This 14-year-old Phillies fan grabbed a Mets home run ball and went viral for making a crafty swap
When Josh Kirsch got his hands on a ball hit by the Mets’ Carson Benge on Sunday at Citizens Bank Park, he threw it back on the field — but it wasn’t the actual home run ball.
When Carson Benge’s home run ball started heading in his direction on Sunday at Citizens Bank Park, 14-year-old Josh Kirsch knew exactly what to do.
The eighth-grader from Roversport was planning for this moment for years, hoping to catch a home run ball in his glove.
After he actually got his hands on the Mets outfielder’s home run, he was expected to do what most other Phillies fans do when they catch the opposing team’s home runs — throw the ball back onto the field. Instead, Kirsch was caught on camera swapping out the ball, pocketing the home run ball and throwing a different one back out on the field.
The Kirsch family has had Sunday season tickets in the outfield since 2022, purposefully on the aisle to give Kirsch a better chance at one day catching a ball. But there’s obviously no guarantee that even if you do get a home run ball, it’ll be a Phillies home run, and you’ll get to keep it. So Kirsch had a backup plan.
“He knows that the Phillies fans will cheer for about 10 seconds, and then be like, ‘Throw it back! Throw it back!’ so he had brought this ball with him to every game we went to,” said his father, Matt Kirsch. “It’s a Little League ball that he wrote in Sharpie in his little chicken scratch, ‘Not the home run ball.’”
Sunday was the first time Kirsch has been caught on camera swapping out the ball, but it’s not the first time he’s “thrown back” a home run. On April 20 last season, Marlins rookie Javier Sanoja hit his first career home run against the Phillies, right into Kirsch’s glove. Kirsch, not knowing it was Sanoja’s first major league home run, threw back the ball he’d stowed away in his pocket, wanting to keep his first home run catch.
But after one of their season-ticket neighbors, listening to the game on the radio, learned that it was Sanoja’s first major league home run, Kirsch wanted to find a way to give the ball back. Ballpark staff was able to verify that the ball Kirsch had was in fact the home run ball, and he got to meet Sanoja and trade it for a signed bat.
“That’s how his mind works,” Matt said. “He’s always thinking about every angle, like, ‘Oh my gosh, what if this happens?’”
Kirsch has always been an avid baseball fan. The family started going to Phillies games in earnest during the 2021 season, and after seeing just how much Kirsch loved to be at the ballpark, they invested in season tickets.
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He plays in the Spring Ford Babe Ruth baseball league, and at home, Kirsch has a collection of baseball and other Phillies memorabilia, including balls he’s had signed during warmups, jerseys, and bats. That’s part of why he wanted to keep the ball — with how baseball works, who knows if Sanoja or Benge might end up being Phillies one day?
So, no regrets, even after he went viral for pocketing the ball, which will now get a place of pride nearby his Sanoja bat. It was still surprising for the family to see the video gain more than a million views across various channels, but they’re taking it in stride.
“My daughter committed to play field hockey at Northwestern,” Matt said. “If you were to ask me which of my two kids was gonna make the Instagram reel for ESPN, I’d be like, ‘Oh, my D-I athlete.’ My Little League eighth-grader made it.”
Father's Day will hit a little differently this year for Don and Preston Mattingly. After years of working in baseball for different teams, often on opposite sides of the country, they are together with the Phillies as the first father-and-son manager-and-GM combination ever. Preston Mattingly joins Phillies Extra to discuss working with his dad, as well as the Phillies' decision to demote Andrew Painter to the minors and their preparations for the trade deadline. Watch here.
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