'He's country strong': Schwarber mashing postseason pitching
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How does Kyle Schwarber do it?
How does he hit the ball so far?
“I want to say an answer, but I'm not going to,” Bryce Harper said after Game 5 of the NLCS on Saturday night at Chase Field. “He’s country strong, man.”
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Schwarber smashed a Statcast-projected 461-foot home run to right-center field in the sixth inning in Saturday’s 6-1 victory over Arizona in Game 5 of the NL Championship Series. It was the fifth-longest home run in the postseason since Statcast started measuring home run distance in 2015. Schwarber also has the second- and eighth-longest postseason homers in that time. He hit a 488-foot blast into the second deck in right field at Petco Park in Game 1 of the 2022 NLCS. He hit a 459-foot homer at Citi Field in Game 1 of the 2015 NLCS, when he played for the Cubs.
Schwarber has hit five of the Phillies' 10 longest home runs since 2015, too, including the postseason. Harper is in the top 10 four times.
(Maikel Franco is the other player in the top 10.)
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“It’s incredible,” Harper said. “Just the way he goes, and the way he swings. He uses that lower half so well. He drives through the ground. Whenever you're able to put your feet on the ground and stay grounded, it's incredible. When guys are able to do that, that's how you hit the ball that way and that far.
“Every chance he gets up there, he has an opportunity to hit a homer. And I think that's the coolest thing about being Kyle Schwarber -- he’s got a really good chance to go deep in any count, any pitch. It’s really impressive.”
Including the postseason, Schwarber has hit 52 homers this year. Twenty-seven would have been home runs in every ballpark in baseball.
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“Everything syncs up perfect,” J.T. Realmuto said. “It’s not like he’s taking a big monster swing. It doesn’t look like he’s trying to hit the ball 460 [feet]. I just think his body, his hips, his hands, everything syncs up so well.”
“He’s just always very connected,” Alec Bohm said. “I feel like he gets the most power out of his swing every time just by how connected he is and how he uses every part of his body. It’s not necessarily that he swings harder or tries harder. Everything just works really well together. Even as a right-handed hitter, you can watch him and pick up some things.”