{"id":283938,"date":"2026-09-11T18:00:08","date_gmt":"2026-09-11T18:00:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/283938\/"},"modified":"2026-09-11T18:00:08","modified_gmt":"2026-09-11T18:00:08","slug":"the-weekend-that-will-determine-the-nl-east-phillies-braves","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/283938\/","title":{"rendered":"The weekend that will determine the NL East: Phillies-Braves"},"content":{"rendered":"

Fresh off a ninth-inning loss to the Houston Astros on Thursday<\/a> afternoon, the Philadelphia Phillies<\/a> are set to begin their final road trip of the season, a nine-game trek featuring stops against three National League East rivals. Their first stop will take them against a familiar foe, the Atlanta Braves, whom the Phillies just faced at home over Labor Day weekend.<\/p>\n

With not only the fate of the NL East, but so much more in the balance, it is time for the Phillies to determine how they want their 2026 season to be remembered.<\/p>\n

A familiar foe<\/p>\n

When Braves ace Chris Sale throws the first pitch at 7:15 PM on Friday, it will be just over 100 hours since the last pitch was thrown between the two ball clubs. They last competed on Monday, when Jes\u00fas Luzardo<\/a> pitched a complete-game shutout in just under two hours at Citizens Bank Park.<\/p>\n

While the series between the Phillies and Braves was a split decision, 2\u20132, it was the Braves that came out victorious over Labor Day weekend. Having maintained their four-game lead over the Phillies in the NL East, the Braves inched closer and closer towards the throne atop the NL East.<\/p>\n

As the teams enter their final regular-season series against one another, there are 15 games left in the regular season. The Braves remain at the top of the division, leading by four games and owning the tiebreaker over the Phillies, essentially giving them a five-game lead.<\/p>\n

The pitching (re)match-ups<\/p>\n

A lot of familiar faces are set to take the mound this weekend between the two ball clubs. Aaron Nola<\/a> and Luzardo are set to make their second consecutive starts against the Braves, while Andrew Painter will start on Sunday.<\/p>\n

The Braves meanwhile opted to give Chris Sale an additional day of rest, not pitching him against the Tampa Bay Rays, to allow him to make the start on Friday against the Phillies. Tyler Mahle and Grant Holmes will then round out the weekend for the Braves.<\/p>\n

Nola has been pitching some of his best baseball recently for the Phillies. Sunday, he kept the Braves to one run over seven innings of work. He will need to match that performance going up against Sale who, despite his age, continues to dominate as one of the best left-handed starters in the game.<\/p>\n

Part of Nola\u2019s successful turnaround has been his work with Garrett Stubbs, who has nearly become his personal catcher. Stubbs has caught seven of Nola\u2019s last eight starts, a stretch that has found him throwing a 2.31 ERA. When Stubbs has caught Nola this season, Nola\u2019s ERA has been 3.13, nearly two points lower than J.T. Realmuto (4.94). While an ace pitcher like Sale would typically call for the more experienced Realmuto to be in the lineup, that pitching edge might be enough to call upon Stubbs on Friday.<\/p>\n

Aaron Nola through June (17 starts): <\/p>\n

\u26be\ufe0f 6.04 ERA, 4 Quality Starts, 2 outings allowing 1 or 0 runs, averaging 5 IP\/start<\/p>\n

Aaron Nola since July 1 (12 starts):<\/p>\n

\u26be\ufe0f 3.21 ERA, 6 Quality Starts, 5 outings allowing 1 or 0 runs, averaging 6 IP\/start#Phillies<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 Kyle Fisher (@KyleFisher45) September 6, 2026<\/a> \t<\/p>\n

Saturday, Luzardo will look to build upon the complete-game shutout from Monday. He will do so against Mahle, who kept the Phillies scoreless through six innings when he was opposite Nola on Sunday.<\/p>\n

Holmes also kept the Phillies scoreless through six on Monday, but some late-game heroics from Kyle Schwarber enabled the Phillies to get Luzardo the win. Andrew Painter<\/a>, meanwhile, was the only Phillies starter not to pitch against the Braves last week. Coming off a rough outing against the Astros where he allowed five runs on a career-high 10 hits allowed over five innings of work, he will need to rebound on Sunday.<\/p>\n

Something more important on the line<\/p>\n

The Phillies cannot win the NL East this weekend, but they can certainly lose it. If the team wants to retain their division crown, the room for error has dissipated. A sweep would put the Phillies right back into the fray with the Braves. Anything else, and the Phillies might as well wave the white flag on the division and focus on the Wild Card Hunt.<\/p>\n

There may be more than the division on the line for the Phillies this weekend. With October approaching, they are running out of time to find their footing against playoff-caliber teams. After facing the Braves, they finish the road trip with six games against the Nationals and Mets before returning to Citizens Bank Park.<\/p>\n

Waiting at home are the Milwaukee Brewers and Tampa Bay Rays, the leaders of the National League Central and American League East, respectively. Those final six games will give the Phillies one more test before the postseason. Every win offers evidence that they can handle that level of competition. Every loss adds to the doubts they have yet to put to rest.<\/p>\n

The Phillies are 28\u201332 against teams with winning records this season. The competition will not get any easier in October. This final stretch is their chance to show they can beat the kind of teams standing between them and a World Series. If they cannot, their postseason stay will be short once again.<\/p>\n

MORE: Aaron Nola feels ‘blessed’, thanks to his Phillies teammates<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Fresh off a ninth-inning loss to the Houston Astros on Thursday afternoon, the Philadelphia Phillies are set to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":283939,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[76286,1423,51890,69,71,70,8740,10167],"class_list":["post-283938","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-philadelphia","tag-braves","tag-mlb","tag-nl-east","tag-philadelphia","tag-philadelphia-headlines","tag-philadelphia-news","tag-phillies","tag-playoffs"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/283938","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=283938"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/283938\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/283939"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=283938"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=283938"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=283938"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}