Zack Wheeler continued Philadelphia’s masterful pitching, Kyle Schwarber belted a leadoff home run for the second time in three days and the Phillies completed a three-game road sweep of the Oakland Athletics with a 3-2 victory Sunday afternoon.
Schwarber went 3-for-4 with two RBIs and Cristian Pache was 2-for-4 with two double and two runs for the Phillies, who completed a 6-1 Western swing by winning six in a row after a trip-opening loss at Arizona last Monday.
As he did in Friday’s 6-1 win over the A’s in the series opener, Schwarber gave the visitors an immediate 1-0 lead when he smacked Hogan Harris’ fourth pitch over the center-field fence.
Thanks to Pache’s double and Schwarber’s RBI single in the fifth, Wheeler (6-4) carried a 2-0 lead through six innings, during which he scattered six hits. He walked two and struck out four in winning his third straight decision, a span in which he’s allowed just one run.
Wheeler teamed with fellow starters Taijuan Walker and Cristopher Sanchez to allow just one run in 18 innings in the series.
Harris (2-1) also was pulled after six innings, charged with two runs on four hits. He walked one and struck out seven as the A’s suffered their fifth straight loss.
Pinch-hitter Aledmys Diaz drew the A’s within 2-1 in the seventh with his second home run of the season off Phillies reliever Matt Strahm.
The visitors tacked on what turned out to be a critical run in the eighth when Pache doubled for the second time and scored his second run, this one on Trea Turner’s single.
The A’s got within 3-2 in the bottom of the inning when pinch-hitter Esteury Ruiz doubled and pinch-hitter Carlos Perez singled him home with one out.
But Jose Alvarado stranded the potential tying run on the bases by getting the final two outs of the inning, before Yunior Marte came on for a 1-2-3 ninth to secure his first career save.
The Phillies won despite getting out-hit 9-7. It was their 16th one-run victory of the season.
Oakland’s pinch-hitters, who now rank second in cumulative batting average in the American League (.288), accounted for three of the team’s nine hits as well as both their runs and RBIs in the loss, which completed a 2-5 homestand.
–Field Level Media