Trea Turner didn’t just collect hits Wednesday afternoon. He collected all the hits. Five of them, to be exact — a leadoff triple, four singles, two RBIs. That’s six multi-hit games in his last seven, which means Turner has officially entered the neighborhood of “how is this even possible?”
And on a night where Turner seemed incapable of making an out, Kyle Schwarber seemed equally incapable of not knocking in runs. His tally: a sacrifice fly, a run-scoring single, an RBI double, and his National League–leading 45th home run. Total damage: five RBIs. Total season damage: 110 — the most in baseball, and a career high.
When the dust settled, the Phillies had walloped the Mariners, 11-2, at Citizens Bank Park. They didn’t just finish a sweep. They pushed their NL East lead over the Mets to six games. And they did it by battering one of the league’s premier pitchers, turning Luis Castillo, a three-time All-Star, into an early shower candidate after just four innings, tagged for 10 hits and three runs.
It started the way these things often do when a team is red hot: Turner tripled to lead off the bottom of the first and scored on Schwarber’s sac fly. Bryson Stott doubled in another in the second. Max Kepler homered in the fourth. Castillo’s night was over, and the Phillies’ onslaught was just beginning.
Meanwhile, after giving up a first-inning homer to Julio RodrÃguez, Jesús Luzardo transformed into a strikeout machine. Six innings, three hits, 12 strikeouts — one shy of his career high. It was his fifth straight quality start, lowering his August ERA to 3.00, and with Zack Wheeler’s return clouded in doubt, the Phillies suddenly need someone to step up alongside Cristopher Sánchez. Luzardo just volunteered.
Seattle briefly made it interesting with a run in the seventh, trimming the deficit to 3-2. And then came the avalanche. Turner singled. Stott singled. Schwarber singled — bringing in two. Bryce Harper singled. Five runs in the inning. Just like that, a one-run game was a laugher.
And the Phillies still weren’t done. Turner added another RBI single in the eighth before Schwarber crushed his 45th homer, a two-run shot that pushed his RBI total to 110. Eleven runs in all, 29 in the series, 48 hits in three games — their most in any three-game stretch since 2007.
José Alvarado returned from his 80-game suspension to a standing ovation and struck out Cal Raleigh — baseball’s home run leader with 47 — to end a perfect eighth. Joe Ross handled the ninth. Seattle got homers from RodrÃguez and Eugenio Suárez, but that was the extent of the highlights. The Mariners have now lost five straight and seven of their last eight. Castillo fell to 8-7, while Raleigh went 0-for-4 and remains one shy of tying the single-season home run record for a catcher.
So the Phillies are now 74-53, six games up on the Mets, and about to welcome the Nationals to town on Friday with Taijuan Walker scheduled to start.
