Ad Disclosure
Trea Turner Played a Wild Baseball Game on Monday Night
By Luke Arcaini
Published:
Monday night may have been the craziest baseball game of Trea Turner’s 12-year career.
Turner has been struggling on the defensive side of the ball. He has four errors in the last week, and is up to 15 errors on the year, after only committing 8 in 2025. The miscues did not stop on Monday night. Turner booted a routine ground ball from Mookie Betts in the first inning. He then booted a ball in the 4th inning from Alex Call. He then booted a ball that would’ve ended the 6th inning. Only the ball in the first inning was ruled an error, but all three plays were miscues by the Phillies shortstop that could’ve lead to a worse result on the scoreboard.
Luckily for the Phillies, what Turner left out in the field was made up for at the plate.
Turner has caught fire over the last month. He came into Monday night’s game slashing .275/.333/.490 with 14 hits, 2 doubles, 3 home runs, and 7 RBIs in the month of July.
He started his night off with a double in the gap. He followed up the double with a home run ball that was smoked out to left field to enhance the Phillies lead up to 4-0 in the 2nd inning.
Turner stepped up to the plate in the 6th inning to some pretty big boos from the Philadelphia crowd after his third defensive miscue of the night took place moments before. He then crushed another home run, making it a multi-homer night. The 2nd home run was the 200th of Turner’s career.
Turner finished his night with a smoked ball up the middle that hit off of his leg, his fourth “booted” ball of the night, even though that wasn’t necessarily routine. The game ended with a routine ground ball up the middle to Turner, who made the play, threw it to first, and heard some extra cheers from the home crowd.
Baseball is a beautiful sport sometimes.
After the game, Don Mattingly had a couple long answers about Turner’s night, his work ethic, and why the team will continue to ride with Turner as “their guy.”
Well, we won. It was a great night. Trea swung the bat really well…he didn’t catch it as well. So, yeah, it was a good night…You know the one thing about all that. It’s like early in the year, he’s not hitting, and y’all want to question all that, moving in the order, and all all those type of things. Same with defense. Trea’s our guy. Trea works every day, so it’s not like Trea’s out there and doesn’t care about defense. Trea cares about his defense. He wants to make plays. He’s working every day, so we ride with Trea. We talked, you know, somewhere in that game, just about you got to put it behind you, right? You put those plays behind you, and he’s not bothered by like what people would say. He wants to make plays. He wants to win, and he he wants to get better. And he knows he’s better than that…I trust Trea, honestly, and I trust all our guys, and Trea’s going to make some great plays. Everybody’s going to make, you know, there’s going to be errors with everybody. So, you know, again, Trea works. He’s out there everyday working on the ground balls. He’s working on his hands, all that type of stuff. So as long as Trea works, we ride with Trea. – Don Mattingly
Turner, like Mattingly said, just has to keep working. It’s not a lack of effort on Turner’s end. But right now, the $300M shortstop is steaming hot at the plate, and he’s a big reason why the Phillies lineup is starting to find success out of the All-Star Break.
“Just a ridiculous game, in general, by me,” Turner said postgame when asked what his teammates said to him as they were walking off of the field. “Just happy we got the win. Just a rollercoaster. Up down, up down. When you have games like that, sometimes you just have to laugh about it. They were giving me a hard time.”
The Phillies, for years, have been searching for that middle of the order, right-handed bat. They’ve gotten spurts from Turner, who won the batting title in 2025. Obviously, they hope that their right-handed bat doesn’t have defensive night’s like Turner did on Monday. But that’s baseball, like Turner, Mattingly, and other guys said. Monday night was an example of how good this offense can be when Turner is on at the plate.
“When Trea goes, we go.” – Don Mattingly
Luke Arcaini has been writing about the Phillies for 6 seasons, and is now in his 2nd year covering for Phillies down at Citizens Bank Park for Crossing Broad. Follow him on Twitter @ArcainiLuke