Homegrown Phillies prospects Aaron Nola and Rhys Hoskins return Red October to Philadelphia

They’d been through the worst of it. Through the rebuild, and the losing, the empty seats, and the dead Octobers.

Now, Aaron Nola and Rhys Hoskins have experienced a Red October. Now they know what it’s like to have 45,553 crimson-clad crazies who waited 11 years between playoff berths to wave their towels and taunt the Tomahawk Chop.

After a 9-1 win over the Braves, and after the Phillies surged to a 2-1 lead in the best-of-five, after they found themselves 27 outs from winning the National League Division Series in a home game less than 24 hours away, everyone agreed: Nobody deserved this moment more than Hoss and Noles.

Nola debuted in 2015, and his teams were 90 games under .500 before this season. He lasted six innings and didn’t give up an earned run. Hoskins debuted two years later, and his teams were 34 games under. His three-run homer wound up being the difference in the game. His bat spike will live forever.

“He’s been in this organization a long time, just like Noles,” Harper said. “For those two guys to be able to do that in their first playoff game at home ... it’s unbelievable. I get chills sitting here, thinking about it.”

They’d produced with inferior teammates, produced as the Eagles won it all in 2017 and the star-studded Sixers surged past them, and they’d done it without a misstep.

They weren’t alone. Harper homered and doubled, and he’s everyone’s hero, but the loudest cheers went to Hoskins and Nola. The fans knew: Hoss and Noles had suffered along with them the past few hopeless seasons. The fans knew that Hoss and Noles hadn’t tasted the sweetness of fall ball on a South Philly night.

» READ MORE: Phillies ride Aaron Nola, Rhys Hoskins to 9-1 win over Braves and move one win from NLCS

Nola and Hoskins had watched their National League East rivals win the last five division titles, including this season’s. The Phillies had to slide into the postseason with a third wild card, a No. 6 seed, their season’s start slowed by the presence of manager Joe Girardi, who was fired June 3. Nola won the clincher

The Phillies then had to beat the Cardinals in a best-of-three in St. Louis, and did it in two. Nola won that clincher, too. The Braves got a five-day bye.

The Phillies had been gone for 14 games and 18 days, so the fans and the fellas could not have savored the reunion more.

It was magical for everyone.

Hoskins raised his hands, screamed at his dugout, and spiked his bat. He didn’t flip it; he slammed it to the ground so hard it bounced back up six inches.

“He took that from me,” said backup catcher Garrett Stubbs, who did, in fact, spike his bat when he hit a walk-off homer June 15.

Hoskins then trotted around the bases, having turned a 1-0 lead into a 4-0 lead in the third inning with a Big Hoss swing that directed a baseball at 107.3 mph some 394 feet away. A brief hug with Harper on his way back to the dugout elicited this from Harp:

“We ain’t losing.”

Accurate.

Rhys Hoskins needed this. He hadn’t done much good in the playoffs; 1-for-19 with seven strikeouts, shaky at first base, as usual. Things were going poorly.

» READ MORE: Reasons to believe in a Phillies Game 4 clinch: Bryce Harper, home cooking, history and more

Rhys Hoskins deserved this. He’d been the voice of the Phillies for all six of his seasons, even after Harper arrived in 2019.

Phillies fans attending their first home playoff game in 11 years — when Hoskins was a freshman in college — booed him lightly when he was introduced before the game, residual ire from his Game 2 miscue, when he botched a hot grounder that led to the Braves’ win that evened the NLDS on Wednesday.

He got booed again when, as the Phillies’ No. 2 hitter, he fanned on a 98.4 mph fastball from Spencer Strider, the favorite for National League Rookie of the Year. And again, in the third, when he fell on his butt trying to pick Alec Bohm’s errant throw from third. And yet again, a fourth time, in the sixth, when he dropped a double-play relay that would have ended the inning and preserved Nola’s shutout.

The boos didn’t bother him.

In the third, he came to the plate insulted, but not by the crowd, per se. The Braves had intentionally walked Kyle Schwarber, who’d led the league in homers but who, at the moment, was at least as cold as Hoskins. Bryson Stott had doubled at the end of a nine-pitch at-bat, leaving first base open, which meant the Braves were so certain of Hoskins’ failure that they were willing to risk another early run.

You’ve heard about how you shouldn’t poke the bear? Well, don’t dis the Hoss.

“I’m human. I’m a competitor. They’re obviously telling me something right away before I even step in the box,” he said. “And I think when you light a little bit of a fire under somebody, tend to hone in and focus a little bit more and just didn’t miss.”

He got it, on a first-pitch, crippled fastball Strider dealt at the knees, down the middle of the plate. The ball left Citizens Bank Park like a scalded cat.

Bryson Stott’s at-bat framed the moment, and Schwarber’s pedigree put another duck on the pond, and J.T. Realmuto chased Strider one batter later, and Harper launched lefty reliever Dylan Lee’s first pitch — a meatball fastball — into the Harper Zone in right-center. It was 6-0 when the 10th Phillies batter finally made the third out of the third inning.

But Big Hoss’ big swing turned the momentum in Game 3.

It’s what he needed. It’s what he deserved.

Suddenly, the man who couldn’t pitch past August is making the autumn his own. Nola had a 4.60 ERA in the months of September and October and surrendered 32 home runs over his eight previous seasons. He was a big part of the reason for the Phillies’ September swoons.

This year, in eight starts since September began, Nola’s ERA is 1.72. He’s turned into Curt Schilling.

Nola lowered that ERA Friday. He gave up one unearned run over six innings and left one runner for Jose Alvarado, who stranded him.

Nola strode off the mound after 90 pitches to the sort of full-throated ovation Roy Halladay and Cole Hamels used to get. An ovation he’d only heard about. He wasn’t drafted until 2014, and that was two seasons after the last great Phillies roster, and three years after the team was any good. A first-rounder who crushed it in college, Nola was in the majors by 2015.

Despite playing on several teams that would’ve had trouble beating triple-A competition and pitching in a ballpark most high school studs would dominate, Nola managed a 78-62 record with a 3.60 ERA. He lost his debut start, going six innings and surrendering one earned run. It’s been a theme.

Not Friday.

“I’m not surprised,” Hoskins said. “I think you’ve seen this month, in October, with the clincher in Houston and in St. Louis and now tonight, there’s no moment too big for him.”

» READ MORE: Zach Eflin says the Phillies are ‘going to do this’ for Corey Phelan, who died of cancer

With Nola and Hoskins in place, the Phillies spent millions since 2019 to add Harper, Realmuto, Schwarber, and Nick Castellanos. Stott’s a promising first-round rookie. They turned catcher prospect Logan O’Hoppe into center fielder Brandon Marsh, whose walk began the big third inning.

None of it would have happened if Nola and Hoskins hadn’t proved themselves worth the risk.

They paid off Friday night.