2023 NLDS Preview: Nationals - Phillies
May 19, 2020 23:21:51 GMT -5
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Post by brewersgm on May 19, 2020 23:21:51 GMT -5
Washington Nationals (97-66) vs Philadelphia Phillies (103-59)
Despite Alex Reyes best efforts, the Nationals vanquished the St. Louis Cardinals and will face their division rivals, the Philadelphia Phillies, in the 2023 NLDS. This is a division series full of star power. The three top batters by WAR this season will be involved in this series, former #1 overall picks Seth Beer and Mickey Moniak of the Phillies, and former #1 overall pick Bryce Harper for the Nationals.
The talent doesn't stop with these 3 though. Both teams also have strong pitching staffs. The Phillies feature Franklyn Kilome who led the entire PBA with 20 wins, and the NL in ERA. He finished with a 2.62 ERA, one hundredth behind Thomas Szapucki, the AL and PBA's leader. The Nationals feature Eric Pena who led the NL with 233 K's and tied Justin Marsden of the Giants for the PBA lead in strikeouts per 9 at 12.0. It should be a fantastic series between two NL titans.
Starters:
There will be no shortage of exciting starting pitching match-ups. Both teams have the horses to stretch over a 7 game series. The aforementioned Kilome and Pena look set to duel in Game 1 of the series in DC. It will be Pena's first ever postseason start. Game 2 looks to be a probable match-up between the Nationals RHP Peter Solomon and the Phillies LHP Madison Bumgarner. Solomon turned in another strong season for the Nationals, with 3.6 WAR over 175.2 IP. While his numbers are down from last season that may be attributable to his BABIP rising from 0.271 to 0.330, as his peripherals were still very consistent. Bumgarner is in his 2nd season with the Phillies after coming over in a trade with Tampa. The Phillies faltered in the NLCS last season but through no fault of Bumgarner. He pitched to a microscopic 0.90 ERA across 3 starts in the postseason last year, resembling the San Francisco Bumgarner of old. By game 3, wildcard starter Franklin E. Perez should be ready to go for the Nationals. He is coming off a 7.1 IP, 2 H, 2 BB, 9 K shutout performance against the Cardinals, which the Nationals hope will carry over to the NLDS. Perez may be the 3rd starter for the Nats in this series but he is no slouch. He set career highs with 196.1 IP and a 3.07 ERA during the regular season. Philadelphia will likely turn to righty Thomas Eshelman. While Eshelman isn't a star like Kilome or Bumgarner he is still a solid arm. He also set a career high in ERA this season, but he didn't do it by blowing away guys like Perez. Eshelman relies on his pinpoint control to limit walks and limit damage, having walked under 2 batters per 9 this season.
After these matchups the pitching gets less exciting but could/will still feature solid starters like Joe Ross (3.28 ERA, 3.3 WAR) and Gerrit Cole (3.73 ERA, 1.9 WAR) for the Nats and Lefty Adam Conley for the Phils. (4.70 ERA, 3.2 WAR). An interesting note is that the Nationals feature no LHP starters, while the Phillies feature two in Bumgarner and Conley. That may be bad news for the Phillies as Bryce Harper and Mike Trout both have had more success against lefties than against righties this season. On the other hand the Nats may be unable to even limit Seth Beer. Beer posted an insane 200 OPS+ vs righties this season, meaning he was 100% more effective against RHP than league average.
Advantage-
Nationals. Trying to choose between the top 2 for each team is splitting hairs, but the Nationals rotation runs deeper. The Nationals will be able to choose between several arms for their 4th man and have a variety of ways they can mix and match their SP for the series. The Phillies are locked into their top 4 unless they want to risk giving the homer prone lefty Joey Wentz a start. Wentz is a talented young pitcher, but against the Nationals power filled lineup he will likely be best served by using his stuff to play up in the pen.
Bullpen:
The Phillies bullpen was much stronger than the Nationals pen this year and should be better than the Nats in the postseason. One of their top stars in RP Dan Altavilla is out with injury, but even with his absence their relief corps is rock solid. The Philadelphia pen finished with the 3rd best ERA in the NL at 3.05 eclipsing the 4.07 mark set by their starters. In fact, only one of their relievers set to make the postseason roster had an ERA over 4.00 this season. RHP Ryan Helsley led the pen in IP with 98.2 IP of 2.19 ERA ball. With Altavilla missing, RHP Dave Simon, a former 2nd round pick, emerged to lead the team in saves in his rookie season. Simon is a GB pitcher with a fantastic changeup who has yet to allow a single HR over his 27.1 IP at the PBA level. Philadelphia has some excellent lefty relievers as well in Ryan Buchter (12.5 K/9, 3.33 ERA), and Ian Krol (8.2 K/9, 2.80 ERA). The diversity of options in the Phillies pen should allow them to attack the splits of Nationals batters, as long as the manager bot knows what it is doing.
The Nats bullpen finished with a collective 3.70 ERA, which might not seem to be a large difference from the Phillies, but was good for only 11th in the NL instead of 3rd. They tasked with only 1.2 innings in the WC game but they did not allow a run, allowing the Nats to win the game in the late innings. The Nats have yet to see deadline acquisition CL Nick Burdi appear in a game for them this postseason. By virtue of doing nothing Nick had a better WC game than his brother Zack. Zack gave up a solo shot in 0.2 IP. Nick is the leader of the Nats bullpen, although his role has shifted since moving to the Nats with only 2 of his 22 saves this season coming in a Nats uniform. The Nats have relied on the likes of RHP Jeremy Jeffress (8.9 K/9, 2.88 ERA) and RHP Jon Carter (13.9 K/9, 3.33 ERA) to close down games for them. A real issue for the Nats is having only a single lefty in the pen, Luis D. Guzman. Even then Guzman struggled against same side opponents this season, posting a poor 5.06 ERA against them. The Nats are going to have to find a way to get the best LH hitter in the game out without a reliable lefty arm anywhere on their pitching staff. Seth Beer should feast this series, and his fellow lefty stars Mickey Moniak and Darrick Hall should have fun too.
Advantage-
Phillies. With multiple lefties and more talent the Philadelphia bullpen should have the edge in this match-up. Nats DH Juan Soto who hit for a 145 OPS+ vs righties and a 77 OPS+ vs lefties may be in for a long series. The Nats will have Beer problems without left-handed pitching.
Lineups and Defense
Seth Beer, the man, the myth, the OOTP 18 legend. In real life Seth Beer had one of the greatest college seasons of all time during his freshman season at Clemson. He slashed 369/535/700 en route to the Dick Howser trophy as the nations best collegiate player. He was the first freshman to win the award. While he is still a decent prospect in the Dbacks system he hasn't reached the peaks he did in college. Not so in the PBA for Philadelphia. Beer slashed 315/457/600, leading the NL in all three categories of the triple slash for a second consecutive year, and putting up his second consecutive 9+ WAR campaign. Beer made PBA pitchers want to bring back Prohibition. They all cursed themselves for not being born a century earlier when the production, importation, transportation, and sale of alcoholic beverages was banned.
(As a side note, let's examine Seth Beer's stat lines at all three of the beer ballparks. At Miller Park, Beer slashed 286/286/400, at Coors Field he hit 300/632/700, and at Busch Stadium he put up a 375/474/563 line. From these stats we can conclude that Beer strongly dislikes drinking Miller lite beer and playing against teams named after beer makers. We can conclude Coors, "the banquet beer" must be his favorite of these 3 beers, although we certainly hope he drinks fine and more tasteful craft varieties more often than these 3).
Besides Beer, the Phillies feature two other incredible lefty bats in their lineup. OFer Mickey, "Maniac" Moniak had a career high 882 OPS and a career high 7.7 WAR. 1B Darrick Hall lead the PBA with 57 home runs and 148 RBIs. He only hit .239 but when he did get a hit it was pretty much always a run on the board for Philadelphia. The Phillies right handers did not match this trio, but they didn't have to. Cristian Arroyo came over from the Giants in a deadline deal and proceeded to put up a 120 OPS+, his best since the 2018 season. Maikel Franco turned in a solid 27 home runs and 2.1 WAR. This Phillies lineup is loaded, and with most of the stars being lefties should have a good series against the Nationals right handed pitching.
Defense is perhaps the Phillies only weak point. Zone Rating was the only major National League category that the team finished outside the top 8 in. The club has plus defenders in the OF with Brian C. Miller and Mickey Moniak, but Seth Beer drags them down in RF with his -0.7 ZR. I guess one man can't do everything. The right side of the diamond as a whole was a sore spot for Philadelphia. Neither 2nd Base (-11.63) nor 1B (-3.10) featured strong defense this season. This is a good sign for left handed Bryce Harper who should find lots of holes to hit the ball to on his pull side.
In contrast to the Phillies star, the Nats main superstar is much better in OOTP than he is in real life. Bryce Harper continued his legendary Nationals career as a force at the heart of their lineup. While Harper didn't lead the PBA in any one category his name is all over the major batting leaders boards. Harper had 7.5 WAR which was more than any AL player, and if not for the Phillies tandem of Beer and Moniak would have led the PBA. Harper combines elite power and patience making for a dangerous bat. He has already broken up a 13 K no hitter this postseason in the WC game. The Nationals were glad Harper was able to maintain his numbers this season as perhaps their biggest batting story involved Mike Trout. Trout signed the largest free agent contract in PBA history prior to the 2021 season. He was a key contributor to the Nats WS run that season putting up a PBA career high 8.5 WAR. Trout followed that up with a 7.3 WAR campaign in 2022. In 2023 however it has been a different story. Trout has not been able to justify his nearly 70 mil salary this year. He hit only 220/374/421, all career lows. A worrying sign was a PBA career high 193 strikeouts, and an average of only .204 against right-handed pitching. Despite his struggles Trout still put together a respectable 3.6 WAR campaign. A number almost any player would love to have. Fortunately for the Nationals, Juan Soto had far his best season, with a career high 2.8 WAR, helping to pick up the slack for Trout. The Nationals still finished 3rd in the NL in wOBA with an 0.323 mark, and 3rd in batter WAR as well. Even with his struggles Trout was still able to hit lefties, and Harper even had reverse splits against them. This bodes well for the Nats as it is likely at least two Philadelphia starts in this series will feature left handed starters.
Like the Phillies, the Nationals are also weak at 2B defense, having finished last in the PBA at 2B ZR, with -13.23 rating. This could be a big problem against the star left handed bats that liter the Philadelphia lineup. This area dragged the whole defense down, but even with the 2B black hole the Nationals had a better ZR than Philadelphia, finishing 10th in the NL. Like Philadelphia though, the defense as a hole was a negative unit with a -12.0 mark. This series should feature a large number of home runs, and home runs are the one batted ball that can't be defended. So the defensive deficiencies for both clubs may be masked somewhat. But in a tight series whichever team's second baseman actually manages to reach a key groundball may make a big difference.
Advantage-
Lineup- Phillies, Beer, Moniak, and Hall are the best trio of lefty bats in the league and no team really has the pieces to neutralize them. They led Philadelphia to the top offense in the PBA. Bryce Harper probably isn't going to be neutralized either though. He has not been slowed down by any type of pitching, and as we just saw he can turn a series almost all on his own.
Key questions:
Is the Nationals superior pitching depth enough to slow down Beer, Moniak, and Hall? Can arguably the top rotation slow down arguable the top lineup, even when the stars for that lineup have the platoon advantage? Eric Pena has to arrive in a big way for DC in his first October starts.
How big of a role will non-homerun hits play? If more balls are put in play it will work to the Nationals advantage, especially on the right side of the field. Both teams are going to give up the long ball, but the Nats look more poised to hit multi-run homers.
Can the Phillies bullpen get Juan Soto out? Juan Soto has been the Nationals second best hitter this season but he struggles with lefthanded pitching which the Phillies possess a lot of.
What is Seth Beer's favorite beer? Or does he prefer Whiskey like his nickname seems to imply?
Prediction: Phillies in 7.