On October 7th, 2011, the Phillies would drop game 5 of the NLDS to the St. Louis Cardinals, with star Ryan Howard infamously tearing his Achilles on the final out. It also symbolized the end of one of the greatest runs in Phillies history. A team that reached the mountaintop, winning a World Series and five straight NL East titles. The Phillies didn’t come close to winning the NL East for another seven years until 2018, when they ultimately fell short. It was the same script again in 2021. Despite recent successes in October, the Phillies were still left waiting for a divisional title. Heading into 2024, one of the Phillies’ many goals was to be division champions and put an end to the Braves’ reign over the NL East. The Phillies, for the first time in 13 years, can check that goal off the list.

The Phillies wrapped up the division with a 6-2 win over the Cubs, after securing a spot in the playoffs a few days prior in New York. Catcher JT Realmuto got the party started early with a run blast at the bottom of the 2nd, which was followed by a Kyle Schwarber home run at the bottom of the 3rd. The Phillies never looked back. Nick Castellanos, Bryson Stott, and Kyle Schwarber would add on, giving the Phillies a 6-run lead and 9 outs from a division title. Despite a bumpy 7th inning, the Phillies bullpen would see out the game, with trade deadline acquisition Carlos Estevez coming on to close out the Chicago Cubs, and slam the door on the chasing pack in the NL East. 

The Phillies have certainly come a long way since Opening Day on March 29th. After dropping their opening two series to the Braves and Reds, the Phillies would go on a tear, winning series after series. They would only drop three series from April 5th to July 4th. The next time the Phillies met the Braves in July, the gap was nearly 10 games between the two ball clubs. The Braves would take two of three from the Phillies, which would start a spiral for Philadelphia. After sweeping out the Dodgers the same week, the Phillies would lose six straight series. Before returning to normalcy by taking two of three at Dodger Stadium. The Braves continued to be plagued by injuries and fell out of the race. This caused them to lose their lead in the Wild Card race. Now, the Mets were the closest challenge to the Phillies. If the Mets really did have any chance to catch the Phillies, it was quickly lost when the Phillies took two of three from the Mets in Philadelphia in September. Despite denying the Phillies the division title for a few days in Queens a week later, the magic number was still down to 1. The Phillies would wrap it up a day later versus the Cubs.

The party went on deep into the night in South Philly. Philadelphia’s clubhouse leader Bryce Harper stated, via MLB, “From top to bottom, from [managing partner and chief executive officer John Middleton] up top to [president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski] to [manager Rob Thomson] to everybody else, we have that same goal every time we go into Spring Training. Win games, win the division, and try to get deep into the postseason every year. People talk about windows[championship windows]and things like that. But with John at the helm, there’s no windows.This is a team that’s going to play for a long time, be competitive for a long time. Obviously, we have a really good team right now and this is our window with this team right now.” 

Harper has been the prime example of the shift in culture within the Phillies team. After many dark years from 2012 to 2018, Harper signed to Philadelphia’s return to the top of the pyramid. While it took a few years to break into the postseason, no other player represents the city like Bryce Harper. The winning pitcher, and longest-tenured Phillie, Aaron Nola expressed, “Man, it’s been a long time coming. It’s really cool. Really cool. I’ve always wanted to win the division. When I first got up here in the big leagues, I felt like we were a little bit ways away from doing that. But we made a lot of jumps over the years. We went through a lot of struggles.” Nearly a decade in Philadelphia and after signing a massive extension, Aaron Nola was there during the dark days. The last player to play with the likes of Utley, Howard, and Hamels. Now, he wins the first division title since that era of Phillies baseball.

The job is however not done yet. The Phillies still are in the fight for the 1 seed with the Los Angeles Dodgers. After that, Red October returns to South Philadelphia. As the Phillies look to bring a championship back to Philly. As John Middleton said after the Phillies won the East, “I want my f****** trophy back!”