PHILADELPHIA — Zack Wheeler wandered into the dugout at 4:53 p.m. ET wearing a red T-shirt, gray sweatpants and black Nike slides with white socks. He leaned on the top step. He stared at the Citizens Bank Park mound. And, for the next 32 minutes, the Phillies’ ace did not move.
A reporter in red leather pants disrupted his view as she took a selfie. Cameramen shuffled past him as they filmed the Phillies taking batting practice. A reporter asked Wheeler if he could borrow a baseball from a nearby bucket. Wheeler shrugged. Howard Eskin, the longtime sports-talk radio crower, approached. They talked for almost 20 minutes. “Everything but baseball,” Eskin later said. The starting pitcher is not to be disrupted on the day he pitches, but Wheeler invited it before Game 1 of the Wild Card Series against the Marlins — a commanding 4-1 Phillies win.
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“I like getting out there and seeing the field,” Wheeler said. “Feeling the weather. All that stuff. Watching the guys do their thing. I don’t know.”
Often, during those 32 minutes, Wheeler’s view of the mound was obstructed. But he looked straight ahead the entire time. He does this before every start and he does not know when he started doing it. Usually, he’s in street clothes and, usually, it’s less chaotic. He is not visualizing anything specific. He is just thinking.
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“He’s about as even as you can be as a human,” Bryson Stott said.
“No moment,” Bryce Harper said, “is too big for Zack Wheeler.”
“I think everybody in this organization appreciates what he’s done,” manager Rob Thomson said, “because it’s been phenomenal.”
Wheeler stepped onto the mound at 8:09 p.m. and he fired a 98 mph fastball. “When I saw his first fastball was 98,” Stott said, “I was like, ‘All right, he’s got it.’ It was pretty electric.” The next fastball was 98.2 mph. The third one was 98.6 mph. He threw two more at 98.6 and 97.9.
Then, with his sixth pitch of the night, he froze Jorge Soler with an 0-2 sweeping slider. Catcher J.T. Realmuto perked up. He had studied every Marlins hitter with Wheeler. Soler does not take 0-2 sliders like that. Something had happened.
“It was going to be a big pitch for us,” Realmuto said.
The Phillies took a 1-0 series lead behind another strong playoff outing from Zack Wheeler. (Bill Streicher / USA Today)More than seven months ago, before spring training began, pitching coach Caleb Cotham posed a new idea to Wheeler. He wanted to tinker with a sweeper — a slower version of the slider with more horizontal movement. Wheeler is skeptical by default. He’s not hard-headed; he is just careful with whom he trusts. He likes Cotham. They have developed a relationship that has helped Wheeler evolve as a 33-year-old pitcher.
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The sweeper was interesting enough in the spring to carry it into the season. But, often, other pitches took precedence. The new toy didn’t always move the way he wanted it to move. It looked like a ball out of his hand too many times. The next step in refining the pitch during the second half of the season, Cotham said, was starting it higher.
“So it plays in the thigh line away from the righty,” Cotham said. “It’s to take advantage of aggression. They have to solve the two-seamer in. When (Wheeler) has a good two-seam in, he has a lot of room to throw the sweeper up in the zone.”
Tuesday night, all it took was one sweeper for Realmuto to know. He started calling it more. Wheeler recorded five of his eight strikeouts on the sweeper. He pitched 6 2/3 innings. He did not allow a Marlins runner to reach second base until the seventh inning.
“That was the best the sweeper’s been,” Wheeler said. “That was a big pitch for me tonight. I just had a very good feel for where to start it and what it was going to do. It did the same thing every single time, no matter if I threw it up or down. So it was a big pitch for me tonight.”
Here was Wheeler, leaning on a pitch he had not thrown before this season, in an important postseason game. His fastball had extra juice, but he had other weapons. That’s evolution.
“With Wheels, his fastball is so elite, you want to use the slider as much as you can to keep them off the fastball,” Realmuto said. “Today, the slider was so good that we were using the slider because it was that good. It wasn’t necessarily trying to hide the fastball anymore.”
There was one sweeper that Cotham loved in particular. It was the sixth inning. Nick Fortes, the Miami catcher, worked a full count. Wheeler had missed with two sweepers earlier in the at-bat. Realmuto called for another one. A walk would have made the inning hairy with the top of Miami’s lineup looming.
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Fortes whiffed at a sweeper in the strike zone.
“That’s pitching,” Cotham said. “(Fortes) might be thinking, ‘Hey, he’s going to throw me a fastball.’ And Wheels was just one step ahead there.”
Zack Wheeler hands the ball to manager Rob Thomson after allowing one run in 6 2/3 innings. (Bill Streicher / USA Today)Wheeler ended his conversation with Eskin at 5:25 p.m. and he disappeared into the clubhouse for more preparation. At 7:33 p.m., he emerged from the dugout to make the long walk to the outfield. The fans noticed him and that’s when the cheers began.
He found another gear.
“It’s got to be the atmosphere and the adrenaline going,” Wheeler said. “As soon as I stepped foot out of the dugout to go stretch out there in the bullpen, the crowd went nuts, and I got chills. So it started right there. I think it just kind of carries into me throwing the baseball. It definitely helps.”
It’s how Wheeler commanded the game. He threw 10 pitches in the first inning, 10 in the second inning and 12 more in the third. The Phillies had squandered chances to take an early lead, but Wheeler did not let that disrupt his momentum.
“He solidified the game,” Cotham said. “It settled the game in.”
“That’s huge,” Realmuto said. “That’s huge on their opposing pitcher most importantly. That guy (Miami starter Jesús Luzardo), he’s struggling to get through innings and throwing a lot of pitches. Then Wheels comes out and has a 10-pitch inning and he’s right back on the mound, right back in the fight. Almost like he never got out of the last inning. It just feels like a constant, constant thing. That’s the big thing about keeping the momentum on your side. Having quick shutdown innings. It helps your offense a lot.”
Zack Wheeler pitches in front of a raucous crowd at the start of the game. (Bill Streicher / USA Today)The moment never felt too big. It’s why the Phillies are confident they can go two wins further than they did last postseason. It’s why they are formidable. They have players like Wheeler, who unlock more in October.
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“You never take it for granted,” Wheeler said of the crowd support. “I got chills right away. I knew it was going to be crazy, but I didn’t expect that. That was awesome. They really got me going. That’s why we all love playing here at home. Throughout the game — maybe a 3-2 pitch or sometimes with two strikes — the crowd’s going crazy, and you kind of just sit there and just take it in for a second and then lock it back in and go after the guy.”
October is supposed to be chaotic. Everything was moving faster around Wheeler hours before he dominated Tuesday night and he never lost sight of the mound. He never looked rushed once he was on the mound. The Phillies didn’t panic. They had Wheeler.
“That’s why,” Cotham said, “he is who he is.”
(Top photo: Sarah Stier / Getty Images)
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