I still believe.
I still believe that the Philadelphia Phillies will win the World Series.
Am I just being delusional? Maybe a bit. But after I predicted a championship parade down Broad Street for the Phillies, I can’t jump off the bandwagon now. I mean, I could, but what fun would that be.
Look, I completely understand all of the Phillies fans out there who don’t have any faith in this team. The Phillies have let their fans down in the playoffs the last few years and this year’s team is far too inconsistent for everybody to just assume they have the talent to win it all. But the fans who said they wanted them to lose and not make the playoffs, so they could fire everybody and blow up the roster, just weren’t living in reality. Phillies ownership is too committed to winning now (4th highest payroll in MLB) to blow up this roster any time soon.
A 9-19 start to the season cost manager Rob Thomson his job and then the team went on a nice run under new manager Don Mattingly. Things leveled off after a while, but the Phillies had the best record in baseball in August, starting in an Iowa cornfield in the Field of Dreams game. Unfortunately, the Phillies then promptly fell on their face in September. They almost missed the playoffs with a 9-14 record to finish the season and actually didn’t qualify until the last game of the season. Older Phillies fans were haunted by memories of the 1964 Phillies collapse, but luckily this Phillies team won just enough to avoid disaster.
But now that they’re in as the 6 seed, the Phillies can absolutely make a run. Hey, that’s exactly what they did in 2022, when they went all the way to the World Series. Unfortunately, they’ve gone backwards since then, losing in the NLCS in 2023 and the NLDS in both 2024 and 2025.
The Phillies will start these playoffs in the Wild Card round against the Atlanta Braves, who won the NL East with a 94-68 record. The Braves won 9 of the 13 games the two teams played this season, but the Phillies have never lost to the Braves in the playoffs. That’s right. Never. The Phillies beat the Braves in the 1993 NLCS, 2022 NLDS and 2023 NLDS.
The Braves will send Chris Sale and his 2.16 ERA to the mound in Game 1, but keep in mind that Sale has a 6.34 ERA in 10 career playoff appearances. Sale will be followed by trade deadline acquisition Tyler Mahle in Game 2. Mahle had a 1.99 ERA in 9 games with Atlanta, but he had a 5.13 ERA in San Francisco before the trade. He has also never pitched in the playoffs. With Martin Perez going on the IL with a back injury, Grant Holmes would pitch Game 3, if necessary. Considering that the Braves used Ray Kerr as an opener for Holmes’ last start, I don’t sense they would have much confidence in him with their season on the line.
The biggest advantage either team has in this series is the Braves bullpen over the Phillies bullpen. While the Phillies pen was among the worst in baseball, the Braves were cruising along with closer Raisel Inglasias, Didier Fuentes and set-up man Robert Suarez who just came off the IL in time for the playoffs, among others.
The Phillies announced that they will start Jesus Luzardo in Game 1, after he only needed 4 pitches to get three outs on Sunday in his first appearance since September. Apparently, the left shoulder discomfort that he was experiencing has gone away just in time. Assuming that Luzrdo will be on a limited pitch count, the Phillies plan to bring SP Andrew Painter in after Luzardo. This makes perfect sense since the Phillies entire bullpen, other than closer Johan Duran and rookie Alex McFarlane have been utterly unreliable. This would seem to point to Aaron Nola being used out of the bullpen in the WC round. Jonathan Bowlan and Jose Alvarado will also see some innings in relief because somebody has to pitch the remaining innings. Tim Mayza and Brooks Raley will be on the roster due to their left-handedness.
That would leave Christopher Sanchez to start Game 2 and most likely, Zack Wheeler would start Game 3, if necessary. There is zero chance that Wheeler wouldn’t demand to pitch Game 3 on short rest. Luckily for Phillies fans, Mattingly is a far better manager than Thomson and would let him pitch.
If the Phillies can actually beat Sale in Game 1, it’s over for the Braves with Sachez and Wheeler up next against Mahle and Holmes. There is also the fact that the Phillies have never won a playoff series in which they lost Game 1 of that series. The best-case scenario for the Phillies would be to win the series in 2 games so Wheeler is lined up to face the Dodgers in the NLDS, but that’s getting ahead of ourselves.
The key for the Phillies pitchers is to limit the damage done by Ronald Acuna. While the Phillies didn’t plunk Acuna (like they should have) after he made one of the slowest trots around the bases after a home run a few weeks ago, they certainly need to make sure he isn’t the difference in this series. If that means walking him regularly, so be it. Nobody else in the Atlanta lineup scares you.
Of course, the key to this series and any future series for the Phillies is their ability (inability?) to score some runs. They have been terrible in September, ranking 29th in baseball in several categories: AVG (.226), OPS (.660) and Runs per game (3.71). That is downright terrible.
Luckily, it all seems to be turning around for the Phillies now that JT Realmuto snapped an 0-for-34 slump with an RBI double on Sunday. Just kidding. Realmuto looks like a shot hitter, but his job is to just handle the pitching staff and throw out runners. Bryce Harper and Kyle Schwarber need to turn back into “elite” hitters if the Phillies have any chance of making a run in these playoffs. Trea Turner? I’ve just about given up on him producing at the plate this season. Missing Luis Arraez with an ankle injury this series is going to hurt, but maybe he’ll heal up in time for future rounds.
If/when the Phillies beat the Braves, they would face the Dodgers in the NLDS because, for some reason, MLB doesn’t reseed their playoff matchups after each round. The Phillies nearly beat the Dodgers in the playoffs last year (thank God that Kerkering is not on the playoff roster this year) and this Dodgers team is nowhere near as good as they have been the last two years. I seriously doubt that they are going to Three-Peat.
After that it would be a matchup with the best team in baseball, the Milwaukee Brewers, assuming they win in the NLDS. Milwaukee is winning with a smallball approach that flies in the face of the analytics nerds running (ruining?) baseball these days. They also have the best pitcher in baseball in Jacob Misiorowski, with his 16-5 record, 1.80 ERA, 0.80 WHIP and 252 Ks. That seems like a daunting task, but Milwaukee doesn’t have a stellar playoff history.
Beating the Brewers would lead the Phillies back to the World Series against an inferior AL opponent, because the entire AL is inferior this season. The best team is the Tampa Bay Rays. Anybody remember the last time the Phillies played the Rays in the World Series?
Somebody cue up the Chase Utley speech.
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