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Franco beats Braves in the 10th as Phillies win third straight

The Braves took the lead in the ninth but could not hold it.

After all of the mistakes - the hanging slider, the avoidable outs on the bases, and the fielding blunders - Maikel Franco tossed his helmet skyward. The Phillies raced from the dugout and chased him to right field at Citizens Bank Park. They won Saturday night, 4-3, and it was difficult to explain how. Whatever. They celebrated.

"You've got to agree with one thing: The guys don't quit," Pete Mackanin said. "They came back, and it was great to see."

The Phillies manager had a muddled path to victory before the game even started. His two most trusted relievers had each pitched the previous two nights. He asked Edubray Ramos to close Saturday, and Ramos failed with one out to go. The Phillies committed two errors in the 10th to fall behind.

Franco, with an opposite-field single, won it in the bottom half. Jeanmar Gomez, the winning pitcher despite allowing a run in the 10th, was the first to hug Franco. Andres Blanco pounded the third baseman on his head. Cameron Rupp dumped a bucket of cold liquid on Franco.

"My body is killing me right now," Franco said.

"It really was a wacky game," Mackanin said.

These Phillies, if anything, have displayed a resilient attitude in the season's first three weeks. This was another game that stayed close, a frequent characteristic this April. The Phillies have played 17 games. Twelve have been decided by two runs or fewer. The bullpen has blown some. It has preserved others.

Jerad Eickhoff labored for 98 pitches in five innings, and the weight shifted to the depleted bullpen. Joely Rodriguez, Luis Garcia, Pat Neshek, and Ramos held for the next 11 outs. Then Ramos blew his first save chance with a hanging slider to Brandon Phillips.

Ramos pitched because Mackanin had leaned on Hector Neris and Joaquin Benoit. It is April. The Phillies are not yet interested in overusing their relievers.

In the bottom of the 10th, they loaded the bases on three singles. Two did not leave the infield and resulted in close plays at second base each time. Brock Stassi started the inning with a clean single to right.

Franco, to win it, did not try to pull the ball.

"My approach is just go up there and look for my pitch, a good pitch to hit," Franco said. "He threw me a fastball away, and I put good contact on it."

Before all of that, the bullpen did its job. Rodriguez and Garcia navigated the sixth and seventh innings. Garcia survived two deep flies, one of which required an incredible catch by centerfielder Odubel Herrera, who glided to the warning track in right-center and smashed into the out-of-town scoreboard with the ball in his glove.

But the Phillies kept the door open for Atlanta with haphazard baserunning. Franco misread a ball in the dirt in the sixth and was caught in a rundown after a strikeout. Freddy Galvis was erased when trying to steal third base with one out in the seventh inning. Aaron Altherr was eliminated at the plate on a shallow fly in the eighth inning.

The game devolved later. Tommy Joseph, booed in the ninth inning after he struck out on three pitches in the dirt, inexplicably fired to an unmanned third base after stepping on first during a bunt play.

"I tried to make the heads-up play, threw it away, and put ourselves in a jam," Joseph said. "But like the rest of the night, the offense put together some good at-bats, and we were able to succeed there."

The go-ahead run moved to third. It scored on an Adonis Garcia tapper to Franco, who wildly threw past first base. The fans who dotted the Citizens Bank Park seats on a bitter night booed again.

Minutes later, they cheered a weird win.

mgelb@philly.com

@MattGelb