SEATTLE -- This wasn't exactly apples to apples. But it certainly bore the same kind of fruit.
When Mitch Moreland launched his pinch-hit homer in Game 4 of the World Series he was flat-out sitting on a first-pitch changeup. The result was the hardest hit homer measured in an October Classic game since 2015, supplying the springboard for what would ultimately be a decisive Red Sox win over the Dodgers.
This one -- Moreland's pinch-hit, three-run blast against Seattle's Hunter Strickland in the ninth inning Friday night, giving the visitors a one-run lead -- didn't come with predictions. That didn't mean he wasn't in another perfect position to present late-game heroics.
“Not necessarily," said Moreland when asked if he was sitting on Strickland's 2-0, 95 mph fastball. "I knew he didn’t want to get behind anymore."
The scenario did, however, offer another example why Moreland is so good at these such things. He has, after all, now hit five career pinch-hit homers.
After starting to contemplate a showdown with Strickland following Christian Vazquez's eighth-inning homer, which brought the Red Sox to within a pair, Moreland truly started zeroing in on what awaited as the ninth inning unfolded. He had only faced Strickland one other time but understood the slider/mid-90's fastball combo that awaited.
So, with Blake Swihart standing at second base and Jackie Bradley Jr. at first with one out, Moreland dug in.
Two straight sliders were presented just off the corner of the plate. The lefty hitter offered at neither, leaving Strickland in a predicament.
"That always helps, I guess, to be in that situation," he said. "The more preparation you can get and experience you’ve got with it, the better you can prepare. Obviously, it’s a little bit different. But yeah, still, all the same, you’re trying to go up there and do your job."
"You get a predictable count with a guy like Mitch and he's dangerous," said Red Sox hitting coach Tim Hyers. "The key was that he laid off the two breaking balls. That set up the whole at-bat because if he swings at one of them it's a 1-1 count and he can go either, or. Laying off the two breaking balls allowed him to take a chance and sit in a zone with a fastball."
Moreland certainly sat in the right zone, equaling the hardest-hit ball of his career (114 mph).
"Yeah, I hit it pretty hard," he said. "It felt pretty good."