If you go further back in the season, there’s his walk-off double against the Brewers on June 4th after Milwaukee walked Bryson Stott to face Castellanos. That series, which ended in a Phillies sweep, looms large as the race for the top two seeds in the NL winds down.
There was a ninth inning, game-tying home run off of future teammate Carlos Estévez on April 30th that sparked a rally to overcome the previous night’s tough loss in Anaheim. There’s a pair of four hit performances on 6/18 and 6/30 that helped fuel two one-run victories over the Padres and Marlins.
There’s his post All-Star break through the end of August performance, where Castellanos led the team with an .827 OPS across a span that included one of the worst slumps of Bryce Harper’s career.
Perhaps no one better encapsulates the vibe around the 2024 Phillies better than Nick Castellanos. Somehow exciting and frustrating, dominant and dominated, elite and sub-par, good and bad, Castellanos and the Phillies sit with the best record in baseball in mid-September despite a span in mid-summer that had many forecasting a collapse. They are poised to collect the franchise’s first division title since 2011. Not everybody on your team needs to be a star, but you do need winning ballplayers on your team if you want to succeed.
The Phillies entered the ninth inning on Sunday against the Mets needing another hero. J.T. Realmuto eventually gave them just that, but what happened before his at bat was pivotal to winning the game.
Nick Castellanos faced Edwin Diaz after the latter struck out Bryce Harper for the first out. Castellanos quickly fell behind 0-2 thanks to fouling off two high and inside fastballs at 97 MPH. Then he took a third one for a ball before fighting off a fourth at 99 MPH for an inside-out single to right field to put the winning run on base. Castellanos would then steal second to get himself into scoring position while Alec Bohm struck out. That stolen base, just the 38th in Castellanos’ career, proved the difference and allowed him to score on Realmuto’s base hit.
Even before coming to the plate in the ninth, Castellanos contributed to the win with a play in the field. José Ruiz entered in the ninth to keep the deficit at 1-0. J.D. Martinez hit a fly ball down the right field line that drifted close to going out of play foul. But Castellanos was able to hustle over and make the catch for the first out, sticking his glove out almost against the wall, Who knows what would’ve happened if the ball landed foul and Martinez got another chance.
Plays like those sometimes get lost in the heroics of the walk-off, but the walk-off doesn’t happen without plays like those. Castellanos is no stranger to walk-offs this season either, as his four walk-off hits are tied for the most in a single season in Phillies history since 1920.
Castellanos’ season numbers aren’t eye popping. He sports a .243/.302/.409 slash line with 20 HRs and 80 RBIs through the Phillies 149 games entering Monday, as he has started every game so far. But he has been arguably their most consistent hitter since the beginning of June with a line of .265/.321/.453. Again, this isn’t earth shattering, but those numbers are good enough for a 114 wRC+ over that span.
Now if you look at Castellanos’ career slash line, those numbers are almost identical. Through his 12 seasons in the Majors so far, Castellanos has a slash line of .273/.322/.468 with 111 wRC+. Yes, it has become clear that Castellanos’ 2021 season where he hit career highs in home runs (34) and OPS (.939) is an outlier, likely to not be repeated. There’s little argument against the idea that he is overpaid for the player he actually is. But none of that means that he can’t be a key contributor on a championship contending team.
Castellanos has gotten some of the biggest hits this season when the team needed them most. Just over the last three weeks there’s the aforementioned single in the ninth inning, a two-run home run in the first inning against the Rays in a game that finished a sweep, another two-run home run to take a 5-4 lead after falling behind 4-0 to the Braves, and a walk-off single against Atlanta that effectively buried them in the NL East race.
After a slow start, Nick Castellanos has definitely turned things around.
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