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| Jhoan Duran surrendered a crucial homer to Austin Riley in Game 1. | CREDIT: Melinda Abrams |
There were a few feet between Bryce Harper and a go-ahead home run. A fraction of a second between Derek Hill and a catch at the center-field wall. And, by the eighth inning Tuesday, one bullpen decision separating the Phillies from a Game 1 win and a loss that pushed their season to the brink.
October can shrink a game that way.
The Phillies lost to the Braves, 5-3, in Game 1 of the National League Wild Card Series at Truist Park, a game they led in the seventh inning and entrusted to their best reliever earlier than usual. Austin Riley erased that lead with one swing, launching a three-run homer off Jhoan Duran in the eighth and putting Atlanta one victory from ending Philadelphia’s season.
The Phillies will hand the ball to Cristopher Sánchez on Wednesday with no margin left.
Before the bullpen became the story, Jesús Luzardo nearly wrote another one.
Making his first start since Sept. 7 after dealing with left shoulder inflammation, Luzardo was expected to give the Phillies only limited length. Instead, he supplied five innings, allowing one run on three hits while striking out six. He threw 77 pitches and kept Philadelphia even with Chris Sale long enough for the game to become a late-inning fight.
“He gave us more than we thought honestly,” manager Don Mattingly said. “Zeus was great today.”
The Phillies scored first when Kyle Schwarber walked and Alec Bohm doubled him home in the opening inning. Atlanta tied it in the second on Mike Yastrzemski’s RBI single, but Sale settled in from there. Philadelphia managed four hits against him in 6 1/3 innings and struck out nine times.
Harper had the most painful near-miss.
With Schwarber aboard in the sixth, Harper lifted a towering drive down the right-field line that had enough distance to change the game. It hooked just foul.
Then he struck out.
Instead of a two-run homer and a Phillies lead, it became another empty at-bat in an 0-for-4 afternoon.
That became one of several moments decided by inches.
In the bottom of the sixth, Michael Harris II singled before Ozzie Albies drove a ball deep toward the center-field wall. Hill tracked it, reached the fence and went up for it.
Hill has made more acrobatic catches than that this season. This one was less about difficulty than timing. He appeared to leave the ground just a fraction early, and the ball hit his outstretched wrist just below his glove as Albies raced to third with an RBI triple that gave Atlanta a 2-1 lead.
The Phillies answered immediately.
Bryan De La Cruz reached, Bryson Stott singled him to third and J.T. Realmuto drove a ball into the right-field corner. Two runs scored.
Suddenly, the Phillies led 3-2.
And that is when Mattingly made the decision that will define how Game 1 is remembered.
Rather than save Duran for the ninth, Mattingly went to him in the seventh with the top of Atlanta’s order approaching. It was an aggressive October move: use the Phillies’ best reliever against the most dangerous portion of the lineup rather than saving him for three outs that might never come.
“We talked about it before the game,” Mattingly said. “It was more the spot.”
Duran made the seventh look easy.
He struck out Dominic Smith, retired Drake Baldwin on a ground ball and got Ronald Acuña Jr. on a deep fly to center.
Then came the decision that mattered even more.
“I threw the first inning and I go back to the dugout and they said be ready for another inning and so I go back out there and try to do my work,” Duran told reporters afterward.
Mattingly had seen enough in the seventh to believe Duran could keep going.
“He made it look easy the first inning,” Mattingly said of Duran. “If the second one would have went really quick, I would have just checked with him. If not, we would have went to somebody else.”
For two outs, it looked as though the plan might work perfectly.
Duran retired Matt Olson on a liner and Mauricio Dubón on a fly ball. Nobody on. The Phillies were four outs from taking Game 1.
Then Harris reached on a soft infield single. Albies was hit by a pitch.
Riley drove the next pitch into the seats in right-center.
Three batters. Three runs. Game flipped.
Mattingly did not lose the game by asking an inferior reliever to protect a one-run lead. He asked his best one to get six outs instead of three.
For five outs, Duran did exactly that.
The sixth never came.
“In our minds we had our best guy out there,” Mattingly said. “You live with this one.”
Luzardo viewed it similarly.
“Heartbreaker, especially knowing all the fight that went into the game,” Luzardo told reporters afterward. “But I mean, he’s the best closer in the game. I’ll take that guy on the mound any day of the week. So, just unfortunate, but there’s a reason why this is a three-game set. And we come back tomorrow and scratch and claw and find our way to play another day.”
The consequences of Mattingly’s decision could carry into Wednesday. Duran threw 27 pitches over two innings, leaving his availability for Game 2 uncertain. Mattingly said the Phillies will check on him before the game. Andrew Painter, he acknowledged, could have been an option later.
The Phillies never got that far.
Brandon Marsh opened the ninth with a single, but De La Cruz grounded into a double play. Stott then flied out to end it.
The Phillies had survived Sale. Luzardo exceeded expectations. Realmuto delivered the hit they needed. They had a one-run lead with six outs to get and their best reliever on the mound.
Four outs from stealing Game 1, they watched it disappear in three batters.
Realmuto, though, did not sound like someone who believed one inning had fundamentally changed what the Phillies think about themselves.
“This is a confident group,” Realmuto told reporters afterward. “We have a lot of faith in ourselves. We just know we gotta go out and play good baseball tomorrow. Faced a really good pitcher today, faced all their good arms. And they faced all our good arms.
“So it’s gonna be an evenly-matched series. We knew we had to win two out of three, we knew it wasn’t gonna be easy. So losing Game 1 isn’t gonna deter us at all, we’re still confident going into tomorrow.”
Confidence is one thing.
Wednesday now demands something more tangible.
Sánchez starts.
If the Phillies want a Thursday, they have to win.
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