High Hopes: A Phillies Podcast - High Hopes Chapter 2: Phillies Need To Win The World Series For Bryce Harper

Episode Date: August 24, 2023

James Seltzer and Jack Fritz react to JT Realmuto's struggles and Bryce Harper's game-tying home run on Wednesday night. Presented by Miller Lite. To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

All-star closer, Kenley Jansen, we have a question. What's the best podcast of all time? Baseball Isn't Boring, baby. I'm Rob Bradford, and every single day I'm sitting down with the biggest names to show you this great game is the greatest game. It's my podcast. It's my passion. It's a cause I started more than two years ago and is now the most prolific national daily baseball pod there is.

Another fact, so jump aboard the B.I.B. Express. Follow and listen to Baseball Isn't Boring, presented by Wasabi Hot Cloud Storage on the free Odyssey app or wherever you get your podcasts. We'll get to a couple of positive events, but the JT thing. We talked about the strikeout. We've kind of been waiting for the Toronto series last year. Like, when is he going to kind of turn it?

Are you getting to the point where you're kind of like, hmm, this is kind of JT? Well, I guess my thing with JT is that, I mean, they're batting him so low. He's like 7th. It's like he's just not killing it. Obviously, the strikeout yesterday was bad. But it's like if he can just be okay. He's been okay.

He's what 95% of baseball teams have in their catcher. Yes, but also you're paying him $25 million. Oh, I know. I'm just talking. Yeah, that's the issue. That's the issue. But also you're paying him $25 million. Oh, I know.

I'm just talking. Yeah, that's the issue. That's the issue. You know, I just, it was probably bound to happen. I just, I'm not totally just freaking out about it because I do, I like the positive step forwards I've seen from almost everyone else. You know, like, I think the offense can survive with this JT, where it's Schwarber's kind of heating back up in the home run department. By the way, since June 2nd.

Did you see that? So they got Gelbstadt. What a great stat. Yeah. Do what you say. Well, let's see. Only him and Shoei have 20-plus home runs and 50-plus walks. In all of baseball.

Now Shoei is batting for 300. Shoei's got 44 home runs and the whole thing. Regardless, whatever. The facts are going to be a good story. Yeah. batting over 300. So he's got 44 home runs and the whole thing. Rick Arliss, whatever. All my facts are going to be a good story. Yeah. But yeah, so like Schwarber,

Turner, Harper. Harper. We're going to talk about Harper in a second. Harper and like, you know, Stott.

Boomer, I'm never too worried about. Like he'll go through a stretch where he's like grounding a double plays. But he's always going to put the bat on the ball. Look, last night

he should have had the game winning hit. Totally. So I'm never like, I'm never too like worried about Alec Baldwin. I agree with you. Same with Stott. I think it was similar with those guys this year at least.

And Stott before the series I think was batting.250 in August, but it never really feels that way with him. So I think they can just survive without JT being the guy that he was last year. And then if you can get anything out of him, great. But he's just not not i haven't felt it like i felt trey this year at the beginning and how i felt about cassianos last year because they're batting higher up in bigger spots no it's a really fair point and i agree with it and look like jt did have a great playoffs last year i mean he had big hits he had clutch hits in the in the

world series i mean that game won like jt was the most important player on the team in that game. So I definitely think it's still in him, and I'm not going to say that he's a disaster for the rest of the year. But, you know, you'd like to see more of JT. Well, yeah, obviously. And is the answer playing Stubbs more? I don't know. We've been down that road, right?

Is Stubbs going to come on there and bunt? I don't know. And it works. It works. But it just doesn't, I mean. Yeah. The threat of a big hit is greatly diminished when Garrett Stubbs is covering the post.

So I'm definitely more in the hope camp. It hasn't felt as detrimental as the other guys. Yeah. I think that absolutely jives. Like it has not felt close to what Cassianos felt like last year or Turner earlier this year. Hey, fantasy football owners. The road to winning your fantasy football championship starts now.

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He's back. He looks like that guy. Even the outs. Dude, he hit four balls 110 miles an hour yesterday. That first out, up the middle, that was like a... I would have been scared to catch that ball. That was a scorcher, man. The one to left field, like almost like Harper is. Like he is, he's as locked in as he's been since last year.

So the only time I've seen a baseball, like that kind of puff, you know, like we hit the home run, like you saw that poof? Oh, yeah. Only time I've seen that on a baseball field was when Randy Johnson blew up the bird. You know what I mean? Like that ball, it literally exploded the baseball. It was 112 miles an hour off the bat or something. Like it's just, he is, I mean, he's just the best.

Like he's just absolutely the freaking best, dude. And he is, it's fair to say that when he gets going, it just kind of, the team is more into it, more locked in because he's like, oh, bleep, we got Bryce Harper back. He's just ascended himself to another level here. He has. No, he really has.

To the point of like, especially the clutch stuff and with the playoffs last year. Dude, it's every clutch. That's what I mean. I just. Great players don't usually come through all the time like this. This is rare for someone

to be his level of baseball player, historically speaking, like a chance to be an inner circle Hall of Famer, like the guy going to the Hall of Fame. It's rare for those guys

to come through this often in those moments. It's rare, dude. It's 100% rare. And while Jeter did it, it was all these little... Little single, it's that, yeah. Yeah, this did it it was all these little little single is that yeah yeah this guy's hitting dingers

like big dongs cut that audio he's just so I said this yesterday on the air and it's genuinely how I feel I never thought I would I would feel the way about a baseball player that I felt about Utley, Rollins, Howard

and Hamels because I was a kid, and those were my guys growing up. A hundred percent. I have a childlike excitement about Bryce Harper as a Philly. Such a good way to put it, man. Like, he, because you get older, it's like, ah, sports are kind of trivial, right? Like, you know, they're just kind of there. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. Like, not with that dude, man.

I just, and I also said this yesterday, like, he's on the Phillies Mount Rushmore already. Like, he is on the Mount Rushmore of Phillies. And for an outsider, for a guy who is not, like, was a guy that we hated for a long time, for me to be on my Mount Rushmore already, like, that is, that's pretty insane. And I just thought a lot about the last couple days.

He's two away from 300 now? Three. Three away from 300. It's either two or three. I think it's three. He's three away from 300. He's going to hit that as a Philly. He's going to hit 400 as a Philly.

And I just can't wait to see him hit his 500. I hope he does it. He says he's healthy. If he says he's healthy, he will get there, but, like, you know, with his swing, as he ages, like, who knows? He's already got back things, and, you know, he's already a top-ranked job. He is going to. But, like, the point being that, like, he is on track to do that.

He's going to die trying to hit 500. His arm will fall off. He knows the history of the sport he knows like the history of what the 500 home run club means and i've just already started having visions of like harper's chase for 500 and then it's like probably what five seven years from now yeah something seven years we're still doing the podcast and like we're on we're on road trips we're if he's not doing it here we're on on the road. We're chasing Bryce's 500th. He has just turned into such a freaking legend here.

He's going to have a statue outside of Citizens Bank Park. It's probably going to be Bedlam at the bank. He's going to go into the Hall of Fame as a Philly. He's going to be in the conversation for second best Philly ever behind Mike Schmidt when it's all said and done. You're right. I agree with you on all of this. Like, he is, and he just, it's the big moments, and it's clutch moments, and it's the hustle,

and it's annoying sometimes, obviously, when he gets thrown out at bases. He's a dumb base runner. We can say it. We love him. Dumb base runner. But it's all for the good of who he is, which is a guy that just plays as hard as he can every single night. I just, that home run yesterday, it's like we have that guy, and we never have that guy.

It's like Jalen. We don't usually have those two kind of guys. And they're different in many ways, but similar in that aspect. And the biggest difference between Jalen and Bryce is that the Eagles were already an established franchise. They were good before Jalen. They were bad the first year, but that wasn't his fault. They just won a Super Bowl in race. Right.

The Eagles were already an established brand. Bryce Harper has turned the Phillies around into people want to come here now. Totally. After, after a decade of losing, you know, he came here and not just players, not just people, players, like he's played a role in,

in, in like soliciting players to come here and, and making this a place to be. And then on top of it, like we joke around the pandering, all that, but like, but all this guy does is every time he has a microphone in front of him,

he has a chance to speak to the world, tells everyone how amazing we are and how amazing Philadelphia is. That's all he does. It's his whole thing. It's his whole – and it's because it's genuine because he feels it. But he Philly-versus-everybody. You can't get in front of a microphone without saying Philly-versus-everybody now because that's his ego. But that's us too. And I was going to say this before but like in my

many years on this planet jack you want to talk about age and wisdom right yes yes that's what we're saying almost aging wisdom i've never in my life i've never i've never seen something like this phillies team and this fan base right now where the team is giving so much love to the fans, where the team is so consistently saying, like, you make a difference. You energize us. You make it hard for other teams to play here. We couldn't be anything without you.

Like, it is, like, I'm, like, getting, like, the clem talking about it, but it's unique, man. Like, it's one-sided. We root for these guys. Oh, go. Like, maybe you'll hear's unique, man. Like it's one sided. We root for these guys. Oh, go. Like maybe you'll hear like, oh, our fans travel or whatever. You'll hear that guy stuff.

Like not this like love affair that is happening right now. Like it is unique, man. And Bryce is the heart of it. He's at the center of it. Like that goes on his Philadelphia legend legacy thing too. And, and it all comes together where this guy is like the athlete of a generation for us and yet we might have another and Jalen it is crazy

and now Harper clearly has his new celebration when he passes home plate like his little shrug thing the MJ I'm in are you kidding me I'm so. I'm in. Are you kidding me? I'm so in.

I'm in. He is so present in every moment. And the Bedlam at the Bank thing was a perfect example. First thing he does is turn the dugout and do Philly's Crosses. He didn't freak. Hoskins was like, this is the greatest thing ever. He spiked his bat. Harper.

Hoskins lost his mind Harper was like I was born for this I was born for this that's what it was in that moment that's the difference that's the difference

and that's what great players have I just I know it's a regular season game I'm getting so excited I'm like getting all like worked out because hopefully

obviously you know all things like go well but we're gonna have another we're gonna have hopefully a home playoff series and we're gonna see Bryce and this fan get his fan base do it all over again and that's the thing to the point, we're going to have hopefully a home playoff series. Yeah. And we're going to see

Bryce and his fan get his fan base through it all over again. And that's the thing, to the point where you're talking and like a statue and all this stuff, like,

I think to your point, Bryce's legacy in Philly when he's all done will be only positive and only great and Mount Rushmore and all and the statue and all that,

but like, obviously we know what it does for the legacy if he can win but but even just past that like like obviously i want to see the phillies win the world series but i want to see this guy win a world series like like seriously though like i mean i don't ever remember a baseball player in this town where i felt like they needed to win it more like he knows like you just talked about how much he cares about 500 he cares about his legacy he cares about being the greatest he

cares about the baseball as a sport. And winning the World Series for this guy would mean everything. Everything. And I want it for me. I know this sounds crazy. I almost want the Phillies to win the World Series more for Bryce than for me.