SAN DIEGO — The Phillies played one of their ugliest games of the season on Tuesday. They’re 2-3 in September and 2-4 in their last six games overall. Let the dread commence.
The sky isn’t yet falling, even if this is September, and even if this is the Phillies. Their five-game lead on a playoff spot at the start of that 2-4 span has dropped just half a game, and with 24 games to go, they’re still in an awfully good position to earn a postseason berth.
It would take a September collapse of proportions even more epic than any of the previous four (or five) iterations for them to blow this one.
But their hold on the National League’s top Wild Card spot has gotten a little more precarious. Before that 2-4 stretch, the Phillies led Chicago by four games. The Cubs then proceeded to win five of their next seven — moving to 30-13, nearly .700, in their last 43 games — while moving just 1 1/2 games back of home-field advantage in the Wild Card Series. (The Phillies, though, do own the tiebreaker via their 5-1 head-to-head record.)
While things still have to go awfully south awfully fast for anyone to be sweating over a playoff berth, it’s not that hard to imagine the race for WC1 coming down to the last week of the season. And while the 4 1/2-game playoff lead, as well as the abject mediocrity of the four contenders vying for the third Wild Card spot, might ultimately mean a nice consolation if the Phillies fall out of No. 1 Wild Card positioning, Rob Thomson made something clear on Tuesday: The Phillies’ goal isn’t to win any Wild Card spot. It’s to win the top one.
Phillies Nation asked Thomson before Tuesday’s loss to San Diego — when the Wild Card lead was 5 1/2 games, and the lead on the top spot 2 1/2 — how the Phillies would approach the final couple weeks of the season if a playoff spot was effectively sealed but home-field advantage in the Wild Card Series remained up for grabs. Would they rest (particularly pitchers) to gear up for the postseason or push the pedal to the metal until home-field advantage was clinched?
Admittedly, it’s far too early to begin contemplating a decision that might not ultimately be applicable anyway. But in the event that it is, Thomson seems to have already made up his mind.
“We’re going for it,” he said. “No doubt. We’re a different team at home. Our fans deserve to see us play in the playoffs. That’s what we’re gonna shoot for.”
Put away the September Collapse dread for a moment and consider such a scenario. In that event, there’s a case to be made for either course of action — to rest or not to rest. Whether the Phillies wind up with the No. 4 or No. 5 seed in the NL (in other words, the first or second Wild Card) wouldn’t change their first- or second-round playoff opponents. They’d obviously benefit from having their top arms, both starters and relievers, fully loaded for October.
But last year showed the Phillies just how significant home-field advantage can be in the postseason. They won each of their first six postseason games, including three blowouts, at a Citizens Bank Park that an opposing coach declared “four hours of hell.”
It’s understandable that Thomson would want to do everything in his power to ensure that perhaps the Phillies’ greatest strength in 2022 is at their disposal once again in 2023.
Thomson’s team will face that conundrum (which apparently isn’t a conundrum) only if the Phillies remain clear of the current logjam at the bottom of the NL Wild Card race. Four teams — the Cincinnati Reds, Miami Marlins, Arizona Diamondbacks and San Francisco Giants, in that order — are separated by two games in the fight for the NL’s last postseason spot. “I think it’s great for baseball,” Thomson said of the number of teams still in the mix this late in the season.
Who might emerge from that mess is anyone’s guess (and this one is on the D-Backs) — but the Phillies learned in 2022 what it’s like to scratch and claw for that third Wild Card spot in the last few weeks of the season. Fun, yes, but also gut-wrenching and horrible.
2023’s Wild Card mess is 2022’s on steroids. If the Phillies take care of their own business, Thomson can watch that mad dash to the finish line from a far more comfortable position this time around. But that comfort isn’t the goal. The goal is to open the postseason in Philadelphia.
And, in that regard, things have gotten slightly more interesting.
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