{"id":22533,"date":"2019-07-22T22:52:00","date_gmt":"2019-07-23T02:52:00","guid":{"rendered":"lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/\/?p=22533"},"modified":"2019-07-22T22:52:25","modified_gmt":"2019-07-23T02:52:25","slug":"drew-smyly-solid-philadelphia-phillies-debut","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/2019\/07\/22\/drew-smyly-solid-philadelphia-phillies-debut\/","title":{"rendered":"Drew Smyly Solid in Philadelphia Phillies Debut"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Philadelphia Phillies<\/a> wasted little time utilizing their latest addition to the roster.\u00a0 Just hours after finalizing contract negotiations, left-handed starter Drew Smyly<\/a><\/strong> was on the mound at Pittsburgh’s PNC Park to take on the Pirates.<\/p>\n

Drew Smyly Allows One Run Over Six Innings<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Smyly’s first start as a Phillie did not come without some adversity.\u00a0 He allowed a run in the bottom of the first and had to deal with a fourth-inning rain delay, but overall he impressed earning a no-decision after going six innings.\u00a0 He allowed one run on four Pirate hits and had eight strikeouts.<\/p>\n

Pittsburgh’s leadoff hitter, Kevin Newman<\/a><\/strong>, doubled down the third-base line to start the game. Drew Smyly got the next batter, Bryan Reynolds<\/a><\/strong>, to strikeout, but Starling Marte<\/a><\/strong> followed with a flyout that was deep enough to advance Newman to third.<\/p>\n

Melky Cabrera<\/a><\/strong> then singled to left to put Smyly in an early 1-0 hole.\u00a0 Smyly, however, kept his composure and got Jose Osuna<\/a><\/strong> to ground out to end the frame.<\/p>\n

Weathering the Storm<\/h3>\n

After the 25-minute rain delay during the top of the fourth, the Phillies offense tied the game thanks to an RBI single from second baseman Cesar Hernandez<\/a><\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Despite the delay, Smyly came back out for the bottom of the fourth and held the Pirates scoreless through the end of the sixth before departing with 96 pitches.<\/p>\n

Phillies Bullpen Dominant<\/h3>\n

The Phillies\u2019 bullpen has had its fair share of struggles as of late but was very strong Sunday.<\/p>\n

Juan Nicasio<\/strong><\/a>, Adam Morgan<\/a><\/strong>, and Hector Neris<\/a><\/strong> each threw scoreless innings before Ranger Suarez<\/a><\/strong> took over in the extra frames.<\/p>\n

After the Phillies\u2019 offense was stymied in the top of the tenth, Suarez surrendered a leadoff double to Adam Frazier<\/a><\/strong> to start the bottom of the inning.\u00a0 He quickly recovered to sit down the next three batters in order.<\/p>\n

Hoskins in the Clutch<\/h3>\n

The Philadelphia offense finally broke through in the top of the 11th<\/sup>.\u00a0Bryce Harper<\/a><\/strong> led off with a strikeout, but teammate Rhys Hoskins<\/a><\/strong> was there to pick him up.\u00a0 Hoskins delivered a towering solo home run to left field on a 1-2 curveball to put the Phillies up 2-1.<\/p>\n

The homer proved to be the decisive blow. Suarez was able to get Josh Bell<\/a><\/strong> to ground out to begin the bottom of the 11th<\/sup>.\u00a0 Cabrera followed with a single, but Suarez retired the next two batters via the strikeout to earn his third win of the season.<\/p>\n

After all the injuries and lack of production from the team\u2019s pitching staff, the Phillies have to be encouraged by Smyly\u2019s start as they push to get back into playoff contention.<\/p>\n

Manager Gabe Kapler<\/a><\/strong> said he pitched like \u201ca professional<\/a>\u201d and was very impressed by Smyly\u2019s curveball, which induced eight swinging strikes.\u00a0 He recorded five of his eight strikeouts with the pitch.<\/p>\n

Even Pittsburgh slugger Josh Bell was impressed.\u00a0 \u201cI think Smyly had a good curveball going,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s something that I haven\u2019t really seen — none of the guys have seen.\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n

Looking Ahead<\/h3>\n

The Phillies have to be pleased to earn the much-needed series win.\u00a0 They will be off Monday before starting a quick two-game series in Detroit on Tuesday.\u00a0 Aaron Nola<\/a><\/strong> is scheduled to pitch against potential trade target Matt Boyd<\/a><\/strong>.\u00a0 First pitch is scheduled for 7:10 p.m.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Philadelphia Phillies left-handed pitcher Drew Smyly had an encouraging debut, tossing six innings of one-run ball against the Pittsburgh Pirates.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3169,"featured_media":22583,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[23,1071],"tags":[672,69,2894],"class_list":["post-22533","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-phillies","category-mlb","tag-drew-smyly","tag-mlb","tag-phillies"],"modified_by":"David Latham, Managing Editor","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22533","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3169"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22533"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22533\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22583"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22533"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22533"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/baseball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22533"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}