PHILADELPHIA -- Chase Utley has chased down some of baseball's royalty, and now he's trying to hold a storied postseason record for his own.

By hitting two home runs in Monday's fifth game of the World Series, Utley moved into a tie with Reggie Jackson -- famously known as Mr. October -- for most home runs in a single World Series.

Utley hit two homers in the Series opener against CC Sabathia and followed that up with another home run against Sabathia in Sunday's Game 4.

With his first home run, which came with no outs in the bottom of the first, Utley tied the National League record for most home runs in a Series. The fourth home run was also second all-time, and Utley joined some baseball greats with the blast, tying the likes of Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Duke Snider and Barry Bonds.

His second homer of the night came in the bottom of the seventh and helped pad the Phillies' lead. It also put him atop the World Series mountain along with Jackson.

Like Utley, Jackson hit most of his homers in bunches. Jackson lifted the Yankees to the 1977 championship over the Dodgers by launching three home runs in Game 6.

Unlike Jackson, Utley's home runs would not lift the Phillies to a championship on Monday, but it did help the defending champions to live another day.

With the Phillies playing in a must-win game, Utley did a good job of sending Yankees starter A.J. Burnett to an early finish. Utley, who went hitless in three at-bats on Thursday with a walk, went deep on Burnett early.

Coming into Monday's game, Burnett had pitched 25 1/3 innings this postseason, giving up 10 earned runs. His win in Game 2 was the first postseason win of his career.

On Monday, things started poorly for Burnett from the start as Jimmy Rollins opened with a single, then Burnett hit Shane Victorino in the right hand.

Utley followed with his fourth homer of the Series and the Phillies were off and running.

The game got away from Burnett in the third inning. Utley led off and walked, and Ryan Howard followed with a walk. Jayson Werth then singled to center to score Utley with the Phillies' fourth run before Raul Ibañez singled to right.

Yankees manager Joe Girardi had seen enough and pulled Burnett, bringing in David Robertson, who gave up the sixth run of the inning.

Utley, a 30-year-old who attended UCLA, has become one of baseball's top players and helped the Phillies win their first World Series title since 1980 as he hit two homers with four RBI as Philadelphia handled Tampa Bay in 2008. Utley didn't hit all that well against the Rays however; those two homers were part of his three overall hits in the Series.

The home runs were big, however, as the Phillies won both of the games he homered in by one run.

This season, he hit 31 homers, two off his career high set in 2008.

Join the discussion

The Miami Herald is pleased to provide this opportunity to share information, experiences and observations about what's in the news. Some of the comments may be reprinted elsewhere in the site or in the newspaper. We encourage lively, open debate on the issues of the day, and ask that you refrain from profanity, hate speech, personal comments and remarks that are off point. In order to post comments, you must be a registered user of MiamiHerald.com. Your username will show along with the comments you post. Thank you for taking the time to offer your thoughts.

     Showing: Oldest first Newest first Most-recommended first Least-recommended first

@Nyx.AuthorDisplayName@ wrote on @Nyx.PostedAtTime@:

@Nyx.repliedToText@

@Nyx.replyAnswerText@

Reply to this Comment @Nyx.Recommender@ @Nyx.AbuseReporter@