Philadelphia Phillies youngsters face a brutal final stretch

The end of the season could be brutal for the Philadelphia Phillies youngsters.

The Philadelphia Phillies, a very young team indeed led by a first-year manager, faced a steep uphill battle Sept. 20. Beginning that evening in Atlanta, and for the following ten days, they would somehow have to make up 5½ games on the division-leading Braves by playing those Braves seven times with a four-day pause beginning Sept. 24 while they played the Colorado Rockies. The alternatives were either hoping for a whole lot of help against Colorado to win a wild card slot or missing the playoffs.

Their only “break” in the pressure against two teams an aggregate 29 games over .500 would follow the fourth game against Atlanta on the near Sunday, which would begin at 1:35 p.m. before they flew two-thirds of the way across the country to play Colorado the next evening. On Sept. 27 their game against the Rockies was also an afternoon game before a flight back to Philadelphia to play, again, the Braves the next evening.

To dismiss the Phillies was a temptation for everyone, this observer included. Perhaps all was not lost, however, even considering the Herculean tasks ahead. It appeared that for four of the coming contests, the Fightin’ Phils would send out Aaron Nola and Jake Arrieta for two games apiece.

Nola had phenomenal numbers for the season, and Arrieta was a former Cy Young awardee and World Champion.

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Immediate Pressure

The most important games were the two coming up immediately, though. In them, the Phillies would be depending on the two weakest links in their rotation, Vince Velasquez and Nick Pivetta, and they needed to win both games. One win in the two would leave them still 5½ behind Atlanta, and two loses would push them 7½ back with only nine games to play.

However, two wins would leave the Phillies merely 3½ games behind the Braves with Arrieta set to face Sean Newcomb Saturday afternoon.

This was the season essentially compressed into 48 hours. Velasquez’ opponent Thursday evening would be Kevin Gausman, who had pitched for the dreadful 2018 Baltimore Orioles until the end of July. Pivetta would face Julio Teheran. In both games the Phillies pitchers would start with ERAs at 4.50 or higher; in both games the Braves hurlers would be sporting ERAs just under 4.00. The rest of the season’s stats were a bit irrelevant except for head-to-head meetings with the team involved.

The Particular Histories

Gausman had faced the Phillies once this season with Baltimore and lost, but he had pitched well for Atlanta, going 5-2. Velasquez had faced Atlanta four times and lost all four games, the last time on May 22. About the only two things seeming positive about that record were four of the 18 runs he had given up to the Braves were unearned and, to trot out a cliché, he was due. Vinny Velo had lasted between 2 2/3 and six innings in his starts.

Pivetta had faced Atlanta four times as well, and the Phillies won three of his games, but he was 1-1 personally. He had last faced the Braves May 21 and gave them no runs in seven innings in the game he won. Teheran had opposed the Phillies three times early in the season and personally booked one decision, a win, while his team had gone 2-1.

It didn’t look particularly encouraging for Philadelphia, but there it was. By Saturday it would probably be very, very obvious whether the Phillies playoff chances were in a death-spiral coma or not. If not, they would still have some work to do.