TLDR: The Phillies could punch their playoff ticket within days, but Dave Dombrowski and Don Mattingly still don't have their bullpen sorted out.
The Phillies are on the doorstep of a 5th straight postseason trip. Their magic number to clinch an NL Wild Card spot is down to 3, meaning it could happen as soon as Wednesday, and the front office is already turning its attention to the part of the roster that actually worries people this October: the bullpen.
According to Todd Zolecki, Dombrowski and Mattingly sat down and talked through the relief situation, and the plan that's emerging is unusual. The Wild Card Series roster will reportedly need 2 starters working in relief roles just to get through it, a sign of how thin the trust in this pen has gotten late in the year.
Todd Zolecki @ToddZolecki · Dave Dombrowski and Don Mattingly talked yesterday about the Phillies' muddled bullpen. It will include two starters in next week's NL Wild Card Series. The Phillies' magic number to clinch a Wild Card is 3, meaning they could punch their ticket as early as Wednesday. t.co/frZNkXSJ07
That's not a small tweak. It's a full workaround. The Phillies optioned Orion Kerkering to Triple-A Lehigh Valley after he posted an 11.57 ERA over his last 9 appearances and a 10.24 ERA in 22 outings since late July, according to MLB.com. Mattingly said the right-hander "kind of lost confidence," and rather than keep running him out in a pennant race, the Phillies pulled him to try to fix it away from the spotlight.
Jesus Luzardo remains the wildcard, literally and figuratively. Dombrowski said he's "very optimistic" about Luzardo's shoulder progress, and both he and Mattingly have left the door open for Luzardo to either start or come out of the bullpen depending on where he's at physically when the series arrives. With Zack Wheeler, Cristopher Sanchez and Aaron Nola lined up as the top of the rotation, that gives Philadelphia the top-end starting pitching to lean on, but it also means at least one of those arms could get pulled into relief duty if the bullpen behind them doesn't stabilize.
Dombrowski's read on it is straightforward: fix the bullpen with whatever's available, and don't be afraid to blur the line between starter and reliever to do it. "We need to straighten it out, but there's a lot of different ways we can straighten it out," he said. That's the calm version of a front office admitting the traditional setup men haven't earned the trust yet.
None of it changes the bigger picture: Philadelphia is in position to clinch a playoff spot almost any day now, sitting on a magic number of 3. But a team with October in its sights doesn't get to just celebrate the clinch — the real work is figuring out who throws the 7th inning of a Wild Card Series game, and right now Dombrowski and Mattingly don't have a clean answer for that yet.