By the eighth inning, Citizens Bank Park was shaking again.
And somewhere in the middle of the chaos, Justin Crawford delivered the moment that may ultimately be remembered as the first true signature swing of his major-league career.
But by the end of the night, the Phillies were once again left staring at another painful missed opportunity.
After storming back from a five-run deficit to force extra innings, the Phillies watched Brad Keller allow two runs in the 11th inning as the Rockies escaped Citizens Bank Park with a 9-7 victory.
Still, amid the frustration, interim manager Don Mattingly walked away encouraged by something his club has struggled to show consistently for much of the season.
“The boys kept going and got us back to a spot that we had a chance,” Mattingly said afterward.
That opportunity looked almost impossible earlier in the night.
For most of the evening, the Phillies had been completely overmatched.
Jesús Luzardo never escaped the fourth inning, needing 95 pitches before being removed without recording an out as Colorado built an early six-run lead.
The collapse felt sudden, but both Luzardo and Mattingly pointed toward the same underlying issue afterward: the inability to finish at-bats cleanly before the pitch count spiraled.
“I thought his stuff was good,” Mattingly said. “It took a lot of pitches to do it.”
Luzardo struck out six hitters through the first three innings, but several extended at-bats steadily elevated his pitch count and prevented him from ever fully settling into rhythm.
“A lot of foul balls, difficult to put them away,” Luzardo said afterward. “A lot of foul balls, falling behind early, getting back in counts late.”
As the game wore on, Colorado’s lineup gradually became more comfortable against him.
“As the pitch count got higher, I feel like they got some better swings off,” Luzardo said.
Then the fourth inning arrived and everything unraveled at once.
Hunter Goodman opened the avalanche with a two-run homer. Kyle Karros followed with a two-run double. Ezequiel Tovar added another RBI single moments later. By the time Mattingly slowly emerged from the dugout to remove Luzardo, Citizens Bank Park had largely gone silent.
The Phillies offered almost no offensive resistance early against Rockies starter Chase Dollander.
In fact, they did not have a runner touch second base until Bryson Stott advanced there in the fifth inning after drawing a walk and moving up on a groundout.
That stat alone captured how flat the offense looked through the game’s first half.
Then Kyle Schwarber changed the energy.
Leading off the sixth inning, Schwarber crushed a solo homer to right field for his 13th homer of the season and the 200th of his Phillies career.
The homer did more than cut into the lead.
It woke the ballpark up.
Schwarber continues to cement himself as one of the defining emotional forces of this Phillies era — the type of hitter whose biggest swings often arrive exactly when the lineup needs life.
J.T. Realmuto later added an RBI double in the inning, but when Tyler Freeman homered in the seventh to restore Colorado’s five-run lead, the comeback again appeared finished.
Then came the eighth.
Bryce Harper opened the inning with a single. Adolis García walked. Brandon Marsh, who extended his hitting streak to 10 games Friday night, lined an RBI single to left field to cut the deficit to 7-3.
Moments later, Stott ripped a two-run double into center field, suddenly bringing the tying run to the plate and shifting the tension inside the stadium.
Then Crawford delivered the swing that changed the entire night.
With two outs and Stott standing on second base, the rookie outfielder launched a game-tying two-run homer into right-center field for the first home run of his major-league career, detonating Citizens Bank Park and completing one of the Phillies’ most dramatic rallies of the season.
“It’s pretty nice right there,” Mattingly said. “He got us tied up again.”
The Phillies have quietly worked with Crawford on becoming more comfortable driving the baseball with authority to the pull side, something Mattingly acknowledged after the game.
“He’s kind of a little bit of a hit collector,” Mattingly said. “He gets them somehow, some way.”
“We’ve been working with him slowly, learning how to pull the ball a little bit better,” Mattingly added. “The power with him, we think, is going to grow over time.”
Crawford said the swing reflected an adjustment the Phillies have encouraged him to make throughout the season.
“I just go up there and try to hit the ball hard,” Crawford said. “I’ve always been told power comes last.”
At first, Crawford was not even sure the ball had cleared the fence.
“I’ve had a few off the wall,” Crawford said. “I was kind of expecting to get on my horse, but it felt good to see it going over.”
And afterward, he made sure the baseball became part of the memory forever.
Crawford successfully tracked down the ball from his first major-league homer, trading a signed bat and posing for photos in exchange for the keepsake he knows he will never forget.
“Really special,” Crawford said. “Being able to tie the game up right there … definitely a feeling that I’ll remember forever.”
Luzardo, despite enduring one of his roughest outings of the season, smiled afterward while discussing Crawford’s moment.
“It was awesome to watch,” Luzardo said. “Obviously super happy for Craw being able to get his first Major League home run. I’m sure he’ll have many more, but I know this is one he’ll remember.”
For a few minutes Friday night, Crawford gave Citizens Bank Park a glimpse of the future.
Unfortunately for the Phillies, the present still found a way to ruin it.
Keller could not keep Colorado contained in the 11th inning as the Rockies pushed across two runs to reclaim the lead and ultimately silence a crowd that only moments earlier believed it was witnessing one of the Phillies’ best comeback victories of the season.
The Phillies may have lost the game in extra innings.
But for one inning Friday night, Justin Crawford gave them something they have desperately needed lately:
Life.
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