The Philadelphia Phillies crushed the Arizona Diamondbacks, 6-0, to take a 3-2 edge in the NLCS.
Zack Wheeler pitched seven shutout innings to post his second post-season shutout, Bryce Harper and Kyle Schwarber each hit a home run, and the Philadelphia Phils won their second straight NL Championship Series game, 6-1, Saturday night.
The Phils, one win away from a World Series berth for the second time in three seasons, got back on track after losing late leads in back-to-back one-run decisions at Chase Field in the second and third games of the series.
After Bryson Stott’s RBI single in the first, Harper slid home on a double steal by catcher Gabriel Moreno that made it 2-0. In the sixth, Schwarber hit a 461-foot shot over the right-center fence to make it 6-1, and two batters later Harper followed with a 433-foot shot to the right-center seats. It was Schwarber’s fifth homer of the NLCS, and his 20th in total, as the Phils punished Gallen for the second time this season.
Realmuto hit a two-run home run in the eighth inning against reliever Luis Frías, making it 6-1. The series shifts to Philadelphia on Monday, where the Phils are 6-0 with 17 homers this post-season.
In his 33rd post-season start, the veteran right-hander allowed one run, five hits, and a walk while fanning eight. He’s 3-0 in four starts this year with an ERA of 2.08 and has struck out 34 and walked two in 26.
The 26-year-old Gallen pitched six innings of four runs, allowing five runs and six hits, and fell to 2-2 in four playoff starts with an ERA of 5.24 after allowing five runs in five innings in Game 1.
Alek Thomas hit his second home run of the series in the seventh inning after his tying homer in the eighth in Arizona’s 7-6 win in the nightcap. Thomas now has a team-record four home runs in the series.
Giancarlo Stanton drove in the first run of the game with an infield single in the top of the seventh. He then scored on a two-out groundout by Stott, who stole second on a wild throw from Moreno. Harper then collided with Moreno, who was dazed but stayed in play. The umpires ruled that Harper could not avoid the collision because of the force of Marte’s throw, which pulled Moreno down at third-base.
With his second homer of the series, Giancarlo Stanton has now homered in 20 of his 63 post-season games, breaking the previous record of 68 games set by Houston’s Jose Altuve.
Harper’s home run was the first in the Phillies’ post-season history, and only the 22nd in all of baseball’s playoff history. It was the ninth home run steal in the post-season since the playoffs began in 1969, and the first for the Phillies since Tampa Bay in 2021.
LINEUP CHANGE
The D-backs made one change to their starting lineup. Pavin Smith was batting fifth for the first time this post-season, replacing Tommy Pham, who was benched after going 1-for-13 in the NLCS’s first four games. Smith had been 3-for-4 this post-season entering Saturday.
ROF CLOSING
With temperatures hovering around 100 degrees in Phoenix, Chase Field’s retractable roof was shuttered for the third time in the series.
CURTAINING OUT
28-time Olympic swimming medalist Michael Phelps
On Monday, the Phillies’ Aaron Nola will face the Diamondbacks’ Merrill Kelly. Nola is 3-0 with a 0.96 ERA in the post-season. Kelly is 1-1 with a 3.00 ERA.
