2016 Topps Heritage High Numbers #548 Charlie Morton

Astros 5, Phillies 0
Game 98 - Tuesday Night, July 25th in Philadelphia
Record - 34-64, 5th place, 25 games behind the Nationals

One Sentence Summary:  The Phillies offense mustered four doubles, but went 0 for 10 with runners in scoring position as former Phillies Charlie Morton and Ken Giles contributed to the shutout win for the Astros.

What It Means:  The Astros are way better than the Phillies.

What Happened:  Nick Pivetta was cruising until allowing four runs in the sixth.  He struck out seven in his outing.  Charlie Morton improved to 8-4, pitching seven innings and striking out nine. Giles, in a non-save situation, struck out a pair in his first outing against his former team.

Odubel Herrera was benched in the seventh when he didn't run out a dropped third strike.

Featured Card:  In his fourth start with the Phillies last season, Morton injured his hamstring and was done for the year.  He pitched a total of 17 1/3 innings with the Phillies, earning three Phillies baseball cards for his short tenure with the club.  Morton has Phillies cards in the team-issued photo card set (the first edition), the Topps retail team set, and in the Topps Heritage High Numbers set, featured here.

Field Report:  Doug and I enjoyed (?) this game with a few thousand other Phillies fans, although the highlight for Doug was once again adding a number of Phillies autographs to his collection.  As has been his routine for recent games, Doug stations himself at the corner of the Phillies dugout, with a handful of other autograph seekers, and patiently awaits* for a player or coach to make his way over.

He added five autographs to his collection last night:  Tommy Joseph, Cameron Perkins, Hector Neris, and coaches Juan Samuel and Mickey Morandini.

*He calls their name relentlessly, but politely, until they come over.

Nick Williams now has a 2016 Topps-style giant card for the Ashburn Alley starting line-up

Gametime with a small Phillies crowd (click to enlarge)