The Phillies may not have wanted to see the month of April come to an end, but if it did, there was no better way to go out.

The three regulars in the lineup who have been under the most scrutiny for their lack of offense collectively turned a loss into a win in the ninth inning Tuesday, as the Phillies rallied to beat the Los Angeles Angels 7-5, guaranteeing a winning record on their current three-city, 10-game road trip.

Nick Castellanos, Bryson Stott, and Johan Rojas have been under the spotlight with varying degrees of harshness over the season’s first 31 games.

So when the Phillies’ last chance in a game that was careening toward a second straight loss against a bad Angels team came down to the bottom of the order – the negative voices in the world of Phillies social media were doing their vocal warmups and thumb exercises.

Angels closer Carlos Estevez had come on, just as he did a night earlier, and struck out Brandon Marsh. On Monday, it was to close out the win for L.A., while on Tuesday it was the first out of the ninth inning that was seemingly about to have the same result.

Then came the first pitch to Castellanos:


Him pointing to the stands on the game-tying swing should tell you he’s starting to get his groove back.

After all, it was his third hit of the night. And while his numbers still aren’t particularly great in total, if you look at the last stretch of games you can see that he’s been swinging it with more authority.

Since he bottomed out following a 0-for-3 against the Chicago White Sox on April 19th, Castellanos has quietly started to look more like himself.

In his last 11 games, Castellanos is 11-for-42 with two homers, four walks and just eight strikeouts. And while those aren’t numbers akin to what made him an All-Star a season ago, a slash line of .262/.326/.452 (.779 OPS) is a vast improvement over the .153/.218/.153 (.371 OPS) that he compiled in his first 78 plate appearances, in which he amassed 20 strikeouts in 20 games.

“Huge man,” Castellanos told reporters after the game. “To be able to come through because I feel like there’s so many spots so far this season when I haven’t, just to pick them up, it feels great.”

After all, happy people hit better, right Nick?

But hey, Castellanos’ homer just tied the game. The Phillies still needed to win it.

Up next was Stott, who waited one pitch longer than Castellanos to loft a ground rule double down the left field line.

Stott’s turn around isn’t as far along as Castellanos. He doesn’t have any numbers that are really starting to pop off the page – other than he has three multi-hit games in the last 12 when he had just one in the first 16.

But he had a two-homer game in San Diego on Sunday and a two-hit game in Cincinnati on Thursday, and the key double Tuesday night, which is definitely a sign of a pattern of improvement forming.

Then came Rojas, who did something he never does:

In the span of five pitches the Phillies went from being down a run with no one on base to up two runs.

Including the playoffs, Rojas has now had 290 plate appearances in his big league career. That was his third homer, and only his second off an actual pitcher (the first came with a position player on the mound).

Rojas looked lost at the plate from the 2023 playoffs throughout spring training and after an 0-fer on April 16th dropped his slash line for the season to .167/.239/.190 (.430 OPS) there was serious question as to how much longer the Phillies could afford to keep him on the roster, never mind as a regular in the lineup.

The next day, Rojas and Trea Turner spent some time together in the batting cage. Turner gave him some tips on what worked for him in the past when he was struggling. Since that chat, Rojas is 13-for-41 (.317) and has an .851 OPS.

He thanked Turner, yet again, in his postgame interview with the Phillies broadcast team on TV. No one expects Rojas to be a .300 hitter. But if he can do just enough to make it that he’s not an automatic out when he plays, the Phillies lineup is suddenly very, very, long.

And if he can come up with big, timely hits like he did Tuesday – same with Castellanos and Stott – well, then the sky’s the limit for this ballclub.

The Phillies set a franchise record for wins in April with 19. They have 20 wins through 31 games for just the ninth time ever. In fact, a look at the standings in the MLB when you wake up Wednesday and you find the list of teams with 20 wins through the end of April is this long:

  1. Phillies

That’s it. The most wins in baseball going into May.

The three guys above are just starting to hit. Bryce Harper hasn’t been Bryce Harper yet. And we’re still a month away from June Schwarber.

There are 27 games to go between now and the next time a page is flipped on the calendar. Will the Phillies be the first team to 30 wins? 35? More?

There’s not a team on the schedule in May with a better record than the Phillies right now – and with the way things are going, it might be that way for the rest of the season.