Phillies’ tight offense continues to make pitchers and managers pay

The Phillies are making opposing pitchers and managers pay for everything right now.

Leading the Phillies by two runs with none out in the bottom of the sixth inning Tuesday night, the Angels opted to intentionally walk Bryce Harper with a man on second. Harper has refused to go out of late with an OPS higher than 1.200 in August and started the game with a 115.7 mph homer and double, so while he did put the tying run on base, it wasn’t exactly a questionable decision.

Alec Bohm ruined Phil Nevin’s plan two pitches later with a three-run homer to left-center.

“I just told him it was a great at-bat, a great situation,” Harper said. “It’s just a really good time for him.”

The Phillies’ comeback didn’t stop there in a 12-7 win. JT Realmuto followed with a double and scored on a safety squeeze from Johan Rojas. Two batters later, Trea Turner hit a helicopter single down the third-base line to the left of Mike Moustakas that came to the line for a two-run triple.

They added three more in the seventh when Bohm doubled, Realmuto singled, and scored on Bryson Stott’s two-run home run. Turner scored a dozen runs on a solo shot in the eighth.

“Funny, today I was driving and listening to WIP like I do a lot during the 2 o’clock hour,” Harper said. “A guy named Chuck called, he calls a lot and he’s hilarious. He was talking about our team, talking about me. I walked into the training room and said, ‘I’m going to go deep for Chuck.’ That guy got me excited, man.”

Greetings to Chuck.

The Phillies are getting production from every section of the lineup and won their fifth straight game to improve to 16 games over .500 with a season-best 74-58 record. They’re on a 91-win pace, started the night four games ahead of the second wild card, and play 20 of their last 30 games against teams that are .500 or worse.

Harper has been the MVP in August, hitting .366/.455/.774 with nine doubles, one triple, nine home runs, 22 RBIs and 22 runs scored in 25 games.

Kyle Schwarber also homered for the 11th time in the last calendar month, during which time he has 34 walks and 36 strikeouts.

Turner has hit .364 with 17 extra-base hits in his last 22 games.

Bohm has up to 15 home runs and 82 RBIs on the season. He is on his way to 18 and 101.

“Anytime you can have a month like that, it’s huge. Being able to keep it running and sustain it is even more important,” Harper said. “We have had a great month. We have a lot of baseball to play and we’ll see a lot of good teams moving forward.”

Michael Lorenzen didn’t pitch well for the third straight start, allowing four runs (three earned) in six innings. He allowed one hit in the six innings: two home runs, two doubles and two singles. The Phillies have scored 91 runs in their last 12 games, an average of 7.6 per night, which can mask a lot.

“It feels good to be able to allow four and then smile after the game because we won,” Lorenzen said. “That’s what this offense brings. It takes a lot of pressure off the starting pitcher. I’m going to go to sleep tonight feeling good about myself instead of kicking myself, tossing and turning all night, and that’s because of offense.”

They look to continue on Wednesday at 1:05 pm when Cristopher Sanchez (2-3, 3.33) takes on lefty Reid Detmers (3-10, 5.03).