PHILADELPHIA _ The ninth inning of a 4-3 Phillies win began with a jog, as Jeanmar Gomez reached the mound with his trademark religious ballad blasting inside Citizens Bank Park. The soundtrack, by the end of the inning, was harsher. Those who dotted the blue seats Sunday afternoon fired boos at the Venezuelan closer.
Then Cesar Hernandez made them all cheer.
He shot a broken-bat single to left that scored Daniel Nava with the winning run and saved Gomez. The Phillies overcame an injury to their starting pitcher and failure by their closer to capture a series victory from Washington, the division's titan.
A day after the Phillies blitzed the Nationals with a 17-run outburst, this proved to be a greater challenge.
Gomez surrendered a game-tying, three-run homer to Ryan Zimmerman with two outs. He may have squandered his last chance as closer; Phillies manager Pete Mackanin hinted last week that Gomez's margin for error had thinned.
Gomez has allowed homers in each of his two save opportunities. He lost his job at the end of 2016, but Mackanin opted to install Gomez as his closer to start 2017 in deference to his 37 saves from a season ago.
That sentiment could soon change.
The Phillies needed to lean on their bullpen because cramps in Jeremy Hellickson's right arm interrupted a strong outing.
Shawn Fcasni grabbed Hellickson's right arm, the one that had tossed five scoreless innings, and attempted to unbend the pitcher's fingers. Hellickson could not warm up for the sixth inning. Fcasni, the Phillies' assistant athletic trainer, saw fingers that locked in a bent position.
Joaquin Benoit, Pat Neshek, and Hector Neris navigated the final four innings Sunday. Neris extinguished trouble created by Neshek in the seventh. The setup man dodged more problems in the eighth before Gomez entered in the ninth.
The immediate concern was for Hellickson, a 30-year-old right-hander who emerged last season as a stabilizing force in the rotation and is the team's highest-paid player at $17.2 million. The injury, which carried the symptoms of "trigger finger," did not appear serious. The Phillies have a relaxed upcoming schedule, with two of the next eight days off. That could allow them to rest Hellickson, if needed.
Neris, Benoit, and Neshek have combined to pitch nine scoreless innings in the season's first six games. They have struck out 10 and permitted just eight base runners. The Phillies spent $14 million on Benoit and Neshek to upgrade their middle relief corps. That investment, after one week, looks shrewd.
The Phillies scored in the second on their best at-bat of the afternoon. Freddy Galvis fell behind 0-2 to Nationals ace Stephen Strasburg with two outs. He fouled off four pitches. Galvis struck the ninth pitch, a change-up off the plate, and did not try to pull it. He beat the shift with a bouncer to where the shortstop would normally stand. It scored Tommy Joseph.
Strasburg threw 33 pitches in the second inning. He walked three Phillies in seven innings. He had never walked more than two in his previous 17 starts against the Phillies.
Hellickson may have been injured on a key swing in the game. He batted in the fifth with a runner on second and one out and tapped a grounder to second. It advanced Andrew Knapp to third. He then scored on an infield single by Hernandez, who later won it with another well-timed hit.
