Any injury after the trade deadline carries extra weight. This one hit the Phillies in a spot they had just chosen to trust. Five days after Andrew Painter gave them one of his most encouraging starts of the season in Baltimore, and just hours after Don Mattingly voiced confidence in the rooki e right-hander’s place in the rotation, Painter left Wednesday night’s start against the Nationals with left hamstring tightness. He will be re-evaluated Thursday. Painter sounded encouraged afterward. He said the hamstring felt better after he came out of the game, and he was optimistic he could still make his next start. “I do,” Painter said when asked if he thinks he’ll make his next start. “We’ll come in and see where we’re at tomorrow, but I feel good about it moving forward. I don’t think it’s going to be anything too serious.” Still, the timing is hard to ignore. Whether the Phillies aggressively pursued a veteran starter before Monday’s deadline or not, they did not land one. The organization chose to roll forward with Painter as its fifth starter. For four innings Wednesday, Painter was easing some of the concern around the back end of the rotation in the Phillies’ 10-4 loss. He had allowed one run, and his nine-pitch fourth inning improved his chances of working deeper into the game. But after 63 pitches, his night was done. Painter said he first felt his hamstring in the first inning, when he slipped after his strikeout of Daylen Lile. He stayed in the game, though. “It started tightening up on me a little bit in the fourth,” Painter said. “That’s why they wanted to be precautionary and didn’t want to turn something minor into something major.” Mattingly said the Phillies checked on Painter after each inning before deciding not to push it. “He just let guys know that it was getting tighter,” Mattingly said. “Obviously, we’re going to be careful there and get him out of there.” It was a humid night at Citizens Bank Park. Early in his start, the 23-year-old repeatedly asked for a new ball and went to the rosin bag between hitters. “Everything was a little wet,” Painter said. “Trying to grip the ball out there. A little bit of slide on the mound.” Painter was “not too worried” about the injury afterward. “I felt like I could have gone out there and still competed,” he said. “They felt like they didn’t want to risk it.” That made the exit frustrating for another reason. Before leaving, Painter had continued to show signs that his reset was working. He got ahead of 11 of the 17 hitters he faced and kept pairing his improved fastball with his new circle-change. On the Lile strikeout, Painter got him with a four-seamer, helping him limit the damage to one run. In the second, with a runner on second, he started Nationals All-Star shortstop CJ Abrams with three sweepers and a changeup, which missed well up and away. On the 2-2 pitch, Painter went back to the four-seamer above the zone and got Abrams swinging. His four-seam fastball, which he has used less often lately, remains the pitch that could unlock the rest of his mix. Painter believes moving away from the splitter and its pre-pitch grip, and instead using the circle-change, has helped him hold the fastball more consistently. Before, he felt he could subconsciously widen his fingers, which could cut into the pitch’s spin. He has been getting more ride on the fastball. The circle-change has also become a bigger piece. “I thought the changeup was really good,” Painter said. “That’s something we’ve been building on. Got some good swing and miss there. I feel like the command of it is getting better and better each time I go out there.” Mattingly thought Painter looked similar to his last time out. “You could tell the way he was going after guys,” Mattingly said. “It was the same look that we saw in Baltimore. I thought he looked like he was going to be fine.” Now the Phillies wait. If Painter has to miss time, they could go back to an opener format with their reworked bullpen and Triple-A starter Brian Keller. They could also look outside the organization, especially with teams around the league beginning to reshape the back end of their rosters. Around this point in the season, clubs often try to shed remaining payroll by designating struggling veterans with money left on their contracts for assignment. Wednesday brought two names onto the radar: San Diego’s Germán Márquez, who owns a 5.26 ERA, and Washington’s Zack Littell, who has a 4.97 ERA. Painter’s evaluation will determine how urgent that conversation becomes. The Phillies struggled to get much going offensively for most of Wednesday night. Their early production came in the second inning, when Luis Arraez led off with a solo homer off the right-field foul pole, electrifying the home crowd. Justin Crawford later added a sacrifice fly with the bases loaded. Then, they went quiet. At one point, Nationals starter Jake Irvin, who the Phillies have hit well historically, retired 11 straight. The Nationals’ bullpen came on in the seventh, and the Phillies threatened against newly acquired rookie reliever Yovanny Cruz after Alec Bohm walked and Brandon Marsh singled. Bryson Stott delivered. He laced a run-scoring single with one out on a 3-2 pitch, tying the game at three. The Nationals put two on with two outs in the ninth against Jhoan Duran, who was pitching in a non-save situation. Duran got slugging rookie Abimelec Ortiz to ground out, giving the Phillies a chance to win it in the bottom half. They went scoreless. The game moved to extra innings, and the Phillies were running low on relievers. They turned to José Alvarado in the 10th, and he walked the bases loaded, pushing Washington ahead 4-3. Alvarado, who did not have his sharpest command, limited the damage to one run, giving the Phillies’ top of the lineup a chance in the bottom half. Derek Hill, the automatic runner on second, stole third during Kyle Schwarber’s 10-pitch at-bat. That opened the door for Trea Turner’s game-tying sacrifice fly, which came on a full-extension diving catch by Nationals right fielder Dylan Crews. It could have gone for extra bases. Instead, Crews saved the game. After Bryce Harper walked, he tried to steal second, was thrown out and stayed down holding his wrist. He remained in the game. “It was pretty sticky out there,” Mattingly said. “It looked like his hand got stuck.” More injury trouble followed in the 11th. Abrams laced a two-run triple off the center-field wall, where Hill hit his head on the fenced area. He stayed down for more than two minutes as the Phillies’ medical staff came out to check on him. Hill eventually got to his feet and walked off the field. Mattingly said he had a shoulder contusion, but the Phillies were still evaluating him after the collision. “You hit a wall like that, it’s not too forgiving,” Mattingly said. “[We’ll] give it a chance to evaluate overnight, see what happens, how he comes in tomorrow.” Those moments are always unsettling. “When people leave for an injury, you always worry about them,” Stott said. “I hope it’s nothing crazy and see how they feel after the game and then into tomorrow.” The Nationals broke it open with four more runs against Caleb Kilian, turning a strange night into a deflating one. Painter showed more signs of progress before exiting. The Phillies came back once, nearly came back again and still watched more injuries pile up in a losing effort. Mattingly did not think the loss would linger. “We had chances,” he said. “Guys are really good at turning the page, and you have to. You have to be ready to play tomorrow.” The Phillies will know more about Painter and Hill on Thursday. ...read more read less