The Inning Should Have Been Over

The official scorer's job in the fourth inning at Truist Park on Saturday night was to imagine a version of it that ended on time. Atlanta scored eight runs in the inning and the book calls five of them unearned — not because Philadelphia handed over five, but because the rule requires the scorer to pretend the third out was made when it should have been, and to charge the pitcher with nothing that happened afterward.

What happened afterward was most of the game. Atlanta 12, Philadelphia 2, in front of 40,863, and the lead in the National League East is six.

The inning began 1-0 Philadelphia, on Bryce Harper's two-out homer in the first, 426 feet to center off Tyler Mahle. Brooks Raley replaced the opener, Tim Mayza, to start the fourth and struck out Drake Baldwin. Ronald Acuña Jr. took Raley to a sixth pitch, an 81.3 mph sweeper, and hit it 353 feet at a 44-degree angle, over the wall in front of the Philadelphia bullpen. One out, 1-1. Matt Olson struck out. Two out, nobody on, and the inning, by any reasonable reading, was over.

Ozzie Albies walked. Michael Harris II singled. Philadelphia went to Grant Holman — his first big-league appearance of the season and his first as a Phillie, the fifth organization of his calendar year — and Harris stole second. Mauricio Dubón singled for two, both runs charged to Raley, who took the loss for the second night running. Austin Riley singled. Sean Murphy hit a ground ball to Bryson Stott at third, and Stott was charged with an error, his fourth. Dubón scored. Ha-Seong Kim walked. Holman threw a wild pitch and Riley scored. Baldwin doubled for two. Acuña singled for one. Olson flied to left.

Eight batters in a row reached after the second out; seven runs scored with two out. Three are earned, all Raley's. Five are Holman's and none is earned — everything after the error that should have been the third out changed the score and not his earned run average, which after seven batters and one out reads 0.00. Philadelphia handed over an error and a wild pitch. Atlanta earned the rest with the bat. The book disagrees, and the book is, in its way, correct: the inning should have been over.

Mahle's evening was seven innings on 97 pitches, six hits, one run on Harper's swing, no walks, three strikeouts — his longest start as a Brave. Over his last six starts he has allowed one earned run or fewer in five and never more than two: 37 and a third innings, six earned runs, a 1.45. He is 6-10 with a 3.91 for the season; fifty-four of the sixty earned runs against him this year belong to eighteen starts as a Giant.

Philadelphia's side of the night, described and not decorated. Mayza opened because Jesús Luzardo was scratched, and gave them three scoreless innings. Then Raley. Then Holman. Then Orion Kerkering, who had not pitched since September 4 — turf toe on his left foot, a walking boot on Friday, declared available by interim manager Don Mattingly, all per MLB.com and in Dex's piece on Saturday morning — pitching an inning and a third on 39 pitches: three walks, and the ninth run, unearned, after Alec Bohm's error at first. In the bottom of the seventh at 9-1, before a pitch was thrown, J.T. Realmuto, Harper and Trea Turner came out of the game, and after the second out Garrett Stubbs, a catcher making his fifth pitching appearance of the year, took the ball. He threw fifteen pitches, fourteen of them between 36.6 and 40.8 mph. Murphy doubled off one at 39.7. In the eighth, Harris hit the first pitch he saw, at 37.8, for a three-run homer.

The reading is mine: at 9-1, with thirteen games left, Philadelphia decided the last four outs of a September game against the club they are chasing were not worth a pitcher. That is a decision about arms, not effort, and the box score records it without comment.

Harris went 4-for-5 with his 25th homer, three runs batted in and his eleventh stolen base; he is hitting .288. Acuña went 3-for-3 with a walk, the homer that tied it and the single that scored the eighth run. Against Philadelphia this year he is 17-for-45 with four of his seventeen home runs.

Atlanta are 88-61, six games clear of Philadelphia at 82-67 with thirteen to play, and MLB's magic number reads seven; the season series is 9-3 with one game left, so Philadelphia can finish it no better than 4-9. Sunday at 1:35 is Andrew Painter against Grant Holmes, the sixth game of the home test I set on September 8, which I total on Sunday night and not before.

Friday's one-run win in eleven innings was worth one game and moved the lead from four to five. Saturday's ten-run win was worth the same and moved it from five to six. The scorer is required to imagine the inning that should have happened. The standings are under no such obligation. They record the one that did.