The Phillies spent three games against the Dodgers looking like a team that had temporarily misplaced the basics.
They dropped two of three at home, and the damage wasn’t just in the final scores. The bigger problem was how often simple baseball turned messy.
Errors and bad stretches happen over a 162-game season. That’s part of the grind.
But when the mistakes start showing up in the stuff players are supposed to have mastered years ago, that’s when it gets ugly.
The baserunning was the clearest example.
On Tuesday night, the J.T. Realmuto play became the kind of blunder everybody saw and nobody could explain.
Justin Crawford was running back to third on contact, and the Phillies had agreed to take the risk, according to Don Mattingly. Crawford’s read was difficult, sure, but the hesitation is what hurt him.
Once he didn’t get back cleanly, the play should have turned into a sprint home. Instead, Realmuto broke back to second base for reasons nobody - including Realmuto - could really sort out afterward.
Realmuto said after the game that he didn’t really know why he ran back to second. That seems to be the one part everyone can agree on.
Wednesday night brought another baserunning mess, and this one may have been even worse if you strip away the swing of the game. Bryan De La Cruz opened the fifth inning with his first home run as a Phillie to tie things at 3.
Bryson Stott followed with a double off the wall. Rafael Marchan then failed to get the sacrifice bunt down and popped out.
Trea Turner grounded out to third with one out and a runner on second, which is about as standard a “read the ball, wait for the throw” situation as you’ll find.
Instead, Stott ran on contact and got himself into the second out of the inning.
Even the Dodgers’ broadcast was stunned.
"What are these guys doing?"
Joe Davis couldn't believe the Phillies made another mistake on the bases. pic.twitter.com/qmRh6aD6dn
- Foul Territory (@FoulTerritoryTV) July 23, 2026
That was a huge chance to flip the game, maybe even grab the lead. Instead, the inning died on the basepaths.
The Phillies also gave away some value in how they handled the bullpen over the last few days, even with Don Mattingly steering them to a strong record since taking over for Rob Thomson.
Monday night’s move from Cristopher Sanchez to Orion Kerkering stood out. Sanchez had worked 5.1 innings and had already allowed singles to Mookie Betts and Teoscar Hernandez, putting the Dodgers on first and second with one out.
He was at 99 pitches, so there was at least a case for getting him out then. The bigger issue was that Hernandez should have been the last hitter Sanchez saw.
Hernandez is 7 for 21 (.333) with 2 home runs and 4 RBIs against Sanchez, and he has not recorded a hit against any right-hander in the Phillies bullpen. That spot looked like Kerkering’s job before the inning got any worse.
Instead, the move came a batter later, which meant Kerkering entered with two on and one out. By the numbers, that could have been a situation with one on and two outs to Muncy. It also brought Shohei Ohtani into the inning, and that’s a matchup any team would rather avoid.
Then there was Aaron Nola on Wednesday night. He threw five innings of three-run ball, then came back out for the sixth with his pitch count in the high 70s.
Freddie Freeman’s OPS is 230 points lower against lefties than righties, and Max Muncy still carries an .800+ OPS against left-handers even though he has not historically hit them well. That looked like the moment for Tim Mayza, who did eventually appear later.
Jose Alvarado had pitched back-to-back nights, so the assumption is he was down. But leaving Nola in there for Freeman and Muncy felt like a bad bet waiting to cash.
After the Phillies lost 9-5, Mattingly was asked why Nola stayed in for the top of the sixth.
It all adds up to a stretch full of avoidable mistakes: baserunning breakdowns, matchup misses, and miscues all over the field. The encouraging part is the calendar.
It’s July, and there’s still time to clean it up. The less encouraging part is that the Phillies are trying to fix the kind of things that should already be second nature.
The trade deadline is 11 days away. The Phillies have nine games left before then - three against the Yankees, three against the Marlins, and three against the Orioles.
They’ll need help from outside the clubhouse. They’ll also need the guys already in it to start looking a lot more like professionals.
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Catcher has become a depth conversation in Philadelphia more than a true need, especially with Rafael Marchan sidelined for a while and Garrett Stubbs not viewed as a reliable emergency starter. Even so, the Phillies front office has more pressing holes to address, particularly in the search for a right-handed slugger and outfield help, which is why a move like this would likely test fans patience fast. The market may exist for a catcher, but for the Phillies, the fit looks awfully hard to justify. [Read more 🡒]