Cristopher Sánchez helps Phillies to series win over Diamondbacks, a day after signing extension

Cristopher Sánchez celebrated his new contract with seven shutout innings and a series win against the Diamondbacks on Sunday.

One day after signing a four-year extension with the Phillies, Sánchez held off Arizona en route to a 4-1 victory at Citizens Bank Park. Sánchez allowed just three hits — all singles — and no runs in seven innings. For the second day in a row, the Phillies pitching staff did not issue a walk.

“It’s incredible, signing the extension [Saturday] and then having this outing today,” Sánchez said through a team interpreter. “But we have to keep going. We have to keep doing things right and keep competing.”

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Sánchez’s changeup was effective, with three of his four strikeouts coming via the pitch. He generated four swings and misses with the pitch. He said postgame he also thought his slider was working well.

Over the offseason, Sánchez focused on adding muscle and maintaining weight, and that effort paid off on a hot day.

“During the first few innings, I was thinking to myself, ‘I’m going to die here,’ ” Sánchez said. “But that’s part of the game. And that’s something that I thought of when I added some muscle this offseason.”

It also helped Sánchez and his fielders that he was inducing a lot of contact on the ground, resulting in quick innings. The Phillies’ defense also turned two double plays.

“He was brilliant,” said manager Rob Thomson. “He really was. All his pitches were working, just throwing strikes, keeping people out of bounds. That’s a good offensive club over there, and predominantly right-handed. He just did a masterful job.

“He’s grown up. Since the first day I saw him, he’s really grown up.”

In the second inning, Alec Bohm extended his National League lead in doubles with his 27th of the season, while Nick Castellanos also stayed hot with an RBI single to drive in Bohm.

The Phillies tacked on two more runs in the sixth. Diamondbacks pitcher Justin Martínez walked Bryson Stott and Brandon Marsh, and then balked to advance both runners. David Dahl brought them home with a single to right.

“It just shows how good this team is,” Dahl said. “We got great pitching, great defense, and timely hitting, and I think that’s how you win in the playoffs. Next man up, and it seems like it’s a new guy every single day.”

Diamondbacks bench coach Jeff Banister was ejected after taking exception to a pitch clock violation on Joe Mantiply, who had entered the game in relief of Martínez.

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The Phillies strung together a Bryce Harper double, Bohm hit by a pitch, and a Stott single to plate another run in the seventh. The offense finished with 11 hits.

“There’ll be ebbs and flows during the course of the season,” Thomson said. “You’ll go through spurts where you don’t hit, you don’t score runs, depending on the pitching, depending on fatigue, and some other factors. But we have a lineup that’s built to score runs. We have some really good hitters. So you’re going to have other spurts where you’re putting up big numbers. So you just have to live through the downtimes.”

Thomson said pregame that new call-up Michael Mercado was available to possibly pitch out of the bullpen in the right situation — ideally a low-leverage one — but such a situation did not arise. José Alvarado took over for Sánchez with a 1-2-3 eighth inning and Jeff Hoffman entered the game in the ninth.

“Alvarado had five days off, Hoffman had four days off, so we wanted to get them some work,” Thomson said. “And it was good all the way around.”

Hoffman allowed a leadoff double to Geraldo Perdomo. A single by Ketel Marte scored him to end the shutout, but after a brief mound visit Hoffman induced a groundout to secure the victory.