Phillies Fall 2-1 to Dodgers on 9th-Inning Baserunning Double Play

Q: Was J.T. Realmuto's costly blunder the real culprit, or a symptom of the Phillies' historically bad offense?

Realmuto’s mistake was the immediate culprit, but it was also a symptom of the Phillies’ larger offensive problem. On the play itself, the blame is clear. With the tying run at third and one out, Justin Crawford getting caught in a rundown did not have to end the game. Realmuto’s decision to retreat from third to second created the second out and turned a live rally into a 5-2-6-4 game-ending double play. Realmuto admitted it was a “lapse in judgment,” and even Don Mattingly said he did not understand the decision. If Realmuto stays at third, the Phillies still have runners at the corners with two outs and a chance to continue the inning. But the reason that one mistake became fatal is the Phillies’ thin margin for error. They scored one run, managed five hits, and struck out 11 times, wasting Zack Wheeler’s seven-inning, two-run, nine-strikeout outing. This was the 23rd time this season they had scored one run or none. Their broader numbers reinforce the pattern: a 92 team wRC+, a .237 average, a .304 OBP and a .403 slugging percentage, all signs of a below-average offense despite a high-payroll roster. So the cleanest reading is both. Realmuto directly cost them that game. But the bigger story is that the Phillies’ offense has been so unreliable that one baserunning error in the ninth becomes decisive instead of merely damaging.

3 articles · Updated · The Philadelphia Inquirer · Jul 22

One out from a comeback, Philadelphia put runners on second and third in the ninth before Justin Crawford broke for home on a ball to third and J.T. Realmuto retreated from third to second, ending the game with a double play.
Realmuto called it a "lapse of judgment," while interim manager Don Mattingly said Crawford had been told to run on contact; either way, the Phillies turned a potential winning chance into two outs.
Max Muncy supplied the decisive damage earlier with a two-run homer in the fourth, the only scoring Zack Wheeler allowed across seven innings in another tight Phillies-Dodgers matchup.
After an 80-minute rain delay, the Phillies managed only four hits, wasting Alec Bohm's first-inning RBI single and Wheeler's recent surge that has cut his ERA to 2.16.