Neshek’s strong All-Star Game bid takes a hit
NEW YORK » By Sunday evening, Pat Neshek should be rewarded for his excellence from April through June with a spot on the National League All-Star team.
By Saturday night, he’s already okay with forgetting about July.
A leading candidate for National League Reliever of the Month in June, Neshek brought an 18-inning scoreless streak into the seventh inning of the Phillies’ game against the New York Mets Saturday in CitiField. Four batters later, he had allowed three runs, enough to be the losing pitcher as the Phillies fell, 7-6.
“It’s baseball,” Neshek said, in the appropriate spirit of the moment, not as a throw-away rationalization. “It happens. Put it behind you.”
The Phillies had taken a 6-3 lead in the top of the seventh on a three-run Tommy Joseph home run. But T.J. Rivera touched Jeremy Hellickson with a leadoff homer in the bottom of the inning, inspiring Pete Mackanin to summon Neshek, he of the 0.72 ERA. But Travis d’Arnaud doubled, Wilmer Flores singled and, after Curtis Granderson fanned, Asdrubal Cabrera ripped a 1-1 pitch over the right-center fence to give the Mets the one-run lead.
And, yes, it was, as a matter of fact, Asdrubal Cabrera bobblehead day.
“Flores did a good job going the other way,” Neshek said. “I kind of hung the home run to Cabrera there. Bad location. You’re going to have days like that when you miss. And he did the right thing.”
Despite a leadoff double from Aaron Altherr, the Phillies could not score again and fell to 26-53. And though Neshek’s ERA grew to 1.39, he remains the Phillies’ likely All-Star selection. His campaign message? “Ah, I don’t have anything to say,” he said.
*** Odubel Herrera, ever streaky, was 0-for-5 with three strikeouts. It was his fourth consecutive game without a hit.
“He’s not swinging the bat well,” Mackanin said. “I’ll probably give him a day off tomorrow to regroup because
he doesn’t look the same.”
*** Nick Williams made his second career start, playing left. He was 1-for-3 with a walk and was hit by a pitch. He also had a new souvenir: The ball he ripped the night before for his first major-league hit.
“They asked me right away if they wanted me to frame it,” Williams said. “I said, ‘Yeah, you can frame it. I don’t need it right away. So that will look better.’”
*** Joseph was 2-for-5 with four RBIs, including a fifthinning double to plate Altherr.
“I’m just trying to make adjustments every day,” he said. “I’ve kind of been inbetween on some swings, had some timing issues over the course of the last couple of weeks. I’m just trying to iron them out and put the ball in play and put together some hard contact more often.”
*** With a no-decision, Hellickson (5-5) still has not picked up a win since May 19. He took the three-run lead in to the seventh Saturday, but surrendered the leadoff home run to Rivera. From there, the Mets looked revived.
“You put six runs up on the board, you probably shouldn’t get to that point,” he said. “If we win half the one-run games we’ve lost, we’re sitting a little better. We grind to the last out every game, but we just haven’t been able to come out on top as much as we’ve wanted and probably should.”
*** NOTES » Nick Pivetta (14, 5.40 ERA) will oppose right-hander Rafael Montero (1-4, 5.63) as the series closes Sunday afternoon at 1:10 … The Phils will host Pittsburgh for four starting Monday … Vince Velasquez, on the disabled list since May 31 with an elbow issue, threw two rehab innings for Lehigh Valley Saturday, allowing one run and one hit, walking one and striking out none … Mackanin, after the Phillies lost for the fifth time in seven games: “You kind of have to win those games. Those are the kind of games you have to win.”