PHILADELPHIA — Teoscar Hernández doesn’t lack for emotion. He performs with pleasure, with exuberance, with delight.
The Dodgers know he can hit. All of us do. If the emotion dissipates, so can the efficiency.
Hernández may have been the goat Saturday night time, in what would have been the Dodgers’ first loss on this postseason. As a substitute, he hit the game-winning residence run, almost levitated round first base, and have become an October hero but once more.
Within the Dodgers’ 16 postseason video games final yr, he hit three residence runs and drove in 12 runs. Within the Dodgers’ three postseason video games to date this yr, he has hit three residence runs and pushed in 9.
You may fret about his uneven protection. You may second guess a defensive play that put the Dodgers deeper into an early gap.
All’s nicely that ends nicely, as evidenced by his three-run residence run that powered the Dodgers to a 5-3 victory over the Philadelphia Phillies within the Nationwide League division collection opener.
“For me, anything that happened before a big moment like that, it’s in the past,” Hernández mentioned.
“I try to put it in the trash and just focus on the things that I need to do.”
Within the second inning of what was then a scoreless tie, the Phillies put runners on first and second with none out. Catcher J.T. Realmuto pummeled a Shohei Ohtani fastball into right-center discipline, the place Hernández approached the ball however didn’t seem to speed up because the ball skipped previous him.
If Hernández had lower the ball off, Realmuto would have had a single, and the Phillies would have scored two runs within the inning. As a substitute, Realmuto had a triple — matching his season complete — and he later scored a 3rd run within the inning.
“I would argue that he wasn’t not trying,” Dodgers supervisor Dave Roberts mentioned of Hernández. “But, yeah, that’s a ball that you don’t want Realmuto to have a triple.”
On Twitter, former Dodgers pitcher Brett Anderson posted — after which deleted — this: “If I’m Shohei I’m going to need Teoscar Hernández to try a little harder.”
Hernández mentioned he didn’t get angle towards the hard-hit ball. Roberts did credit score Hernández with a defensive adjustment on a later ball, shading the road to maintain Bryce Harper to a single quite than an extra-base hit that might have pushed residence a run for the Phillies.
Teoscar Hernández follows by means of on his three-run residence run within the seventh inning of Recreation 1 towards the Philadelphia Phillies.
(Robert Gauthier / Los Angeles Instances)
The Dodgers minimized Hernández’s defensive publicity final yr by taking part in him most frequently in left discipline, with Mookie Betts in proper discipline. This yr, with Betts at shortstop and the Dodgers declining so as to add a proper fielder on the commerce deadline, Hernández has performed proper discipline all season.
The one main leaguer to play extra innings in proper discipline this season and end decrease in defensive runs saved: the Phillies’ Nick Castellanos, who acquired into Saturday’s recreation solely after Harrison Bader suffered a groin damage.
Make no mistake, although: Hernández is right here to hit. The Dodgers awarded Hernández a three-year, $66-million contract final winter, nicely conscious that designated hitter wouldn’t be an choice due to that Ohtani man.
As Dodgers catcher Will Smith defined Saturday to a reporter questioning whether or not he may spend extra time as a DH sooner or later: “We’ve got a pretty good DH. I think we’re pretty set on that.”
Hernández was neither hitting nor fielding nicely for a lot of the second half, inflicting Roberts to say at first of September that he had urged his proper fielder to “get in the fight.” Within the final week of August, he even benched Hernández for sooner or later.
Stated Roberts then: “I think we’ve lost a little bit of that edge over the last couple months. For me, I want to see that edge, that fight, that fire, and I’ll bet on any result.”
In September, Hernández put up a .769 OPS, his finest for any month because the first one. Within the Dodgers’ first postseason recreation, he hit residence runs in consecutive at-bats.
On Saturday, of their third postseason recreation, he stepped to bat within the eighth inning with two on, two out, and the Dodgers trailing by one run — and the Phillies had scored one additional run when he couldn’t run down that Realmuto triple.
Hernández homered. He smiled. He skipped.
“It was a great moment,” Ohtani mentioned.
In his face, we noticed pleasure.
