Whicker: Earning Mr. October (or Mr. November) nickname isn't easy
Phillies slugger Bryce Harper powered Philadelphia to a World Series berth.
October 25, 2022
By Mark Whicker
Canadian Baseball Network
It’s hard to be Mr. October.
Steve Pearce, Edgar Renteria, David Freese, Rick Dempsey, Jermaine Dye, David Eckstein, Gene Tenace, Scott Brosius and Larry Sherry were all MVPs of the World Series.
Barry Bonds, Eddie Murray, Darryl Strawberry, Joe Morgan, George Brett and Frank Robinson never were.
Warren Spahn wasn’t. His teammate Lew Burdette was. Willie Mays never won it and now the award bears his name.
It’s difficult because the opponent draws a bullseye on the superstar. We will not lose to him.
We’re much more willing to make a hero out of Al Weis or Scott Spiezio. The best player will have difficulty making a difference without a bat in his hand.
But Roberto Clemente, Mike Schmidt, Brooks Robinson, Pete Rose, Johnny Bench and, of course, Reginald Martinez October (cq) all were Series MVPs.
Few were as good as Bryce Harper has been for the Philadelphia Phillies, the 87-game winners who would be resting at home if not for the grace of the expanded playoff, but now play Game 1 in Houston Friday.
It was Harper’s clutch two-run home run in the bottom of the eighth inning in Game 5 of the National League Championship Series - his third home run of the series - that propelled the Phillies into the World Series. And it gave Harper a .400 NLCS average.
But stardom is far more than stats. Harper has been legendary since he was a teenager in Las Vegas. He hit a 500-foot home run at St. Petersburg’s Tropicana Field when he was 15, during an international home run derby. He was a catcher then, but also was clocked at 96 mph on the radar gun. Today he might try to be the next Shohei Ohtani.
He was Washington’s slam-dunk choice with the first overall pick in 2010. The year before, the Nationals had chosen Stephen Strasburg, who remains the only 1-1 pick to take the MVP award, for his work against the Astros during the 2019 Series.
Harper has been detoured by various injuries, and the Nationals won the World Series the year after he signed his 13-year contract with Philadelphia. Among active players, he is eighth in slugging percentage and sixth in OPS. Harper has also won two MVPs and has been Rookie of the Year, and has led the NL in runs, doubles, home runs, walks, and OPS-plus in various years.
This year he missed about two months when Blake Snell’s pitch broke his thumb. When he did play, he slugged .514. It’s likely that the Phillies would have made the playoffs with no sweat if Harper had logged in more often, but maybe that’s just him. In 10 full seasons, he has played 140-plus games only five times, and that’s when his MVPs have happened.
There has always been a lupine quality to Harper’s play, a violence about it. If the MLBPA made a movie, Harper would be the guy in the garage with the chain saw. But there’s a shrewdness, too, born of maturity and his lifelong awareness of his destiny. Harper picked Philadelphia because of the long term, but there could have been an oil-water mix with a fan base that prides itself on “toughness” but loves to be acknowledged, as if they’re participating.
Harper was smart enough to sing the praises of the Philly crowds, from Day One, and they responded in kind. Of course, idolatry comes easy when you hit five home runs in 11 postseason games and your club goes 8-2 on the way to its first World Series in 13 years.
Already, they’re theorizing that Harper’s Sunday punch was the single best moment in the sporting history of the City of Brotherly Love. It’s hard to argue against that, unless you want to go with Brandon Graham’s sack of Tom Brady that wrapped up the Eagles’ only Super Bowl win.
In San Diego and other places, they’re wondering why manager Bob Melvin gave Harper the opportunity to touch the sky. The Padres led, 3-2, going into the eighth. Leadoff hitter J.T. Realmuto, who had the best NL batting average after the All-Star break, singled off Suarez. At that point Josh Hader was in the bullpen, the shaggy lefty whom the Padres brought in from Milwaukee, the terminator who had given up eight home runs to lefty hitters in 355 plate appearances, and had limited them to a .136 average.
Hader had become a one-inning pitcher, but nothing says that his inning had to be the ninth. There were dangerous righthanded hitters behind Harper, true. But if the Padres weren’t using Hader in a good-vs.-good situation like this, why was he there? As it was, he sat back down after the homer and the game and the series disappeared into the soggy rabble. He worked once in the five-game series.
The Phillies also have triggered mumblings throughout baseball, particularly on Elysian Park Avenue in Los Angeles, about the quirky unfairness of the postseason. You don’t have to be good, you just have to be hot at the right time. And it’s true that the Phillies wouldn’t have qualified without the addition of a sixth playoff team in each league.
But they weren’t particularly hot coming in. They lost 13 of their last 20 regular season games. They were 22-25 in one run games and were 11th in NL defensive efficiency.
They seemed doomed in their very first playoff game, but the St. Louis Cardinals insisted on trying to use closer Ryan Helsley after he had jammed a finger, and the Phillies put together enough exotic hits to win in extra innings. Harper’s early homer keyed the Game 2 win in the best-of-three series.
Suddenly it didn’t matter that this had been a beer-league lineup most of the year, avoiding such details as relief pitching and defense. They all got hot, and 20 of their 37 hits against the Padres went for extra bases.
Team president Dave Dombrowski added some detailing. Shortstop Bryan Stott and centre fielder Brandon Marsh made the defence palatable, as long as no one was hitting baseballs to first baseman Rhys Hoskins. He insisted that the Phils add Kyle Schwarber, the leadoff man who led the NL in homers, and solid rightfielder Nick Castellanos. He also ejected Joe Girardi from the dugout and replaced him with 59-year-old Rob Thomson, George Steinbrenner’s close friend during all those Yankee years.
Had the Boss been alive, Thomson (Corunna, Ont.) might have gotten the Yankees’ job instead of Aaron Boone. Instead he applied the light guidance that a veteran team appreciated.
Above all, the Phillies had a chance in the postseason because they had Zack Wheeler and Aaron Nola as starting pitchers, and two sizzling relievers in Jose Alvarado and Seranthony Dominguez. Sure, they got hot. Most champions do. Most also-rans sit through the winter and wonder why they didn’t.
The Los Angeles Kings won the Stanley Cup as a No. 7 seed. The Green Bay Packers won all their playoff games on the road before they beat Pittsburgh in a Super Bowl. What’s important is to recognize that October’s games are the ones everyone will remember, and bring the appropriate energy.
Somehow, the Dodgers won 111 regular season games and got to October with shakiness in their rotation and their short bullpen. Somehow they let the trade deadline come and go without addressing the loose threads in their regalia. And they lost.
The system did not make that happen.
That, and a lot of other things, has left the podium to Bryce Harper. He has only three October games left before the calendar flips.
Will he become Mr. Autumn? Only if the Astros are feeling lucky.