State of play -- and playing time -- changes has Nick Castellanos as odd man out in Phillies' outfield platoon

Scott Lauber, The Philadelphia Inquirer on Sep 5, 2025

Published in Baseball

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MIAMI — If Nick Castellanos, iron man-turned-part-timer, was going to get back in the Phillies’ lineup against a right-handed pitcher, it was surely Friday night with the Marlins using a three-inning opener.

Yet here was Castellanos, stapled to the bench.

“Those three guys right now,” manager Rob Thomson said before the game, citing Harrison Bader and lefty-hitting Brandon Marsh and Max Kepler, “are swinging the bats good.”

True, and relative to Castellanos, in particular. Then, on cue, Kepler, Marsh, and Bader raised their bats to outfield meritocracy, each clubbing homers in a 9-3 romp behind seven innings from Cristopher Sánchez that felt as light and airy as the ocean breeze on Miami Beach.

The Phillies (82-59) won for the sixth time in eight games. And as another day fell off the regular-season calendar, they maintained a six-game lead over the Mets (76-65) in the NL East and a 3½-game lead over the Dodgers (78-62) in the race for a postseason bye.

All with their $20 million right fielder idling in the dugout.

Castellanos batted .180 with a .509 OPS and only three RBIs in August, part of a seasonlong drop in his production. But he has a long track record of following cold spells with scorching streaks, and in the past, Thomson has allowed him to swing his way out of slumps.

Why not now?

Consider what the alternatives have done since Aug. 1:

Kepler: .281 average, four homers, .531 slugging

Marsh: .302 average, four homers, .512 slugging

Bader: .308 average, three homers, .505 slugging

So, although Marlins opener Valente Bellozo is hardly Sandy Alcantara, the former Cy Young winner who will start here Saturday, Thomson stuck with the hotter hitters, notably Kepler in right field in Castellanos’ place.

And in his first at-bat, Kepler jumped on a changeup from Bellozo and smashed it into the third deck in right field to open a 2-0 lead in the second inning.

In the fourth inning, after Bellozo gave way to reliever Luke Bachar, Marsh stayed alive by fouling two tough full-count pitches. On the ninth pitch of the at-bat, he got a hittable fastball and drove it out to right field.

Bader followed by pulling a center-cut slider to left field, and all of a sudden, the lead swelled to 5-0.

The Phillies tacked on four runs in the seventh inning, and again, the outfielders stirred the offense. With Marsh and Bader on base, Kepler drove them both in by banging a single to right field, then scored on Bryson Stott’s three-run homer.

Sánchez, meanwhile, cruised through seven innings with his usual sinker-changeup combination. He allowed one run on six hits and struck out five batters to lower his ERA to 2.60.

And Trea Turner continued his MVP push with four hits to lift his league-leading average to .305.

Castellanos, who has sat out the last two games and three of the last four, isn’t likely to start Saturday against Alcantara either.

It’s been a stark change. A year ago, he was closing in on becoming the first Phillies player to start 162 games since Jimmy Rollins in his MVP 2007 season. Three months ago, his consecutive-game streak ended at 236 games when Thomson benched him for an inappropriate comment after being replaced for defense.

Castellanos began sitting out more last month, but even then, he played at least two out of every three games in a series. But with Bader, Marsh, and Kepler outproducing him, the state of play — and playing time — has changed.

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