When the season started, was 96 wins part of your team forecast for the 2025 season? I had a feeling they would be good again (feel free to go back and check our season predictions), but I had them winning a wild card spot. I’m not sure too many saw the huge downfall of the Braves coming. Maybe a step backwards, sure, but they had a cliff dive for a while. 96 wins for the Phillies is a major accomplishment. They even get a divisional flag to fly! I know that doesn’t mean much to some people, but it’s nothing to sneeze at either.

Three up

Kyle Schwarber

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56 home runs is nothing that Schwarber should be hanging his head about. No, he didn’t get to Ryan Howard’s stratospheric team record of 58, but what Schwarber did was put an offense on his back (at times) and give them some power that they were sorely lacking. There was a time this year where many were wondering where the power went on the team. Home runs weren’t really being hit and their rank among the game’s slugging teams was lower than expected. Now? They’ll end up finishing in the top three in the NL in team slugging, and they were led by Schwarber. What a season he had.

Trea Turner

It’s been years since the team has had a batting title to bring home. 1958 and the beloved Richie Ashburn was the last Phillies hitter to be able to give himself that title. It feels a little rough that a few weeks on the injured list helped keep his number afloat above .300, but those around him, the ones that could threaten to take his spot had a chance and did not take charge of the race. I have no interest in whether or not we should call someone with the best batting average in the league the “batting champion”, but these are rules MLB has set and Turner has bested all challengers.

Cristopher Sanchez

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I’ll have more on this later, about the fact that maybe the Cy Young race shouldn’t be as over as many are predicting it to be, but I’ll continue to marvel at the ascension of Sanchez into the upper tier of pitchers in the game. We’re no longer talking about one of the better left handed pitchers that is in the game today. This man is one of the best pitchers – PERIOD – that takes the mound every fifth day. It has been a truly remarkable rise for him and now, he gets to show everyone what he can do.

Three down

The Mets

Lol.

The Astros

double LOLLOL.

The shadows

Listen, it’s likely that the team will be playing in the four o’clock hour next Saturday since they have a big market to pull from and MLB will probably want to use that market size to combat the titanic ratings that a college football game will get at the same time slot. That means there will be shadows to contend with and as we saw last year in Game 1 against the Mets, it did play a factor. If they aren’t in that time slot, then the excuses will be null and void (as they should be anyway), but if they are at that time, brother, get used to hearing about it all game long.