Author: Lochlahn March

WASHINGTON — From Kyle Schwarber’s perspective, pinch-hitting is one of the most difficult things to do in baseball.

Derek Hill takes it one step further.

“It’s the hardest thing to do in sports,” the Phillies outfielder said.

On Wednesday night, both Schwarber and Hill were called on to do it in the ninth inning, and both delivered. Schwarber, who had been on the bench with lower back tightness, drew a crucial 10-pitch walk to put the tying run aboard against the Nationals. And Hill blasted a go-ahead, two-run home run in the 5-4 win over the Washington Nationals.

After playing the unlikely hero, Hill left the Phillies clubhouse Wednesday night to see family before reporters entered, but he fielded questions pregame on Thursday about the moment.

“Obviously the guys, they fought their butts off all nine innings, so just to be able to come in there and contribute was really cool,” Hill said.

Hill, who was acquired by the Phillies on June 11 from the Chicago White Sox after Adolis García’s season ended due to injury, has three pinch-hit home runs this season. He is tied with Randal Grichuk for the most in the major leagues this year.

And he followed it up with another big ninth-inning moment in Thursday’s 10-5 win. Hill came off the bench in the seventh, and after Bryce Harper’s go-ahead homer, he launched another two-run shot to give the Phillies more insurance.

Entering Friday’s series opener against the Mets, Hill was hitting .375 with a 1.042 OPS in 24 plate appearances with the Phillies. He has collected at least one hit in the last six games he’s appeared in. Of those, he only started three.

When opportunities are few, how does he stay ready?

“I went through a lot of trials and tribulations over the last some-odd years,” Hill said Thursday. “Just kind of failing, succeeding here and there, and just being able to take little pieces out of the successes, and hopefully continue doing that.”

According to interim manager Don Mattingly, experience is the real key to success as a pinch-hitter. Hill has 39 pinch-hit plate appearances since debuting in the majors in 2020, including 18 this year.

“I think it’s hard. I think it’s easier for older guys that kind of know their swing, they walk up with a plan,” Mattingly said. “I think it is something that it’s always hard. Pinch-hitting is tough, because you get one shot.”

Making contributions like the ones Hill made in the Nationals series can certainly help a new player integrate into a clubhouse. But the 30-year-old Hill didn’t need any help in that department.

“He’s been a good guy in our clubhouse. He’s a guy that’s prepared, he’s low maintenance, ready to go at all times,” Mattingly said. “We go look for a pinch-hitter, and he’s ready with a bat in his hand, or he knows when we defend with him, and things like that.”

Added Schwarber: “He fits right in with our group.”

According to Hill, Brandon Marsh in particular has been a big help in adjusting to the Phillies. The outfielders already knew each other before the trade, having played together in the Arizona Fall League as prospects in 2019.

“We all see the work that he’s been putting in down in the cages, and he’s a phenomenal athlete and a hell of a ballplayer,” Marsh said. “We’re lucky to have him, and just being a buddy of his from a couple years ago, and seeing him throughout these past couple years, and now getting to play together has been special for us.

“He’s been awesome for us, and we’re going to need him. We’re going to keep relying on D-Hill, for sure.”

Hill said he’s taking the opportunity to learn from Marsh while he gets an up-close look at the career season Marsh has been putting together.

“Marshy is the man, obviously,” Hill said. “We kind of already have that camaraderie and everything like that. And he’s a high energy guy, and I like to think of myself as the same.”

Thursday night’s series finale against the Nationals marked the halfway point of the Phillies’ season. The year is far from over and things still need to be done before playoff races truly take shape.

But when they do, the three consecutive ninth-inning outbursts this week against the Nationals might become even more significant in hindsight. And Hill, mere weeks after being acquired in a desperation move because of García’s injury, turned out to play a crucial role in two of the comebacks.

“Every single game matters,” Hill said. “At the end of the year, you’re going to look back at a couple games and be like, those are ones that got us in, or those are the ones that didn’t get us in. So to be able to keep that focus on 162 is pretty important.”

WASHINGTON — Kyle Schwarber and Derek Hill were down in the batting cages together underneath Nationals Park when the ninth inning began.

Schwarber had been on the bench for the last two days with tightness in his lower back, but he started to feel like himself again by the seventh inning on Wednesday night. He let interim manager Don Mattingly know he was available to pinch-hit if needed.

The Phillies, trailing the Nationals by one run, hoped they would have an occasion to use him. And when right-handed pitcher Orlando Ribalta came out for the ninth, Schwarber knew they would.

He stepped into the box with two outs, representing the Phillies’ last chance. The Nationals convened on the mound to discuss how to approach him.

“You’re just trying to stay within yourself, stay in the zone, and just trying to find a way on base,” Schwarber said.

It took 10 pitches, but Schwarber got there. He fell behind 1-2, and then fouled off four pitches and held off on three more to draw a walk.

And when the Nationals brought in lefty Richard Lovelady, it was Hill’s turn. The outfielder, who the Phillies acquired earlier this month, delivered a pinch-hit, go-ahead two-run homer for a 5-4 win over Washington.

“I’m just trying to go up there and just execute the plan that the hitting department has laid out for us,” Hill told the Phillies radio broadcasters. “And, obviously, tonight they gave us a pretty dang good one.”

In both at-bats, the Phillies were down to their last strike. And neither Schwarber nor Hill had an automated ball-strike challenge to fall back on, as the Phillies burned both by the fifth inning.

Hill, who left the clubhouse before reporters entered postgame, has plenty of experience coming off the bench in his six-year career. This season, he has 17 pinch-hit plate appearances between the Phillies and the White Sox.

But for an everyday player like Schwarber, it’s a much rarer occurrence. Schwarber has 61 career pinch-hit plate appearances, his last coming in 2024.

“It’s never easy,” Schwarber said. “It’s the hardest thing to do in the game, I think, is being a pinch-hitter and having to go up there and taking an at-bat.”

Schwarber watched the Phillies’ furious ninth-inning comeback on Tuesday night inside the visitors’ clubhouse. Due to his back tightness, he’d been unable to contribute as the Phillies went down to their final strike of the game and then rallied back to score eight runs.

As it unfolded, Schwarber had to keep himself from jumping up and down in excitement.

“It’s been a couple of crazy nights here,” said Mattingly.

On Wednesday, the Phillies once again fell behind early. The Nationals built a 2-0 lead on solo home runs off Aaron Nola in the first and second innings. Washington stacked eight lefties — including two switch-hitters — in its lineup. But by the time the Phillies offense jumped ahead in the fourth, Nola appeared to find a rhythm.

“I just tried to keep the guys in the game as long as I could,” he said.

He got ahead in the count more often, throwing first-pitch strikes 62% of the time. Nola successfully shut down Nationals star James Wood in all three of his plate appearances against him, striking him out in the third inning with a knuckle curve. It was one of five strikeouts Nola recorded over five innings.

“He’s the kind of guy I’ve learned to appreciate more and more, just the way he continues to fight, continues to make pitches,” Mattingly said. “He may bend a little bit, but he just doesn’t give in and stop pitching.”

The Phillies punched back, capitalizing on two singles, a double, a fielding error, and a sacrifice fly to score three runs and take the lead in the fourth. Alec Bohm, who ultimately reached first base on the error, fouled a ball off his foot in his at-bat and appeared to be in some pain. He played through it and remained in the game, but Mattingly said afterward that Bohm will get X-rays to ensure there isn’t a break.

Some managerial maneuvering backfired on Mattingly in the sixth as the Nationals jumped back in front. When Curtis Mead stepped up to pinch-hit against Phillies lefty Kyle Backhus, Mattingly countered by bringing in Jonathan Bowlan. As a righty, Bowlan had the advantageous matchup on paper against Mead, a right-handed hitter.

But Bowlan served up a first-pitch sweeper to Mead, who blasted it over Brandon Marsh’s head and into the left field seats for a two-run homer.

Things worked out, however, after a similar countermove in the ninth. After Schwarber’s walk, the Nationals brought in the left-handed Lovelady to face Justin Crawford, prompting Mattingly to call on Hill.

“He’s been making some really good adjustments since he’s gotten to us,” Schwarber said of Hill. “He works extremely hard, and he fits right in with our group. And to see him go out there and have that big swing, put us ahead, it’s really cool.”

Mattingly also used Garrett Stubbs as a pinch-runner for Schwarber, and Stubbs remained in the game to play third base for the bottom of the ninth.

He was not tested defensively, though, because Jhoan Duran struck out the side to earn the save and seal the Phillies’ second straight ninth-inning comeback.

“It’s them understanding that this game’s never over,” Mattingly said. “ … I think that’s important for our club to know that we can score a lot, we can score a little, we can score in different ways. I think these wins are very important.”

WASHINGTON — Bryce Harper had a suggestion for Gabriel Rincones Jr.

The Phillies rookie spent his formative years living in Scotland due to his father’s work there as an offshore safety adviser in the oil industry, and his parents and sisters still live there.

Harper was sitting down one day with Zack Wheeler when Rincones walked by and said hello.

Harper started playing the bagpipes on his phone, and told Rincones that he should incorporate the Scottish instrument into one of his walk-up songs.

“Hell, yeah,” Rincones said.

He settled on “Scotland the Brave,” a patriotic Scottish song played on the bagpipes, and walked up to it in his second at-bat at home last Tuesday. (Rincones’ main walk-up song is “Zombie” by the Irish band The Cranberries.)

It was a special moment, hearing a traditional Scottish song before a major league at-bat, but Rincones doesn’t think he will stick with it.

“It just gets me too riled up,” he said. “It’s like I can’t focus.”

But even if it isn’t soundtracked by the bagpipes, Rincones still takes pride in representing Scotland on the major league stage. His family moved from Venezuela to Glenrothes, Scotland, when he was 6 years old. He lived there until age 12, when he moved back to Venezuela to pursue a baseball career, and ended up in Florida after that.

“That I have some part of representing Scotland is awesome,” Rincones said. “I grew up there, have friends there, ties there.”

Scotland was where Rincones first learned English, so he actually speaks with a Scottish accent.

When he’s in the United States, though, he is able to switch into an American accent. But when speaking to his family or friends back in Scotland, he slips back into it. After Phillies outfield coach Paco Figueroa told newly acquired Derek Hill that Rincones grew up in Scotland, Hill thought he was joking until Rincones broke out the accent to prove it.

“I get stuck speaking like this sometimes. I just can’t get my words up, but when it’s talking with my friends back home, or my little sister, it’s just fluid,” he said.

Rincones also loves haggis, a traditional Scottish dish made of sheep organs that he would often eat at restaurants growing up.

He visits his family in Glenrothes, Scotland in the offseason, usually spending Christmas there. It can be hard to train for baseball while he’s there, so he sometimes has to get creative for batting practice.

“I bought this little BP machine, where it throws like little tiny balls and you can make it throw curveballs and stuff,” Rincones said. “But it’s so windy over there that I can’t just do it outside. I have to go to a fitness center and then rent out half a basketball court.”

It’s been fun for Rincones to watch the Tartan Army — the supporters of Scotland’s national soccer team — take over baseball stadiums while they are in the U.S. for the World Cup. Many Scotland supporters went to a Red Sox game at Fenway Park last week for Scottish Heritage night, a day after their team beat Haiti in its first match.

And ahead of its next match against Brazil in Miami on Wednesday, hundreds of Scottish fans — including a group of bagpipers — caught a Marlins game at LoanDepot Park on Monday night.

“They’ve never cared about baseball, but they just want to have a good time,” Rincones said.

In Rincones’ experience, the baseball community in Scotland is very niche. He played in a men’s league in Scotland with his father growing up to stay involved in the game he loved before eventually moving away to pursue it more seriously.

His friends used to tease him about his major league dreams, and now many of them stay up late into the night to catch MLB games from across the Atlantic.

But no matter how small the community may be, Rincones is proud to have a chance to represent it.

“A part of me is always going to be in Scotland,” he said.

Extra bases

Kyle Schwarber was scratched from Tuesday’s game shortly before first pitch with low back tightness. Edmundo Sosa replaced him in the lineup as designated hitter. … Aaron Nola (3-4, 5.71 ERA) is scheduled to start Wednesday against Nationals right-hander Miles Mikolas (2-6, 5.47).

WASHINGTON — The Phillies have a solution for their fifth spot in the rotation, for the time being.

The team called up Alan Rangel from triple-A Lehigh Valley ahead of Monday’s game against the Nationals. The right-hander, who has a 3.99 ERA in 70 innings with the IronPigs, was scheduled to appear behind lefty opener Tim Mayza on Monday, which started in a rain delay. And according to interim manager Don Mattingly, the plan is for Rangel, 28, to stick around with the big league club for now.

“I mean, at this point I think we’ve kind of made a commitment to that spot,” Mattingly said. “I’m not saying we’re making a commitment to a full start every time. It could be openers, it could be starting. Sometimes the team lineup construction depends.”

This marks Rangel’s second stint with the big league club this season. He appeared in one game in April, allowing one earned run and striking out five over three innings against the Cubs. In six career major league games, Rangel has a 2.57 ERA.

The fifth rotation spot had been vacated by Andrew Painter, who was optioned last week to reset and work on his fastball after struggling to a 7.06 ERA. Painter is scheduled to throw multiple bullpen sessions before seeing game action in triple A.

The Phillies used Mayza as an opener on Monday because of the Nationals’ left-handed heavy lineup. Washington had six lefties and switch-hitters penciled into their lineup for the series opener. But facing a team with more righties, Mattingly said he would feel comfortable using Rangel as a traditional starter.

“I’ve seen him only pitch a little bit in spring training, but I think the fact that Rangel has kind of been the guy throwing the best, they felt like, down there, and he was going to be the best guy, long-term, for us,” Mattingly said. “ … We’ll see what he can do. He’s throwing the ball well. Last time he came up, felt like he threw the ball well. So we’ll see what it looks like.”

Backhus reactivated

The Phillies had the flexibility to use Mayza in an opening role because Kyle Backhus (left elbow inflammation) was activated from the 15-day injured list on Monday, giving the Phillies three lefties in the bullpen, also including José Alvarado.

Backhus, a sidearmer, had a 4.66 ERA before landing on the injured list on April 30. However, that number is skewed by his first appearance of the season on March 26, when he gave up three earned runs in ⅓ of an inning.

After that, Backhus had been pitching his way into a higher-leverage role, and had allowed one earned run across his last five appearances before the injury.

“He was throwing the ball really well, and it felt like he was getting his outs and looking really good,” Mattingly said. “As you get a guy back, you just kind of get comfortable first, we wouldn’t like stick him in the eighth or anything like that. But we do think he is a guy that matches up well with the lefties. He’s a different look for us. I like him, he’s really athletic, he handles the position well, so has a lot of good things other than just pitching.”

Extra bases

MLB released its second update for its All-Star fan voting on Sunday, and Brandon Marsh has accumulated 1,256,874 votes and ranks second among National League outfielders, only behind the Dodgers’ Andy Pages (1,518,451). The top two position players and top three outfielders once voting closes on June 25 will advance to the second phase. Also in position to advance is Kyle Schwarber (1,540,202, second among designated hitters), Bryson Stott (801,006, second among second basemen), and Alec Bohm (804,309 votes, second among third basemen). … Jesús Luzardo (6-4, 4.20 ERA) is scheduled to start Tuesday opposite Nationals right-hander Zack Littell (6-6, 5.45).