BOSTON — The Phillies and Red Sox are both trying to reset after firing their managers in the same uneven 2026 season, and Thursday’s game puts two clubs still searching for footing back under the spotlight. Philadelphia sends Andrew Painter to the mound against Sonny Gray, with both teams carrying the burden of starts they could not afford.
The Phillies dismissed Rob Thompson after a 9-19 start, and the move has at least jolted the club in a better direction. They are 11-3 under Don Mattingly and now sit at 20-22, a mark that still leaves plenty of ground to make up but looks far healthier than the opening month. Boston’s change came the same way, with Alex Cora dismissed and the Red Sox going 7-7 since then while remaining 17-24 overall.
The numbers explain why patience ran out in both dugouts. Boston has scored only 157 runs, one of the lowest totals in the league, and the club came into the season expecting more after acquiring Gray from the Cardinals in the offseason. The Phillies had their own high bar after re-signing Kyle Schwarber and JT Realmuto, and they were expected to be one of the better teams in baseball a year later. Instead, both teams spent the early part of the season chasing damage control.
Painter, 1-4 with a 6.89 ERA and a 1.71 WHIP, is still looking for a clean outing that can change the conversation. He has allowed 12 earned runs over 14.2 innings in three road outings and is coming off a start in which he gave up eight earned runs over 3.2 innings. Teams are hitting.295 against him the first time through the lineup, a sign that opponents are getting to him before he settles in.
Gray has been steadier for Boston, even if the results have not translated into a fuller team turnaround. He is 3-1 with a 3.54 ERA and a 1.29 WHIP, and his 1.80 ERA at Fenway Park suggests he has been more comfortable at home. Even so, he has reached the sixth inning just twice in six outings, leaving the Red Sox bullpen to bridge a lot of innings in games that have often been tight.
The matchup leans on familiar names too. Phillies hitters are batting.250 overall against Gray, with Alec Bohm 6-for-13 against him. Kyle Schwarber, though, has not found the same comfort, going 2-for-24 with 10 strikeouts. Those split numbers make this more than a simple rebound spot; they show how little margin either side has as both clubs try to stop the season from slipping further away.
For the Phillies, the question is whether the post-Thumbson surge can survive a bad start from Painter or whether Mattingly’s run is still too dependent on a lineup expected to carry more weight. For the Red Sox, it is whether Gray can keep the game in range long enough for an offense that has struggled all year to do enough damage. On a day when both clubs are already living under new managers, the next break may matter less than the first team to avoid another self-inflicted wound.
