Justin Crawford on four pitches.
Houser then pounded Turner with sinkers after a first pitch breaking ball then slowed him down with an inside changeup off the same tunnel. Kyle Schwarber half swung at an inside slider for a strikeout, then Bryce Harper hit a soft grounder to end the inning.
The second time through the Giants order turned Painter’s command problems into results. Willy Adames took a 2-1 sinker down the left field line for a leadoff double. Arraez then smacked a hanging slider, then a poor throwing decision by Crawford allowed him to take an extra base.
For the entire night, Painter struggled to locate early count fastballs. Of his 30 four-seam fastballs, Painter threw just 9 of them for either a called strike or a whiff. Matt Chapman came up and sat a breaking ball because falling behind on a fastball again was a bad idea. He put a great swing on a curveball to triple’s alley that just kept carrying past the sliding Crawford in center.
With one out, Ramos was able to pull his hands in just enough to bloop a single to no-mans-land in center field to make it 3-0.
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The fourth, and Painter’s last inning of the night was another slog. After a Jerar Encarnacion groundout, three straight base runners got on to load the bases. He fell behind again to Arraez but Oracle kept a deep flyball in the yard to make it 4-0.
The bottom of the Phillies order once again tried to start a rally. Realmuto started it off with a single to center field with no outs. After seeing fastballs and sliders in for roughly a week, Crawford was able to get his hands extended on a down and away Houser sinker to put runners on second and third.
Trea Turner then did his job to move the runners, hitting a ground ball to second base for to put the Phillies on the board. After a Schwarber walk, Harper smoked a 112.5 mph double to right that scored Crawford and put runners on second and third.
That was all for the fourth but the bottom of the order started another rally two innings later. Crawford took a hanging 0-2 changeup to right for a single, Trea Turner hit a spinner in front of Jung Hoo Lee for a knock that forced a Tony Vitello pitching change.
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Former Pittsburgh Pirate left-hander Ryan Borucki came in to left Schwarber and Harper in a high-leverage situation. He has allowed a .522 OPS over his career against left-handed hitters so it made sense for Vitello to make the call.
However, the former college manager is learning quickly that plans don’t always work at the big league level. Schwarber watched four pitches and then walked to first base after tapping his helmet. Harper then picked up his third hit of the night with a single to tie the game.
Then Alec Bohm squibbled a backup slider right down the first base line to give the Phillies the lead for good. A Brandon Marsh sacrifice fly would add some insurance.
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The bullpen stood tall and lived up to the preseason hype. Rob Thomson used five different relievers, each for exactly one inning, to finish this one out. Tim Mayza struck out Adames in a scoreless fifth, Jonathan Bowlan threw some pitches that will go on PitchingNinja in the sixth, then the veterans in Jose Alvarado and Brad Keller put up scoreless innings to set things up for Jhoan Duran.
The Giants made things a little interesting with two outs in the ninth. Adames worked a 2-0 count, then smoked a get-me-over splinker off the right field wall for a casual double. It was up to Luis Arraez to keep the inning going but the Giants threat only lasted two pitches, hitting a ground ball to Turner at shortstop to end the night.
Who knows what Giants manager Tony Vitello will say tonight or tomorrow? His media appearances have ranged from regretting a big speech he gave to players to mentioning Kanye West. On Sunday, Vitello defended his first ejection as a big league manager by talking about how he called Frank Anderson and Oklahoma State’s college baseball team “cheaters”. You can’t make this stuff up.
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