NEW YORK -- With one cathartic swing from Harrison Bader, it looked as if the Phillies had finally reversed their fortunes at Citi Field.
Bader lofted a game-tying two-run home run off Ryan Helsley in the eighth inning Tuesday night, ending a seven-pitch at-bat with a crowd-silencing blast. It was the sort of hit that the Phillies sorely needed, and who better to provide it than Bader, a key part of last year’s Mets team.
But Bader’s heroics soon became a footnote. Jhoan Duran allowed four consecutive singles in the ninth inning, the last a walk-off knock off the bat of Brandon Nimmo. The Phillies lost, 6-5, suffering their ninth straight defeat at Citi Field, including the postseason.
“It’s not the building,” Phillies manager Rob Thomson said. “They’re playing good. And we played well today, too. We battled back.”
It’s not the ballpark -- that would be silly -- but at times, it sure does feel like it.
“Every playing surface just has a different feel to it,” Bader said. “Different batter’s box, different batter’s eye. Sometimes, it’s really just as simple as that.”
Whatever it may be, Tuesday’s game unraveled in a similar fashion to Monday’s. Jesús Luzardo coasted into the fifth inning, staked to a 2-0 lead. A two-strike slider went awry, hitting No. 9 hitter Luis Torrens to lead off the frame. The next three batters reached, trimming the deficit to one run. Just like that, Luzardo was out of the game without recording an out in the fifth.
“It can’t happen,” Luzardo said of the hit-by-pitch. “It’s something that I did earlier in the game with [Tyrone] Taylor, backfoot sliders that actually hit the back foot. Can’t happen.”
The Phils turned to their designated fireman, Orion Kerkering. No Phillies reliever has inherited more runners this season than Kerkering. But this was only the second time that he had entered a game before the sixth inning, part of a premeditated plan from Thomson, who informed Kerkering of the possibility before the game.
“We wanted to try our best to stay away from David Robertson,” Thomson said. “We have a bunch of guys who could be down tomorrow, so that was kind of the plan, to have him come in and kill an inning for us. That didn’t happen.”
Pete Alonso scorched Kerkering’s second pitch into left-center field for a go-ahead two-run double. When the inning was all said and done, the Mets sent 10 batters to the plate, scoring five runs.
And yet, unlike on Monday, the Phillies proved resilient. They scratched a run across in the sixth inning on an infield single from Edmundo Sosa. Nick Castellanos worked an eight-pitch walk to set the table for Bader in the eighth.
The game remained tied until the ninth, when Duran entered. The stalwart closer tossed seven scoreless outings to begin his Phillies tenure, a dominant force at the back end of a volatile bullpen. But Duran blew his first save with his new club on Friday. He allowed two hits on Saturday. And after two days off, he didn’t look any better.
The Mets tagged Duran for four consecutive singles, the first time he has allowed four straight hits. In fact, it’s only the third time in his career that he has allowed four hits in a game. The first two came off Duran’s signature splitter, the next two against the four-seamer, with the game-winner off a 101.7 mph heater.
“I threw the pitch where I wanted to throw it,” Duran said. “They made contact, the ground ball past the defense. So they put the ball to the spot [where] there isn’t anybody there. So they had good luck today.”
The Phillies (76-56) entered this three-game series with the luxury of a seven-game National League East lead. The Mets (71-61) are undeniably the more desperate team, hoping to claw back into the division race. This was a chance for Philadelphia to lay the hammer down, all but burying its rival.
So far -- with another crushing defeat at Citi Field -- that hasn’t happened.
“I thought Bader’s home run, that was something that went our way,” Thomson said. “They battled. We’ve been playing good baseball. We’ve got a five-game lead. We come in here tomorrow and go to battle again.”