{"id":916718,"date":"2026-10-01T15:20:10","date_gmt":"2026-10-01T15:20:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/916718\/"},"modified":"2026-10-01T15:20:10","modified_gmt":"2026-10-01T15:20:10","slug":"phillies-aaron-nola-reportedly-starting-vs-braves-over-zack-wheeler-for-mlb-playoffs-series-finale","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/916718\/","title":{"rendered":"Phillies’ Aaron Nola Reportedly Starting vs. Braves over Zack Wheeler For MLB Playoffs Series Finale"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Philadelphia Phillies will go into Thursday’s winner-take-all Game 3 against the Atlanta Braves in the National League Wild Card series with Aaron Nola starting on the mound. <\/p>\n

Per The Athletic’s Matt Gelb<\/a>, Phillies interim manager Don Mattingly is going with Nola rather than using Zack Wheeler on short rest with a spot in the NLDS at stake. <\/p>\n

As a result of their four-game losing streak last week that prevented them from clinching a playoff spot early, the Phillies had to use Wheeler on the final day of the regular season.<\/p>\n

Wheeler allowed one run over six innings in a 7-3 win over the Tampa Bay Rays to help Philadelphia secure its postseason berth, but the situation left his status for the wild card round unclear.<\/p>\n

Even though Wheeler won’t get the start, Mattingly told reporters<\/a> after Wednesday’s 4-3 win to extend the series “it’ll be pretty much all hands on deck” for Game 3.<\/p>\n

The Phillies are fortunate to have a deep starting staff that allowed them to go with All-Stars Jes\u00fas Luzardo and Cristopher S\u00e1nchez in the first two games against Atlanta.<\/p>\n

However, Game 3 left Mattingly with a decision between Nola or Wheeler. John Clark<\/a> of NBC Sports Philadelphia noted Wheeler has never started a game in the regular season or playoffs on short rest.<\/p>\n

Wheeler’s only relief appearance in his MLB career was in Game 7 of the 2023 NLCS against the Arizona Diamondbacks. He tossed 1.2 scoreless innings in a 9-7 loss.<\/p>\n

Nola will be pitching on regular rest after starting on Saturday against the Rays. He only made it through one inning, allowing three runs on four hits in a 12-1 loss.<\/p>\n

While Nola’s overall stat line this season doesn’t look great with a 4.67 ERA, he did get better as the year went on. The right-hander had a 3.33 ERA in 14 starts after the All-Star break.<\/p>\n

Nola made three starts against Atlanta this season with two coming in a five-day span from Sept. 6-11. He allowed three runs and struck out eight over 13.1 innings in those two outings last month.<\/p>\n

The Phillies forced Game 3 against Atlanta thanks to Kyle Schwarber and Bryce Harper hitting back-to-back homers in the eighth to tie the score at three. Alec Bohm delivered the go-ahead solo homer in the top of the 10th.<\/p>\n

Andrew Painter finished the game on the mound with three scoreless innings out of the bullpen.<\/p>\n

Game 3 between the Phillies and Braves from Truist Park will be played at 8 p.m. ET on Thursday. The winner will advance to play the Los Angeles Dodgers in the NLDS starting on Saturday. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Philadelphia Phillies will go into Thursday’s winner-take-all Game 3 against the Atlanta Braves in the National League…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":916719,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[435],"tags":[49,48,462,82],"class_list":["post-916718","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mlb","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-mlb","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/916718","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=916718"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/916718\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/916719"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=916718"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=916718"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=916718"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}