Categories: 2024 Postgame Recaps

Thrilling comeback, see-saw Game 2 culminate in Castellanos walk-off, tying the NLDS

Nick Castellanos featured in the Phillies’ Game 2 comeback win. (Cheryl Pursell/Phillies Nation)

After swinging right over the top of two, Nick Castellanos finally took a sweeper in the dirt in the fourth inning of Sunday’s NLDS Game 2. The Citizens Bank Park crowd, fed up at the offense and a flailing team trailing 2-0 and on pace for a series hole of the same score, congratulated him with a Bronx cheer.

Castellanos shook his head. The FS1 broadcast cut to him right at that moment.

Over the course of the next two hours, Castellanos sent these f***ing people into a frenzy.

Castellanos featured in a thrilling come-from-behind victory for the Phillies, who turned a 3-0 hole into a tie game, then erased a 4-3 deficit in a furious eighth-inning rally, then blew that lead in the ninth inning only for Castellanos to make it all worthwhile. His two-out, walk-off single evened the NLDS, a Game 2 victory the Phillies desperately needed.

At some point in the middle innings, the FS1 broadcast booth mentioned that someone on Philadelphia’s side would need to step up with a big hit to get the crowd back into it. It always had to be — and always was going to be — Bryce Harper. He came through. His two-run homer in the sixth inning got the Phillies on the board and turned a three-run deficit into one, and Castellanos did the rest with a back-to-back shot of his own, tying the game at three.

Momentum was short-lived. Brandon Nimmo hit a solo homer with two outs in the seventh to put the Mets back up.

The walk-off, and all the highs that preceded it, were not the only celebrations at Citizens Bank Park on Sunday. It was Bryson Stott’s 27th birthday. He honored the occasion with a full-count two-run triple in the eighth, a better at bat than most of his veteran teammates had worked to that point in the NLDS. It flipped a deficit on its head, and Stott scored on J.T. Realmuto’s swinging bunt the next at bat.

The Phillies needed the insurance run. Matt Strahm, on for the ninth despite Carlos Estévez throwing just eight pitches in the eighth, surrendered a two-run homer to Mark Vientos, his second of the game.

No matter. Trea Turner and Bryce Harper worked two-out walks to set Castellanos up in the bottom half. These f***ing people partied. The Phillies stayed alive. Game 3 is Tuesday.