After a Tough Weekend in Atlanta, Phillies Struggle to Create Belief
My assumption this fine Monday morning is that you do not need to kickstart your week with 1,000 words about the Phillies’ latest setback in Atlanta, so please allow for the abridged version:
Andrew McCutchen homered on the first pitch. His third leadoff homer in eight games did not ignite a fiery rebound win a night after one of the Phillies’ most unlikely losses in recent memory, and, if you have watched this team frequently in recent years, that’s truly saying something.
Instead, McCutchen’s homer served as nothing more than a mere flicker produced from a lighter down to its last drop of fluid. Aaron Nola quickly put the Phillies in a hole. The offense would squander the few chances it created thereafter.
And so it goes.
The Phillies yet again failed to win a series on the road — their ninth straight such failure (0-7-2) dating back to last season — as they continue to hover around the .500 mark (for the fourth straight season).
After putting together five consecutive wins, it’s probably unfair to suggest a pair of losses in early May, even one featuring three separate blown leads following the eighth inning, will go on to define the season. But it is difficult to take in what happened this weekend at Truist Park and not feel like this episode has already aired, repeatedly, over the past few years.
Fans most definitely remember those failures, and the players probably do as well, even if some of the cast has changed.
When asked last night about the team’s increasingly problematic road struggles, Nola said he hadn’t give it any thought. I asked Bryce Harper about the same topic after the Phillies were swept by the Mets in New York last month. The question prompted a cliché-filled run-on about how both he and his teammates needed to do more and be better, and I wouldn’t expect either player to say anything different.
But all of this has me thinking about where this team is at from a mental standpoint right now.
Baseball players, coaches and managers have to excel in downplaying the highs and lows of a 162-game season. That’s why you will often hear Joe Girardi respond to questions about adversity with “that’s baseball” and get throwaway lines from players about “one of 162,” or “getting ’em tomorrow.”
At some point, however, too many losses, ones that range from a good old fashioned gut-punch to those utterly stunning in nature, over too many years, have to add up. Such losses, particularly ones that occur in what are viewed as “big games” against division rivals, become part of a team’s identity.
My working theory is that a handful of the core players who have been around here in recent seasons have to, at the very least, privately wonder if and when they will start nailing down these pivotal games that they have let slip away with such regularity for years now.
Certainly, part of the Phillies’ inability to win these games highlights the roster deficiencies that have been talked about at length dating back to the winter. Still, there’s enough talent in that clubhouse to prevent at least some of these seemingly scheduled losses, so what I come back to is a question about belief.
Did you believe the Phillies were going to bounce back and win that series last night? I’ll guess the answer is no, but that’s to be expected. For fans, there are a lot of scars, both fresh and old, and, well:
Everyone is miserable because everyone is miserable.
— Matt Gelb (@MattGelb) May 9, 2021
But what I’m really curious about is this team’s self-belief in its ability to eventually win the type of series it so graciously gave away to the Braves this past weekend.
No doubt, roster tweaks will be needed if the Phillies want to get serious about a postseason run, but for those moves to matter, this is a team that must first find a way to prove to itself that the next four-plus months won’t be more of the same old story.
My guess this morning is that there are some doubts.