Miller clanks 3rd HR of night off scoreboard

CHICAGO — When Phillies manager Joe Girardi submitted the lineup card for Thursday’s series finale against the Cubs, some of his regulars — namely Andrew McCutchen and Rhys Hoskins — weren’t there.

In Hoskins’ place was Brad Miller, a player Girardi had only penciled into the starting lineup one other time since June 23. Hitting in the No. 2 slot on Thursday, Miller may not have been the bat Phillies fans thought they’d see in the lineup as Philadelphia tried to win just its second road series of the season.

Miller wasn’t the bat Chicago was probably most concerned with, either — especially with Bryce Harper batting a spot behind him — but he proceeded to break out for a three-homer, five-RBI night as he led the Phillies to an 8-0 victory at Wrigley Field.

To the outside eye, Miller’s 14th career multi-homer game (also his first three-homer game and the first for a Phillies batter since Jayson Werth on May 16, 2008) might have seemed like a bit of a fortunate play by Girardi. Beyond some smaller reasons, though, what it really came down to was Girardi wanting to stack left-handed bats against Chicago starter Adbert Alzolay.

Girardi called Alzolay’s splits versus left-handed and right-handed batters “about as drastic as you see,” and the numbers backed that up: in 2021, Alzolay had allowed righties to slash .183/.240/.289. Against lefties, those skyrocketed to .248/.324/.608. So, Girardi went with a lefty-heavy lineup, and it worked to perfection.

In Alzolay’s five innings of work, Philadelphia lefties went 5-for-12 with three extra-base hits, providing more than enough support as Zach Eflin’s six scoreless innings gave him his fourth win of the year.