Kelly's solid start in return from IL backed by offensive outburst

PHOENIX -- For nearly four months, Merrill Kelly could only watch as his D-backs teammates at first struggled and then caught fire.

Each day, he would drive to the D-backs Spring Training complex and work at rehabbing his strained right shoulder. Then he would go home and turn on the TV and watch, a spectator after being such an integral part of the rotation since 2019.

Sunday, Kelly got his chance to contribute once again and the right-hander delivered five quality innings as the D-backs beat the Phillies, 12-5, to take three of four in the series in front of another raucous crowd at Chase Field.

“I felt good,” Kelly said. “I had some fun. Obviously sucked not being able to be here and participate. Popped in from time to time, just when they're in town, but obviously feels good to be back with the boys and just being able to be a part of the good baseball that they're playing right now.”

The D-backs are the hottest team in baseball at the moment. Since July 1, they are 25-10, which are the most wins in the Majors over that span, and they’ve won 15 of their last 18 games.

The fans have taken notice as well as they jammed Chase Field for the four-game 2023 NLCS rematch. The D-backs drew 138,445 fans over the four games, including 37,952 for Friday night’s walk-off win and 46,183 for Saturday’s NL Championship replica ring giveaway, the second-highest announced attendance at home this year.

When Kelly initially got hurt and was scratched from a mid-April start against the Giants, he was optimistic that he wouldn’t be out that long. But when the MRI came back and he began to hear from doctors, it became clear that the rehab was going to take quite a while.

Like most things it felt like forever when he was going through it, but not so much when he finally returned.

“Standing where we are now, it feels like it went by fast,” Kelly said. “Probably in the middle of that, it was moving a little slow, but I just really tried to take that time to be productive. I didn't want to go backwards or just kind of coast through it. I wanted to make sure that my time there was well spent, and we got some stuff done to get back here.”

Kelly pitched in some simulated games at the Spring Training complex and made one rehab start for High-A Hillsboro before his return and, as expected, it took him an inning or so to get his feet under him.

While he felt like things sped up on him in the first inning, the Phillies capitalized by scoring a pair of runs, but Kelly allowed just one hit the rest of the way before exiting after the fifth.

“Once things slowed down it was kind of like riding a bike again,” Kelly said.

And given the way the D-backs have been swinging the bats during their hot streak, two runs was not much of a deficit as they showed by cutting it in half in the bottom of the first and then scoring four in the third and three more in the fifth to take control of the game.

Outfielder Jake McCarthy once again came up big with a three-run triple, while Corbin Carroll homered for the second straight game.

With Eduardo Rodriguez coming off the injured list last Wednesday to make his D-backs debut, and now Kelly’s return, the D-backs finally have their projected Opening Day rotation healthy for the stretch run.

“I just hope I can come in and keep the momentum going,” Kelly said. “Obviously, when you come to a team that's been rolling, you just don't want to be the squeaky wheel. So I'm just going to try my best to kind of keep my head down and go to work and just try to continue the momentum that these guys have built.”

So far, so good.