Perhaps Kyle Schwarber gave baseball fans a sneak peak at this year’s Home Run Derby at Citizens Bank Park. The Philadelphia Phillies super-slugging lefty launched home runs in back-to-back at-bats on Saturday against the New York Mets — in the same inning.
First he teed off a solo shot on Mets starter Freddy Peralta, taking the third pitch of the third inning, an 85-mph changeup, for a 456-foot ride, all the way over the right-center wall and into the second deck full of elated Phillies fans.
Then, after Philadelphia chased Peralta later in the frame, Schwarber mashed the fourth pitch left-handed reliever Cionel Pérez tossed. The three-time All-Star, who seemingly gains more power with age, lifted a 97-mph sinker to almost the same spot he dropped off the other long ball, with the three-run shot sailing 457 feet.
Schwarber’s third-inning dingers danced a combined 913 feet across the Bank. They were the 33-year-old’s 26th and 27th homers on the year. And they drove in a total of four runs, half of the Phillies’ scoring output in the frame.
By the end of the third, Philadelphia was up 11-0 on the NL East rival Mets.
An equally tantalizing subplot started to unfold in that inning: Bryce Harper’s campaign for the cycle. Earlier, Harper opened the scoring gates on Saturday, rocketing a solo home run — his 16th long ball of the year — to right field.
During the circus of the third inning, he lashed a double and a single. All that was left was the elusive triple, which he promptly secured in his next at-bat.
That came in the fifth inning, when he shot a liner into the left-center gap and raced around the bases to cap the 11th cycle in Phillies history.
This story is being updated.
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