NLDS vs Dodgers 2025

[Philsmania]

It is pretty amazing how well this team did with a number of position players and pitchers having off years:

-Nola
-Alvarado
-Ross
-Romano

-Stott
-Bohm
-Casty
-Realmuto
-Kepler

Even Harper had a down year for him, but Turner, Schwarber, Marsh, Wheeler (until the injury), Sanchez, Suarez, Luzardo, Duran, Banks and Bader have carried them through the down slides.

In the case of Stott and Bohm, they really upped their performance in September (and August too for Stott) when, coincidentally or not, the Phillies played their best baseball of the season.

[zambonir]

Even Kepler was more almost 10 OPS+ points better in the second half. Close to .800 OPS in both Aug and September. Sosa also had a much-needed monster second half, Kemp with a great September too.

Arguably Bohm was more consistent than last year, just without the massive early high. Take away April and he and Marsh both look fantastic (and Marsh would have had more WAR in LF all year).

[zambonir]

Not that there is a ton of suspense but I guess rosters aren't due until tomorrow?

[zambonir]

Not sure these are official, let alone locked in, but they are on the Phillies website.

[EastFallowfield]

Seems like offense across the board had a down year, so some stats surprised me...

Bohm was 10th in the NL in batting average.

Harper was 11th in the NL in OPS (Schwarber #2).

Harper was 10th in the NL in slugging (Schwarber #2)

Phils had 3 in the top 15 in OBP (Schwarber, Harper and Turner).

[zambonir]

Not surprised about Bohm given he is second on the team and Trea won the batting title and nobody hits for average anymore. Interesting context for Harper's "down" year though.

[fish]

I’m compartmentalizing-this series as the Phillies World Series. They won’t face a better team, and one of them has to go home after. I suspect whoever does will blame their bullpen for it. My biggest hope is that the Phillies compete like they did in their last series against them. The biggest sin for a Phillies club is to lose in an uncompetitive flop.

One unsaid storyline is that world of Japanese baseball who never gave Phillies baseball a second thought, and who will be watching, is going be talking about it after tomorrow no matter what the outcome. It could be we end up looking like a spiteful mob of crazy people or, fingers crossed, a place with a baseball experience that looks like a whole lot of fun to be a part of. As we know, that will all depend on what happens on the field.

[zambonir]

If it comes down to bullpen I like our chances. But I'd rather not get shut out for five-six innings first.

Great point. I don't think we are going to boo Ohtania or throw batteries at Sasaki. But would be great to break their hearts, and maybe catch the attention of another player. Or a 14 year-old.

[zambonir]

I guess the sked is in fact set, even if other games aren't played. One late one, one not, and then a fairly late start if it goes five which is probably better for the players coming back from Pacific time.

(Source is Phillies social.)

[andyb]

Interesting that the starters for games 2 and 3 are still unannounced for the Phillies. I am guessing that there is a chance one of Luzardo or Suarez will be in the bullpen late in game 1 and would be bumped back to game 3 if they pitch. Seems most likely with Ranger in that scenario since he has done it before. Ranger also is probably the game 2 starter if that does not happen splitting up the higher velocity pitchers.

The game 1 relief scenario I guess would also bring a Nola tandem into play for game 3 with that game 1 relief pitcher..

[EastFallowfield]

The Athletic story says all signs point to Luzardo in Game 2...

Part of the motivation is to have Luzardo at home, along with the option to have a quicker hook on him because there is an off day between Games 2 and 3.

But another reason for that alignment is to have Suárez available in the bullpen during Game 1.

Phillies-Dodgers NLDS: What we’re watching in the series, starting with...

[BostonRoss]

I guess analytics says that advertisers pay more if games start at :08 or :38

[phillychuck]

And they can fit more ads in between :00 and :08 than between :00 and :05...

[zambonir]

At least those times are presumably correct. The 7:30 Penn State game last week kicked off at 7:52 (with TV advertising 7pm to get you to watch their pregame).

[zambonir]

This was definitely thought to be a factor last year because we'd played the Mets so much.

And no Mayza I guess?

Matt Strahm and Tanner Banks enter this series as important figures. The Phillies will want Strahm on Ohtani and Freddie Freeman late in games. But teams have discovered it’s increasingly dangerous to have the same opposing hitters seeing the same relievers over the course of a postseason series. Suárez, if the right momenwwt arises, could help mitigate that in Game 1.

Meanwhile Mrs. Harper had another kid this week. Timed for the bye.

[BaseballCat]

[EastFallowfield]

I've always felt that postseason odds for a given series are basically 50/50. So far, in this playoff format, it's played out exactly 50/50 for the teams with the byes.

So, after three years of this format, what have we learned?

We’ve had 12 Division Series. Six times, the rested team won. Six times, the stayed-warm team won. It’s actually kind of perfect.

And this...

Teams who got the bye in the first round have a perfect 100% “did you advance to the second round” rate. It’s the only fully predictable thing in baseball.

https://www.mlb.com/news/how-first-round-bye-affects-mlb-playoff-teams

[andyb]

I just assume the higher seeds with the bye will eventually settle into winning 55%-60% of the series. Home field advantage and on average they are better teams. But the short series means it should be somewhat close to 50-50 no matter what. Home teams win about 54% of regular season games (less than in most sports). Play 3 and the odds should be a bit higher than that. But we'll probably need 50-100 total series for the trends to settle down.

[zambonir]

The quirk, while not statistically significant, is that five of the six warm teams who won were in the NL (with the Phillies being two of those, as well as one of the rested losers), while five of the six rested winners were in the AL.

Really whatever momentum LA might have should be mitigated by them winning in two (they haven't played in three days and also had to travel). But the sweep and the NL having the heavy off-day sked also means there's not really any wear on them either.

[EastFallowfield]

Of course, there's no guarantee this will be the last playoff format ever, so there might never be a large enough sample size to ever make it mean anything.