Phillies’ World-Series-or-bust season ends with NLDS heartbreak

NEW YORK — Carlos Estévez punched his glove, looked to the sky and walked slowly back to the visitors’ dugout.

The Phillies’ World Series-or-bust season effectively ended just moments earlier in the sixth inning of Wednesday night’s 4-1 loss to the Mets in Game 4 of the National League Division Series at Citi Field. Philadelphia right-hander Jeff Hoffman, who had been manager Rob Thomson’s most-trusted reliever this year, loaded the bases with no outs, hitting a batter and firing a couple of wild pitches. Estévez replaced him with one out and the Phils clinging to a one-run lead.

Estévez, who had been the club’s closer since joining the team in late July, fired a 2-1 fastball over the plate, which Francisco Lindor crushed to right-center field for a go-ahead grand slam.

It was the dagger to the heart of the Phillies’ season.

But so many other things went wrong for the Phils in the NLDS. So many of them seemed to be emblematic of their struggles in the second half of the regular season and their undoing in the final five games of the 2023 NL Championship Series.

The Phillies scored 12 runs in the entire NLDS. They scored two runs in the first five innings of all four games combined, which meant their starters needed to be pretty much perfect the entire time.

They weren’t, other than Zack Wheeler in Game 1.

Philadelphia’s bullpen also collapsed in the NLDS. It had been a strength all season, but it allowed 16 earned runs in 12 2/3 innings against the Mets.

Each of the seven relievers who pitched in the series allowed at least one run.

It all happened in Game 4.

Philadelphia left-hander Ranger Suárez performed a near-miracle, pitching 4 1/3 scoreless innings. He loaded the bases in both the first and second innings but avoided disaster. The Phillies, meanwhile, did nothing offensively the first three innings before scoring in the fourth inning to take a 1-0 lead.

But they couldn’t add on.

Hoffman had warmed up in the second, third and fifth innings before he finally entered the game with one out in the fifth. He stayed in for the sixth, and that is when everything fell apart. And now the Phillies must pick up the pieces and make the necessary changes to try to make sure this doesn’t happen again.