Photo: Zach McHoul / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0)

ANAHEIM, Calif. Zack Wheeler loaded the bases before recording an out Sunday, and it looked like the same pitcher who had been charged with eight runs in four innings his last time out in Seattle. Then Trea Turner turned a double play, Wheeler settled in, and the Phillies walked out of Angel Stadium with a 5-2 win and a three-game sweep.

It was Wheeler’s first quality start since July 21 and his first win since July 12. Backed by Edmundo Sosa’s second go-ahead homer of the series and a late offensive push, the Phillies improved to 20-7 in August, the best record in baseball for the month, with one game still to play.

For a team that went 9-15 in July, the turnaround matters. The Phillies have won 13 of their last 15 and sit a season-high 17 games over .500. They trail the NL East-leading Braves by five games heading into seven head-to-head meetings in September.

Two inches and a graph told Wheeler what went wrong

In his first seven starts after the All-Star break entering Sunday, Wheeler carried a 7.18 ERA. His outing in Seattle was the low point: four homers allowed, five walks, eight runs.

In the four days between starts, Wheeler and the Phillies’ pitching staff dug into his biomechanics, going beyond traditional video to joint-tracking data that can detect tiny positional changes.

“We feel like we kind of figured some things out,” Wheeler said. “When I feel off, I look at the biomechanical stuff because you see more stuff than regular video. You can see the smallest little difference. My glove was down two more inches than where it had been all year in my last start. They showed me a graph of how it’s been trending, so we brought the front arm up a little bit and went from there. Everything synched up off that. I was able to get my weight on my back leg and that helped me be more direct rather than rotational.”

Interim manager Don Mattingly put it more simply: Wheeler had developed a lean toward home plate that was throwing off his posture. The glove fix addressed the root cause.

Wheeler said the adjustment clicked on the first pitch of the fourth inning, a fastball that Christian Moore took for a called strike. From there, the timing felt right.

A shaky first inning, then five strong frames

The early signs were not encouraging. Wheeler walked leadoff hitter Wade Meckler on six pitches, hit Mike Trout, and watched Vaughn Grissom single to load the bases with nobody out. But Moisés Ballesteros chased a splitter and grounded into a 1-6-3 double play. One run scored. Wheeler then struck out Moore on three pitches to escape.

“I think it just kind of settled him down, because those first few batters he wasn’t as sharp, and he looked really good in the bullpen,” catcher J.T. Realmuto said. “So I knew that once he got that double play, got out of it, I felt pretty confident that he was going to be himself today.”

After that first inning, Wheeler allowed just three hits and no runs over his final five frames. He sidestepped a leadoff double in the third with help from center fielder Derek Hill, who made a diving catch to rob Ballesteros.

The sixth inning brought one more test. Wheeler walked consecutive batters with two outs, pushing his pitch count past 100. Mattingly considered pulling him but gave him a shot against José Siri. Wheeler fell behind 2-0, then battled back to strike out Siri on a full-count curveball, his sixth strikeout of the day.

In all, Wheeler threw 108 pitches. Half were four-seam fastballs that averaged 95.4 mph and topped out at 96.3. He generated 15 swings and misses, five on the 11 curveballs he threw.

“You know what he can be and what he can do, and this was a good start to head in that direction,” Mattingly said.

Sosa’s second go-ahead blast of the series

The Phillies’ offense mostly slumbered against Angels lefty Yusei Kikuchi. Realmuto broke through first, launching a solo homer to center in the third to tie the game at 1-1. It was his 10th of the season.

The score stayed there until the seventh, when Sosa turned on a splitter inside and sent it over the left field wall for a go-ahead solo shot. On Friday, Sosa had delivered a pinch-hit grand slam to cap a comeback win. He is now 8-for-20 with 12 RBIs over his last seven games.

The rest of the lineup piled on once Kikuchi left. Kyle Schwarber walked to open the eighth, Turner singled, and Alec Bohm drew a walk to load the bases. Luis Arraez, pinch-hitting for Sosa, lifted a sacrifice fly. Brandon Marsh followed with a pinch-hit RBI single. Bryce Harper added an RBI double in the ninth, extending his career-best on-base streak to 32 games.

Bullpen holds without its top arms

With Jonathan Bowlan and Jhoan Duran both unavailable after heavy recent workloads, the Phillies turned to Alex McFarlane, José Alvarado and Orion Kerkering to cover the final three innings.

McFarlane, the rookie right-hander, recovered from a leadoff walk to post a scoreless seventh. Alvarado got two outs in the eighth but left two runners on after back-to-back singles. Kerkering entered and induced a groundout from Siri to end the threat.

Kerkering stayed on for the ninth and allowed an RBI double to Trout that cut the lead to 5-2, but he struck out Grissom to end the game and finish 1.1 innings of work. For the series, the Phillies’ bullpen allowed just two runs in nine innings.

Arizona and Atlanta loom in September

The Phillies open a three-game set Monday night in Arizona against the Diamondbacks, who currently hold the third NL wild-card spot but sit 4.5 games behind Philadelphia. Aaron Nola is scheduled to start the opener.

On Friday, the Braves come to Citizens Bank Park for a four-game series, the first of seven meetings between the clubs in the next two weeks. With a five-game deficit in the NL East, the Phillies control their own path.

“It’s time to go, because it’s that time of year where it’s time to start chasing the division,” Realmuto said.

Wheeler lines up to pitch in Arizona. He knows one start does not erase a month of struggles, but he and his catcher believe the fix is real.

“He’s close. I’m sure he would tell you the same,” Realmuto said. “He felt closer to it today than he did his last start. And I know he’s working hard on it. We have all the faith in the world.”