PHILADELPHIA (AP) — Kyle Gibson retired his first 18 batters and pitched one-run ball over eight innings, Kyle Schwarber hit his NL-leading 34th homer and the Philadelphia Phillies beat the Washington Nationals 7-2 Friday night.
Rhys Hoskins, J.T. Realmuto, Nick Castellanos and Darick Hall also homered for the Phillies, who have won eight of nine to solidify their standing in the race for the NL’s third and final wild-card position. The victory moved Philadelphia 10 games over .500 for the first time since they were 37-27 on June 8, 2019.
Gibson (7-4) overpowered Washington’s lineup, weakened significantly after the club traded Juan Soto and Josh Bell to San Diego this week. He struck out four, allowed two hits and hit two batters over 105 pitches in his first start in nine days after taking bereavement leave for the death of his grandmother.
“Whenever you can execute pitches consistently and you feel like you are executing pitches in the right spot, you are locked into things and not thinking about adjustments,” Gibson said.
With four pitches getting mixed and matched and working on the corners, Gibson was able to force soft contact for most of the night.
“His two-seamer was really good,” Nationals manager Dave Martinez said. “His cutter was good. He didn’t throw a slider for a strike until, like, the third time through the order. But man, that was pretty nasty.”
Gibson forced 12 groundball outs, including a sparkling backhand defensive play by third baseman Alec Bohm on a hard-hit ball by Ildemaro Vargas to end the sixth that kept the dream of a perfect game alive.
“Once you get through the first time around the lineup, you start thinking about it,” Gibson said. “And then, when you get that play from (Bohm), you start chasing it, knowing you have one more time…