How the Phillies’ path to a World Series is shaping up in a wide open National League playoff field

In 2022, the Phillies clinched the last National League playoff spot on the third-to-last night of the season and got to Game 6 of the World Series. Last year, the Diamondbacks backed into the final wild card and won the pennant.

Given that context, this is going to sound bonkers. But here goes ...

The NL playoff field is as wide open as ever.

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Baseball won’t have a 100-win team for the first time in a full (non-pandemic) season since 2014. Maybe that doesn’t mean squat. Because hanging triple digits in the win column hasn’t translated into commissioner’s trophies in the wild-card era.

Ask the Dodgers what 100, 111, 106, and 106 wins got them in the last four 162-game seasons, other than increasingly intense heartburn after three divisional round bootings and an NL Championship Series loss.

But the absence of a regular-season superpower also means there isn’t a clear-cut favorite ripe to be knocked off. If the Dodgers, let’s say, go all the way with Shohei Ohtani, Mookie Betts, and Freddie Freeman atop the order, nobody will be surprised. But if they bow out early again, well, what did you expect from a team that can’t keep its pitchers healthy?

Every contender has warts. The range of outcomes for each could spin your head like a vinyl record. Entering the weekend, even the World Series-winning odds set by the sport’s leading projection models were all over the map.

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The Phillies will sidestep one potential land mine if they finish with the best or second-best record in the NL, which would secure a bye in the best-of-three wild-card round.

(Every right-minded manager, even the Braves’ Brian Snitker, would take the challenge of keeping his players sharp during a five-day layoff over pressing his luck in a miniseries that can be rife with upsets.)

No matter the opponent, the Phillies would be favored in the division series. But just because they will get home-field advantage — and a Game 1 matchup of Zack Wheeler against the other team’s No. 3 or 4 starter — doesn’t mean it will be a slam dunk. The gap between them and everybody else isn’t wide enough for that.

Let’s break down the other NL contenders, from the division leaders to the wild-card hopefuls.

Nine months ago, when they signed Ohtani to a record-setting contract, and many times thereafter, the Dodgers ruled out the two-way unicorn from pitching this season while his surgically repaired right elbow heals.

And now?

“The odds of it coming to pass are very slim,” manager Dave Roberts told reporters last week. “But they’re not zero.”

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They’re far less than 50/50, too, but indulge us: NLCS, Game 7, ninth inning, and Mr. 50/50 on the mound to send the Dodgers to the World Series.

It wouldn’t get more dramatic.

But the fact that the Dodgers are even daydreaming of using Ohtani out of the bullpen is an indictment of their perilously thin pitching ranks. They have put 12 starters — 12! — on the injured list this season, most recently Tyler Glasnow and Gavin Stone.

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Yoshinobu Yamamoto recently returned from a shoulder strain. Walker Buehler is still rounding into form after missing last season with a second Tommy John elbow surgery. Clayton Kershaw is trying to come back from a bone spur in his toe. That leaves trade-deadline addition Jack Flaherty as the Dodgers’ surest thing.

Well, except for a lights-out bullpen that features young flamethrowers Michael Kopech and Brusdar Graterol and a star-laden offense at a time of year when the stars tend to shine. (Worth noting: Ohtani has never been to the playoffs, while Betts is 2-for-25 in the last two postseasons.)

But will the Dodgers run out of starting pitching?

After the Brewers took two of three games from the Phillies this week in Milwaukee, Rhys Hoskins made a prediction.

“Something tells me,” he said, relaying his hunch to reporters, “that’s probably not the last time we’re going to see those guys.”

Maybe not.

The postseason tends to be dominated by big names, and the Brewers don’t have very many. (Get to know Jackson Chourio, because the 20-year-old rookie center fielder is a sensation.)

» READ MORE: Brewers executive Matt Klentak’s mark on the Phillies’ roster remains strong.

But here’s what Milwaukee does have: a shutdown bullpen.

The Phillies just saw it firsthand. The Brewers unleashed nine relievers in three games and gave up three runs in 11⅓ innings. It almost didn’t matter that starters Freddy Peralta, Frankie Montas, and Aaron Civale — all of whom will likely make postseason starts — didn’t complete six innings. The Brewers still struck the Phillies out 39 times in the series.

Nobody outside of Milwaukee will pick the Brewers to come out of the NL. But they have defied expectations all year. They overcame the defection of manager Craig Counsell to the rival Cubs, an offseason trade of ace Corbin Burnes, and the loss of Christian Yelich to season-ending back surgery in July.

Oh, and they won the NL Central in what was supposed to be a bridge year.

Who needs Juan Soto?

Or Josh Hader? Or Blake Snell? Or Seth Lugo and Michael Wacha?

Not the Padres, apparently, who traded their No. 3 hitter last winter and didn’t re-sign three-fifths of the rotation and their closer, yet somehow got ... better?

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General manager A.J. Preller turned Soto into righty Michael King and prospect Drew Thorpe, then flipped Thorpe in spring training for ace Dylan Cease. Preller went for it, as usual, at the deadline, trading a half-dozen prospects to beef up the bullpen. And with Jason Adam, Tanner Scott, and Bryan Hoeing joining hard-throwing closer Robert Suarez and lefties Adrián Morejón and Yuki Matsui, the Padres can shorten a game as well as any team.

Fernando Tatis Jr. is raking again after missing two months with a stress fracture of his right thigh bone. Manny Machado is finally healthy, too, after offseason elbow surgery. Jurickson Profar and rookie Jackson Merrill give the Padres a strong outfield. Luis Arráez strikes out every six weeks or so.

But while San Diego is lovely in October, here’s a reason the Phillies should want to go anywhere else: Entering the weekend, Padres pitchers threw the second-highest percentage of non-fastballs in the NL. And the Phillies were vulnerable to curveballs and sliders during their midsummer swoon.

Pop quiz: Which teams leads the majors in runs?

It’s the Murderers’ Row Diamondbacks — and by 52 runs, no less, over the Dodgers entering the weekend. Second baseman Ketel Marte does it all, and dynamic Corbin Carroll had a big second half after a poor start. They’re surrounded by a supporting cast of Christian Walker, Eugenio Suárez, and righty-mashing designated hitter Joc Pederson.

So, no, these aren’t your 84-win Cinderella Diamondbacks of last year.

» READ MORE: How far can the Phillies ride their NLCS Game 7 heartbreak? Players who have been there know.

But a deep postseason run often takes a toll on pitchers. Maybe that explains Zac Gallen’s drop-off and Merrill Kelly’s early-season shoulder strain. Brandon Pfaadt has struggled, too. And Jordan Montgomery, a late free-agent signing after leading the Rangers past Arizona in the World Series, was so bad that he briefly got booted from the rotation.

Hard-throwing Justin Martínez and A.J. Puk added octane to a bullpen that struggled to a 4.42 ERA through Thursday. And the Diamondbacks did unlock how to subdue the Phillies offense last October. The scars from that series don’t heal easily, if ever.

But it’s fair to wonder if there’s enough in the tank for the D’backs to execute as effectively this year.

In 2019, the Nationals won the World Series after famously starting 19-31. Two years later, it was the Braves’ turn despite being 52-55 on Aug. 1. And a season after that, the Phillies started 21-29, fired Joe Girardi, and won the pennant.

Could it be the Mets’ turn?

At their nadir, on June 2, they were 24-35. But Francisco Lindor moved to the leadoff spot, Mark Vientos took over third base, Sean Manaea turned into a No. 1 starter, and the Mets got on a 61-33 roll with a plus-129 run differential through Thursday night’s four-homer shellacking of the Phillies’ Taijuan Walker.

» READ MORE: Phillies vs. Mets in September — and it matters for the first time since 2008. Let the fun begin.

In the words of infielder/pop star Jose Iglesias, “OMG!”

The sample is large enough to believe that it’s sustainable, even if logic says the Mets can’t make a deep postseason run with an ace-less rotation and a bullpen that ranked only 16th in ERA (3.94) entering the weekend.

But the more immediate concern is Lindor, the NL MVP in a non-Ohtani universe. He tweaked his back last Friday night in Philadelphia, and now, the Mets may have to lock up a wild card without him. Lindor’s fill-in, top prospect Luisangel Acuña (brother of injured Braves star Ronald Acuña Jr.), was off to a blazing start, going 8-for-15 in his first six games.

Maybe they will fall short, but given the overcrowding on their injured list, it’s a wonder the Braves even hung around in the wild-card race to have a chance next week in a three-game showdown with the Mets.

Three reasons the Phillies shouldn’t want to see Atlanta again, even with Acuña, Spencer Strider, A.J. Minter, Austin Riley, and Reynaldo López on the shelf:

» READ MORE: Keeping their starting pitchers healthy is key to a World Series run. Here’s how the Phillies plan to do it.

Phillies-Braves, Round 3 would be great theater. But it’s probably not the matchup the Phillies want.