Chimney Sweep

Phillies pitchers dominate once more, sweep Braves on Bohm hit

PHILADELPHIA – A slew of excellent pitches and just enough punches gave the Philadelphia Phillies a good start on their journey to dethrone three-time NL East champion Atlanta Braves.

Alec Bohm had a tie-break singles in the eighth inning, Zach Eflin gave Philadelphia another strong start, and the Phillies ended a three-game sweep for the Braves with a 2-1 win on Sunday.

Philadelphia’s pitching team was the story of the opening streak as the starting trio of Aaron Nola, Zack Wheeler and Eflin gave up just three runs, 11 hits and one walk while recording 24 strikeouts in 20 2/3 innings against NL MVP Freddie Freeman and one Atlanta lineup, which led the majors with 556 hits in 2020.

The Phillies Bullpen, who scored a 7.06 ERA in 2020, failed to deliver a run in 7 1/3 innings in the set.

“Everyone did their job,” said Phillies manager Joe Girardi. “The starters came in and did their job. The bullpen did its job. Limiting this team to the number of runs we did is not easy.”

Philadelphia’s pitching kept the Atlanta lineup in check, with Freeman, Ronald Acuña Jr., Ozzie Albies and Marcell Ozuna coming together to score 3 for 44 (0.068) on the three-game set.

“We’re going to go through that in this game,” said Braves manager Brian Snitker. “We’ll probably go through that in July or August. We’ve had some good pitchings. But I’d rather be up against a team like us (as opponents) early rather than late, if we get our offensive going and get some at-bats. ” “

Eflin went seven strong innings, allowing only four hits and one walk while striking eight. The only mistake he made was hanging Travis d’Arnaud a curveball that ended the winds blowing into Citizens Bank Park on the seventh, ending Atlanta’s 19-inning scoring drought, with a binding solo -Homer pierced.

“We know these guys can strike,” said Eflin. “It’s a huge goal to go into a start and try to limit the number of strokes they can hit. They emphasize weak contact against them. It’s great to go deep into the game at the first start, get them out to balance, to double something. ” play when I had to and let her guess. “

Philadelphia regained the lead in eighth place when Rhys Hoskins, Bryce Harper and Bohm beat consecutive singles against Chris Martin (0-1). Hoskins hit midfielder Cristian Pache just before the throw.

Hector Neris recorded his first parade, avoiding the problems caused by two-out walks to Freeman and Ozuna. D’Arnaud flew out to end it

“I think we’ve proven to ourselves that we can win a game every night and we have people who move up,” said Bohm. “And we showed our bullpen was real by these guys closing the door.”

Atlanta starter Ian Anderson jiggled in trouble early on, hitting seven hitters while allowing four hits. Andrew Knapp homered in the second.

CROWD SOURCING

After the Phillies played in front of 8,500 people in the first two Homestands games, the Phillies received permission from the City of Philadelphia to increase the crowd to nearly 11,000 fans on Sunday – about 25 percent of that at Citizens Bank Park.

The club announced a crowd of 10,773 for the final on Sunday, with social distancing pods scattered around every level of the ballpark.

The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania has increased entry restrictions for outdoor sports and concert venues to 50 percent on Sundays and 25 percent indoors. However, the city of Philadelphia has different regulations and has capped visitor numbers to just 20 percent before Sunday.

NEXT

Braves: Atlanta was scheduled to play in a three-game set in Washington starting Monday. The Nationals had to cancel their first three games of the season due to a COVID-19 outbreak. Drew Smyly will make his first start for the Braves after coming from San Francisco as a free agent. The Nationals did not reveal their starting pitcher and were not fully cleared for full squad training on Sunday afternoon.

Phillies: Host the New York Mets in a three-game set starting Monday. Philadelphia will send newly signed left-hander Matt Moore up the hill for the first time. Moore spent the 2020 season in Japan after playing only twice for the Detroit Tigers in 2019. He faces two-time Cy Young winner Jacob deGrom, who will make his New York delayed opener debut after a weekend series in Washington was postponed due to the Nationals’ COVID-19 issues.

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