Catching up with Matt Stairs | Extra Innings in Red October

The Phillies are playing the Dodgers so there was only one person to call Thursday morning: Matt Stairs. I wondered if Stairs ever gets tired of talking about that shot he ripped into the night at Dodger Stadium. Of course not, he said. How could he? Stairs lives in Canada, coaches youth baseball, and is enjoying life as a grandfather. And yes, he still cherishes that swing vs. the Dodgers.

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— Matt Breen (extrainnings@inquirer.com)

P.S. I’m writing this newsletter every day of Red October. Get it daily by signing up for free here.

I know I wasn’t the only one who thought about Stairs once it became official that the Phillies would face the Dodgers in October. Everyone knows where they were when one swing cemented Stairs as a Philadelphia icon. It’s something Philly — and Stairs — will never forget. So here’s Stairs, in his own words, recounting that night in L.A.

Sometimes, you sit there and wonder what would have happened if I would’ve struck out? What would’ve happened? Would I ever have got a broadcasting job? Would I ever been a hitting coach? It’s a what-if sometimes. Or what-if I was an everyday player and hit the home run? Was it a bigger home run because I was a pinch-hitter? For me, that was my job.

It’s been so many years since it happened and I can honestly remember walking up the steps, walking to the on-deck circle, seeing Broxton run in through the gate and just remember not hearing anything. I didn’t hear a word. I didn’t hear music. I didn’t hear boos. I didn’t hear people call me a fat ass. I didn’t hear people call for Broxton. It was a cool moment.

Broxton only gave up one home run since June against left-handers. I knew Broxton and I had faced him in the past. He never threw me inside. He always threw fastballs away and tried back-foot sliders. It was just one of those nights that the first pitch he threw was a strike and everything was in slow motion. What set up the home run was the second pitch. He threw me a slider, a back-foot slider. If you talk to the majority of left-handed hitters, we swing at that pitch a lot. You see that little spin coming inside and we think you have to speed up the meter and pick up a fastball, then it breaks off the table and next thing you know, you’re down 0-2. I took it. I was like ‘Ahh, that’s pretty good.’

I knew how to slow the game down, stay even keeled, my heartbeat was very half assed. What really helped me out was that I never expected to get a hit when I pinch hit. I wasn’t thinking negatively. Like I wasn’t thinking ‘I have no chance.’ I knew it was such a hard job, you’re facing the best closers in the game or the best setup guys in the game. I wasn’t saying that I had no chance to get a hit, but I didn’t expect to get a hit. What I wanted to do was I wanted to stay with my game plan and that’s the only thing you can control as a hitter. The only thing you can control in the batter’s box is your game plan. After that, you have no chance. You can’t control if you’re getting a hit through the four hole. You can’t control if you’re getting a hit to right center. Because everything has to line up perfectly.

Did I know he was going to throw a 3-1 fastball? Yes. Closers don’t want to get beat by a secondary pitch. They can’t get beat on secondary pitches. If he doesn’t pull the fastball inside, who knows what happens? I might have rolled over on it, I might not have swung at it. Who knows? He just happened to pull the fastball inside instead of keeping it over the plate and the rest was history.

My job was to go up there and have big shoulders. If I sucked at the time and struck out, I struck out. I hit a home run, luckily it was at the right time. It’s awesome. Honestly, it is. You knew you were helping to change the momentum of the series and getting to the World Series and going on to win the World Series.

I think of everything that happened that inning. You don’t forget. It means a lot to you. Victorino’s big home run, hitting a curveball off of Wade, down and in hitting it into the bullpen. Seeing the Flyin’ Hawaiian going around the bases. Then Chooch hit one to left field and it was my turn to step up to the plate and do something special.

People text me all the time through Facebook and people who have my number, ‘Hey, we saw the home run again last night.’

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As the Phillies prepare to open the postseason, there’s no better time to sit down with the greatest player in franchise history. Mike Schmidt joins “Phillies Extra” to share his thoughts on the team’s quest to win the World Series, Kyle Schwarber’s big season, Pete Rose’s Hall of Fame chances, and more. Watch here.

It’s hard not to think about Stairs every time Kyle Schwarber uses that short, easy swing to send a ball out. They both made their homers look almost effortless.

Schwarber already had his Stairs-esque October swing when he made Bryce Harper’s jaw drop with a 488-foot homer in San Diego.

“I wish I had the power he does,” Stairs said. “He hits balls that are just ridiculous. I thought I had pretty good power and then you see where he hits the baseball and it’s like ‘My God.’

“To me, he has the perfect stance of relaxation. Almost like he’s not ready to hit, but he’s 100% locked in. He’s just so calm and relaxed. There’s not a lot of movement. He really relies on that lower half and the torque he generates with his swing is so impressive. It’s such a short, compact swing. I had the same stance minus the power. Every time he steps in the batter’s box, you know he’s going to hit the ball very hard or he’s going to hit the ball very far.”

Expect Schwarber to match up in the late innings against Dodgers left-hander Alex Vesia, who struggled in Game 1 against the Reds but looked good in Game 2 when he entered the game in the middle of an at-bat with the bases loaded. Schwarber is 0-for-7 in his career vs. Vesia with a walk and a hit by pitch, which happened earlier this season. Left-handers hit .159 this season against Vesia with just two homers. Schwarber hit .292 this season in 48 at-bats against left-handed pitching with three homers. If he gets the chance, he shouldn’t be overmatched by Vesia.

Roki Sasaki’s ninth inning on Wednesday night for the Dodgers. That was nasty. He needed just 11 pitches to retire the three Reds he faced, his splitter looked unhittable, and six of his seven fastballs were in the triple digits. The other one was 99.8 mph. Good luck. There’s still major questions about the Dodgers’ bullpen but they may have at least figured out a way to get the final three outs of a game by moving Sasaki — who missed most of the season with a shoulder injury — to the ‘pen.

It felt like a major advantage a week ago that the Phillies had a shutdown closer and the Dodgers had a committee. Now, both teams have ninth-inning arms that the other side does not want to see. So how do the Phils and Dodgers get to the ninth? That could provide the difference in this series as the pressure falls on the managers to build a bridge to the ninth. Someone’s bullpen management is going to falter and it could decide who’s moving on.

Stairs played 19 years in the majors and spent just 6% of his career in Philadelphia. But that home run was enough to put him firmly into Phillies lore. That’s what can happen in October, when one moment can change a player’s life. If the Phillies make a run this month, it’s safe to assume that someone will have a moment like Stairs did at Dodger Stadium. Seventeen years later, we’re still talking about it. Let’s see who can do it this time. Email me a prediction and we’ll see if anyone guessed right when the dust settles.

“Everyone throughout the playoffs had big hits,” Stairs said. “I hit mine off Broxton and was the pinch-hitter who turned the series around. But the home runs from Victorino and Utley and the plays Utley made. Jenkins’ pinch-hit double. There’s just so many things as a team that help you win the World Series. It’s not just one big hit. Yes, it can be a game changer or a series changer. But I got into that position to change a series because of the whole team and what we did to get to that point and what we did afterwards.

“People talk about my home run, but Victorino’s home run was just as big if not bigger. He got us back into that game. You can sit back and say ‘Yeah, I hit that home run’ but I always talk about how important it was for that whole team and what we did to get into that situation.”

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