Phillies' Don Mattingly Not to Blame for Game 1 Implosion
· Yahoo Sports
The Philadelphia Phillies fell to the Atlanta Braves, 5-3, in Game 1 of their Wild Card Series on Tuesday afternoon, and the game was blown by the most unlikely of culprits.
Jhoan Duran.
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A lights-out closer for the Phillies all season long, Duran entered the game in the seventh inning with Philadelphia holding a 3-2 lead. It was an uncharacteristic decision by Don Mattingly to use Duran so early, but Duran has been, buy far, the Phillies' best reliever.
The result? Duran pitched a clean seventh. But then in the eighth, he allowed an infield single, hit a batter and then coughed up a three-run home run to Austin Riley — all with two outs.
As expected, Mattingly was lit up after the game, with many questioning why exactly he decided to bring in Duran so early.
But can you really blame him?
Philadelphia's bullpen has been horrendous most of the year, and it has been particularly atrocious lately. Case in point, Alex McFarlane — the one Phillies reliever outside of Duran who has looked competent recently — surrendered a run on a couple of hits in the sixth inning, resulting in the Braves claiming a 2-1 edge.
Mattingly didn't really have a ton of options at his disposal. Jonathan Bowlan had a horrific month of September. Tanner Banks owns a 6.19 ERA. Chase Shugart has been shaky all season long. Tim Mayza has been decent, but can you really trust him? The less said about Jose Alvarado, the better.
It was also highly unlikely that Mattingly would use Andrew Painter that late in the game, especially when he would almost surely prefer to have his right-hander available in more of a long relief role.
So again, what was Mattingly really supposed to do?
The whole idea of only having your closer come in during the ninth inning (and the eighth on occasion) is not a rule; it's just a tradition. And Mattingly wasn't about to let tradition get in the way of his best chance of stealing Game 1.
Surely, Mattingly understood that winning the opener would have been enormous for a Phillies squad that entered the Braves series as a huge underdog, especially considering that Chris Sale was on the mound for Atlanta.
Mattingly knew that he would be sending Cristopher Sanchez to the bump in Game 2. Meanwhile, the Braves would be using Tyler Mahle. A Game 1 win would have been a potential killer for Atlanta.
But sometimes, even the best laid can go awry, and we saw that on Tuesday.
Don't pin this on Mattingly. Blame a Phillies front office that failed to properly address a clearly lacking bullpen last winter.