World Series: Frustrated Phillies are repeating the wrong past as series heads back to Houston

PHILADELPHIA – For baseball fans here with keen ears and long memories, the cry is forever lodged in their brain: “Everybody hits – hoo-HOO!” A Phillies fan in the 200 level at old Veterans Stadium would shout it when the home team rallied. Harry Kalas, the voice of the Phillies in those days, actually referenced it in his Hall of Fame speech.

Whoever he was, that fan – or fans; perhaps there were imitators – likely saw many games in 1983, the last year the Phillies wore powder blue uniforms in the World Series. It was a road style then, unlike Thursday, when the Phillies went retro for a Game 5 thriller against the Houston Astros at Citizens Bank Park.

The players looked sharp, but their imitation went too far. The Astros escaped with a 3-2 victory, holding the Phillies to six hits the night after a combined no-hitter. The Phillies trail in this World Series 3-2 and head to Houston with a .174 team average. Their mark was similarly dismal – .195 – in a five-game World Series loss to Baltimore in 1983.

Sometimes, indeed, everybody hits. But now – as it was in that long-ago World Series – nobody seems to do it in the clutch. The Phillies went 0 for 20 with runners in scoring position against the Astros from the fifth inning of Game 1 until the eighth inning of Game 5.

“We’re striking out more than we normally would in those situations, and that’s a testament to how good their pitchers are,” catcher J.T. Realmuto said. “You see they’re doing a better job of putting the ball in play when runners are in scoring position, and we’re just striking out a little bit too much. If we’re going to be successful in the next two games, we’re going to have to be able to put the ball in play when guys are out there.”

The Phillies have struck out 59 times in the World Series, the Astros 48. After hitting .269 with runners in scoring position during the regular season – trailing only the Los Angeles Dodgers and the Astros – the Phillies are 5 for 29 in that situation in this World Series.

“You wouldn’t be human if you weren’t frustrated,” said the Phillies’ Kyle Schwarber, who ripped a leadoff homer but ended the sixth and eighth innings with two runners on base.

“I think the biggest thing is that everyone’s going to flush this out and we’re going to have to be ready to go there for Game 6. You can be frustrated, sure, but we get an off day, we get a little reboot and we’re going to see where this goes.”

It goes back to Minute Maid Park on Saturday with the Phillies facing elimination for the first time this postseason. They had never trailed in any of their four series – against St. Louis, Atlanta, San Diego or Houston – until Ryan Pressly finished off a five-out save on Thursday.

“We’ve faced adversity all year,” said outfielder Nick Castellanos, who grounded to shortstop as the potential winning run to end Game 5. “What a better storybook ending than if we can go there and win this in Game 7?”

The Phillies will try to become the fourth team to clinch a championship at Minute Maid Park, after the 2005 Chicago White Sox, the 2019 Washington Nationals and last year’s Atlanta Braves. The Nationals won Games 6 and 7, a feat the Phillies must match to return with a trophy.

“We’re not the first team to be in this situation, right?” said Bryce Harper, who reached base four times on Thursday. “This game’s been going on for a long time. It’s really a good team over there, we know that.”

The Astros have asserted themselves with stingy pitching – their relievers have a 0.98 ERA in the World Series, and starters Framber Valdez and Cristian Javier have allowed one run in 12⅓ innings. Javier worked the first six innings of the Game 4 no-hitter, and Valdez, who won Game 2, will start again on Saturday with a chance to clinch the title.

Valdez’s unusual curveball/sinker combination stifled the Phillies after their 10-inning comeback win in the opener. He also beat them on the final day of the regular season.

“Any time you take more at-bats off a pitcher, you become more familiar with him and all of their tendencies,” Castellanos said, using the word – tendencies – that Valdez chose to describe his habit of rubbing his pitching hand on the palm of his glove hand.

“We’re definitely going to be more prepared. The more times that you can take a test, the better chance you have of getting a good test score.”

Maybe so, but Valdez is probably the worst possible matchup for a Phillies lineup built on power, because he is durable and rarely gives up homers. Valdez led the American League in innings (201⅓) and fewest home runs per nine innings (0.5) this season.

The Phillies won the opener on a homer by Realmuto and connected five times in Game 3. But Realmuto and the slugging first baseman Rhys Hoskins combined for seven strikeouts in Game 5, and the Astros stymied the Phillies with slick plays by first baseman Trey Mancini to end the eighth and center fielder Chas McCormick for the second out of the ninth.

McCormick chased down Realmuto’s deep drive and caught it against the out-of-town scoreboard in right-center, tumbling to the dirt while holding up his prize. It was close to the spot where the Phillies’ center fielder, Brandon Marsh, had made a first-inning error on Jose Altuve’s double.

“That’s a tough wall to play – it hits the mesh, it goes straight down; it hits the brick, it bounces a hundred feet off,” Marsh said. “I took my chance on getting close to it hitting the mesh so Altuve couldn’t get to third. It bounced off, I missed the ball, and he got to third anyway.”

With Altuve at third, Jeremy Peña drove him in with a single through the drawn-in infield. With runners at the corners in the eighth, Hoskins charged a Yordan Alvarez grounder but let it kick off his glove; he got an out at first base to avoid an error, but the Astros scored their third run.

“We just have to go and play better, that’s all it really comes down to,” Realmuto said. “We have to make the plays when they’re there to be made, and we’ve got to put the ball in play with runners in scoring position.”

The Astros were worse than the Phillies with runners in scoring position on Thursday; they were 1 for 11, and the Phillies were 1 for 7. But the Phillies’ futility stands out as a minislump at the worst possible time.

“That’s baseball,” Phillies manager Rob Thomson said. “It’s the ebbs and flows of the game. Sometimes you go through times when you don’t hit with runners in scoring position and then three days later everybody’s getting hits.”

Everybody hits. The Phillies cannot afford to wait to hear those echoes again.