Phillies’ bats power a ‘good win’ in series-opening rout of the Braves

ATLANTA — The starting pitchers loosened their arms. The national anthem was performed. All that remained was for the teams to take the field and an adorable child to shriek, “Play ball!”

Then it rained.

Actually, it poured. And if the Phillies didn’t come here with enough pent-up offense after scoring one run in 27 innings in Houston, well, there’s nothing quite like waiting through a two-hour, 19-minute delay to unleash a lineup’s fury.

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When the game finally started, at 9:34 p.m. Friday night, the Phillies scored almost as many runs in three innings as they did in the previous five games combined en route to a series-opening 13-0 thumping of the Braves.

One run in three games in Houston?

Four homers in three innings in Atlanta.

Go figure.

“We talked about it and we weren’t very good the last three days,” said Trea Turner, who hit two of the Phillies’ season-high five homers overall. “But to score early, get a good win, and kind of put that behind us is nice and not let that kind of snowball on us.”

There were even actual smiles in the dugout and moments of levity, as the Phillies (48-34) snapped a three-game losing streak and reclaimed sole possession of first place in the National League East.

Start here: Otto Kemp banged his first major league homer in the third inning, three batters before Kyle Schwarber hit his 309th. Kemp hit a first-pitch slider from Braves starter Bryce Elder into the first row in left-center field, and from the top step of the dugout, Bryce Harper motioned to the two fans who caught the ball to throw it back on the field.

Kemp did eventually get the ball — in exchange for an autographed bat.

“It was a cool moment, something I’ll remember forever,” said Kemp, whose milestone homer came in his 67th plate appearance in the majors. “It felt like a long time coming, but just knew it was a matter of time before it happened. Good to get the first one off the back.”

Fast-forward to the ninth inning. With Braves infielder Luke Williams on the mound and Turner needing a triple for the cycle, his drive to left field cleared the fence for a homer. Schwarber followed by taking a big swing at a 57-mph eephus pitch — and missing.

Cue the laughter from the dugout.

And if you didn’t think the Phillies needed the comic relief, you didn’t see the last three games against the Astros, when they ran a scoreless streak to 26 consecutive innings.

“We’re really good at, when we embarrass ourselves, we can kind of laugh about it,” Turner said. “I know it’s obviously serious, but sometimes in this game, you’ve got to laugh at some of the struggles and the mistakes and move on. And I thought we did a decent job of that tonight.”

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It hardly seemed to matter that the Phillies ran a reliever relay race to the mound.

Mick Abel was initially scheduled to start. The rookie righty warmed up before the thunderstorm and kept his arm loose by throwing in the indoor batting cage because the forecast called for the rain to stop within one hour.

“Once it got to an hour, it was about 8:15, we kind of knew that it was going to be another hour, at least,” manager Rob Thomson said. “And we just shut him down.”

Instead, lefty Tanner Banks pitched the first two innings before passing the baton to Taijuan Walker for two innings and Alan Rangel for the last five.

The Braves stuck with Elder after the long delay, and it didn’t work out well. He gave up Turner’s double on his second pitch, then walked three of the next five batters to force in a run.

From there, the rout was on. Turner and Nick Castellanos took Elder deep in the second inning. Every starter had a hit by the fifth inning; all but Max Kepler scored at least one run. Thomson emptied the bench by the middle innings.

And near the end of a week filled with the wrong kind of history, the Phillies broke out with the type of early-inning onslaught that happens once every 46 or so years. The last time the Phillies got at least 11 hits, including four homers, through the first three innings of a game: May 17, 1979, the famous 23-22 victory at Wrigley Field.

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“Only a matter of time before the ticking time bomb goes off,” Kemp said. “Very refreshing to know that we just needed a change of scenery.”

And maybe an unplanned rain delay to stew for a little bit longer.