Rob Thomson began describing what made Zack Wheeler so effective Saturday night against the Pirates then stopped himself.
“I mean, it’s the same quotes. You can take the same quotes from the last 20 starts and fill it in,” the Phillies’ manager said.
Wheeler is on another one of his dominant runs. It was 84 degrees at first pitch Saturday night and he barely broke a sweat, mowing down the Pirates over six scoreless innings and riding an early lead to a 5-2 win, one of the Phillies’ most comfortable of the season.
Wheeler allowed just three hits and a walk, improving to 5-1 with a 2.67 ERA. The Phillies have won his last four starts and seven of 10 for the season. He’s cruised his last six times out, putting just 31 men on base over 39⅔ innings with a 1.82 ERA and .177 opponents’ batting average.
All of Wheeler’s stuff was up Saturday — velocity, spin and command. He hit 99 mph with his four-seam fastball and 98 with his sinker. The sinker was his best of the season, 96.2 compared to a season average of 94.5.
“Sometimes they just explode out of his hand and you know he’s got his A-plus-plus stuff instead of his A-plus stuff,” said Bryson Stott, who drove in three runs.
“A guy with that many pitches, that many strike pitches, he may save one or two the first time through the order and you think you’ve got him, and then he busts out the splitter, cutter or slider. That’s what the great ones do, they keep a pitch in their arsenal and start using it the second or third time through.”
Wheeler’s sinker has been a plus pitch for years but hadn’t been as sharp early this season. Last week, he attributed it to facing so many left-handed hitters. The sinker is more of a weapon vs. righties and he just doesn’t see many. On Saturday, though, the Pirates started five of them.
“The pitch was good, but obviously when you throw it more in a game, it’ll be better,” Wheeler said. “Everybody’s been stacking lefties against me so you can’t throw it as much and it won’t be as crisp or as good.”
The Phillies (27-18) scored in the bottom of the first with one-out singles by Trea Turner and Bryce Harper and an RBI double from Kyle Schwarber. The Pirates are 2-19 this season when falling behind and have scored the fewest runs in baseball, so jumping on them early almost always means a win. Their only runs came on a Bryan Reynolds homer with one out in the ninth.
Stott added to the Phillies’ early lead with a solo home run in the third inning and they scored three more times in the fourth on Stott’s two-run single and Bryce Harper’s RBI double.
Stott’s homer came on a low-and-in slider to end a six-pitch plate appearance, the same number he saw before lining out in the first inning. Stott leads MLB this season with 4.59 pitches seen per plate appearance, a valuable attribute for a leadoff hitter. All four of Stott’s home runs this season have been pulled to right field on pitches on the inside corner at the belt or below.
“Yeah,” Stott said when asked if his eyes light up when he gets a pitch in that zone. “Kinda big, sometimes too big, like my last at-bat, the one in the dirt. I like it there and do damage there. Sometimes you’ll get a game where you’ll see every pitch outside and then you get one in. You don’t want to miss it.”
Harper sure seems to be finding his swing. He went 3-for-4 with a walk and two RBI in Friday’s win then reached base three more times Saturday. His double was the kind of swing Harper puts on a ball when he’s going well, laced to the opposite field with fading action away from the left fielder. He’s slumped for about a month yet still has an .816 OPS.
The Phillies have gone 10-4-1 in their 15 series. Only the Tigers (10-4) have a better series winning percentage. The back-to-back victories guarantee the Phils at least a .500 homestand and they can make it a winning week on Sunday, but it will be a challenge facing Pirates ace Paul Skenes for the first time. Mick Abel makes his big-league debut.
“It should be a good matchup,” Wheeler said. “I’m excited for Abel, he’s worked hard. Happy to see him up and getting a chance.”
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