Bryce Harper's Shot Heard Around The World

PHILADELPHIA, PA — Bryce Harper's white cleat dug into the golden dirt at home plate in south Philadelphia as it had a thousand times before. He cocked his left elbow. The bat curved like a cobra rearing and gently wavering. A sea of red and blue blurred into infinity behind him. He bared his shoulder back over his jaw and he swung.

It was the bottom of the eighth. There was a man on first and the Phillies were losing 3-2.

The pitch was a 99 mile an hour fastball from the Padres' Robert Suarez. It followed up a 91 mile an hour changeup. It grazed the outside corner. It was a perfect pitch.

Harper's swing connected the ball with the meat of the barrel. The crack of the bat, the sound of spring, the sound of youth and little league and hope renewed, was a screaming whisper that roared even over the din of some 40,000 of the most raucous fans on the face of the planet.

It was not a Ruthian moonshot. It was not Kyle Schwarber's historically hard hit monster earlier this week in San Diego. It was not Harper's now second most famous Philadelphia home run, the grand slam walkoff three summers ago.

It was the best possible swing on an elite pitch. He went to the opposite field with the outside pitch, his bat following fully through and tapping his lower back. The ball soared high into the charged dark blue rainy sky and dropped just on the other side of the left field fence into a crowd of frenetic red. Like a lost child triumphantly falling back into the arms of a joyous village. One that had waited years, one that had watched decades turn, time that felt like centuries.

The blast put the Phillies in the lead, 4-3. They would never relinquish it. The hit, on the biggest possible stage at the biggest possible moment, clinched the Phillies series win over the Padres and their first World Series berth since 2009. It's a swing that will headline highlight reels for generations.

Harper's October is already one of the greatest playoff performances of all time. Obviously, Harper was named the most valuable player of the NLCS. He leads all batters with more than 12 plate apperances with a .419 batting average this postseason, and an absurd 1.315 on-base plus slugging percentage.

All of it has come against an elite handful of the best pitchers on the best teams in the National League.

There are questions that will linger in the minds of San Diego fans for generations, too, particularly if this squad never returns to this stage again. Why did the Padres leave in the right handed Suarez to face the lefty Harper, with arguably the game's greatest left handed relief pitcher warming in the bullpen in Josh Hader? If the move was to leave Suarez in, why did they have Suarez pitch strikes to Harper, the hottest hitter in the game this postseason and for much of the past two calendar years? They could have pitched around him.

They didn't. Somewhere the sculptors are sharpening their chisels. Somewhere the formless metals that will iconicize this mythic Phillies October are coming into shape. If there's a parade on Broad Street this fall, there will be a silver statue of number three on Broad and Pattison by spring.