PHILADELPHIA (AP) — Nick Castellanos, Trea Turner and Kody Clemens homered, and the Philadelphia Phillies beat the Chicago Cubs 9-6 on Wednesday night and clinched a first-round bye in the playoffs. Castellanos had three hits and scored three times. Bryson Stott also had three hits and Brandon Marsh drove in three runs for the Phillies, who claimed their first NL East title in 13 years on Monday night.
Coupled with Milwaukee’s 2-1 loss to Pittsburgh, Philadelphia secured the bye and home-field advantage in the NLDS. The Phillies owned the tiebreaker with the Brewers after winning the season series against the NL Central champions. Philadelphia will host Game 1 of the NLDS on Oct.
5. “We just have to take it one step at a time and take care of business,” Marsh said. “There's nothing like it.
This is why we show up. This is the stuff we dream about.” Nico Hoerner homered twice for Chicago, and Isaac Paredes hit four singles.
The Cubs lost two of three in the series to finish with a 39-42 road record. Philadelphia closed out the home portion of its regular season with a 54-27 mark, though one of the home games was a loss to the Mets in London. A crowd of 42,438 was on hand for the 47th sellout of the season, running the home attendance at Citizens Bank Park to 3,308,638 on the year.
The Phillies finish with three games at Washington, beginning on Friday. Philadelphia can clinch home-field advantage through the NL Championship Series by ending the season tied with or .