Nola, offense struggle vs. Guardians: 'Didn’t get the job done'

CLEVELAND -- On Thursday, the Phillies snatched victory from the jaws of defeat with a come-from-behind win over the Rays that featured contributions from up and down the lineup.

That bevy of offense never came on Friday, as the Phillies only tallied six hits against four Guardians pitchers in a 6-0 loss to Cleveland at Progressive Field.

“Tough travel last night. We had our chances tonight and didn’t get the job done,” shortstop Trea Turner said.

The lack of offense came on a day where Aaron Nola labored on the mound. He allowed four runs on six hits in five innings.

Nola’s first mistake of the evening came in the fourth inning when he gave up a solo home run to Guardians slugger Kyle Manzardo on a fastball on the outside part of the plate.

Things went from bad to worse for him an inning later.

After opening the fifth inning with a walk to Gabriel Arias, he allowed a two-run home run to Angel Martínez on a changeup over the middle of the plate.

“The walks have been crushing me this year,” Nola said. “It feels like they always score. I’ve got to keep trying to limit those every outing.”

The Guardians added a run later in the inning when they loaded the bases on three straight singles from Steven Kwan, Daniel Schneemann and José Ramírez against Nola. They eventually tallied a run on an RBI groundout from Carlos Santana.

“I let it get away from me that inning,” Nola said.

Both homers came against left-handed hitters, which has been a bit of a problem for Nola so far this season. While left-handed hitters entered Friday’s game hitting .235 against him, he’s now allowed seven home runs to them.

This version of Nola looked more like the version that had a 6.65 ERA through his first four starts of the season than the version that allowed just one run over 13 innings in his previous two starts coming into Friday.

Prior to the game, Phillies manager Rob Thomson said he felt that Nola was coming around, and that it seemed like he had command of all of his pitches. While he threw all five of his pitches on Friday, he also allowed four batted balls with an exit velocity of 99 mph or better.

“I thought he was good,” Thomson said after the game. “I thought he was better than his line. He had the leadoff walk in the fifth inning which is kind of taboo but I didn’t think the homer was going out; it just kind of back spun out. A little bit of tough luck.”

The Guardians added two runs in the seventh inning on a Ramírez homer off Joe Ross.

The Phillies’ best chance to score came in the fourth inning when they loaded the bases with two outs in an inning where Guardians starter Gavin Williams struggled. Max Kepler and Johan Rojas worked walks and Alec Bohm hit a single, but Williams got Rafael Marchán to ground out to end the threat.

The Phillies forced Williams to throw 46 pitches over the first two innings of the game before he only needed 52 pitches to get through the next three. While Phillies hitters forced Williams to issue four walks, they also struck out eight times and failed to record an extra-base hit.

“You’ve to give [Williams] credit,” Thomson said. “He settled in and we got out of the zone a little bit. We had opportunities. He had 88 pitches after four innings so that tells you a little bit about it. It’s unfortunate we couldn’t get a couple runs across there.”

Turner and Nick Castellanos both had two-hit games, which consisted of 66% of the Phillies' offensive production. Alec Bohm and Johan Rojas had the team’s other two hits.

“That felt like earlier in the year when we kind of got bit by the homer and we didn’t get ours,” Turner said.

While the Phillies struggled to put together much of anything on offense on Friday, both Thomson and Turner spoke about how they had already shifted their focus to Game 2 of the series on Saturday.

“Go to sleep, come back tomorrow and go get them,” Thomson said.