One pitch wipes out summer of success, and Phillies fall short for 16th straight season

NEW YORK (AP) — One pitch wiped out six months of success, the cruelty of 21st century baseball that rewards autumn ability over summer superiority.

Carlos Estévez crouched on the mound, put his hands on his knees and turned his head to watch over his left shoulder as Francisco Lindor sent his 2-1 fastball soaring toward right-center field. When the ball landed in Philadelphia's bullpen for a sixth-inning grand slam that wiped out a 1-0 Phillies lead, the reliever dropped his hands and his head sank.

“I knew it right away,” Estévez said after Wednesday night's 4-1 loss to the New York Mets ended the NL Division Series in four games and sent the Phillies home for the winter.

Sixteen years and counting without a World Series title. And in each of the last three seasons, Bryce Harper & Co. keep getting knocked out further from the trophy.

“Every loss is kind of the same, man," Harper said. “Any time you lose and don't finish the job of a World Series, it's the same — if it's the next round or the World Series round, it all feels pretty similar.”

Philadelphia reached Game 6 of the 2022 World Series before losing to Houston. It seemed to be on the verge of success with an offense anchored by Harper, Kyle Schwarber, J.T. Realmuto and Nick Castellanos, and a rotation headed by Aaron Nola and Zack Wheeler.

Trea Turner was added for 2023, and the Phillies took a 3-2 lead over Arizona in last year’s NL Championship Series before dropping Games 6 and 7 at home.

Then the Phillies started 46-20 this year to open a 10-game division lead and finished 95-67 to win the NL East for the first time since 2011.

“You just feel like you fail,” Turner said. “We had a fun season. We had some good memories and whatnot. But when your goal is to win the World Series and I think we talked about it plenty, it’s nothing but kind of a failure. So I don’t think it’s from lack of trying, lack of talent or who we have in the clubhouse. We just couldn’t get it done.”

There were signs of trouble heading into October. The Phillies lost eight of their last 13 games during the regular season.

“I didn't feel like we were playing like ourselves the last couple of weeks,” Turner said.

Philadelphia batters hit .186 against the Mets, including 6 for 31 with runners in scoring position. And relievers had an 11.37 ERA, allowing 11 of 15 inherited to score.

A third championship after 1980 and 2008 remains elusive. The core could be kept together. Estévez and fellow pitchers Jeff Hoffman and Spencer Turnbull are the only players eligible for free agency.

“I don’t like losing a series. I want to win a World Series, But anything can happen in a short series,” Phillies manager Rob Thomson said. “But I don’t see us going backwards, no.”

Turner understood the frustration of Phillies fans who had expected so much more.

“They're wearing this this just as hard as we are,” he said.

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Philadelphia Phillies pitcher Ranger Suárez reacts during the second inning of Game 4 of the National League baseball playoff series against the New York Mets, Wednesday, Oct. 9, 2024, in New York. (AP Photo/Adam Hunger)

Philadelphia Phillies pitcher Jeff Hoffman walks off the field after walking the bases loaded against the New York Mets during the sixth inning of Game 4 of the National League baseball playoff series, Wednesday, Oct. 9, 2024, in New York. (AP Photo/Adam Hunger)

Philadelphia Phillies manager Rob Thomson walks off the field after a pitching change during the sixth inning of Game 4 of the National League baseball playoff series against the New York Mets, Wednesday, Oct. 9, 2024, in New York. (AP Photo/Adam Hunger)

RETRANSMISSION TO CORRECT ID - Philadelphia Phillies reliever Carlos Estévez walks off the field at the end of the sixth inning after giving up a grand slam home run to the New York Mets during Game 4 of the National League baseball playoff series, Wednesday, Oct. 9, 2024, in New York. (AP Photo/Adam Hunger)

Philadelphia Phillies first baseman Bryce Harper (3) takes a break during a pitching change by the New York Mets during the sixth inning of Game 4 of the National League baseball playoff series, Wednesday, Oct. 9, 2024, in New York. (AP Photo/Frank Franklin II)

RETRANSMISSION TO CORRECT ID - Philadelphia Phillies reliever Carlos Estévez (53) reacts after giving up a grand slam home run to the New York Mets during the sixth inning of Game 4 of the National League baseball playoff series, Wednesday, Oct. 9, 2024, in New York. (AP Photo/Adam Hunger)

STOCKHOLM (AP) — South Korean poet and novelist Han Kang was awarded the Nobel Prize in literature Thursday for a poetic and unsettling body of work that the Nobel committee said “confronts historical traumas and exposes the fragility of human life.”

A slow-burning international literary star who has won multiple awards in South Korea and Europe, Han is the first Asian woman and the first South Korean writer to win the Nobel literature prize. She was awarded for books, including “The Vegetarian” and “Human Acts," that explore the pain of being human and the scars of Korea's turbulent history.

Nobel literature committee member Anna-Karin Palm said Han writes about “trauma, pain and loss,” whether individual or collective, “with the same compassion and care.”

“And this, I think, is something that is quite remarkable,” Palm said.

Nobel committee chairman Anders Olsson praised Han’s “empathy for the vulnerable, often female lives” of her characters.

“She has a unique awareness of the connections between body and soul, the living and the dead,” Olsson said.

Han is the second South Korean national to win a Nobel Prize. Late former President Kim Dae-jung won the peace prize in 2000 for his efforts to restore democracy in South Korea during the country’s previous military rule and improve relations with war-divided rival North Korea.

Speaking to the Swedish Academy by phone, Han said she had just finished having dinner with her son at home in Seoul when she got a call with the news.

She said she was both “honored” and surprised to become South Korea's first Nobel literature laureate.

“I grew up with Korean literature, which I feel very close (to)," said Han, whose father and brother are both novelists. “So I hope this news is nice for Korean literature readers and my friends, writers.”

As for celebrating the win, she said: "I’m going to have tea with my son and I’ll celebrate it quietly tonight.”

Han wins the Nobel at a time of growing global influence of South Korean culture, which in recent years has included the success of films like director Bong Joon-ho’s Oscar-winning “ Parasite,” the Netflix survival drama “Squid Game” and the worldwide fame of K-pop groups like BTS and BLACKPINK.

Han, 53, won the International Booker Prize for fiction translated into English in 2016 for “The Vegetarian,” an unsettling novel in which a woman’s decision to stop eating meat has devastating consequences.

Accepting that award, Han said writing novels “is a way of questioning for me.”

“I just try to complete my questions through the process of my writing and I try to stay in the questions, sometimes painful, sometimes — well — sometimes demanding,” she said.

Han made her publishing debut as a poet in 1993; her first short story collection was published in 1995 and her first novel, “Black Deer,” in 1998.

Works translated into English include “Greek Lessons” — about the relationship between a woman who can no longer speak and a teacher who is losing his sight — “Human Acts” and “The White Book,” a poetic novel that draws on the death of Han’s older sister shortly after birth. “The White Book” was an International Booker Prize finalist in 2018.

“Human Acts” — which Olsson, the Nobel committee chair, called a work of “witness literature” — is based on the real-life killing of pro-democracy protesters in Han’s home city of Gwangju in 1980. The book won Italy’s Malaparte Prize in 2017.

Her most recent novel, “We Do Not Part,” is due to be published in English next year. It also confronts a chapter in South Korea's 20th-century history, which saw the country endure war, the division of the Korean peninsula and dictatorship. The novel deals with a 1948-1949 uprising on Jeju, an island south of the Korean mainland in which thousands of people were killed.

Anders Karlsson, a lecturer at London's School of Oriental and African Studies who has translated Han into Swedish, said he was “overjoyed” at the Nobel accolade.

He said Han's “poignant, condensed” prose is able to describe “difficult and dark passages in South Korean history ... in quite open and inviting language that engages and does not deter the reader.”

The literature prize has long faced criticism that it is too focused on European and North American writers of style-heavy, story-light prose. It has also been male-dominated — Han is only the 18th woman among its 120 laureates.

Six days of Nobel announcements opened Monday with Americans Victor Ambros and Gary Ruvkun winning the medicine prize. Two founding fathers of machine learning — John Hopfield and Geoffrey Hinton — won the physics prize. On Wednesday, three scientists who discovered powerful techniques to decode and even design novel proteins were awarded the chemistry prize.

The Nobel Peace Prize will be announced Friday and the economics award on Monday.

The prize carries a cash award of 11 million Swedish kronor ($1 million) from a bequest left by the award’s creator, Swedish inventor Alfred Nobel. The laureates are invited to receive their awards at ceremonies on Dec. 10, the anniversary of Nobel’s death.

An earlier version of this story incorrectly said “Human Acts” was an International Booker Prize finalist in 2018. “The White Book” was a finalist for the prize.

Lawless reported from London. Corder reported from The Hague, Netherlands. Kim Tong-hyung in Seoul, South Korea, contributed.

South Korean Kim Hyung-duk, 77-year-old, holds books by the South Korean writer Han Kang after buying them at a bookstore in Goyang, South Korea, Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024. (AP Photo/Lee Jin-man)

A book store employee handles books by the South Korean writer Han Kang in London, Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024. Kang has been awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. (AP Photo/Kin Cheung)

A TV screen shows a file image of the winner of the 2024 Nobel Prize in Literature, South Korean writer Han Kang, during a news program at Seoul Railway Station in Seoul, South Korea, Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)

A TV screen shows a file image of the winner of the 2024 Nobel Prize in Literature, South Korean writer Han Kang, during a news program at Seoul Railway Station in Seoul, South Korea, Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)

Books by the South Korean writer Han Kang displayed at the Swedish Academy in Stockholm, Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024. Kang has been awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. (Jessica Gow/TT News Agency via AP)

Books by the South Korean writer Han Kang displayed at the Swedish Academy in Stockholm, Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024. Kang has been awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. (Jessica Gow/TT News Agency via AP)

A book store employee handles books by the South Korean writer Han Kang in London, Thursday, Oct. 10, 2024. Kang has been awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. (AP Photo/Kin Cheung)

Anders Olsson, chairman of the Nobel Committee for Literature 2024, speaks to the media after the announcement of the winner of the 2024 Nobel Prize in Literature, South Korean writer Han Kang at the Swedish Academy in Stockholm, Sweden, Thursday Oct. 10, 2024. (Jessica Gow/TT News Agency via AP)

Anders Olsson, chairman of the Nobel Committee for Literature 2024, speaks to the media after the announcement of the winner of the 2024 Nobel Prize in Literature, South Korean writer Han Kang at the Swedish Academy in Stockholm, Sweden, Thursday Oct. 10, 2024. (Jessica Gow/TT News Agency via AP)

FILE - Han Kang speaks to the media after winning the Man Booker International prize for fiction for her book 'The Vegetarian' in London, Tuesday, May, 16, 2016. Kang has won the Nobel Prize for Literature. (AP Photo/Alastair Grant, File)

Swedish Academy's permanent secretary Mats Malm announces the winner of the 2024 Nobel Prize in Literature, South Korean writer Han Kang at the Swedish Academy in Stockholm, Sweden, Thursday Oct. 10, 2024. (Jessica Gow/TT News Agency via AP)

Swedish Academy's permanent secretary Mats Malm announces the winner of the 2024 Nobel Prize in Literature, South Korean writer Han Kang at the Swedish Academy in Stockholm, Sweden, Thursday Oct. 10, 2024. (Jessica Gow/TT News Agency via AP)

Swedish Academy's permanent secretary Mats Malm announces the winner of the 2024 Nobel Prize in Literature, South Korean writer Han Kang, at the Swedish Academy in Stockholm, Sweden, Thursday Oct. 10, 2024. (Jessica Gow/TT News Agency via AP)

Swedish Academy's permanent secretary Mats Malm announces the winner of the 2024 Nobel Prize in Literature, South Korean writer Han Kang at the Swedish Academy in Stockholm, Sweden, Thursday Oct. 10, 2024. (Jessica Gow/TT News Agency via AP)

FILE - South Korean author Han Kang listens to a reporter's question in front of a banner of her new fiction during a news conference in Seoul, South Korea, Tuesday, May 24, 2016. Kang has won the Nobel Prize for Literature. (AP Photo/Lee Jin-man, File)

FILE - South Korean author Han Kang answers a reporter's question during a news conference in Seoul, South Korea, Tuesday, May 24, 2016. Kang has won the Nobel Prize for Literature. (AP Photo/Lee Jin-man, File)

FILE - South Korean author Han Kang poses for the media during a news conference in Seoul, South Korea, Tuesday, May 24, 2016. Kang has won the Nobel Prize for Literature. (AP Photo/Lee Jin-man, File)

FILE - A Nobel Prize medal is displayed before a ceremony at the Swedish Ambassador's Residence in London, Monday, Dec. 6, 2021. (AP Photo/Matt Dunham, File)

FILE - A close-up view of a Nobel Prize medal at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) in Bethesda, Md., Tuesday, Dec. 8, 2020. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin, File)

The Nobel Prize in literature is being awarded in Stockholm

FILE - A bust of Alfred Nobel on display following a press conference at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, Sweden, on Monday, Oct. 3, 2022. (Henrik Montgomery/TT News Agency via AP, File)

The Nobel Prize in literature is being awarded in Stockholm