South Jersey’s Tyler Phillips and his family are living a Phillies dream. And his dad hopes he never wakes up.

So, you want to speak with Dan Phillips about his son’s historic major-league debut — for his hometown team, no less — last weekend and upcoming first start in the ballpark where he grew up going to games.

“Just to warn you,” Phillips says, “I’ll probably get choked up and have spells of crying.”

Sure enough, the proud dad’s voice cracked a handful of times during a 40-minute chat this week, and well, it was 100 percent understandable. Because Tyler Phillips’ walk to the mound Saturday at Citizens Bank Park to start the second-to-last game before the All-Star break will mark the latest fulfillment of a dream that spans four generations of fathers and sons in a Phillies-loving family from South Jersey.

And if Hollywood turned it into a movie, nobody would believe it.

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“I just keep thinking,” Dan Phillips said, “‘I hope I don’t wake up from this dream.’”

It has been a week now, since the Phillies put Tyler on the 40-man roster and called him up from triple A. They needed another arm in the bullpen for a holiday weekend series against the Braves, and the 26-year-old righty from Burlington County and Bishop Eustace Prep pitched well in his last four starts for Lehigh Valley.

But that didn’t make the news any less surprising.

“I was actually at the bank at the teller when he FaceTimed, and I said, ‘Hey, can I call you back?’” Dan recalled. “He says, ‘No, no — and maybe you should be sitting down.’ We were almost in shock. He expects us to be going, ‘Yaaaah!’ And we’re just like looking at each other. We didn’t expect it.”

Dan’s feet had barely touched the ground, then, when Tyler ran in from the bullpen with the Phillies trailing by five runs last Sunday in Atlanta. Tyler struck out the side in the fifth inning — Matt Olson on a 2-2 curveball, Marcell Ozuna and Travis d’Arnaud on sweepers. In four innings, he piled up seven strikeouts, the most in a major-league debut by a Phillies reliever.

And Dan had the perfect vantage point.

“The staff there was so nice. They let me get down behind the plate,” he said. “They escorted me down, so I could watch him from down there. After the game, I was jumping over all the barriers and everything to get down to the field. I was like, ‘I don’t care. I’m going down there to hug my son.’”

Especially because the Phillies could’ve swapped out Phillips for a fresh arm after he threw 53 pitches. Instead, they informed him that he will take the revolving No. 5 spot in the rotation that was occupied for two starts by rookie Michael Mercado, who was filling in for injured Taijuan Walker (finger) and Spencer Turnbull (shoulder).

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Which brings us to what’s about to happen Saturday.

“It’s just amazing,” Dan said. “Wearing the pinstripes is something special. Getting to see him start, warm up, it’s just going to be amazing to watch.”

There’s no estimating how many pitchers the Phillipses have watched warm up over the years. Dan and his late father, Frank, became regulars at Veterans Stadium in the early 1990s. They bought a partial season-ticket plan and sat in the 500 Level in the pennant-winning 1993 season.

Frank and Dan passed down their passion to Tyler when he was born in 1997. His first game: July 3, 1999, Dan says, reciting the date without hesitation. But then, what red-blooded Phillies fan would ever forget a 21-8 throttling of the Chicago Cubs?

“Fireworks night,” Dan said, not referring to back-to-back homers from Rico Brogna and Mike Lieberthal in an eight-run first inning. “They had 58,000 people there. That was Tyler’s first game. He was 2.”

One year older than Tyler’s son, Frank, named after his grandfather.

The Phillipses were there for the last game at the Vet in 2003 and the 2004 opener of the Bank, where they often sat in bleacher seats near the bullpens. And in 2007, when Tyler pushed his grandfather, an ardent fan of Ryan Howard, through the concourse in a wheelchair.

“My father would watch every game,” Dan said. “I could still hear him saying, ‘Did you see Howard hit that home run?’ He’d call us after every game and give us a little recap. That’s what he did.

“I wish he could see Tyler.”

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Then there was the time that Dan feared he lost Tyler amid a throng of children who swarmed the Phanatic.

“All the kids dress the same. They’ve all got jean shorts and a red shirt, right?” Dan recalled. “The Phanatic runs up the aisle in the lower levels, and all these kids, they just follow him up. Tyler gets in that group and all the kids separate and I’m like, ‘Where the hell’s Tyler?’ I’m telling the ushers. I run all the way down to the field level. Finally I found him. We went way up to the 700 Level and sat up there, just him and I.”

The Phillipses took multiple family vacations to Clearwater, Fla., for spring training. One of Tyler’s favorite pastimes: sneaking through a crowd of fans to snag autographs.

“I was like, ‘He’s going to get trampled,’ and he’d come out with a signed ball,” Dan said. “We probably have like 30 balls that are signed by all the Phillies from those teams.”

The Phillipses didn’t have as much time to attend Phillies games once Tyler began playing travel ball. He got drafted by the Texas Rangers in the 16th round in 2015 and signed for $160,000. He reached triple A in 2021 but got waived. The Phillies claimed him, and he unknowingly pitched through a torn ligament in his elbow before undergoing Tommy John surgery in 2022.

It’s a lot.

And now, on the eve of Tyler’s career zenith, with who knows how many family and friends likely to be in attendance, it’s impossible for Dan to not think about when his son was 8, maybe 9, and they saw former Phillies manager Dallas Green at a restaurant in Clearwater.

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“Tyler said to him, ‘I’m going to play with the Phillies one day,’” Dan said. “And Dallas Green just looked at him, he’s having his cocktail there, and he just says, ‘OK.’

“It’s a miracle to get to the top and throw a pitch. All I ever wanted was for him to have a chance to get on the mound and throw a ball. I’m just glad he’s made it there, and thankfully, the Phillies gave him that opportunity.”