Armed with a new contract, Phillies’ José Alvarado has moved on from Game 6 homer

CLEARWATER, Fla. — No matter how many times you play the video, it always looks the same. José Alvarado reaches back and slings a 99 mph fastball over the heart of the plate, and Yordan Alvarez crushes it 450 feet over the center-field batter’s eye. The scoreboard flips from “1-0, Phillies” to “3-1, Astros,” the last lead change in the sixth and final game of the 118th World Series.

Some pitchers never recover from a moment like that.

Alvarado swears he won’t be one of those pitchers.

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“Hell no,” the hard-throwing lefty said Friday after signing a three-year, $22 million contract extension with the Phillies that includes a $9 million club option for 2026. “That’s baseball, man. I watched it [again]. That’s baseball. Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose. That’s the game.”

The Phillies are so certain that Alvarado will shake off giving up the championship-dashing homer that they bought out what would’ve been his first two years of free agency. He will make $3.45 million this year, as previously agreed upon through salary arbitration, then $9 million in 2024 and 2025, according to a source. The deal, which came one day after the Phillies locked up Seranthony Domínguez to a two-year, $7.5 million extension, also includes a $50,000 signing bonus and a $500,000 buyout in 2026.

It’s a risk, to be sure. But the Phillies also saw the 27-year-old Alvarado resurrect his career last year, going from unusable for then-manager Joe Girardi in May to the most trusted option in Rob Thomson’s bullpen in October.

So, Thomson made a point to speak with Alvarado after the World Series and check in with him during the offseason “just to tell him that I have the utmost confidence in him.” Because when Alvarado unleashes his next pitch, it’s best for him and the team that he not still be thinking about one of his last ones.

“It was one pitch and it’s on the big stage, and you get past it,” Thomson said. “He’s had home runs hit off him before, and he’s gotten past it. Just so happens that was on a big stage. But we’ve had the conversation, and just [based on] his reaction, I don’t worry about it.”

Besides, as Alvarado sees it, if you pitch long enough, you’re bound to encounter all forms of adversity.

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Craig Kimbrel can attest. Consider what happened to him in Game 4 of a 2017 divisional-round series with the Boston Red Sox.

One of the most accomplished closers of the last decade before signing with the Phillies last month, Kimbrel entered a tie game in the eighth inning against the Astros and gave up a wild pitch, a walk, and an RBI single in an eight-pitch at-bat against Josh Reddick. He came back out for the ninth and allowed a two-out RBI double to Carlos Beltrán that all but ended Boston’s season.

Talk about an ending so rotten that it had the potential to linger through a cold winter.

“The Grind?” Kimbrel said, laughing about the 38-pitch nightmare. “It was a complete grind. There’s moments in the game that are big, and you never forget them. You want to forget them, but you don’t. You use them to your advantage. You learn from them. Why did that happen? Why did a guy get such a good swing? Did I set it up for him to have that opportunity, or was it just one of those scenarios where I made a good pitch and he made a good swing?

“Because that happens a lot in this game, too. And you can’t kick yourself. Bad things happen in this game. It’s how you deal with them and move forward.”

The Phillies’ belief in Alvarado stems from his electric stuff. His sinker averaged 99.6 mph and registered triple-digits 205 times last season, according to Statcast. Upon returning from a 17-day stint in triple A, he threw his cutter more frequently, especially to right-handed hitters. Armed with that combination, he struck out 64 of 149 batters (42.95%) over the last four months of the season.

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Alvarado also began working with a mental skills coach who helped him focus better on the mound. Soon, he developed a swagger to match his stuff. The reliever who once struggled to harness his command walked through the clubhouse wearing a T-shirt that read, “Strike One, Strike Two & Good Luck.”

“I know I had a bad start to the season,” Alvarado said. “I say, never give up. Baseball’s not easy. I got sent down to play for two weeks, 17 days. My mind was like, ‘Never change. Be the same guy, Alvarado. Come in early, work out, give me the ball, pitch and compete.’ When I came back to the big leagues, I said, ‘OK, just throw the ball, attack the hitter, and that’s it.’”

Why change now? Certainly not because he gave up a homer to a left-handed hitter for the first time since July 30, albeit at the worst possible time.

“When he first came back up, it was still a little bit [shaky], and then, bang, got it. And then he had it the rest of the year,” Thomson said. “So, I’m banking on the fact that he’s got his confidence way high, his delivery’s more under control, he’s able to power the ball through the zone. Getting both those guys [Alvarado and Domínguez] signed is so, so important for the organization moving forward.”