Phils Up, Birds Down (Bad)

🚦 THE Philly Sports Newsletter

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Philip Keidel & John Foley
September 30, 2024

© Rafael Suanes | 2024 Sep 29

Happy Monday, everybody! The best news we can give you today is that it’ll be almost two weeks before the Eagles play again. By that time, we expect the Phillies to have a chokehold on their National League Division Series.

Yeah, you’re right…maybe “choke” isn’t the best word to hang on the Phillies after the way the 2023 NLCS ended.

Let’s get after it.

In the email today:

⬆️ Phillies End Regular Season on High Note

The Phillies defeated the Washington Nationals on Sunday, 6-3, earning their 95th win and putting a bow on the 2024 regular season. Kody Clemens made a heck of a catch in the ninth inning to preserve the victory.

Some milestones-ish:

  • Nick Castellanos started the game and made one plate appearance. He’s the first Phillies player to start all 162 games since Jimmy Rollins in his 2007 MVP campaign.

  • Aaron Nola threw five innings, falling two outs shy of a 200-inning season.

  • Trea Turner was caught stealing in the seventh, leaving him one stolen base short of a 20/20 season.

The Phils are locked in as National League’s second seed and will have home field advantage over any NL opponent except the top-seeded Dodgers. If they make it to the World Series, they will have home field advantage over any AL pennant-winner.

In the middle of the NL bracket, the Brewers and Padres will be the third and fourth seeds, respectively. The fifth and sixth seeds are still up in the air with the Braves, Mets, and Diamondbacks hoping to secure a spot.

Anthony detailed potential postseason scenarios for On Pattison here.

But here’s the short version: the Mets and Braves play a doubleheader in Atlanta today, and if either team wins both games, the other NL East squad goes home. (That would put the Diamondbacks in the playoffs as the sixth seed.) If the Mets and Braves split the doubleheader, they’ll both go to the postseason and the Diamondbacks will be out out of luck.

It’s a beautiful, chaotic end to baseball’s 162-game grind.

The team that ends up as the sixth seed will square off against the Brewers in the wild card round, and the Phillies will play the winner of that matchup in the NLDS.

⬇️ Eagles Fall to 2-2 with Lopsided 33-16 Loss to Bucs

Eagles fans waited months for the regular season to start. Then during the season, they wait eagerly for the team to play again. There are 17 game days each season, and Eagles fans are as a rule completely locked in for every one of them.

Which makes the way the Eagles comprehensively failed to compete for the first 20 minutes of yesterday’s loss so galling.

That Johnson drop came with 7:24 left in the second quarter. By all rights, it should have been 28-0.

You have to feel for any fans who made the trip to Tampa. The temperature on the field was in the high 80’s, with a “real feel” over 100 degrees. Sitting in those seats watching the Birds get blown out must have felt like hell.

It’s tempting to overreact to a loss like this. Calls for Nick Sirianni’s head (which seem to come every week any more) were plentiful online during the carnage.

“We had nine plays, and three of them are third downs. So now, he had two carries on six plays. I mean, when you go three and out, nobody’s gonna have any touches, nobody’s gonna have any catches.”

Nick Sirianni

Blaming the coach in the wake of such a bad loss is natural. But there are two significant problems with killing the coach in this spot.

First, the Eagles’ offense was without its two top wide receivers (A.J. Brown and DeVonta Smith) as well as arguably its best offensive lineman in Lane Johnson. Sure, the Eagles would’ve preferred to run Saquon Barkley all day — but the Buccaneers knew that, too.

Second, the Eagles don’t play again until October 13 (home for the now 1-3 Cleveland Browns). The Eagles have two weeks to get healthy and fix their problems. Note also that they have yet to play a division opponent.

By the way, if the Eagles fire Sirianni, who coaches the team? It’d be a good idea to have his replacement lined up before you fire him. That speaks to whether it was wise to bring him back for this season…but there is no point in looking backward.

Now, if they lose to the Browns, all bets are off.

🏒 Flyers Fans Thirst for Dawn of the Matvei Michkov Era

We’re not here to rehash the last miserable years (decade?) of Flyers hockey. You can find summaries of that sadness on your own time.

IT’S NOW MATVEI MICHKOV TIME. Lot of very sexy buzz about this kid.

Flyers head coach John Tortorella throws compliments around like manhole covers, especially where young players are concerned. So there is definitely something significant happening here.

But even if you want to downplay preseason statistics and the flowery praise from the head coach, there’s one indicator you cannot ignore:

This is Sean Couturier’s 13th season in the NHL, all with the Flyers. Coots is 31 years old and has played almost 800 games in the league. Bottom line, he’s seen just about everything you can see.

So if Couturier is willing to drop the gloves in a preseason game to send the message that Michkov is off limits, well, Michkov might not be Sidney Crosby…but he probably ain’t Alexandre Daigle, either.

📆 This Day in Philly Sports History

On September 30, 2007, the Phillies clinched the NL East and returned to the playoffs for the first time since 1993. They had trailed the first-place Mets by seven games with just 17 left to play, but hunted the New Yorkers down on the season’s final day.

đź“Š Poll

Of their three potential NLDS opponents, who would you prefer to see the Phillies play?

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Results from Friday:

đź“ş Coming Up

Games before our next send.

September 30, 2024

  • Flyers at New York Islanders (preseason), 7:00 p.m.

Thanks for reading. See you tomorrow.

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