October 01, 2026
Dale Zanine/Imagn Images via Reuters Connect
Aaron Nola got the call for Game 3 and didn't give them much.
It was said by many this season that the Phillies were a team built for the postseason.
We now have definitive proof: they're not.
They chased, swung and missed. They made base-running blunders. They were woeful with runners in scoring position. And they overflowed the kitchen sink, throwing two of their best starters out there on short rest in a 6-2 loss to the Braves in Game 3 of the NL Wild Card Series Thursday.
The season is over. The Phillies lacked the bullpen or the consistent hitting to even sniff a deep postseason run. They'll now have to find a way to be better next season, with more than $217 million locked into contracts already for 2027.
For one last time in 2026, here's a look at the good, the bad, and the anger-inducing end of the season:
• Kyle Schwarber had a good series. I know, who cares... but he had two hits Thursday, had the big home run Wednesday and was on base twice Tuesday. For all of the high priced hitters, many of whom have disappointed (seven years remain on Trea Turner's deal), Schwarber continues to earn his money every season.
Schwarber scored the Phillies' first run on an RBI Alec Bohm ground out in the sixth.
• Derek Hill's leadoff triple in the eighth inning was cool. He scored too — too little too late.
• We're grasping at straws here — but if you're an optimist, who appreciates being a fan of a franchise that is willing to spend the money to make it to five straight postseasons — the Phillies aren't going to fall off a cliff or anything. Probably.
There are some real areas for improvement, most notably the bullpen, which will and should get a complete and total overhaul this offseason. The outfield needs a transfusion as well. Whether or not you trust Dave Dombrowski and company to successfully lead these endeavors is a reasonable thing to worry about, but the starting pitching staff (which includes three of the likely top 10 NL Cy Young vote recipients) is locked down for next year, as are the core hitters.
Bohm is as good as gone, with a youth infusion potentially on the horizon with top prospect Aidan Miller expected to sniff the major leagues. It will be an interesting winter for Phillies fans, but it beats the alternative — being a perpetually rebuilding team with no fan interest or hope whatsoever.
• The 2026 Phillies did they best they could to put bandages and duct tape on their glaring weaknesses this season, but they limped into the postseason with arguably their best hitter Luis Arráez injured and the pitching staff in total disarray. It didn't feel like a team destined for a deep run.
Their issues last week, needing all 162 games to clinch, sort of created this environment and few teams are able to overcome issues like the Phils created for themselves. The Wild Card format is just brutal. The writing was on the wall in September, and they lasted one day into October.
• Could Aaron Nola have started any worse? With trouble finding the strike zone early, the veteran issued one-out walks to Ronald Acuña Jr., and Matt Olson. And then Michael Harris blasted a homer to right field to put the Phillies in a bad spot pretty early.
Nola's last outing was just one inning, with similar disaster as he allowed three runs Saturday and was pulled after one inning. Prior to that, he'd been pretty solid with an ERA near 3 — but the Phillies could have gone a different way in this one. Jesús Luzardo and Zack Wheeler, each on short rest, are aces who have had success agains the Braves. The Nola decision wasn't an easy one, but the result isn't that surprising. No MLB pitcher allowed more homers this year than Nola.
He lasted 1.2 innings before he was lifted — Don Mattingly didn't feel comfortable letting him face the Braves lineup a second time though.
• Wheeler, who started Sunday and entered in the third inning Thursday on three days rest for the first time ever, looked like the grown up in the room. He pounded the strike zone and elicited contact that the Phils' defense could handle. Keeping the Braves off their heals. One has to wonder what might have happened had the Phillies gone with Wheeler to start things off.
The stated reason, at least according to the NBC broadcast, was that the coaching staff felt Wheeler was better suited for a bullpen role than Nola, who got the start. It really feels like every possible binary decision Mattingly needed to make over the last few weeks of the 2026 season (and postseason) was incorrect.
Whatever the reason it didn't matter. Wheeler was shaky on short rest too, with a walk in the fourth leading to an Ozzie Albies bomb and 5-0 lead. He battled through 68 pitches and scattered a few walks, clearly not his full ace self. But he's committed to winning, and he showed a lot of grit and talent over four innings.
• It's not even worth the effort at this point to lament about the Phillies' bullpen — but Mattingly avoided it like the plague for a reason. As soon as Wheeler left the game, Jonathan Bowlan gave up a homer to Olson, just to make the Braves feel a little better.
• I love Bryce Harper. But what the heck is this? Chris Sale (who inexplicably entered a four-run game against a dead Phillies team with the Dodgers up in two days) struck out the Phillies' former MVP without throwing a single pitch in the strike zone:
Chris Sale strikes out Bryce Harper!
— MLB (@MLB) October 2, 2026
The Braves are 3 outs away from a trip to the NLDS 👀 pic.twitter.com/v3wE8wliWM
• Braves "opener" Ray Kerr pitched just 18.1 innings this season and has just over 72 of them in his big league career. The Phillies made him look like Randy Johnson in his prime. Swings and misses. Weakly hit outs on pitches out of the zone. You'd think a veteran group of hitters would pick their spots, but the lifelong reliever couldn't have pitched any better. Not long removed from working at 7-Eleven and other odd jobs, the journeyman went 3.1 innings and handed the ball off to Grant Holmes with a solid 3-0 lead. You can't make this stuff up.
• We mentioned it before a few times in this space, but the 2026 Phillies — predictably — were not good enough to make history Thursday. Just three teams have ever lost Game 1 in the 3-game Wild Card Series and advanced. Philadelphia as a franchise has still not won a win-or-go home game since the 1980 NLCS.
• The season ended with Otto Kemp pinch hitting. That's where we'll end this post. A fitting end, from a frustrating player to a frustrating season.
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