The Philadelphia Phillies (85-60) got one step closer to putting the New York Mets (76-69) in their rearview mirror with an emphatic 9-3 stomping on Tuesday night.
The Mets’ hitters looked bewildered by Ranger Suarez all night, leading to 12 strikeouts during his six shutout innings, half of which came against Juan Soto and Pete Alonso.
The Phillies opened the scoring with a two-run double by Nick Castellanos
in the bottom of the first inning.
Bryson Stott reached base with a one-out single in the second inning but was quickly erased by a Manaea pickoff throw for the second out. Then the fill-ins for Alec Bohm at third and for Trea Turner as the leadoff hitter went yard back-to-back.
Mark Vientos took David Robertson deep to lead off the seventh inning and open the scoring for the Mets and chip away at the lead, but it was nullified in the bottom of the inning with a three-run shot by Kyle Schwarber, his 50th of the year, joining Ryan Howard as the only Phillies in that club.
The Mets inched closer in the top of the eighth with a few hits off Tanner Banks, an RBI single by Soto making it a 7-2 game.
The Phillies again answered in the bottom of the inning with a rally of their own. Edmundo Sosa doubled and Stott, Otto Kemp and Harrison Bader hit consecutive singles to add two more runs.
Max Lazar gave up another run in mop-up duty but that’s all the disenchanted Mets could muster.
Bader was 3/5 in his first audition leading off in place of the injured Turner. Stott and Kemp combined to go 5/7 with a walk in the eighth and ninth holes in the order.
Since they were swept in the series in Queens at the end of August, the Phillies have gone 9-3 while the Mets have gone 4-8.
The Phils’ “magic number” for the division title going into tonight’s game was eleven, meaning a loss would have required them to go 11-6 (.647 PCT) to guarantee their prize. That magic number is now nine, giving them the luxury to underperform at 9-8 (.529 PCT) the rest of the way. No club has ever squandered a nine game lead with 17 to play.
Game three of the four-game series takes place tomorrow night as Cristopher Sanchez is set to face Clay Holmes.
