After 'frustrating' stretch at plate, Phillies bats break out vs. Cubs?

CHICAGO -- The Phillies believe in their offense, even if it has been in a bit of a rut lately.

Since starting the year 7-2, Philadelphia had fallen to .500 for the first time all season with Friday’s 4-0 loss. Slugging had been an issue, as between April 8 (the start of the 6-11 stretch) and Friday, the Phillies’ .348 slugging percentage ranked 26th in baseball. In that same span, their 11 home runs were tied for 26th in baseball. Only one of those homers had come in their previous five games, in which the Phillies were 0-5.

“It can be frustrating, it can be mind-boggling, whatever it is,” designated hitter Kyle Schwarber said postgame Friday. “But I think, overall, if we keep getting guys on base and we keep finding ways to get guys into scoring position, things are going to start going our way. We just have to keep fighting and continuing to do that.”

It didn’t take long for Schwarber’s team to prove him correct. In Philadelphia’s 10-4 win over Chicago on Saturday at Wrigley Field, the offense broke out with a six-run fourth inning and picked up their first "W" in a week.

“Once [left fielder Max] Kepler had the bloop hit down the line to score [in the fourth], it just seemed like everything opened up,” manager Rob Thomson said. “It was good to see. I thought we had really good at-bats today. Yeah, we swung the bats well.”

The Phillies had trailed the Cubs by three in the top of the seventh Friday but had something cooking when shortstop Trea Turner stepped to the plate. With two outs, they had runners on first and second and then, Turner laced a grounder up the middle.

Instead of a hit driving in the runner from second and getting Philadelphia on the board, it went for an inning-ending forceout. The rally was over. The Phillies had recently been stuck in a place where the big, timely hit just wasn’t coming, and that felt like another example of that hit eluding them.

But when the opportunity presented itself again in the fourth inning Saturday, they didn’t let it go to waste.

Schwarber led off getting hit by a pitch from Cubs starter Ben Brown. After two straight singles loaded the bases, Kepler hit a fly ball that hit the grass in shallow left field, driving in the team’s first run. Third baseman Alec Bohm followed with another RBI single.

It took until the sixth batter of the inning for the Cubs to record an out, but even that was a sacrifice fly. Second baseman Bryson Stott then hit an RBI single, and two batters later, first baseman Bryce Harper delivered a two-out, two-run double.

The entire lineup got to the plate in that frame (Schwarber did twice), and all but one Philadelphia hitter scored or drove in a run (three did both).

“Me and [catcher] J.T. [Realmuto] had some duck-fart knocks, and then we opened it up,” Kepler said. “That’s the game of baseball. You don’t have to really square them up every time, but just try and make something happen to rally around.”

Kepler, who entered the game with a 1.054 OPS in 12 games at Wrigley Field, had a 3-for-5 day, including a solo home run in the seventh. He was unaware of his success hitting at the historic ballpark -- “I didn’t even know that. Usually, I’m freezing my [butt] off,” he said -- but he carried that into Saturday and led the charge for the lineup.

The Phillies didn’t necessarily get fully over their slugging hump, as doubles by Schwarber and Harper and Kepler’s homer were the only three of the team’s 12 hits to go for extra bases.

As far as the big hit goes, though, the Phillies finished the day 7-for-13 with runners in scoring position and had four two-out RBIs. Whether it was a single or an extra-base hit, the lineup managed to find different ways to score runs and get the win.

“This isn't a 100-meter race; this is a marathon,” said starter Jesús Luzardo, who now owns a 1.73 ERA in his first six starts with Philadelphia. “We're going to go through good moments, bad moments, offensively, defensively, pitching-wise. It's just a matter of containing them, keeping them small and then going back to what we can do.

“We all know what this lineup is capable of. There's no doubt about that.”