PHILADELPHIA (AP) — Don Mattingly won his first game as Philadelphia’s interim manager, as Jesús Luzardo threw seven innings to lead the last-place Phillies past the San Francisco Giants 7-0 on Tuesday night.
Mattingly won hours after he was promoted from bench coach to replace the fired Rob Thomson after the NL East champion Phillies lost 11 of 12 games and began the day tied for the worst record in the majors.
Dave Dombrowski, the Phillies’ president of baseball operations, flirted with the idea of replacing Thomson with former Red Sox manager Alex Cora. Cora was fired by Boston over the weekend but won a World Series with the team in 2018 when Dombrowski ran the front office.
Cora declined, citing family reasons. Dombrowski promoted Mattingly, the former New York Yankees great, who had two previous managerial stints with the Los Angeles Dodgers and Miami Marlins.
Mattingly — who officially works for his son, general manager Preston Mattingly — said ahead of the game he believed the Phillies had the talent needed to play to their potential and turn the season around.
For a night, at least, he was right.
Thomson, who led the Phillies to four straight playoff appearances, said before the game he was to be going to spend his unexpected free night watching the Phillies.
What he saw was more of what the Phillies expected out of Luzardo (2-3) this season.
He allowed two hits, struck out eight and walked none, just two starts after the lefty allowed nine runs and 12 hits against the Cubs. It was the third time in his first four starts Luzardo allowed five-plus earned runs.
Brandon Marsh hit a sacrifice fly in the fourth off Giants starter Tyler Mahle (1-4) and the Phillies tacked on four more runs in the sixth. Bryce Harper — who called Thomson perhaps the best manager he ever played for — hit an RBI double and Adolis Garcia ripped a two-RBI double to right-center in the inning.
Trea Turner had four hits.
Mahle gave up five runs in five innings.
Up next
The Giants send RHP Logan Webb (2-3, 4.86 ERA) to the mound against Phillies LHP Cristopher Sánchez (2-2, 2.94 ERA).
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AP MLB: https://apnews.com/hub/mlb
Dan Gelston, The Associated Press
