Matt Strahm pitched a 1-2-3 bottom of the eighth and the Alec Bohm got a two-out single in the top of the ninth before Brandon Marsh grounded out to end the threat.
Jeff Hoffman came on in the bottom of the ninth to attempt to preserve the deadlock and ended up with the shortest outing of his career, leaving a first pitch fastball up in the zone for rookie, Adrian Del Castillo, who crushed it to right field for his first home run in his second career game.
With some momentum and their ace, Zack Wheeler, on the mound, the Philadelphia Phillies (69-47) floundered against the Arizona Diamondbacks (64-53) and their starter, Ryne Nelson, to end their winning streak at three games with a 3-2 loss on Friday night.
Wheeler allowed a run in the bottom of the first on three singles, with some unlucky “hit ‘em where they ain’t” contact.
With one out in the bottom of the third inning, Wheeler with a fastball up in the zone that Joc Pederson returned for a solo shot to deep right field to extend the home lead to two.
Both teams scattered a few singles through the middle innings, until Bryce Harper finally cracked Nelson with just enough power to inside-out a fastball over the left field fence to halve the deficit.
Nelson was finally lifted from the game after Nick Castellanos worked an eight-pitch, one-out walk in the top of the eighth inning. Against lefty, AJ Puk, Johan Rojas produced his first extra base hit since July 13th with a wall-crawling double that scored Castellanos and tied the game.
Since July 13th Jeff Hoffman has gone 0 - 1 with a 5.59 ERA in 10 appearances.
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