Phillies avoid EPIC MELTDOWN to clinch a playoff spot in Game 162 09/27/2026 POSTGAME RECAP
PHOTO CREDIT: Eric Hartline, IMAGN IMAGES
They never said it would be easy right?
With game to go in the regular season the Phillies needed to do just thing
WIN.
That has not come easy lately
The had lost four straight, and six of their last eight games, culminated by last night's 10 run blowouts against the Rays in the pouring rain.
Today though, different story! (Except the rain, that was still a thing.)
The Phillies had six extra-base hits. Harper and Sosa both homered in the fifth inning. Harper’s homer, a laser to right, was his 29th of the year and just his second in a span of 27 games.
Kyle Schwarber, one of the many slumping Phillies, singled with one out in the first inning and came in to score on a double to right by Bryson Stott. That hit gave the Phils their first lead since Tuesday. It brought the drenched crowd alive and replaced the boos of the last few days with cheers. The Phillies hitters relaxed and stopped pressing. They got four more hits in the second inning, including three doubles.
J.T. Realmuto broke out of an 0-for-32 skid with an RBI double and Schwarber capped it all with a two-run double that resulted in more big cheers.
“That was one of our better crowds, I thought,” he said. “You don’t hear a lot of, ‘Let’s go, Phillies,’ at our games. It’s just waiting for things, right? And it would be great if it would be like an uplifting type of scenario than a …. You know, in the Milwaukee series, somebody makes an out in the fourth inning with a guy on base and it’s like a boo, and I know it’s the fans right to do it – like, you can either lift up or you can hold down. And when you lift a team up, you’ve got a game," said Phillies intern manager Don Mattingly.
Zack Wheeler, who missed the final six weeks of last season and the first month of this season due to surgery for thoracic outlet syndrome was awesome for his 27th and final outing shutting the AL's best team down through six innings of work to just 5 hits and a run.
“This was like the playoffs, win or go home,” Wheeler said. “I was just pitching like it was win or go home. To see those guys (the offense) get going gave me a little extra comfort out there on the mound of not having to be perfect with every pitch. It’s always good when you have that backing.”
The Phillies will play the Braves in Atlanta starting on Tuesday at 2 PM in the Wild Card round!
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