ST. LOUIS — In bracing for his first career postseason start, Zack Wheeler recounted his most nerve-racking moments on a baseball field. He thought about the 2012 Futures Game in Kansas City and the 2021 All-Star Game in Denver. He remembered the pterodactyls churning in his stomach, the pounding in his chest.
“I’ll just kind of look back at those and how I handled that and go out there and stay the same,” Wheeler said Thursday before the Phillies worked out at Busch Stadium on the eve of their first playoff game in exactly 11 years. “Those are some different moments for me that I kind of had to settle myself down for. I’m sure it’ll be the same.”
Maybe. But October tends to have a strange effect on even the best pitchers. For every Roy Halladay, who tossed a no-hitter in his first playoff start in 2010, there’s a Clayton Kershaw, who has a 2.48 ERA in his career and a 4.19 mark in the postseason.
