The Phillies tied a homer record that hasn't been seen in 15 years
After years of bad baseball and general futility, the Philadelphia Phillies are on the rise. They have the youngest team in the majors, excellent starting pitching, and a lineup full of power threats. On Thursday night in Cincinnati, the Phillies delivered on those power threats with a historic outburst of home runs that gave the Phillies the win, and their biggest National League East lead of the season.
The hot and humid Cincinnati weather was perfect for hitting home runs. Rhys Hoskins got it started in the first with a two-out solo shot, and was followed by Carlos Santana hitting the only multi-run homer of the night, a two-run jack to right field. Nick Williams hit his first homer of the night in the third inning, and Maikel Franco hit his first in the fifth inning. Then everyone but Santana did it all again. Hoskins hit his second dinger of the night in the sixth inning, Franco got his second in the seventh inning, and Williams put a button on it with his homer in the ninth.
It’s a rare thing for three players to hit two homers each in the same game. So rare that it hasn’t been done in 15 years, since the Boston Red Sox did it in 2003.
The @Phillies are the 1st team since 2003 to have 3 players with multiple home runs in the same game as Rhys Hoskins, Maikel Franco, and Nick Williams have hit 2 apiece.
The last team to do so was the Red Sox (David Ortiz, Bill Mueller, & Jason Varitek)on July 4, 2003.
— ESPN Stats & Info (@ESPNStatsInfo) July 27, 2018
If you’re looking for eerie coincidences, this one’s a doozy. The starting right fielder on that day in 2003 was someone the 2018 Phillies know and love.
The starting right fielder for the Red Sox on this day: Gabe Kapler. https://t.co/DDqTSKvRr2
— Joe Giglio (@JoeGiglioSports) July 27, 2018
Phillies manager Gabe Kapler started that multiple home run game for the Red Sox in 2003. Baseball can be such a small world.
The Phillies also tied some franchise records on Thursday night. The Phillies have hit seven home runs in only one other game in franchise history, a game against the New York Mets that happened nearly 20 years ago.
Phillies just tied the franchise record for most home runs in a game with 7, last done on Sept. 8, 1998 vs. Mets.
Nick Williams hits his second HR of the game, one of three Phillies with a multi-homer game tonight vs. Reds (Hoskins, Franco).
— Meghan Montemurro (@M_Montemurro) July 27, 2018
And that game is also the only other time three Phillies hitters have hit two home runs each.
The only other time the Phillies had a game with three players recording multi-homer games was in that same game on Sept. 8, 1998 vs. the Mets (Brogna 2, Sefcik 2, and Estalella 2). https://t.co/FN6uAJag0Y
— Meghan Montemurro (@M_Montemurro) July 27, 2018
The Phillies absolutely unleashed on the Reds, but the seven homers they hit didn’t come in one burst. Instead, they spread it out over the entire game, tallying 18 total hits and scoring in all but two innings. They scored three runs in the first, and then single runs in the third, fifth, sixth, seventh, eighth, and ninth innings. They were relentless.
The Phillies are starting to really heat up. This is how they’ve looked over their last six games.
Phillies HR totals, last 6 Gms:
6 Hoskins
4 Franco
3 Williams
2 Herrera
1 Kingery, Alfaro, Plouffe, Santana— Marc Farzetta (@MarcFarzetta) July 27, 2018
But it stretches farther back than that. On June 19, they were 4.5 games back in the National League East, with both the Atlanta Braves and Washington Nationals in front of them. Five weeks later, they’re 2.5 games up on the Braves and seven games ahead of the Nationals. That’s a big leap
There is still a lot of baseball left to be played, and the NL East race is far from decided. But it’s definitely time to start taking the Phillies seriously. Rhys Hoskins definitely thinks so.
Start believin’ 🤘🏼 #BeBold
— Rhys Hoskins (@rhyshoskins) July 25, 2018
– – – – – –
Liz Roscher is a writer for Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email her at lizroscher@yahoo.com or follow her on Twitter at @lizroscher.
More from Yahoo Sports:
• LeBron Jr.’s basketball game cancelled amid security concerns
• Red Sox manager ticked at Orioles’ postponing game Boston led 5-0
• Kevin Durant’s latest social media feud: McCollum called him soft
• Conor McGregor reaches plea deal in NYC assault case