PHILADELPHIA _ The Phillies spent the first four days of the week away from baseball. After a month of scuffling, the All-Star break provided a respite. Some spent it in Philadelphia, while others _ like Bryce Harper, who vacationed in Tennessee _ went elsewhere. Gabe Kapler walked around the city, ate at his favorite restaurants, and caught up on sleep.
"And then doing a whole lot of nothing," Kapler said before his team opened the second-half with a 4-0 loss to the Nationals. "Trying not to make plans and have places to be and have things to do."
The Phillies spent the break in possession of one of the National League's two wild-card spots. But they did not end the first half with the look of a playoff team. And on Friday night, when Kapler finally had plans and a place to be, they did not resemble one when they opened the second half at Citizens Bank Park.
Nick Pivetta lasted just five innings. The offense was shutout for the fourth time in the last six weeks. They had just two hits after the fifth inning and failed to rally against a bullpen that had the National League's highest ERA in the first half.
They have lost 16 of their last 20 games against teams not named the Mets. The series against Washington, Kapler said, is "an especially important series for us to set the tone for the second half of the season and we're prepared to do exactly that. Set the tone." Instead, they laid an egg against a team that is the hottest team in baseball since June 1 and seems primed to pull away from the Phillies.
Four days without baseball were not enough to fix the flaws that sent the Phillies from third to first place.
The Nationals tagged Pivetta for two runs in the second and could have added more than the one they scored in the third if it were not for Scott Kingery's diving catch in center. Pivetta threw 87 pitches and was nearly lifted an inning earlier for a pinch-hitter but his spot did not come up in the order. He gave up just three runs, but that was three too many for a lineup that has not produced the way the team dreamed it would.
The right-hander did not allow a homer for the first time in five starts and the Phillies did not allow a homer in a loss for just the eighth time this season. They allowed the most homers in the National League before the All-Star break. All was not lost on Friday night.
The Phillies tallied seven hits off Stephen Strasburg, but none were of consequence and just one _ a second-inning double from Maikel Franco with Andrew Knapp and Pivetta coming behind him _ was for extra bases. Harper singled in the first and Rhys Hoskins walked to bring Jay Bruce to the plate with two outs. He popped up. Scott Kingery and Harper singled in the fifth to bring up Hoskins as the tying one with two outs. He lined out.
The Phillies are less than three weeks away from the trade deadline and team president Andy MacPhail said before the game that the performance of the team will determine how active the front office is before July 31. Nights like Friday are not going to push management to be aggressive.
The next six games _ two against the Nationals and four against the Dodgers _ could be enough to make the trade deadline a moot point. A bad stretch and the Phillies could fall far enough from the race that reinforcements are no longer necessary.
The best news they received Friday was that they will avoid Max Scherzer on Sunday after facing Patrick Corbin on Saturday. Scherzer was scratched with a sore back. On the day baseball returned, that was about all the relief the Phillies could find.
