Major League Baseball

2022 World Series: Phillies relievers shut down Astros, justify bold managing

Updated Oct. 29, 2022 3:25 a.m. ET

HOUSTON — Rob Thomson managed his first World Series game as if it were Game 7, and his Philadelphia Phillies pulled off a historic upset because of his aggressiveness and the confidence it conveyed to them.

The baseball lifer had managed with a conservative bent through this postseason's first three rounds. Now that the Phillies are facing the behemoth Astros at the end of the line, Thomson has exponentially increased his tolerance for risk.

Thomson asked each of his three best relievers, as well his presumptive Game 3 starter, to enter a tied game Friday at Minute Maid Park. Then he asked each of them to wait out a half-inning and return to the mound. All four supplied spotless relief amid unconventional circumstances, enabling the Phillies to engineer a five-run comeback and complete a 6-5 win in 10 innings in Game 1.

Bullpen management was key

Ben Verlander lauds Phillies manager Rob Thomson for the way he used his bullpen in the Game 1 victory.

Myriad events had to break in Thomson's favor for his big bet to pay out with a win. Among them: Nick Castellanos had to save the game with a running, sliding ninth-inning catch. J.T. Realmuto had to deliver the winning home run, to the opposite field, in the top of the 10th. And David Robertson, the fifth-choice reliever who failed to clinch the National League pennant five days earlier, had to save it.

Castellanos barely made the play. Realmuto's homer evaded Kyle Tucker's glove by a few inches. And Robertson's save, while the tying and winning runs stood in scoring position, might have been the closest call of all.

That, though, is what it will take for the Phillies to surmount the more talented Astros over the rest of this World Series. If they win this, they will win it on the margins. He cannot comfortably say as much, but Thomson made clear with his actions that he knows it.

It began in Friday's fourth inning, when he asked José Alvarado, his top lefty, to begin warming behind faltering ace Aaron Nola. The Phillies were facing Justin Verlander and trailing by two runs. Deploying an elite reliever in such a situation, so early in a game, so early in a series, would be unprecedented.

But because Philadelphia had already knocked three runs off what was once a five-run deficit, Thomson believed his team had a better chance to come back than win-probability metrics estimated.

"I think once we scored the three you were kind of feeling it," Thomson said. "That's really why I went to Alvarado in the fifth inning, which I haven't done all year, because I thought that the momentum that changed there was so important to keep."

He also understood that turning to his best options, risk be damned, would further fuel his roster. The Phillies interpreted his choice of relievers as a declaration of purpose.

"It just immediately screams confidence at you," Rhys Hoskins said.

The choice, Hoskins said, did not surprise him.

"Even though we haven't seen it," he said. "Thomson's just been so nails and so confident with every move that he's made that anything this guy does at this point feels like the right button."

The right buttons were these: Thomson summoned Alvarado with one out in the fifth, Zach Eflin with one out in the sixth, Ranger Suárez with two outs in the seventh and Seranthony Domínguez with one out in the eighth. No one received the benefit of a clean inning. Suárez had been prepared to make a brief appearance in lieu of a between-starts bullpen session, but not a multi-inning stint.

"So," Thomson said, "that's a little more taxing."

Suárez's Game 3 availability is now uncertain. But if the Phillies worried too much about Game 3 during Game 1, they would have lost Game 1.

After the game, Thomson essentially revealed his comprehensive strategy for success in 11 words: "Get through those guys, and we'll figure out the rest later."

Alvarado, then, entered with no one on base and Nola's pitch count numbering 81. But the starter had already surrendered five runs, and Thomson did not want to chance another against the heart of Houston's lineup. Alvarado faced Yordan Álvarez, Alex Bregman and Tucker, and dispatched the trio on seven total pitches, split across the fifth and sixth innings.

In a similar situation in Game 2 of the NLCS, Thomson took a notably more conservative tack. Nola was pitching. There were two outs in the fifth inning, a runner stood on second and a talented left-handed hitter approached. Alvarado never stood up in the Petco Park bullpen. Thomson instead called in journeyman Brad Hand, who hit a batter and surrendered the two singles that scored the winning runs. That remains the only game the Phillies have lost over the last 16 days. It was a rare mistake by the one-time interim manager.

"He's pushed all the right buttons throughout the whole year," Kyle Schwarber said.

Of course, the buttons change depending on the season. Perhaps preserving Alvarado had been the right choice with one win already in the bag in the condensed NLCS. In the World Series, against a more talented team possessing home-field advantage, the optimal decision was to risk it.

"In the postseason," said Robertson, the sudden closer, "all rules are abandoned."

David Robertson closes it out

David Robertson induces a game-ending groundout to seal the Phillies' 6-5 victory.

Consider what Thomson risked if the Phillies lost Friday: a series deficit; no certain Game 3 starter; a tired bullpen. He would have received criticism. His choices would have been the wrong ones at essentially any other time than the moment in which he made them. They proved right because his team proved his confidence right.

Pedro Moura is the national baseball writer for FOX Sports. He previously covered the Dodgers for The Athletic, the Angels and Dodgers for the Orange County Register and L.A. Times, and his alma mater, USC, for ESPN Los Angeles. He is the author of "How to Beat a Broken Game." Follow him on Twitter @pedromoura.