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Sports Illustrated
Sports Illustrated
Sport
Tom Verducci

Bryce Harper’s Legend Grows as He Sends the Phillies to the World Series

PHILADELPHIA — Postseason baseball is about the spin of a roulette wheel. Unlike football and basketball, where you can give the big moment to your best player, baseball is about taking turns. It is the most democratic of our games. And so as the big wheel slows to a stop, the bouncing ball may stop in the crook of a Cookie Lavagetto or Bobby Thomson or Gene Larkin or Travis Ishikawa or any one of nine spots in a lineup. Those are moments of serendipity.

And then there are legends.

The intersection of the great player and the great moment is sport at its best. It is Henry Aaron hitting a walkoff homer to win the 1957 pennant. Just say the name and the year and you know. Carlton Fisk in 1975, Kirby Puckett in 1991, David Ortiz in 2013.

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