Kyle Schwarber tied a Philadelphia Phillies franchise record by homering in his fifth consecutive game, launching his major league-leading 17th home run of the season to lead the Phillies to a 2-1 victory over the Boston Red Sox on Tuesday night. The win also marked Don Mattingly’s 900th career managerial victory.
Philadelphia improved to 20-22 with their third straight win and sixth in eight games, moving to 11-3 since Mattingly took over as manager from Ron Thomson on April 28.
Zach Wheeler (2-0) delivered a strong outing, allowing one run on six hits over 7 1/3 innings while striking out four.
Schwarber has now hit six home runs over his last five games. He joins an elite list of Phillies players who have homered in five straight games: Bobby Abreu, Dick Allen, Odúbel Herrera, Rhys Hoskins, Mike Schmidt, Trea Turner, and Chase Utley.
Mattingly became the sixth active manager to reach the 900-win milestone, joining Terry Francona, A.J. Hinch, Dave Roberts, Kevin Cash, and Craig Counsell.
Jhoan Duran allowed a hit and a walk in the ninth inning but secured his sixth save of the season.
Boston has now lost three of their last four games.
Red Sox opener Jovani Morán (0-1) pitched just one inning, surrendering the solo home run to Schwarber. Brayan Bello followed with 6 1/3 innings of relief, allowing one run on four hits.
The game marked Philadelphia’s first meeting with Boston since Phillies president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski fired manager Rob Thomson last month and attempted to hire former Red Sox skipper Alex Cora, who had lost his job two days earlier. After Cora declined the offer, preferring to spend the summer with his family, Dombrowski promoted Mattingly from bench coach.
Schwarber opened the scoring in the first inning, jumping on Morán’s 92 mph fastball and driving it 386 feet over the right-field fence and into the Red Sox bullpen, beyond the reach of right fielder Wilyer Abreu.
Bryson Stott added an RBI double in the second inning to give Philadelphia a 2-0 lead.
Boston had a chance to tie the game in the seventh when Mickey Gasper reached base with one out and Abreu hit a high fly ball to right field. However, the ball fell about six feet short of the fence and was caught by Adolis García. Ceddanne Rafaela later delivered an RBI single to cut the lead to 2-1.
Up next: Phillies rookie right-hander Andrew Painter (1-4, 6.89 ERA) is scheduled to start Wednesday against Red Sox right-hander Sonny Gray (3-1, 3.54).