ANAHEIM, Calif. — It was just 56.6 mph off Trea Turner’s bat.
According to the StatCast metric that takes into account exit velocity and launch angle, it had an expected batting average of .150. The majority of the time, contact like that would have been a routine out.
But the Angels had their infielders drawn in during the 10th inning Saturday, looking to stop the bleeding that started with an RBI double from Kyle Schwarber to break the 1-1 tie. And Turner’s soft ground ball found a gap between them.
As it dribbled between first and second base, Justin Crawford read it perfectly. The rookie, whose one-out single was key in kicking off the late rally, hurtled toward home with pinch-runner Garrett Stubbs following behind. Both scored, securing some needed insurance runs for the Phillies’ 4-2 win over the Angels.
“I thought I saw the ball pretty well on that pitch, and thought I was going to hit it pretty hard, and then obviously capped it,” Turner said. “It ended up working out. Yeah, it’s just find a way, any way, no matter how bad it looks, or how good it looks.”
Turner arrived in California ice cold. He ended an 0-for-19 skid by picking up two hits in Friday’s series opener, and followed it with two more on Saturday. Even if neither was very flashy, interim manager Don Mattingly hopes that these two games could get him back on track.
“I know they’re not bullets anywhere, but they’re still two hits,” Mattingly said. “And as you wake up in the morning, you all of a sudden you’ve put two hits up, two days in a row. So hopefully that gets him rolling a little bit.”
The Phillies broke the stalemate in the 10th with some textbook baserunning. Before Turner’s single, Schwarber dropped a bloop hit into center field in front of a charging Mike Trout. J.T. Realmuto made sure it reached the ground before scoring from third, while Crawford went from first to third, and Schwarber advanced to second on the throw.
It was a stark difference from earlier in the game, when it looked like baserunning blunders might cost the Phillies the win. They ran into three outs on the base paths. In the eighth inning, Turner was fooled by Trevor Martin’s pickoff move, and was thrown out trying to steal third.
Turner believed he managed to sneak under the tag, but a review deemed there was insufficient evidence to overturn the call.
“I didn’t deserve it, but yeah, I thought I got in there,” Turner said.
Later in the inning, Bryce Harper tried to take matters into his own hands for an insurance run, and was thrown out trying to steal home against Martin and catcher Travis d’Arnaud. With Alec Bohm at the plate in an 0-2 count, Harper took off on the pitch and was initially called safe. After lengthy review, that was overturned to become the third out of the inning.
“I don’t think you’d really ever expect anybody to steal home, even if they’re a speed guy,” Turner said. “Just trying to make the play. Sometimes it doesn’t work out, but I like the aggression.”
The third mistake came on the first play of the 10th inning, when ghost-running Brandon Marsh attempted to advance to third on a ground ball to shortstop, and was easily thrown out.
Extra innings became necessary after Jonathan Bowlan conceded a game-tying homer to Zach Neto in the eighth. The Angels’ shortstop fouled off seven pitches, including four in a row, before teeing off on a sweeper in the bottom half of the zone.
As soon as the ball cleared the left field wall, Phillies starter Cristopher Sánchez was no longer in contention for his 17th win of the season, after one of his strongest starts of the second half. He turned in seven scoreless innings and held the Angels to two hits in his deepest start since completing seven on July 11 against Detroit.
Five of Sánchez’s eight total strikeouts came on his changeup, including one vs. Neto to end the fifth inning. Neto dropped to one knee over the plate trying to make contact with the pitch that nicked the bottom outside corner, becoming the 200th strikeout victim of the season for Sánchez.
“We just have to keep going,” Sánchez said through team interpreter Diego D’Aniello. “This doesn’t end now.”
He joined fellow lefty Jesús Luzardo as the second Phillies pitcher to reach the milestone this year. Both Sánchez and Luzardo eclipsed 200 strikeouts in 2025.
The Phillies offense needed every bit of Sánchez’s dominance to keep them in it. They hadn’t capitalized as much as they could have against Angels starter Ryan Johnson, who issued four walks his first time through the Phillies order. Many of his misses weren’t close to the strike zone.
The Phillies managed one run against him, which came on an RBI single from Marsh in the second. They threatened to break the game open that inning after Crawford worked a key walk to load the bases and flip the lineup back over, but consecutive pop-ups to shallow left from Schwarber and Turner stranded all three runners.
“You worry about that second [inning]. You leave guys out there,” Mattingly said. “It’s kind of one of those things you hope it doesn’t come back to bite you. And then we never really got anything going after that, until late.”
Jhoan Duran pitched a scoreless ninth inning to force extras, and after the offense’s three-run outburst in the 10th, Mattingly asked his closer for three more outs. It’s something that he wants Duran to get more experience doing as the postseason looms.
Duran, who had recovered from a stomach bug that rendered him unavailable Friday night, obliged.
He conceded one run in the 10th on a single and a force out, but induced back-to-back flyouts from Neto and Trout to seal the win and the series victory.
“Tonight, I thought we made some mistakes as a team, and I think we know that, and we want to play better,” Turner said. “But it’s nice winning those games and learning from it, than losing them and trying to learn from it. … There’s still room for improvement, but it feels like we’re playing pretty good this week.”
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