What’s the deal with these Phillies?
How do they continue to field better performing teams?
How do they continue to crush the dreams of clubs that felt like they were made for the playoffs too?
How did they maintain one of the best lineups in Major League Baseball history with a .186 batting average and three home runs in four games?
How did they manage to get those last few outs, which can be agonizing at this time of year, using their bullpen virtually in reverse to finish off the Braves?
“Winning teams find ways to win at all costs, right?” a shirtless Bryce Harper asked rhetorically in the beer-soaked Phillies clubhouse after his team advanced to its second straight NLCS. “That’s a really, really good team over there. I have so much respect for the Atlanta Braves as an organization, the way they operate, the way they play. They have a great lineup from one to nine.”
“And we just beat a really, really good team.”
They beat the Braves with pitching. And with timely hitting. And with the longball. And at speed. And with defense.
This is not the home-run-or-bust offense of previous seasons. It’s no longer the top-heavy roster it was when guys like Harper and JT Realmuto first arrived.
It’s a clubhouse with a mix of highly paid stars, young guys trying to establish themselves and a few veterans looking to change careers.
“I can’t speak for other teams, but our guys came together really, really well,” said Dave Dombrowski, president of baseball operations. “We’re not finished yet. Personally, I’ve always felt that the best clubs in the major leagues have a good core of experienced players who are really good players and in the prime of their careers, and some good young players on the rise. I think they are really important to the overall chemistry of the team.”
It’s a team assembled by a veteran front office executive in Dombrowski who has pushed so many of the right buttons, from naming Rob Thomson manager last June to staffing the bullpen to acquiring unheralded or overlooked players who need a second chance.
“With all the statistics you have, it doesn’t take an expert to figure out who has the talent to perform,” said managing partner John Middleton.
“It really depends on the character of the person. You have to know that the person will be hungry and that he will be hungry every day. She will be motivated to win. She’ll go.” Being as motivated as Bryce means working hard to come back from injury as quickly as possible. And in ten years they will be just as hungry as they were on day one. And that’s all character.
“That’s why I think Dave has done a really good job, and honestly, (former GM Matt Klentak) did that before him because Matt was there when we signed Bryce and then we signed Zack Wheeler, who obviously was traded for Realmuto. That’s kind of how you get a really good team.
There is no shortage of great personalities in the Phillies clubhouse. Guys like Brandon Marsh, Alec Bohm, Garrett Stubbs and Bryson Stott obviously love to party and set the tone for the celebrations in the clubhouse. They might not feel so comfortable if the leader and face of the franchise, Harper, wasn’t so relaxed. Harper has an oversized aura, but doesn’t walk around like the king of the castle. He doesn’t make the young people or newcomers nervous with his presence.
He’s just a regular guy, as Jeff Hoffman put it.
“The big-money people we have are just guys,” Hoffman said. “They are team guys. They want to win. I can’t say enough about this group, these guys making a lot of money. They’re all just boys. I’ve never seen anything like it. It’s incredible.”
There’s something about the audacity with which the Phillies play. They feel like the best team no matter where they are. It doesn’t matter that the Braves finished 14 games ahead of them for the second straight season. The Phils are confident in the talent level of their 26-man roster, their ability to make game-winning plays late in the game and respond to blows to the face.
“I just think there are so many people who have been in situations like this, not just now but throughout their lives,” Harper said. “We just tune together, we tune well.”
Just six games into their 2023 playoff run, the Phillies have produced so many interesting storylines.
Harper and Wheeler potentially build legendary postseason resumes.
Nick Castellanos looks better than he has in the last two seasons with two home runs in Game 3 and two more in Game 4 of the NLDS. On both nights, his first home run tied the game in the half inning after the Braves took the lead.
The Phillies never trailed by more than a full inning at any point in the four-game series, thanks in large part to their strong right fielder.
“What a stud,” Realmuto said. “He’s an absolute guy. Nobody in the dugout was surprised by his play today, he looked so good on the field. He just has this killer mentality in him.”
Trea Turner, as the Phillies expected, was a difference-maker in every way in October, going 12 for 24 (.500) with four doubles, two home runs and four stolen bases against the Marlins and Braves.
Aaron Nola found something late in the season and made a mechanical adjustment to align his shoulders with home plate. He has thrived since then, posting four strong starts in a row, including two in the playoffs.
Seranthony Dominguez’s speed and whiff rates were down in the middle of the summer. No longer. Ranger Suarez was shaky in his final two games of the regular season. Not in the playoffs. Craig Kimbrel missed his last two save chances in September. He responded with three scoreless innings in October.
The pitching team in particular deserves great praise. Ronald Acuña Jr. will likely win the NL MVP. He wasn’t a factor in the NLDS. Matt Olson led the majors with 54 home runs and 139 RBI. He wasn’t a factor in the NLDS. Marcell Ozuna ruined the Phillies in the regular season. He was stranded in a small village in the NLDS.
“Trust our stuff, it really was,” Realmuto said. “Up and down our entire starting rotation and our bullpen from top to bottom, we have a lot of guys that have good stuff, able to mix locations, mix speeds and keep hitters off balance. With such a good lineup over there, you have to be able to mix speeds and keep them guessing. We managed to do that for most of the series.”
Thomson singled Dominguez, Alvarado and Kimbrel in the sixth, seventh and eighth innings, leaving left-handers Gregory Soto and Matt Strahm to handle a right-handed portion of the Braves’ lineup in a two-run game in the ninth inning. Soto put runners in the corners with no one out. Entering the game was Strahm, who had two saves all year.
Popup, flyout, strikeout. Game over.
“That’s why I came here,” Strahm said to Dombrowski as the two hugged outside the clubhouse after the game.
And then there was Johan Rojas. The Phillies’ rookie center field dynamo ran down an Acuña line drive with the bases loaded and two outs in the seventh inning that could have saved the Phillies’ season. For an average centerfielder, perhaps even a slightly above-average centerfielder, this is a base-clearing double.
“We knew he could play in midfield. I didn’t know he was going to catch the ball,” Dombrowski said. “When he got hit I thought he flew off the wall. But when he’s in the field of the ball, he can catch it. He was phenomenal for us and will be a really good player. But the special thing about him is that he always showed that no moment was too big for him. He appreciates that. And he’ll just keep getting better and better.”
The Phillies didn’t end the Braves’ year because of one, two or three guys, they ended it because they were the better team. Next up are the Diamondbacks in the NLCS. Games 1 and 2 will take place Monday and Tuesday nights at Citizens Bank Park.
When the Phils got past the Marlins in the wild-card round, Realmuto said he delivered the same message to his teammates before each series: “Don’t give the Phils a reason to celebrate.”
The NL East never got the message.
“We haven’t quite reached the next level yet because our ultimate goal is to win the World Series. It wasn’t about reaching the postseason or beating the Braves,” Realmuto said. “It’s fun and we’ll celebrate it, but this team is built to win the World Series. We still have more work to do.”