Kyle Schwarber on Phillies’ Turnaround: ‘We Were 9-19 to Start the Year’

Kyle Schwarber showed up to the Home Run Derby with a bat in one hand and a blunt assessment of his team’s season in the other. The Phillies slugger sat down with Pat McAfee on Monday before the derby and didn’t sugarcoat how ugly things got in Philadelphia before they got good.

“We feel pretty good about where we’re at,” Schwarber said. “Especially from where we started. We were 9-19 to start the year off. Lot of adversity kind of happened… They let (manager Rob Thomson) go, then we turned it around and put ourselves in a really good position. I think we’re only a couple games out of the division lead.”

How the Phillies Clawed Back

The early disaster was real. The Phillies looked broken after that 9-19 start, and the front office made the kind of move that usually signals a lost season — they fired Rob Thomson. Thomson had been a steady hand, getting them deep into the playoffs in back-to-back years. But the plug got pulled anyway.

And then something flipped. Interim manager Don Mattingly took over and the team started playing the kind of baseball everyone expected from them in the first place. They’re now sitting two games behind the Atlanta Braves in the NL East heading into the All-Star break. That’s not nothing.

The turnaround has been driven largely by Schwarber himself. The guy leads the majors in home runs with 32, and his slash line is .254/.367/.560 with a .927 OPS. He finished second in NL MVP voting last year. He might do it again this year, even if everyone already knows Shohei Ohtani is going to win it. Ohtani is doing things nobody else can, but Schwarber has been relentless.

Philadelphia Gets Its Moment

The timing of the All-Star events landing in Philadelphia couldn’t be better. Citizens Bank Park is hosting the Home Run Derby and the All-Star Game, and Schwarber made it clear the city is ready to show out.

“Just for us here, it’s gonna be so freaking cool just to see all of the fans here tonight,” Schwarber said. “We get to see it on a pretty regular basis, what they bring electricity-wise to us. For it to be on display for the national stage is going to be pretty cool.”

The Phillies fanbase is something else. They show up loud and they stay loud. There will be a lot of other fans in the building this week, sure, but don’t expect the home crowd to be quiet about it. The national broadcast is going to have a field day with that atmosphere.