Bryce Harper, a modern-day Gehrig or Ruth, saves the Phillies to tie the NLDS, and electrifies Citizens Bank Park

by Marcus Hayes | Columnist
Published Oct. 6, 2024, 7:49 p.m. ET

The Showman just keeps showing up.

Bryce Harper is under contract for $330 million. He remains a bargain. He drove the Phillies to the 2022 World Series. He carried the Phillies to the seventh game of the 2023 NLCS, with one arm, no less. He switched from right field to first base and helped them win 95 games in 2024, which earned them the No. 2 seed in the National League and the accompanying first-round playoff bye.

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He even walked twice and doubled in Game 1 of the NLDS, a bright spot on a dark day for the Phillies’ losing offense.

Then, Sunday.

NLDS: Mets defeat Phillies 3-1

Game 1: Mets 6, Phillies 2 | Hayes | Murphy

Game 2: Phillies 7, Mets 6 | Hayes | Murphy

Game 3: Mets 7, Phillies 2 | Hayes | Murphy

Game 4: Mets 4, Phillies 1 | Hayes | Murphy

Harper’s 431-foot, two-run homer in the sixth inning cut the Mets’ lead to 3-2. It was the first pitch fully inside the strike zone that he saw all night. It turned the Bank into bedlam. Red October, absent since last season’s letdown in the NLCS, returned in its full, crimson glory.

“That got everybody going,” Phillies manager Rob Thomson said. “That was huge. To get on the board and get the crowd back in it?”

“It was sick,” Harper said of the decibel level during his home-run trot. “Best fan base in the world.”

They’re watching the best playoff hitter in the world.

After reaching base in six of his 10 plate appearances in this series, Harper’s 1.024 postseason OPS now ranks third all-time behind Lou Gehrig and Babe Ruth among players who have played at least 34 games, like Gehrig. Ruth played 41. Harper’s played 51.

Ruth.

Gehrig.

Harper is, right now, without peer, as locked in as he’s ever been.

» READ MORE: Murphy: Nick Castellanos rises from the dead — again — and slays the zombie Mets .... for now

“I feel real good,” Harper said.

He made 45,679 feel just as good.

The crowd hadn’t been “in it” since the eighth inning of Game 1, when the Mets charged from a 1-0 deficit and took the game by the throat. The Phillies hitters — Harper excluded — simply choked in Game 1.

This time, Harper put the Mets in a chokehold.

“From that point,” Thomson said, “I thought our at-bats got a lot better.”

(The next one he saw, from Tylor Megill in the ninth, he roped 300 feet down the right-field line, just foul. He walked in that plate appearance).

Harper’s one-out walk in the eighth turned into a three-run rally and a 6-4 lead. His ninth-inning walk set up Nick Castellanos. He is as locked in as he’s ever been, and that’s saying something.

But the homer. The homer. The 112-mph missile that started it all ...

“It felt,” said J.T. Realmuto, “like the ballpark got reenergized there.”

Amid all the bashing and walking and inspiring and re-energization, Harper shined in the field. He made two diving stops that smothered ground balls and another dive that snagged a line drive, all of which squelched Mets threats and made things matter late.

He had help. He always needs help. It’s baseball.

Sunday, Castellanos gave him the most help.

Castellanos followed Harper’s homer with his own, a solo blast that snapped a 1-for-26 playoff stretch. Castellanos sent Harper first-to-third in the eighth with a single and scored on Bryson Stott’s triple, then scored Trea Turner from second with a walk-off single with two out in the ninth.

But none of that happens without Harper’s homer, or Harper’s walk in the eighth, or his walk in the ninth.

Turner got the first two hits in his last five playoff games and worked a two-out walk in the ninth to start the rally. He scored the winner.

Starter Cristopher Sánchez made it through five innings, the only damage a two-run homer by Mark Vientos in the third. Carlos Estévez silenced the Mets in the eighth, and right-hander Jeff Hoffman saved lefty Matt Strahm’s bacon after Strahm blew the save in the top of the ninth when he gave up a two-run homer. The Mets’ amazing streak continued: They have scored 20 runs in the eighth and ninth innings over six games since Monday.

But they didn’t win. Harper wouldn’t have it.

There’s nothing like postseason baseball. There’s nowhere like Citizens Bank Park. There are no fans like Phillies fans.

And there’s nobody like Harp. And so it was, Sunday evening.

I was in Boston in 2004, when they broke the curse, when it all began with pinch runner Dave Roberts stealing second base in the ninth inning of Game 4 of the ALCS against the Yankees, launching the first 0-3 comeback in baseball history, culminating in a World Series win. Fenway and Red Sox fans do not compare. I’ve seen the Cubbies kill the “Billy Goat” curse (and I’ve staggered out of that namesake tavern of legend). I was there for Joe Carter’s Canadian walk-off. I’ve seen things get hot in Houston, and things go subway wild in both New York parks.

But there’s nothing like the Phillies’ home field in autumn, when temperatures fall and stakes rise.

And so it was, Sunday evening.

The fans got louder than the music. They swung rally towels over their heads like Berserkers swung axes, only with more joy, or anger, depending on the moment.

» READ MORE: How rally towels became essential for the Phillies and remind John Middleton why he owns the team

They howled when Harper, the best active playoff hitter, homered.

They roared when Castellanos clutched up.

They erupted when Stott tripled in two runs for a 6-4 lead in the eighth.

And they released the loudest sigh of relief in Philly history when Castellanos drove in Turner in the ninth, averting an 0-2 hole in the best-of-five series that now heads to New York for evening starts Tuesday and Wednesday. Aaron Nola starts Tuesday, which at least gives the Phillies a solid chance to return for a Game 5 and Zack Wheeler on the mound for the clincher.

They sighed mostly because Harper wouldn’t leave them hanging.

He’s the main reason the Phils are 13-5 in the postseason at the Bank since 2022.

Face it.

He’s the main reason for everything.