Nick Castellanos rises from the dead — again — and slays the zombie Mets .... for now

by David Murphy | Columnist
Published Oct. 6, 2024, 8:15 p.m. ET

Come, young grasshoppers, gather ‘round your Uncle Nick. He has a story to tell. Lend him your ear. You might learn a thing or two.

Your game is impressive. I’m sure he’d tell you that. Mark Vientos, Pete Alonso, Brandon Nimmo … all of you Mets. You’ve got it within you. Real recognizes real. Game recognizes game. Wouldn’t surprise me at all if, during the mayhem of Game 2, a wistful smile crossed ol’ Uncle Nick’s face as you again and again punched your way out of the grave.

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But there’s something you should know about Nick Castellanos.

He invented this stuff.

Nobody rises from the dead like him.

NLDS: Mets defeat Phillies 3-1

Game 1: Mets 6, Phillies 2 | Hayes | Murphy

Game 2: Phillies 7, Mets 6 | Hayes | Murphy

Game 3: Mets 7, Phillies 2 | Hayes | Murphy

Game 4: Mets 4, Phillies 1 | Hayes | Murphy

Forget about adding another chapter to the Phillies’ postseason legacy. Game 2 of the NLDS would require multiple volumes to fully capture what went down, what it meant, and what it might signal for the future. At the moment, we only have room for 1,000 or so words. It will take half that many just to know where to start.

Do you start with the end? With that familiar end? With that geyser of cream-and-red jerseys cascading out of the dugout, Castellanos’ game-winning, series-turning, walk-off single still rolling to a stop off the left-field wall? With the score changing and then turning final, 7-6 Phillies, this best-of-five NLDS now knotted at 1?

Do you start five minutes earlier, in the top of the ninth, with Castellanos charging in right field and sliding and scooping the final out to preserve a tie game and earn himself another chance?

» READ MORE: Hayes: Bryce Harper gives the Phillies life in a 7-6 win that ties the NLDS with the Mets and electrifies Citizens Bank Park

Do you start five minutes before that? With Castellanos’ game-turning single in the bottom of the eighth? With him moving the tying run to third, setting up a triple from Bryson Stott that gave the Phillies a lead that lasted for less than a half-inning? Do you start with the moment Castellanos touched the plate with that first fleeting go-ahead run?

Do you start two innings before that? With the game-tying home run he hit in the sixth?

All are appropriate jumping-off points. But none as fitting as this. Two innings before the tying home run. With Castellanos swinging at two straight sliders below the zone, each of them accompanied by boos, followed by a sarcastic cheer when Castellanos did not swing at another slider that bounced before the plate. The boos returned when he swung at the next one, also low, sending a soft groundout rolling toward short.

It was here where it started to feel like the 2024 season might really be lost. Game 2 felt a lot like Game 1, a series of fruitless at-bats ticking toward an inevitable conclusion. They were like a driverless car left in gear, idling toward the edge of a cliff. They were playing with more spirit, more gumption, more energy than they had in Game 1. Yet the results were the same. They were facing an eminently hittable pitcher in Luis Severino. But they were not hitting. By the time the bottom of the sixth arrived, they had scored a total of two runs in 15 innings against the Mets, none of them in Game 2. The boos grew louder and more frequent, broken up only by a roar from the pockets of Mets fans who’d wormed their way into Citizens Bank Park.

“It’s not how you start, it’s how you finish,” Castellanos would say later.

But at that point on time, those two things felt one and the same.

Inevitability. That’s what it felt like. Not just the end of an inning or a game or a series, but the end of an era. They would be down 2-0 in the series, and they would leave home base for the last time, and when they returned they would need to look different. Four straight postseason games they had not hit, dating back to their NLCS collapse in Games 6 and 7 last October. Something would need to change. Perhaps even Castellanos himself.

And then it happened, the thing that always seems to happen with the Phillies this time of year. With Castellanos, in particular.

“Nick’s just a resilient person,” said catcher J.T. Realmuto. “He’s dealt with a lot of ups and downs here in Philly and he always seems to come out on top. He just thrives in those situations.”

» READ MORE: Phillies’ Alec Bohm says his benching was ‘a little surprising,’ but he isn’t pouting

Except, this time around, he was facing an opponent who seemed to have stolen the mojo and made it their own. The Mets are not a carbon copy of the Phillies by any stretch of the imagination. More like an AI-rendered hand. They are equally familiar and confusing. Zack Wheeler could not kill them in Game 1. Castellanos couldn’t do it with his game-tying home run in the sixth inning of Game 2. He couldn’t do it after the Mets retook the lead in the seventh. The Phillies emerged from the eighth with a 6-4 lead. Mark Vientos wiped it out with a two-run home run in the top of the ninth.

By the time the ninth inning rolled around, Game 2 felt like a battle between two different species of invasive vines taking turns running over each other with a lawn mower.

“They don’t quit,” Realmuto said. “We’ve seen it the whole second half [of the season]. They just grind out ABs. They seem to get better in the later innings with their at-bats. They are better against bullpen pitchers, which is tough to do. That just shows you how resilient they are. They don’t give up.”

Except, you can’t hack the guy who wrote the original code.

Two outs in the bottom of the ninth, game tied at 6. Trea Turner walks. Bryce Harper walks. Castellanos steps to the plate. He swings through a cutter — of course he does. He fouls off a sinker. And then he does what he does: laces a no-doubt-about-it single that pounds the grass in left.

“The series is far from over,” Castellanos said. “They are a really good team and they are playing together. They are playing as a unit. They’ve been through adversity before.”

The Mets aren’t dead yet.

“It felt like a sigh of relief being able to come out on top tonight,” Realmuto said.

If you are able to sigh, that means you are breathing. Somehow, the Phillies are still alive.

» READ MORE: Matt Straham, Phillies bullpen struggle again but remain confident