Friday was one of the most fascinating days in postseason baseball in recent memory, with José Altuve And Alex Thomas hitting home runs that are destined to live forever in franchise lore. It was just a breathtaking day of baseball. The ALCS will take a day off so everyone can move from one Texas city to the next, but the NLCS suddenly has the same pivotal game with a tied series that the ALCS had on Friday. It’s as close and electrifying as playoff baseball. And we still have so much to do.
It’s Game 5 in a tied series on a Saturday: it doesn’t get much better than that. Here’s a look at three key storylines from NLCS Game 5.
Phillies at the D-backs
Series tied 2-2
Zack Wheeler vs. Zac Gallen
8:07 p.m. ET, TBS
Scenario #1: After a wild game in the bullpen, is it time for a classic pitching duel?
We certainly understand the traditionalists among you who looked at the starting pitchers listed for Game 4 of the NLCS and said, “Wait, who are these guys?” If you grew up in a certain era, it’s downright confusing to see bullpen games this late in the postseason. But as we saw on Friday, these games can be exciting.
Both the Diamondbacks and Phillies had to empty their bullpens early Friday night, leading to a series of wild swings and fascinating twists and turns, with both managers pulling every lever at their disposal and ultimately running out-almost out of launchers.
Given Saturday’s kickoff game, it should be a lot easier, and both managers are probably hoping they won’t have to strategize as much. Zack Wheeler and Zac Gallen are two of the best pitchers in baseball, and while Wheeler had the upper hand in this game in Game 1, it was in Philadelphia. Gallen had a 4.42 ERA away in 2023 and a 2.47 ERA at Chase Field.
Scenario #2: Have we seen the last of Craig Kimbrel in this series, and perhaps for the rest of the playoffs?
Kimbrel will likely be in the Hall of Fame one day, and he’s on the short list of the most dominant finalists of all time. But he’s been playing with fire for most of these playoffs, and in the last two games, he and his team have been very burned. The game-tying homer he gave up to Alek Thomas in the bottom of the eighth Friday might have been the biggest moment of this entire series, a series that has had many.
Kimbrel has now suffered defeat in two straight games, and his inability to make it through the eighth led to a cascading problem for the Phillies – which is why José Alvarado had to pitch even though he looked gassed – and This is a problem that will only continue. only to get worse when they play their third match in three days. Kimbrel is one of several veterans who have produced for the Phillies all year. But it’s hard to see how Rob Thomson could trust him right now, and probably in the future.
Scenario #3: Wait, are the Diamondbacks going to steal this thing?
The D-backs won their first five games in the playoffs, and while it wouldn’t be fair to call those wins an aberration or fluke, they certainly felt more like a good team on a heater rather than a great team playing at their natural level. . When they lost those first two games in Philadelphia, including that blowout in Game 2, it felt like the ground had finally fallen out from under them: It looked like they might just get swept out of this entire series. And then… they kept coming back.
Their eighth inning Friday night was that entire postseason streak in microcosm: Long odds against them, the world assuming it was about to end, and then, out of nowhere, the D-backs just bombarded everyone. That Thomas home run was a jaw-dropping moment, and before you knew it, the D-backs had the lead, then the game, then the series tied. They have their best pitcher on Saturday, in front of a crowd that saw two days of deeply exciting baseball, with a chance to take control of this series and get within a game of their first World Series in 22 years. You didn’t see it coming. I didn’t see it coming. Nobody saw it coming. And yet: they are still there.
