Mitch Keller faces double trouble, loss to Phillies in return from Triple-A

Mitch Keller is back, and for one Sunday afternoon, the walks didn’t accompany him to PNC Park.

But the Philadelphia Phillies (52-53) had little trouble with pitches in the strike zone, smashing five doubles among the eight hits and four runs Keller (3-8) allowed in five innings. Relief pitcher Cody Ponce gave up seven hits (three more doubles), and the Phillies went on to a 15-4 victory against the Pittsburgh Pirates before an announced crowd of 17,875.

The loss was the 13th time this season in which the Pirates surrendered 10 or more runs. But the 15 weren’t a season high for a Pirates opponent. They lost 20-1 to the Atlanta Braves on May 21.

The game marked the eighth time this season, the Pirates (40-65), who won the first two games Friday and Saturday, had an opportunity to sweep a series and failed. They haven’t swept the Phillies in Pittsburgh since June 12-14, 2015. They are the only team in the majors this season without a sweep.

“We have to figure out a way to finish it,” manager Derek Shelton said. “Sweeping a series in the big leagues is hard. It’s just going to be something that is part of our overall team growth.”

After the game, there was talk of Keller’s growth, even though he worked through baseline traffic in all but a three-up, three-down fourth inning. He didn’t walk a batter, and that was seen as a sign of progress. After all, he had walked 29 in his 47¹⁄₃ previous big-league innings before he was sent to Triple-A Indianapolis on June 12. There, he was 1-1 with a 3.21 ERA and 13 walks in 28 innings.

“I thought he was better,” Shelton said. “The fastball command was better, something we’ve worked on. Gave up some breaking balls in the middle of the plate and they had damage on them.” Shelton noted “flat sliders” Keller threw to J.T. Realmuto and Jean Segura, but he also was impressed by Keller’s ability to hit the strike zone.

“One of the things we talked to him about in his development in Indy and we even talked about pregame was him commanding the ball in the plate,” Shelton said. “Left some balls in the middle of the plate that got hit, but he was on the plate so that’s definitely a positive sign.”

Keller said getting demoted to Triple-A helped him.

“When I got sent down, it was just kind of ‘Let’s simplify things, get back to what I used to do out there, feeling athletic, getting some good tempo and some good rhythm.’

“In the first and second innings, my breaking ball stuff was up in the zone. It was up enough where they could do what they wanted with it.”

He did get plenty of help from his fielders, especially in the second from first baseman John Nogowski and in the fifth from center fielder Bryan Reynolds, who caught a 101-mph, 400-foot fly ball from Segura up against the fence.

In the second, with the Phillies already ahead, 1-0, Alec Bohm and Didi Gregorius opened with singles. With runner on the corners, Nogowski fielded a ground ball by Odubel Herrera and threw out Bohm at home plate. Then, Nogowski grabbed a bunt by pitcher Kyle Gibson and threw out Gregorius at third base. But Segura’s double into centerfield scored two runs.

Consecutive doubles by Bryce Harper and Realmuto added another run in the fifth. Ponce allowed a single to Bohm and doubles to Gregorius and Segura to add another run in the sixth.

Harper ripped his third double of the game to lead off the seventh, followed by Realmuto’s single. Ponce retired the next two batters before Gregorius knocked in two runs with a single. Ponce’s pitching line for the day: Two innings, seven hits, four runs and — like Keller — no walks.

Finally, in the eighth, Pirates relievers Luis Oviedo and Nick Mears walked five among the 11 batters they faced, and the Phillies added five more runs. Nogowski pitched for the third time this season in the ninth, his pitches dropping below 50 mph on multiple occasions. He gave up two runs and the last two of the Phillies’ 20 hits (nine doubles).

Shelton constructed a new-look infield, with Hoy Park at shortstop, Wilmer Difo at second base and Rodolfo Castro replacing Ke’Bryan Hayes at third. Park, acquired from the New York Yankees in the Clay Holmes trade, doubled for his first major-league hit in the seventh innning and scored on pinch hitter Kevin Newman’s sacrifice fly. Castro batted sixth in the batting order, one slot ahead of Park, and was 1 for 4.

The Pirates scored their first run in the third inning on Difo’s two-out RBI single. Michael Perez hit his seventh home run in the ninth to account for the Pirates’ final two runs.

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