Among the dozens of losses suffered by the Philadelphia Phillies during their ultimately disappointing 2019 season, these are the 10 that stand out as the most painful.
It’s time to take one last bath of negativity when it comes to the 2019 Philadelphia Phillies season after the team was officially eliminated from playoff contention on Tuesday.
And we’re going to do it in a very Philly sort of way by counting down the team’s 10 worst losses this year.
While I will freely admit that I do not follow any other team closely enough to determine how many horrendous or heart-breaking defeats they may have suffered this year, I have a hard time believing that anyone measures up to the Phillies in this regard.
There are terrible teams out there that lost more games than the Phillies did, and of course even the best teams still lose about 60 games every season.
But no team (and fan base) in the league that had realistic title or at least postseason expectations for this year has had to deal with as much disappointment as Philadelphia.
The toughest part of this exercise was narrowing the list merely to 10 setbacks that best represented the team’s bad luck, roster shortcomings, and all too frequent mismanagement on the field.
There was no shortage of games this year to drive Phillies fans mad. And perhaps most tellingly is the fact that no games from the last few weeks of the season even made the list, because by that point the damage was already done, and there was little to no hope left for a miraculous playoff push.
So let’s first look at some of the games for the Phillies you may recall as being pretty awful, but that still didn’t make the cut.
(Dis)Honorable Mentions: Not Quite Bad Enough
So many games, so little time.
On May 4, the Phillies took an 8-5 lead into the eighth inning at home against the Washington Nationals. But Pat Neshek struggled, and then Adam Morgan allowed home runs to the first two hitters he faced to give Washington the lead.
The Phillies eventually lost 10-8.
June 29 was even worse, with the Phillies cruising to a 6-1 lead over the Miami Marlins through five innings. But Miami got two runs back in the sixth inning and then scored six runs off of the terrible tag team of Juan Nicasio and Morgan (again) in the seventh, sending the Phillies to a 9-6 loss.
July 15 was a different story entirely, as the Phillies were absolutely pummeled 16-2 by the visiting Los Angeles Dodgers. Gabe Kapler let Roman Quinn pitch the final 1.1 innings on a truly embarrassing night.
On Aug. 8, the Phillies lost 5-0 to the San Francisco Giants, managing only one hit in the process. At least, that’s what the box score tells me what happened, as nobody saw a single second of it because it was a Thursday night YouTube game that started at 9:45 ET and came on the same night of the Philadelphia Eagles preseason opener.
Obviously, we didn’t miss much.
On Aug. 30, the Phillies found themselves in a 1-1 deadlock with the New York Mets through seven innings. At that point, the Phillies forgot how to pitch, and their bullpen allowed five runs in both the eighth and ninth innings en route to an 11-5 loss while Mets fans laughed it up at Citizens Bank Park.
Exactly one week later, on Sept. 6, the Phillies found themselves visiting the Mets at Citi Field. Down 4-2 in the ninth inning, the Phils rallied to tie the game on a home run by J.T. Realmuto.
In the bottom half, Mike Morin retired the first two Mets hitters, and it appeared that extra innings were imminent. But he allowed two straight singles, and Kapler lifted him in favor of Nick Vincent. Vincent proceeded to hit the first batter he faced on an 0-2 pitch and then walk the next man to force in the winning run.
Those defeats were all painful. But they are like the buzzing of flies compared to the disasters on this top ten list. Behold!
10. June 23: Marlins 6, Phillies 4
A 6-4 loss where you trailed from the second inning on isn’t, on the surface, that bad of a loss.
Sounds pretty routine, right?
But when you look at this game in the grand scheme of things, this was horrible, as it was final game of a series sweep that the Phils suffered at home to the lowly Marlins, a team that came into town 19 games under. 500 with the All-Star break still weeks away.
The Phillies should have been angry after losing a pair of close games on the weekend already, their offense scoring just four runs in that span. They should have come out and pounded the Marlins on this Sunday afternoon to right the ship.
Instead, they fell behind 6-2 by the fifth inning and were meekly swept aside. It was pathetic.
I am hard-pressed to remember the Phillies suffering a worse sweep than this, and it highlighted the disturbing trend of the struggles that they had with the lowly Marlins this year.
While the rest of the NL East gobbled up wins against Miami, the Phillies played down to their level and couldn’t bank victories against a meager opponent. It made a big difference.
This wasn’t their worst loss against Miami, but it was symbolically deep.
9. June 10: Diamondbacks 13, Phillies 8
Poor Jerad Eickhoff. Just as he looked like he was turning the corner in his return from a long injury layoff, this game happened.
The Arizona Diamondbacks hit back-to-back-to-back home runs to open the game and never looked back, blitzing Eickhoff for five homers and seven runs in a little over three innings before Gabe Kapler mercifully dipped into the bullpen.
Arizona would add three more homers to finish the game with eight total long balls, making the five hit by the Phillies seem paltry in comparison as the team’s 13 combined dingers set a new major league record for a single game. A dubious distinction for the Phils.
As for Eickhoff, it was his final start of the season, as he was banished to the bullpen afterward. He surrendered five runs in one inning of mop-up duty in a game the following week, and then went on the IL with a biceps injury, which kept him out for the rest of the season.
We may have seen the last of him in a Phillies uniform, sadly.
This game just added to the litany of problems that the Phillies seemed to have all year long whenever anyone not named Aaron Nola was on the mound.
8. April 19: Rockies 4, Phillies 3
The Phillies and Colorado Rockies had been going at it for over four hours in an early-season contest at Coors Field when Bryce Harper ripped a two-out double in the top of the 12th to give the Phils a 3-2 lead.
Juan Nicasio came out in the bottom half, his second inning of work, in an effort to nail down the win.
Nicasio walked a man, but there were two outs when Charlie Blackmon came to the plate. Gabe Kapler decided to let the right-handed Nicasio face the left-handed All-Star Blackmon, rather than the right-handed Drew Butera, who was on deck.
Yes, the same Butera who lost the Phillies backup catcher competition to Andrew Knapp in spring training a few weeks prior.
Nicasio put Blackmon in a 1-2 hole, but then he unsurprisingly left a meatball hanging over the plate, which Blackmon belted 400+ feet to win the game for Colorado. You just can’t lose a game that long when you get the lead.
As I zoned in and out of consciousness watching the tragic ending of this game, little did I know how many more problems awaited the team. This one was frustrating, but there was much worse to come.
7. July 27: Braves 15, Phillies 7
Burn the Saturday Night Special jerseys and never speak of them again.
A night after getting embarrassed 9-2 by the Atlanta Braves in the series opener, the Phils hit a new low in this one.
And it was even worse than the score indicates, as the Phillies trailed 14-1 in the fifth inning. Zach Eflin got bombed for 10 of the runs, prompting his demotion to the bullpen for several weeks after the game.
Ranger Suarez wasn’t much better in relief, and perhaps the only surprising thing about this game is that Kapler didn’t turn to a position player to pitch in the late innings.
It was the Phillies’ fourth-straight loss to the Braves in July, as they watched Atlanta completely pull away from them in the standings. It wasn’t supposed to be this way.
The Phils would rebound with a win the following day to avoid being swept. In fact, they won the season series versus the Braves. But you wouldn’t know it by games like this.
In every meeting between the teams, Atlanta seemed to break out the bats and/or get the clutch hit they needed while the Phillies couldn’t.
The Braves look like they’ll be good for a long time. That’s a problem.
6. April 9: Nationals 10, Phillies 6
The Phillies got to Nationals co-ace Stephen Strasburg on this night, plating six runs in four innings against him as they built a solid 6-1 lead with Aaron Nola on the mound.
But the Nats slowly chipped away until finally a two-out, two-strike home run by Victor Robles off Edubray Ramos tied the game in the top of the ninth.
What about Hector Neris, you say? He had thrown a ton of pitches the previous inning and wasn’t able to come back out for another frame.
We all knew what was going to happen next.
Jose Alvarez was victimized by four runs in the top of the 10th inning, and the Phillies saw just eight pitches in their half before going down in order to complete the slow collapse.
At this point, the Phillies were still 7-3 on the young season, so there didn’t seem to be much reason to worry.
But this one was a pretty foreboding harbinger of some issues that would plague them throughout the year. Good teams bounce back from tough losses like this, and it gave the Phillies their first real chance to show what they were made out of.
They lost 15-1 the next day.
5. June 2: Dodgers 8, Phillies 0
Trying to salvage the final game of a series at Dodger Stadium, where they have been terrible in recent years, the Phils were locked in a scoreless battle with the Los Angeles Dodgers through six innings.
Nick Pivetta was pitching the game of his life so far, whiffing nine Dodgers to that point while allowing just three hits while throwing 82 pitches.
That’s when Kapler got thoroughly pantsed by Dodgers skipper Dave Roberts.
Cesar Hernandez ripped a two-out double in the top of the seventh, bringing Maikel Franco to the plate. Except it didn’t, because Roberts did not hesitate to intentionally walk Franco in a bid to bring up Pivetta and force Kapler’s hand.
Kapler pinch hit Phil Gosselin for Pivetta, and he proceeded to take a called third strike right down the middle to end the inning. Vince Velasquez replaced Pivetta on the mound in the bottom of the seventh, allowing a tie-breaking home run.
It didn’t even end up mattering that Edgar Garcia and Yacksel Rios imploded to allow a combined seven runs in the bottom of the eighth, as the Dodgers only needed the one run on this day in an 8-0 win.
And it’s all because Kapler removed a pitcher who was absolutely cruising in order to take a very low percentage gamble.
4. June 14: Braves 9, Phillies 8
The Phillies slowly built a 5-1 lead on this night, and it grew to a 7-2 advantage by the seventh inning stretch.
Oddly enough, Kapler actually stuck with Nick Pivetta in this one, allowing him to come out for another inning. But he allowed a leadoff home run to Brian McCann and then permitted two more men to reach base before finally being yanked after throwing a career-high 116 pitches.
Velasquez would allow an inherited runner to score, cutting the Phils lead to 7-4. They added a run in the eighth inning, but Atlanta plated two more to make it 8-6 headed to the ninth.
You could just feel it coming, and it was going to be extremely painful.
Hector Neris allowed a leadoff hit but then recorded a pair of outs. He issued a walk and then got the Braves’ Austin Riley down to his last strike before allowing an RBI double. Yet the Phillies were still clinging to an 8-7 lead.
Again, Neris got two strikes on McCann, but the elderly backstop floated a garbage game-winning hit to the opposite field that some would say should have been caught to send the Phillies to a baffling but predictable 9-8 loss.
3. June 3: Padres 8, Phillies 2
The Phillies came into San Diego on a four-game losing streak, yet they still led the National League East at this point thanks to a strong first 1/3 of the season.
But that would all be wiped away in an instant in the first inning of this game.
After Andrew McCutchen led off the game with a walk, Jean Segura hit a pop-up to the right side of the infield.
Not unusual, except that Segura dropped to one knee on his swing and then didn’t immediately get back up to run down the line. Seeing this, San Diego Padres second baseman Ian Kinsler let the ball drop so that he could turn it into a double play.
San Diego executed the twin killing, at the expense of McCutchen’s ACL, which he tore in the ensuing rundown. His season was done after 59 games. This is a guy who had only failed to play in 150+ games once this decade.
But, that’s the Phillies for you. Avoidable season-ruining injuries and a lack of accountability after the fact, as Segura never faced any kind of discipline from Kapler for the lack of hustle that led directly to the play (or another incident a few weeks later).
The whole situation was a painful, but perfect demonstration of what is wrong with the team under Kapler, and the theme continued throughout the season.
Oh, and the Phillies lost the game 8-2 after allowing a seven-run inning for the second-straight game.
More importantly, they lost their leadoff hitter, and Kapler would try out seven different players in the spot after McCutchen’s injury without ever getting the kind of production that the team needed.
2. Aug. 2: White Sox 4, Phillies 3
The Phillies held a 3-2 lead over the Chicago White Sox in the top of the ninth inning, when a two-out, two-strike single by Matt Skole (who?) tied the game, resulting in extra innings.
The teams remained deadlocked through the 13th inning, and it was at that point that Kapler called on Roman Quinn of all people to face the heart of Chicago’s order in the 14th inning.
Are you kidding me?
The Phillies had already used seven pitchers, which was apparently the limit of how many of them were ready, willing and able to pitch on that night.
Still, Quinn improbably threw a scoreless inning, although he needed some help from Velasquez, who was playing left field and threw out a runner at home. It was ridiculous.
It was on to the bottom of the 14th, and I don’t have to explain why it was critical for the Phillies to score at that point, but they went down 1-2-3.
In the 15th inning, Quinn managed to get the first two outs, but then the bottom finally fell out and the White Sox pushed a run across, although Velasquez came up with even more heroics in left field.
The Phillies were retired in order in the bottom of the 15th, and they lost 4-3. Their offense managed only two hits after Chicago had tied the game in the top of the ninth. It was an unacceptable situation all the way around.
Also, did I mention that Adam Haseley, who played the whole game in the outfield, was a pitcher in college?
Unreal.
1. Aug. 23: Marlins 19, Phillies 11
Any loss to the Marlins is a bad loss. They are a minor league team and a terrible franchise in every way.
But that didn’t stop the Phillies from experiencing the top stinker of the year while wearing the awful “players weekend” jerseys on a Friday night in Miami in front of an announced crowd of 9,065.
The Phillies built a 7-0 lead by the third inning, yet Vince Velasquez gave it all back in short order as the Marlins went single-single-hit by pitch-single-single-home run, all in a span of 18 pitches to tie the game and chase Vinny from the mound.
Guess Gabe should have kept him in left field, right?.
After the Phils seemingly recovered to take a 9-7 lead, they unimaginably allowed the Marlins to score 12 runs over the next four innings. The final result was a 19-11 loss for the Phillies, one that you simply can’t come back from.
It was the worst loss of the season and maybe the worst of the decade for a team in serious need of restructuring this offseason.
Not all losses are created equal, and the 2019 Phillies reminded us of that time and time again this year. Let’s just hope that they learned something from all of the losses that they piled up.
And don’t hold your breath for a “10 best wins” list anytime soon, since Philadelphia has some work to do before that can even be considered to take place.