SENSATIONAL SANCHY

BY ROCK HOFFMAN

For six innings in their Tuesday night game with the Athletics at Citizens Bank Park, it looked like the Philadelphia Phillies were going to rely on a solo home run by Bryce Harper to propel them to a 1-0 victory for the second game in a row, but they exploded for eight runs over the final two innings to win 9-1. While the offense was nice for the fourth lowest-scoring team in Major League Baseball, the real star of the show was starting pitcher Cristopher Sánchez, who threw eight innings while allowing just five baserunners (three hits, a walk and a hit batter); he struck out 10 batters.

CRISTOPHER SANCHEZ THREW 8 SHUTOUT INNINGS WHILE STRIKING OUT 10.

“Good accomplishment for me,” Sánchez said, who has 19 consecutive home starts where he pitched at least five innings and allowed two or fewer earned runs, through the Phillies interpreter Diego D’Aniello Pérez, “the mentality is to keep going so the next outing I can go out and toss eight more.”

“He was electric tonight,” second baseman Bryson Stott said. “Just from the first inning alone, you knew he had all three pitches and when he’s got all three pitches going, he’s one of the best pitchers in the game. He goes right at them, keeps us involved and still gets his strikeouts."

After the Phillies left the bases loaded in the first and didn’t score with two on and no outs in the second, Harper led off the third inning with his eighth homer of the season, putting Luis Severino’s sweeper into the seats just to the right of the bullpens.

The Phils again failed to score with two on and one out in the fourth. The Athletics, who came into the game leading the American League West by two games, threatened in the sixth and seventh innings. First baseman Nick Kurtz struck out with the tying run on second to end the sixth. In the seventh, Sánchez gave up back-to-back singles to start the inning, but he proceeded to get Tyler Soderstrom on strikes, Austin Wynns grounded out then with a full count, he got Darell Hernaiz to swing and miss on a low changeup. An excited Sánchez pounded his glove a couple times and yelled.

“I was just letting a little emotion out,” he said.

In the bottom half of the frame, Trea Turner got a leadoff double, he scored on a sacrifice fly by Adolis García. J.T. Realmuto doubled home Harper, who walked, and Brando Marsh, who reached via a single to right. After Tyler Ferguson relieved Mark Leiter Jr., Stott greeted him by drilling his first pitch off the façade of the second deck to make it 6-0. Three more runs were added in the eighth, when Turner drove in Justin Crawford and then scored on Harper’s second round tripper of the night. A ball that just cleared the fence in centerfield and one that Harper originally thought the Athletics’ Zack Gelof caught.

Closer Jhoan Duran made his first appearance since April 11^th, after being activated from the injured list, he was rusty and needed 27 pitches to get out of the inning. He walked in a run as part of three walks overall but did strike out two batters.