In the interest of full disclosure, Zack Wheeler didn’t have to contend Sunday with three of the Boston Red Sox’s four best hitters.
Guess what? It wouldn’t have mattered.
Wheeler didn’t throw baseball’s seventh no-hitter this season in the Phillies’ had-to-have-it 6-2 victory, but it wasn’t for a lack of stuff. He has dominated this month -- all season, if we’re being honest -- with a fastball that hums in the upper-90s. But he also had his slider sizzling, and although he threw only six curveballs, he produced four swings and misses with it.
With or without resting Xander Bogaerts and J.D. Martinez and banged-up Alex Verdugo (he pinch-hit in the ninth inning), the Red Sox didn’t stand a chance.
Wheeler gave the Phillies the star turn that they desperately needed at the end of a difficult week. They snapped a four-game losing streak and bookended a 2-4 homestand that precedes another three-city, nine-game road trip beginning Monday night against the Miami Marlins. Hello again thorn, meet the Phillies’ side.
It was imperative, then, that Wheeler subdue one of the highest scoring offenses in baseball. Brad Miller bashed a three-run home run in a four-run first inning against Red Sox starter Eduardo Rodríguez, but make no mistake, the Phillies hopped on Wheeler’s back and rode their co-ace as far as he could take them.
As usual, it was deep into the game, saving a bullpen that has been worked hard for the last three games, in particular.
Wheeler gave up a 474-foot home run to Franchy Cordero in the eighth inning, the only blemish against him. But he went 7 1/3 innings, the seventh time in 10 starts that he completed at least seven. He retired 17 consecutive batters at one point and matched his career high with 12 strikeouts. In his last six starts, he has given up eight earned runs (including four in one inning May 1 against the New York Mets) in 44 1/3 innings for a 1.64 ERA.
In 10 starts overall this season, Wheeler has a 2.38 ERA. According to the Elias Sports Bureau, he’s the first Phillies pitcher with a sub-2.50 ERA and sub-1.00 WHIP in his first 10 starts of a season since Roy Halladay in 2011. In 21 starts since the Phillies signed Wheeler to a five-year, $118 million contract, he has a 2.65 ERA.
Any way you slice it, Wheeler has been elite.
Wheeler’s third pitch of the game fell in front of Miller in right field for a leadoff single for Kiké Hernández. And that was all the Red Sox would get until Hernández rolled a harder-hit single up the middle with two out in the sixth. Danny Santana drew a walk to offer the resemblance of a rally, but Wheeler threw three fastballs to dangerous Rafael Devers before getting him to foul-tip a slider into catcher Andrew Knapp’s mitt.
After falling behind in back-to-back games against the Red Sox and scoring a total of one run in the last two games of the previous series against the Marlins, the Phillies jumped out 4-0 in the first inning -- their first lead since Tuesday night -- and thanks again to Wheeler, played from in front for the entire game.
It began harmlessly enough with Odúbel Herrera getting hit by a pitch with one out. Herrera stole second, and after Jean Segura struck out, Rhys Hoskins beat the shift by shooting a two-strike pitch through the vacated right side of the infield for an RBI single.
Hoskins stole second before Alec Bohm walked. Up stepped Miller, who launched a full-count fastball into the netting that’s attached to the left-field foul pole. It was Miller’s fourth homer of the season and his 21st in 316 at-bats dating to the All-Star break in 2019.
It also marked the Phillies’ 13th first-inning homer this season, second to the Atlanta Braves (16) for most in the majors. Including Miller, nine Phillies players have hit a first-inning homer.
The Phillies added two runs in the eighth inning on Andrew McCutchen’s sacrifice fly and an RBI double by Herrera. And although reliever Archie Bradley gave up a home run -- on a fastball that registered only 91 mph -- to Devers and the Phillies committed two errors in the ninth inning, they emerged with the victory behind Wheeler.
