Cubs jump on Ranger Suárez early to send Phillies to fifth straight loss

It’s never a good sign when a position player takes the mound. And on Friday night in the ninth inning of a 10-1 loss to the Chicago Cubs at Citizens Bank Park, Phillies infielder Kody Clemens took the mound. It was not a quick and painless outing. Clemens, who took the ball from Andrew Bellatti, was tasked with getting two outs, and needed 14 pitches to do it. He allowed a single to Nick Madrigal, induced a force out, allowed a walk to Dansby Swanson — which was when the boos really started to ring — and retired Mike Tauchman on a flyout to put the Phillies, and their fans, out of their misery.

When Nick Castellanos caught the final out of the top of the ninth, fans started to cheer. It was a sarcastic cheer. This has been a rough stretch for a Phillies team that entered this season with playoff expectations. They’ve struggled to gain any momentum. From May 7-13, they won five straight games. Now they’ve lost five straight and are 20-24.

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For about two months, fans followed Ranger Suárez’s recovery from a left elbow strain with anticipation. Starting pitching depth was thin, but if the Phillies could just survive until Suárez’s return, they would be alright. It made sense in theory, but it hasn’t worked in practice.

Suárez lasted just two innings against the Cubs in his second start of the season. His command was erratic, and often came and went in bunches. He needed just six pitches to induce a groundout and a flyout in the first inning, but needed 19 more pitches to end the inning with a strikeout of Patrick Wisdom.

He quickly loaded the bases in the second inning with two singles and a walk, and allowed two more hits and another walk to produce four runs and put runners on first and second with no outs. But Suárez got himself out of trouble as quickly as he got into it. He kept his pitches in or around the zone, and struck out Ian Happ, Seiya Suzuki, and Wisdom to end the inning.

“It was weird,” manager Rob Thomson said of Suárez’s outing. “He got six outs and four of them were strikeouts. And a lot of walks and hit in between. So, we’ve got to look at it.”

By that point, Suárez was at 66 pitches. His night was over. He allowed five hits, four runs, and three walks with four strikeouts. It was not a characteristic Suárez outing, for many reasons, but the walks were especially notable. Suárez allowed no more than four walks in a game last season. To allow three in two innings was troubling.

“I just see it as a bad day,” Suárez said. “But I felt good coming in. I just wasn’t locating my pitches today.”

“I think a little bit of it was rust, but we’ve got to look at everything,” Thomson said. “I don’t know whether he’s giving something away. But we look at that stuff all the time. We’ll try to figure it out.”

Suárez has a 10.50 ERA over his two starts. Of course, that’s too small of a sample size to glean anything from, but the Phillies don’t have much a grace period to give him. Their starters entered Friday’s game with a 4.94 ERA. Taijuan Walker has a 6.53 ERA and wasn’t able to get out of the first inning on Wednesday at Colorado. After sending struggling left-hander Bailey Falter to triple-A Lehigh Valley on Tuesday, the Phillies don’t have a fifth starter. It’s likely they’ll have to go with a bullpen game on Sunday.

A makeshift bullpen game on Friday night was the last thing they needed. By the time Cubs starter Marcus Stroman exited the game after six innings, the Phillies had already used four pitchers. They used six by the end of the night. They haven’t gotten a quality start in a week. The bullpen has stepped up, but at some point, all of those added innings will begin to show.

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If there were any bright spots, they were Jeff Hoffman, who was signed to a minor league contract on March 31, and Andrew Vasquez, who was claimed off waivers from the Giants in November. Hoffman has not allowed a walk since making his Phillies debut on May 6. He hasn’t allowed an earned run in four outings this month and has given up just two hits — one of which came on Friday.

Entering in relief of Suárez in the third inning, Hoffman allowed just one batter to reach base, retiring the six others he faced. Vasquez entered in the sixth inning, allowed a single to Suzuki, and retired his next five batters. He allowed just two hits over two innings with two strikeouts. He has a 1.33 ERA over 20⅓ innings this season.

Friday wasn’t a defensive clinic for either team. The Cubs made two errors and the Phillies made one, after an error was taken away from left fielder Kyle Schwarber by the scorekeepers later in the game. But the Phillies’ mistakes were far more costly.

Schwarber bobbled a line drive hit by Suzuki in the fifth inning. It was initially ruled an error, but was later changed to a double. Reliever Erich Uelman allowed a walk, struck out Matt Mervis and then allowed a sacrifice fly by Yan Gomes to score Suzuki.

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In the next at-bat, with two outs and a runner on third, Christopher Morel hit a ball to Phillies shortstop Trea Turner. It bounced off his glove for his sixth error of the season and a run scored. Uelman allowed a walk and a double after that, to score two more runs. By the time he walked off the mound, Uelman had allowed four runs — only one of which was earned.

“The way we play, that’s on us,” Bryce Harper said. “I think each guy in this clubhouse should be frustrated with the way we’re going about it right now. The mistakes we’re making. We’re not playing the game the right way. And when you don’t play mistake-free baseball, you lose ballgames. And we need to be better.

“You guys have been watching the games; you guys can see what’s going on. A lot of those things can’t happen if you want to be a winning ballclub. We have to play better, we’ve got to be better, and we’ve got to start that tomorrow.”

Before the game, Phillies hitting coach Kevin Long explained why he wasn’t concerned about his team’s recent struggles with runners in scoring position. He said he took solace in the fact that the Phillies were putting runners on base to begin with. That wasn’t the case on Friday.

The Phillies managed just one run and three hits. They saw only three opportunities to score with runners in scoring position and didn’t capitalize on any of them.