Last Night In Baseball: Phillies Blow It Twice, Then Play Awe-Worthy 9th To Win

There is always baseball happening — almost too much baseball for one person to follow themselves. Don’t worry, we’re here to help you by figuring out what you missed but shouldn’t have. Here are all the best moments from last night in Major League Baseball: If you, as a Phillies fan, turned the Phillies-Nationals game off in disgust after Philadelphia gave up the lead in the eighth, then you missed one of the single most absurd innings of baseball of 2026. First, to set the stage. The Phillies were down 5-0 after four innings, with the upstart Nationals  — surprise competition for an NL wild card with the Phillies this season — hitting Jesús Luzardo hard and early. Luzardo might have struck out 13 batters in 6 ⅔ innings, but he also showed too much of the other side of his game by allowing five runs in the first four of those frames. The Phillies’ offense was there to pick Luzardo up. Philadelphia got on the board with a pair of runs in the fifth, scored another in the seventh, and then dropped another three on the Nationals in the eighth inning to take the lead for the first time all night, on a three-run double by catcher J.T. Realmuto. With a resurgent Luzardo out of the game by the eighth, though, the Nats struck again. Washington also scored three runs in the inning, with all three — and a blown save — charged to reliever Orion Kerkering. Pinch-hitter Luis García Jr. walked to open the bottom of the eighth, then left fielder Dylan Crews was hit by a pitch. Second baseman Jorbit Vivas then crushed a middle-middle sweeper 410 feet to center, and it was 8-6 Nationals as quickly as it became 6-5, Phillies. And then things got intense. Brad Lord came on in relief to protect this new Nationals’ lead, and recorded outs against the first two batters of the inning. The lineup turned over, bringing leadoff hitter and shortstop Trea Turner to the plate with Philadelphia down to their final out. He singled, then advanced to second on defensive indifference with left fielder Brandon Marsh at the plate. Marsh caught a sweeper over the middle of the plate on the next pitch, and drilled it 400 feet to tie the game up, 8-8. First baseman Bryce Harper would follow with a single, then pinch-hitter Derek Hill came in for Kerkering, who was in the lineup since the Phillies had lost the DH earlier. Hill singled, bringing up second baseman Bryson Stott with two down and the game tied. Stott also homered, on a sweeper so inside that it was nearly out of the strike zone by the time he connected with it. Philadelphia was now up 11-8 thanks to a five-run rally with two outs… and it wasn’t over yet. Lord walked Realmuto and then was relieved by Paxton Schultz, who allowed a single to right fielder Gabriel Rincones Jr., and then a two-run double to third baseman Edmund Sosa, giving him five RBIs for the game. Center fielder Justin Crawford would then walk in his second plate appearance of the inning, and Turner would drive him in his second hit of the ninth. That made it 14-8, Phillies, and again, all of those runs in the ninth were scored with two outs, in the second come-from-behind rally the Phillies staged across two innings. The Nationals would push a run across in the bottom of the ninth, surely panicking Phillies’ fans everywhere after what had transpired in the eighth, but that was all Washington could manage. The Phillies won, and added another game to their lead over the Nats in the NL wild-card race, which now stands at 2.5. Sure it’s unorthodox, but it’s not against the rules. A goofy way for a double play to happen? Absolutely. But then the Diamondbacks defeated the Cardinals by a single run, 4-3, and suddenly this weirdness was load-bearing. The Braves went up 4-0 on the Padres in the top of the second, but that’s why they play nine innings, folks. Or in the case of Atlanta and San Diego on Tuesday, 10 of ‘em. The Padres did not wait long to respond: shortstop Xander Bogaerts and DH Will Wagner walked back-to-back with one out, then catcher Rodolfo Dúran singled in the former to make it 4-1. That was just the start of things: second baseman Sung-Mun Song singled in Wagner, then right fielder Fernando Tatis Jr. lined an RBI double to right at 104 mph off the bat; 4-3, Braves. Left fielder Samad Taylor then singled to shortstop, which was followed by a throwing error by Mauricio Dubón — the Padres scored twice there, and took the lead. Atlanta would tie things up then go ahead with a couple of runs in the fourth and fifth, the latter coming on a solo homer by Dubón. That would be it for the Braves, however. In the bottom of the seventh, Tatis came up big again, this time with a 410-foot blast to center for his third homer of the year. It’s taken some time, but he’s starting to look more like the Tatis everyone expected, and is up to .286/.348/.370 courtesy a .337/.371/.506 performance across 20 June games. The game would go to extras thanks to Tatis’ dinger, and there came more signs of life from third baseman Manny Machado’s bat, too. Machado, who had a game-winning homer the day before against Atlanta, had a chance to walk it off in the bottom of the 10th, and he hit a ground ball up the middle 105 mph to do just that. That’s the second game in a row for Machado with a game-winning hit, and also the 10th walk-off of his career. He’s batting .256/.327/.581 over his last 11 games and 49 plate appearances — not enough to save his season line at this point, but if he can keep that up, and Tatis is balling, too, then suddenly the Padres’ offense isn’t so hapless. As is, San Diego has taken the series from the Braves, despite Atlanta coming into the series a game back of the MLB-leading Dodgers for most wins in the league. Atlanta is now just 5.5 up on the Phillies in the NL East, while San Diego — still in possession of a wild-card spot — maybe has something to build on here after an abysmal stretch saw its standing fall over the last month-plus. The Marlins have had just one pitcher in their history, which dates back to 1993, reach 1,000 career strikeouts. It’s not due to a lack of high-quality pitchers in franchise history, either, but more to do with the limited time that the team tends to have with these pitchers. Kevin Brown was absolutely electric with the then-Florida Marlins, compiling a 2.30 ERA at the start of the most hitter-friendly era in league history, and helping the team to its first-ever World Series championship. Brown also pitched for the team for two years. Homegrown studs like Josh Beckett — another pitcher who helped the team to another title — were eventually dealt instead of re-signed, so just 607 of his 1,901 career strikeouts came while with the Marlins. Ricky Nolasco had been the only one to pull it off, as he spent eight seasons and 1,225 innings of his career with the Marlins, resulting in 1,001 strikeouts with them. On Tuesday, he was joined — and surpassed — by Sandy Alcantara. Alcantara struck out four batters in 6 ⅔ innings, in which he also limited the Rangers to a single run. The third tied him with Nolasco, and the last of them gave him sole possession of the Marlins’ franchise record — every strikeout he records with Miami from here on out pushes that number forward. The Marlins would end up winning, too, even as the bullpen tried to blow it by allowing three runs after Alcantara’s exit. The offense scored six, though, with right fielder Owen Caissie driving in three of them, and Miami held on. When Jac Caglianone debuted for the Royals last summer, there was excitement. Here was a powerful prospect, Kansas City’s first-round draft pick from the prior year, already in the majors. The reality did not reflect that potential, however: the 22-year-old with limited minor-league experience hit just .157/.237/.295 with seven homers in 63 games and 232 plate appearances. He was significantly better to begin 2026, but as May ended his OPS fell under .700 — there was still work to be done in his development. It’s possible that Caglianone has figured something out since, as he’s been on an absolute tear in June. The first baseman went yard not once… …but twice on Tuesday against the Rays. That’s six homers in five days, and his third multi-homer game since June 9. Caglianone began June with a .685 OPS, and after batting .373/.453/.773 with nine of his 14 homers over his last 20 games, he’s now up to .277/.349/.498 and an .847 OPS. It’s important to remember, too, that Caglianone’s power is legit — he was a first-round pick despite a likely future as a first baseman because of that pop, but it was figuring out how to unlock it against big-league pitching that was the question. He might have done that at this point, since he has more homers this month than he had during his entire 2025 run in the majors, as well as in the first two months of this season. The Royals would defeat the Rays, 12-5, and while expecting a dozen runs every night is a lot, this is a much better team with Caglianone hitting like scouts felt he was going to be capable of. The Mets are in limbo as the trade deadline gets closer and closer, and you can thank games like Tuesday’s loss to the Cubs for that. The offense managed to put up six runs, but the pitching politely let the lineup know that six runs was not nearly enough. A five-run first, punctuated by a three-run homer by center fielder Pete Crow-Armstrong, made it clear it was going to be that kind of night. That long ball made it a 24-game on-base streak for PCA, and yet another disaster start for Kodai Senga, who is now wearing a deserved 0-6 record thanks to seven earned runs pushing him to a 10.08 ERA on the season — Senga also gave up a two-run shot to shortstop Dansby Swanson before exiting, which made it 7-2, Cubs. Shortstop Francisco Lindor should return soon, among other reinforcements, but star left fielder Juan Soto exited early due to back tightness and is day-to-day, while the likes of Senga and David Peterson continually blow New York’s shot at a W. This is a team that is much better than its 12-game losing streak from earlier in the year, but has also been playing sub-.500 ball since it ended. The Cubs, meanwhile, are in possession of a wild-card spot despite their own lengthy losing streak earlier in the year, and are 41-37 after this win. There are better teams out there, but, so far, one of them is not the Mets. What’s fun about this throw is how casually left fielder Cody Bellinger goes about it. Which certainly fits his whole vibe. There’s no massive build-up to this throw, certainly not one befitting the shot that comes out of his arm, and yet he beat the runner, left fielder Riley Greene, by a proverbial mile, anyway. As the Yankees would defeat the Tigers, 4-3, this play ended up being pivotal. Greene had no business running on Bellinger, sure, but also the throw made that abundantly clear. In another closely fought game, the Mariners took down the Pirates, 3-2. Seattle got there two ways: one, a classic dinger from catcher Cal Raleigh, one hit a mile up that came back down in the stands… …and the second an instance of hometown betrayal. Mariners’ second baseman Cole Young is a Pittsburgh native, and this was his first trip back home to face the Pirates. He celebrated the occasion with his seventh homer of the year, a two-run shot to put the Mariners ahead for the first time, and for good. On the bright side for the Pirates, the bullpen didn’t blow it for once. On the, er, less bright side, the offense generated just two runs despite getting 10 baserunners against starter George Kirby, stranding nine runners while going 2-for-8 with runners in scoring position. The AL Central race has been surprisingly competitive so far this year, and the “surprising” part is because it’s the White Sox duking it out with the Guardians, while the Tigers hang out near the bottom of the division. Chicago has been up to the task, though, and showed it again on Tuesday. The Guardians are playing rookie Khalil Watson in the outfield, in part because regular outfielder Angel Martínez is on the IL. The top-100 prospect picked up his first career hit and RBIs on Monday, and on Tuesday, he added his first MLB homer. That would be all the offense that Cleveland could muster, however, and while the White Sox also had a tough time scoring — Parker Messick went 7 ⅔ with 10 strikeouts and just four baserunners allowed — they eventually scored a second run. First baseman Miguel Vargas hit his 17th long ball of the year to put the White Sox up, 2-1, and that would be the final score. Vargas has been a revelation this season, hitting .237/.350/.470, which is a huge improvement on a 2025 that was itself a jump in production from his days with the Dodgers. More play like that will help keep the White Sox competitive in the AL Central. Chicaog, by the way, has sole possession of first place in the division thanks to this dub.