MILWAUKEE -- When Bryce Harper connects, it's one of the most awesome sights in sports. He unloads on the ball, uncoils on it, and when he barrels it up, it's only a matter of watching how far it goes. You can't look away when he steps to the plate, whether you're cheering or booing. Goodness knows, Harper has heard plenty of both during his seven-plus seasons in the majors.
This season alone, Harper has three of the 28 longest homers in baseball and sports an average homer distance that ranks ninth, but even these numbers hardly do justice to the majesty of his long-ball swing. High, soaring shots are Harper's calling card ,and they have been since he was a teenage catcher. And when that calling card is missing ... it tends to brighten the glare in one of baseball's brightest spotlights. This is one of the shows in The Show, one that landed for an extended run with the Philadelphia Phillies before this season. So much -- so much -- has already been written about it. He understands.
"Everybody's got a job to do," Harper said, addressing his inquisitor. "Just like you doing an interview right now. You have a job to do. You're going to write what you want, just like anybody else is going to write what they want. I respect that."
Any fair analysis of Harper's career ought to note that he has done a lot more with his career than hit tape-measure home runs. That skill, in itself, won't get you a 13-year, $330 million contract like the one he landed from the Phillies. Over the course of his career, Harper ranks seventh among all hitters with a .386 on-base percentage and 12th with a .379 wOBA. His fWAR ranks 12th among hitters.
Yet, it's the long ball for which Harper is mostly known, and only 11 players ever hit more through their age-25 season than the 184 bombs he hit for the Washington Nationals. The homers are why pitchers handle him with such care. The homers, or the anticipation of them -- along with some kind of innate ability to attract all manner of attention -- are why Philadelphia's attendance is up 10,794 fans per game over this point last season. That's an increase more than three times as large as any other team's.
When the Phillies officially signed Harper on March 2, it was the final piece of a puzzle five years in the making. Philadelphia's aggressive offseason had already announced to all and sundry that the rebuild was over. The time to win is now. The signing of Harper was the pièce de résistance, the promotional poster that told us the Phillies planned to win right way, win big and win for a long time.
Last week, the Phillies arrived in Chicago fresh off a series sweep of the Colorado Rockies. The day before, Harper cranked his ninth homer, a 404-foot shot off left-hander Mike Dunn. It had a hang time of 5.6 seconds, just above his 11th-ranked average of 5.5. It was a hopeful sign for a slumping superstar. After a fast start to his Philadelphia career, Harper tumbled to a .185/.329/.338 line over a 36-game span, leading to the first appearances from the famous boo-birds of Citizens Bank Park and analytical scrutiny from every corner of the web.
"Like I said, everybody's got a job to do," Harper said. "Whatever they write, they can write. I've been going through this since I was 16 years old. Doesn't really bother me at all. I've got a great family, a great team, a lot things are bigger than what people are writing. I just try to go out there and do what I know how to do."
The good news was that Harper had finished that homestand strong, hitting in five straight games and homering in the last two. Perhaps things were starting to roll again. It was time to hit the road for seven games against the two beasts of the NL Central. It was a chance to give fans in the Midwest -- most of them hostile -- a chance to bear witness to another Bryce Harper home-run binge.
And as Bryce-curious fans watch, they may just catch a glimpse of a team that is a lot more than him, one that appears to be coming out of a five-year-long hibernation.
May 20, The Jake Arrieta Game: Phillies nip the Cubs, Bryce shows off his arm, but all eyes are on Jake.
The Phillies' offseason netted two former MVPs (Harper and Andrew McCutchen), two 2018 All-Stars (shortstop Jean Segura and catcher J.T. Realmuto) and a former All-Star closer in David Robertson. That's five key spots belonging to name-brand performers known for their feats in other places.
That description is most apt for Arrieta, who was making his first start at Wrigley Field since leaving the Cubs for the Phillies as a free agent before last season. Chicago is where Arrieta won his Cy Young Award (2015) and his championship ring (2016). He hasn't forgotten, and neither have the fans. When Arrieta strode to the plate for his first appearance with the bat, he received a standing ovation from the denizens of the friendlier-than-usual confines.
"It felt great," Arrieta said. "It was something that I experienced pretty much from Day 1 here, with the fan base, and Cubs fans all across the country and all across the world. They really respect and appreciate what guys are able to do for them. It means a lot, it really does. I'll never forget this city, the fan base and organization."
Of course, Arrieta is with a new team trying to win another ring for a team that is working to quench a brief, by Cubbie standards, 11-season title drought. He's not Cy Young Jake at this point, and he's not even the No. 1 starter in Philly, a designation that goes to 2018 breakout star Aaron Nola. But Arrieta has been very good for the Phillies, stabilizing a rotation that is still cycling through young pitchers who collectively are trying to prove they can stick on a contending team.
Arrieta was in the same spot as Harper last year -- a premium free agent and Scott Boras client who ended up waiting until spring training for an acceptable offer. His signing signified that the Phillies were emerging from their rebuild, while Harper's suggested that they had emerged. Count Arrieta a fan.
"I don't think I'm surprised, because I know what kind of guy he is now, from a personal point of view," Arrieta said. "It's obvious that he takes it very seriously. Regardless of what's going on at the plate, and whatever happened the last couple of weeks, he's out there to do whatever he can to save outs, take away hits and help us win a game."
As for Harper, there were no homers on this night, a cold spring affair with a game-time temperature of just 50 degrees. He was booed every time he came up, which happens everywhere he goes. It's so reflexive at this point that you get the feeling the fans can't remember why they are booing him. The first ball Harper hit rocketed off his bat at 115.5 mph, only to find Jason Heyward's glove. After that, all he could muster was a walk, dropping his season slash line to .229/.367/.465.
That's not to say that Harper didn't contribute: In the fifth inning, he uncorked a 96 mph bullet that Realmuto caught before wheeling around to put an acrobatic tag on a sliding Anthony Rizzo. It was a key play in a game the Phillies won 5-4.
"When you have a catcher like that, who can move around and is agile," Harper said, "he does a really good job with his glove. I just try to make an impact on both sides of the ball. I talked a lot about that in spring."
May 21, The Juan Nicasio Game: Gabe Kapler's bullpen blues, Harper has fun with the bleacher bums.
One thing you hear about Harper's presence in a clubhouse is that he takes the pressure off everyone else by being such a lightning rod for the fans and media. Everyone else is able to relax and go about their business in blissful anonymity.
It's a nice thought, but it's only true to a certain extent. Harper makes headlines pretty much every time he opens his mouth, but here's the thing: He doesn't open his mouth that often. He doesn't vibrate with electricity. He isn't surrounded by hordes of reporters as he goes about his pregame routine. Harper is, in essence, just another ballplayer on just another team in just another clubhouse. The season is long -- you can't write about the guy every day, and Harper speaks to the media less frequently than most of his teammates.
Not that Harper doesn't manage to exhibit that little extra flair from time to time, which seems to keeps the spotlight pointed his way. After he caught Kyle Schwarber's fly ball to end the sixth, Harper turned and motioned as if he were going to toss the ball up into the bleachers. Instead, he threw the ball over the bleacher bums and onto Sheffield Avenue.
"Same old stuff," a playful Harper told reporters the next day. "They were really nice last year because they wanted me, you know? They were nice to me, but now they're back to not."
Enter Gabe Kapler, in his second season as the Phillies' manager. He's baseball's ubermensch, a lifer who has scouted, worked in the media, handled player development, coached, managed, played -- all by the age of 43, and all while becoming fluent in analytics and maintaining an Adonis-like physique. He was born in Hollywood and looks like it.
Kapler was the guy who, last year, endured a wave of think-pieces calling him a mad scientist who was trying to reinvent baseball. ("I remember those pieces vividly," he says.) To be sure, there were some missteps and head-scratchers. Yet the bottom line was that Kapler was a first-time manager leading a team that was supposedly still in developmental mode, and he drove it to a first-place standing that lasted into August.
This year, it feels like Kapler is more like just another big league manager trying to make his way in the world in one of the game's most-demanding markets.
You don't see as many of the mad-scientist pieces, but Kapler's second season certainly has not gone unscrutinized. His handling of an injury-plagued bullpen has drawn the most attention.
As Philadelphia embarked on its trip to the Midwest, they had four key arms on the injured list: Victor Arano (elbow, out until at least June), Tommy Hunter (forearm, also expected to be out until June), Edubray Ramos (bicep, June) and Robertson (elbow, July). During the trip, veteran sidearmer Pat Neshek reported pain in his shoulder and was sent back to Philly.
Bullpens ... a 21st century manager's biggest pain in the patootie, or so you would think.
"First, it's my favorite part [of managing]," Kapler said. "I love pitching. It's the most interesting and exciting part of the game for me."
That night, Zach Eflin threw six solid innings, while Edgar Garcia and Jose Alvarado got the game to the ninth with the Phillies up 2-1. But finally, Kapler pulled the wrong lever or, more accurately, the only lever he had left to pull that night wasn't a good one. Nicasio came in, struggled with his command, and lost the game, the final blow coming on Javier Baez's pinch-hit single. The Cubs evened the series with a 3-2 victory.
Life as a big-league manager is plagued by such nights. You piece together the perfect plan with what you have to work with that day, and then one cog breaks down, halting the entire machine. For the Phillies, at a time when baseball is scrambling to staff bullpens with quality arms to fill the higher-than-ever demand for relief innings, Kapler's ability to keep the engine running most nights could well determine how they fare in the NL East race.
"It's like a puzzle," Kapler said. "My favorite thing about it is there are so many unknowns. Can a guy go two days in a row, three days in a row? What's the threshold? How much rest does he need after he goes two days in a row? How can we keep our guys fresh, but also go after today's win.
"It is really an interesting challenge. It's not black and white. It's very nuanced. One reliever is not like another."
Back in Bryce World, Harper's deke of the bleacher bums was his sole highlight of the night. He went 0-for-4 at the plate, dropping to 0-for-8 for the series. He did make a fine play on Heyward's liner in the third. But everyone waiting for Harper's next moonshot would have to wait another day.
May 22, The Cole Irvin Game: Rotation flux, a surprise bunt and the dawn of the new Phillies regime.
Irvin entered his third career start with a chance to solidify his spot in the Philly rotation, even just for the short term. Power righty Vince Velasquez was nearing his return from a forearm strain, and Kapler said his role was up for discussion. There was an upcoming day (Tuesday) with a "to be determined" listed as the Phillies' starter. The eventual identity of that starter injected a mild dose of drama into the week.
Irvin had allowed just four runs and a .531 OPS over his first two big league starts. But it was 80 degrees in Chicago with an 18 mph wind blowing out and, well, that's never good news for the pitchers. Irvin went 4⅔ innings, allowing seven runs and a pair of homers. One of the dingers was a Rizzo smash that broke a portion of the Budweiser sign that towers over the right-field bleachers. The next day, Irvin was optioned to Triple-A Lehigh Valley.
"I don't know that we have that much information on Cole yet," Kapler had said prior to the outing. "It's still pretty early in the process."
We will surely see Irvin again at some point, but there was some unmentioned poignancy to his matchup that day against the Cubs' Cole Hamels, the longtime Phillies starter and core member of the 2008 champions. It was his first career start against his former team.
However, this was different than Arrieta's return to Wrigley. While many of Arrieta's title-winning teammates remain on the Cubs' roster, Hamels was traded away from the Phillies in 2015, fully kicking off the rebuilding process from which Philadelphia is just emerging. While there are a handful of current Phillies still around that Hamels played with, none of them were members of that championship team.
Irvin was drafted in 2016, making him the first draft pick during the tenure of general manager Matt Klentak to reach the majors. Klentak took over the job after the 2015 season, during which the Phillies moved on from former GM Ruben Amaro Jr. Amaro was roundly criticized both for hanging on to the remnants of the championship core too long, and for not doing enough to augment that core with useful role players while that window of contention was closing.
Amaro's time with the Phillies -- 10 years as assistant GM, then GM from 2009 to 2015 -- wrapped around one of the golden eras in the history of a franchise that has lost 323 more games than any other. You can argue whether or not the period of 2003 to 2012 was the franchise's high point, or if it was the clubs of the late 1970s and 1980s. But the teams built by Ed Wade, Pat Gillick and Amaro finished .500 or better in 10 straight seasons, won five straight NL East titles from 2007 to 2011, took two NL pennants and that 2008 World Series crown -- one of just two in Phillies' annals.
While Amaro was slow to hit the reset button, his fingerprints are all over this year's Phillies. Here's the list of the players on Philly's 40-man roster who came into the organization under Amaro: Drew Anderson, Victor Arano, Dylan Cozens, Austin Davis, Seranthony Dominguez, Zach Eflin, Jerad Eickhoff, Maikel Franco, Arquimedes Gamboa, Edgar Garcia, Cesar Hernandez, Odubel Herrera, Rhys Hoskins, Scott Kingery, Andrew Knapp, Adonis Medina, Adam Morgan, Hector Neris, Aaron Nola, Nick Pivetta, Roman Quinn, Edubray Ramos, Yacksel Rios, Ranger Suarez, Mitch Walding and Nick Williams.
And here are the ones to come in under Klentak's direction: Jose Alvarez, Jake Arrieta, Enyel De Los Santos, Phil Gosselin, J.D. Hammer, Bryce Harper, Tommy Hunter, Cole Irvin, Andrew McCutchen, Pat Neshek, Juan Nicasio, J.T. Realmuto, David Robertson, Sean Rodriguez, Jean Segura and Vince Velasquez.
Paradoxical as it may seem, the younger players on the current roster were nearly all acquired by Amaro, a GM who hasn't made a move for the team in 3½ years. It also makes sense: Amaro's efforts laid the youthful foundation for the Phillies, while Klentak came aboard and has since gone about filling in the gaps, a process that remains ongoing. Klentak simply hasn't been around long enough for the fruits of his staff's amateur acquisition efforts to ripen on that front. Thus Irvin is the only one of his prospects to break through so far.
According to Baseball-Reference.com, the Amaro guys have compiled 6.4 WAR thus far for the 2019 Phillies, while the Klentak guys are at 6.7. Amaro made plenty of mistakes, not the least of which was a neglect of analytics. Nevertheless, both executives deserve credit for this year's roster. However, Amaro guys, Klentak guys -- it's all on Kapler to steer them to the finish line this time around.
"My biggest lesson from last year is that if I can help our players stay confident, if I can help our players feel comfortable," Kapler said, "that's more important than hunting for every marginal advantage in-game. In other words, rather than trying to optimize the lineup every day to score the most runs possible on paper -- how do our players feel about their spot in the lineup? Really pay attention to the emotions and confidence levels in the clubhouse. What I learned is that's more important than tactical advantages."
With Irvin getting pounded early and often, the Cubs built a big lead and held on for an 8-4 win. Hamels went only four innings, earning a no decision for his effort. The poor outing for Irvin suggested he might need more time in the minors, which is where he returned. But with Velasquez's role unclear, that meant Kapler was left to deal with a rotation hole on top of his ever-changing bullpen puzzle.
On the Harper front, he flew out to the wall in his first at-bat and once again went homerless, even on that day of ideal conditions for homer hitting. His 0-for-9 start to the series appeared to call for drastic measures: In his second at-bat, he dragged a bunt past Hamels for a single.
It was Harper's 12th career bunt single. He ended up with two more singles on what turned out to be a productive day. But, still, no homers.
May 23, The Aaron Nola Game: Success in the wind, first-round failures and a lineup presence.
Aaron Nola took the mound Thursday, an afternoon affair with another hitting-friendly wind blowing out. Nola held the Cubs hitless on his first trip through the order and pitched into the sixth of a 9-7 Phillies win that became dramatic late because of more Philadelphia bullpen issues.
Nola usurped the assumed place of Arrieta as Philadelphia's ace in 2018. He ranks 11th in pitcher fWAR since the beginning of last season. And while Nola limped a bit out of the gate, he has now gone 4-0 with a 3.05 ERA over his past seven outings.
Nola is a bit of a unicorn on the Phillies: He is the only player picked in the first round by the organization who currently is contributing at the big league level. He has compiled 16.6 bWAR in his career after being picked seventh overall in 2014. The last Phillies first-round selection to put up 10 or more career bWAR prior to Nola was Hamels -- picked way back in 2002.
So while Amaro brought in many of the players currently on the roster, there was a glaring hole in terms of the kind of premium production you get from high-ceiling first-rounders. Former top prospect J.P. Crawford was used a ballast this offseason by Klentak to bring back Segura and Nicasio via trade, but beyond him and Nola, Philadelphia has gotten zippo at the big league level from first-round picks since winning the World Series.
Thus Klentak was left to use free agency and the trade market to bring in the top-of-the-roster producers that should have come from at least three or four first-round draft picks. And at the top of the roster, there is Harper -- the first overall pick by Washington back in 2010.
All of the new additions, including Harper, contributed to the Phillies' win. McCutchen doubled twice, walked and scored a pair of runs. Segura had a double and homer, two runs and two RBIs. Realmuto homered. And Harper had an RBI single, though he once again failed to go deep.
Harper also drew an intentional walk to load the bases in the eighth for Hoskins, who popped out. This has been a much more normal season for Hoskins, who struggled at the plate for much of the 2018 season and especially with the glove as he mostly played out of position in the outfield.
"One thing I think about when talking about this," Hoskins said, "is that all of us in this room wouldn't be here if we didn't learn to separate offense from defense in the minor leagues. Does it weigh on you when you go home at night? Sure. But when you're on the field, the ability to separate, to not take at-bats into the field, and not taking whatever happens on the defense to the box, you kind of have to learn that."
This season, he's back at first base and, usually, has the added benefit of hitting behind McCutchen, Segura and Harper, and in front of Realmuto.
"You can't pitch around all of us," Hoskins said. "You've got to pick your spots of who you're going to go after."
One reason you probably don't see as many "Kapler as mad scientist" pieces is that the addition of four veterans means that he can roll with a largely set lineup. That he has chosen to do so might indicate growth, or it may simply be, as he did last season, Kapler is running this year's team based on the personnel on hand.
"Last year's personnel, in order for us to be competitive, required us to tinker a little bit, us to mix and match a little bit," Kapler said. "This year, we have a guy at first base who is not coming out of the lineup. A guy at second base who is performing very well and is probably an everyday player, in the lineup regularly. Segura is our shortstop. He plays every single day, fills the two-hole, no need to move him out that position.
"Our left fielder and right fielder are former MVPs who are going to play every single day and are going to continue to dominate in their roles and in the lineup. There just hasn't been the need to be especially creative. Our guys are dependable horses and we're going run them out there and try to make them as comfortable as possible while getting them an occasional rest day. [Even] our catcher is a guy that never wants to come out of the lineup."
May 24, The J.T. Realmuto Game: A display of old-school fundamentals, dueling MVPs and a possible bullpen solution.
Here's one way to look at how much things can change in baseball: Even if you left contracts out of the equation, do you think the Brewers would trade Christian Yelich straight up for Bryce Harper?
Probably not, but that picture could change in about a month if Harper goes off and Yelich goes into a deep slump. The former seems a lot more likely than the latter. Yelich looks every bit as potent as he did during his run to the 2018 NL MVP and, in this game, he knocked his 20th home run of the season.
Good thing, too: Yelich had missed a couple of games because of a balky back. The night before the start of the Phillies series, Yelich was spotted at the Fiserv Forum, taking in a Bucks-Raptors Eastern Conference finals matchup. When Yelich was shown on the scoreboard, he did the thing that has somehow become obligatory for athletes and celebrities to do: He chugged his drink.
"When I saw him doing that, I was pretty sure he was going to play today," Brewers manager Craig Counsell joked. "It made me feel really good."
Yelich's good-natured act only endeared him even more to the fans in Brewtown. But here's the thing: Can you imagine if Harper had been spotted doing the same thing at a Sixers game? Harper is a devout Mormon who famously abstains from alcohol, so this is even more hypothetical than most hypotheticals. Chances are, Harper would have been hammered for letting his hair down. There is a weird double standard when it comes to telling Harper's story and that of most of the game's current set of stars.
Why? Who knows? Some people incite strong reactions one way or another, and Harper is one of those people.
"I think Bryce wants to be looked at as a member of this year's team," Kapler said. "He wants to be looked at as a leader in the clubhouse, not the leader. I think he's done so successfully. He's certainly not shied away from any opportunities to take pressure off his teammates. He's been accountable, and from my perspective incredibly professional.
"But he's big. His personality is bright and positive. And he's a great teammate. I've had a great experience with him so far."
There have already been a string of stories about Harper's fluctuating batting average, which is kind of ironic since no one is supposed to look at that as an evaluative metric any more. To be sure, a month of sub-.200 hitting with a load of strikeouts is never a good thing. However, even when Harper goes into funks with his average, he's generally still getting on base via walks -- he led the NL last season -- and makes hard contact when he does meet the ball.
"I think that his mechanics are really good," Kapler said. "They are the kind of mechanics that you teach. I remember back when I was an analyst working for Fox, I used to talk how pretty the mechanics are, how violent the backside is. We always talk about the back knee dropping down and toward the firm front side, and how that creates all sorts of torque and power. He does all of those things."
Harper's method of dealing with funks seems to be to just stick with his routines and to keep moving forward. According to ESPN Stats & Information tracking, patience for Harper is more than a virtue -- it's a necessity. Just 42 percent of pitches Harper has seen this year have been in the strike zone, the fifth-lowest rate in MLB. He tends not to tinker.
"I'm not a very big video guy or anything like that," Harper said. "There are times when you're going to struggle, and there are times when you're going to be really good. I'm just trying to stay even keel, not get too high or get too low. Really just enjoy the process of going through the struggle, and enjoy the process of going through really good stuff as well. I just try to maintain as well I can and play well on both sides of the ball."
In the meantime, he contributes by walking, running hard on the bases and, this season at least, by playing plus defense and making plays with his strong arm. Harper's defensive runs saved (DRS) total last season plummeted to minus-26. So far this season, he's at plus-1.
The Phillies need every bit of defense they can get. Last season, Philadelphia's minus-132 team total for DRS was easily the worst in baseball. So far in 2019, they are at minus-3, ranking near the middle. If the lineup produces at the plate as expected, that will be more than good enough.
Besides Harper, Hoskins' return to first base has boosted the defense, as has the steady play of Segura. Plus, in Realmuto, the Phillies have one of the game's best defensive backstops, a rare-these-days everyday catcher who also serves as a kind of defensive captain.
That was on display in the Brewers' half of the fifth. With Yelich on third and Ryan Braun on first, Milwaukee had Braun take off and stop halfway between first and second. The hope of course was to get Realmuto to throw through to second, to allow the streaking Yelich to score.
Instead, Realmuto and Segura sniffed it out. The catcher popping out of his crouch and a charging shortstop was Yelich's signal to break for home. But Segura caught the ball on the run in front of the bag and threw back to Realmuto, who put on the tag.
"A lot of spring training work," Realmuto said. "We practiced that just about every other day in spring training. Doesn't really happen that often during the season, but we have specific plays we have to put on. The plan there was that if I threw it through, it was coming back to me, because we knew they were just going to try to steal a run."
Perhaps it's reading too much into one play, but it's a sequence that feels unlikely to have happened with last year's squad.
"I think we can be a better defensive club than we've shown," Kapler said. "I think we can execute on fundamental plays more consistently. I think we have individuals who have stood out and really made some great plays for us. But generally I think there is more in the tank. I think we are a better defensive club than we were last year."
The Harper homer watch went on: He hit a sacrifice fly his first time up and stroked an RBI double in fifth. He didn't leave the yard.
May 25, The Andrew McCutchen Game: Bucks, beats, a bomb and a masterpiece.
Saturday was a festive day in Milwaukee, with the temperature climbing into the 80s and the roof open for a mid-afternoon matinee at Miller Park. The Bucks were slated to play their Game 6 in Toronto that night, while Flo Rida was scheduled to perform at the ballpark once the game ended. A little something for everyone.
For Kapler, Saturday's game was fraught with peril. In Friday's win, he had gotten six shutout innings from his hard-working bullpen. Six innings made necessary by a short outing from starter Jerad Eickhoff. Kapler needed Arrieta to get deep into the game.
By the time Arrieta threw his first pitch, he already had a lead. That was provided by McCutchen, who hit a towering home run to center field off Chase Anderson to lead off the game. While everyone, as always, zeros in on Harper, McCutchen has been coming on of late, hitting .333/.440/.690 over his previous 11 games with three homers and 11 RBIs. This is exactly what the Phillies hoped for when they inked McCutchen this winter, well before he knew he'd be playing an outfield corner opposite Harper.
"He's really intense in his at-bats," Kapler said. "When he's intense and fighting for every pitch, because he knows the strike zone so well, really good things happen. He's had really good at-bats all year, but [lately] the ball has been starting to jump off his bat.
"One of the things that we talked about when we acquired Andrew was that he's capable of reproducing one his top-notch years in our ballpark. When the weather gets warm, he's going to heat up, and we expect that he's going to produce."
The Phillies hit three more homers -- none by Harper, who went 0-for-4 with a walk -- but they didn't need much offense. Arrieta was brilliant, going eight innings on 100 pitches before giving way to Jose Alvarez.
"What we're trying to do as a staff is establish the strike zone early and pitch deep into games," Arrieta said. "Preservation of the bullpen is what the best teams do. You reap the rewards of that late in the season."
Kapler was ecstatic about Arrieta's well-timed outing, but almost as excited about his club's ninth inning. That frame featured back-to-back homers from Hoskins -- a two-run shot -- and Realmuto, a rally that turned a 4-2 lead into a 7-2 romp.
The upshot: That meant Kapler was able to avoid using closer Hector Neris for a third straight game. Little things like that, strung together, with one unit picking up another, and one game's success spilling over to the next, a process replicated dozens of times over the six-month season, is what contention looks like.
"It would be easy to [dismiss] Rhy's home run and J.T.'s home run as a couple of tack-on runs," Kapler said. "Those were enormous runs for us. Huge, huge home runs. It allows us to preserve Neris, gives us a fresh, fully-loaded bullpen, relatively speaking, heading into the last game of the series, and then we have an off-day the following day."
May 26, The Vince Velasquez Game: Bullpen blues again, the long-ball wait is out of time, and the offense gets overwhelmed.
A win in the last game of the series in Milwaukee not only would have given the Phillies a sweep of the tough Brewers, but it would have turned a good trip into a great one. Before the game the clubhouse was quiet, with players, including Harper, sitting around watching a soccer game on ESPN.
The game turned into a rout. Milwaukee starter Brandon Woodruff threw five perfect innings before backup catcher Andrew Knapp homered for the Phillies. He was the only baserunner the Phillies had all day. Meanwhile, Eflin gave up a couple of homers and the game turned into a rout when Velasquez gave up four runs, including homers by Yelich and Hernan Perez, in two-thirds of a inning.
Before the game, Kapler announced that Velasquez was going to stay in the bullpen and Nick Pivetta would be summoned from the minors to fill in that "TBD" hole for the mysterious Tuesday start. On Friday, Velasquez looked like the next great two-inning reliever, striking out four in his first outing off the injured list and touching 97 mph with his heater. Then, on Sunday, he looked like the maddeningly inconsistent pitcher he often has been as a starter.
It was a downer way to end a successful trip, one that succeeded with zero home runs from Bryce Harper. For anyone who had followed the Phillies from Chicago to Milwaukee, hoping to catch at least one Bryce bomb, it was not to be. There was no joy in Brewtown in the trip finale -- the mighty Harper struck out. Three times.
The trip ended 4-3 for the Phillies, not a bad outcome by any stretch, and they carried that mark with them back home to the crucible of the Philadelphia sports world.
Epilogue
Here is how you know your team is trying to win as soon as possible: It signs two former MVPs and trades for both an All-Star shortstop and the consensus best catcher in the game. It does all of this over the course of one offseason. It's good stuff, at least until the season begins. Then you have to actually go out and win games.
Harper's numbers aren't where they should be and he knows it. He tends to shy away from live batting practice except before the first game in a series at a new park, so he can adjust to the backdrop. He does most of his work in the cages, to maintain his routine and "evolve it here and there if I need to." Mostly though, he just tries to navigate the long season.
"I think it's just, we play 162 games a year," Harper said. "Some guys like to swing a lot. For me, I just try to get through 162 and not swing so much. Keep strong and going through that for a whole grind, a whole year. Swinging on the field every day, it just doesn't do it for me."
Still, as it was last year, even during fallow periods of rising strikeouts and dropping batting average, Harper is a positive factor for his team. His .227/.355/.438 slash line is likely more the floor for his performance than it is a new baseline. Well, it better be.
"I have a job to go out and perform and do what I need to do," Harper said. "Have I been doing that right now to the best of my ability? Probably not. I just try to keep positive. That's about it. I don't really look at my walks or anything like that. My number of walks are going to be what they're going to be at the end of the year, homers and RBI, too. Hopefully my average ends up where it needs to be."
Add to the likely better days to come for Harper the fact that the Phillies' offense overall has hovered around league average, well short of preseason projections. That could be construed as a good thing, of course; positive regression is never a given.
"I understand what you're saying," Kapler said. "I can appreciate what you're saying. I think there is that 'waiting for everyone to click all at the same time' narrative. I don't know how realistic that is. Most of the clubs I have been around, they've had some of the guys swinging the bat really good at times. Others, not at the top of their game.
"We have seen that when we've gotten contributions from up and down the lineup, not everybody in the lineup but each segment of the lineup, we have been pretty explosive and have worn pitchers down. We do believe that is something that is part of the character of our team."
The Phillies had Memorial Day off, sitting in first place with a 31-22 record, but you'll have to excuse any Philadelphia fan not willing to succumb to giddiness. As mentioned, the Phils led the division as late as Aug. 12 last season, and added veterans Asdrubal Cabrera, Wilson Ramos, Jose Bautista, Justin Bour, Luis Avilan and Aaron Loup to augment a run for the postseason. Instead, they collapsed, going 15-30 to finish the season at 80-82.
Because of the fade of 2018, you could argue that the spotlight on Kapler is as bright as it is on Harper, and it may shine more brightly on Klentak than anybody else. This is really the first Phillies big-league roster that has as much of a Klentak stamp as it does an Amaro stamp. But it is not a perfect roster, and Klentak will be tasked with filling in the gaps with hopefully more success than he did a season ago. But it could well be that the key gaps have already been filled.
"It's a comforting feeling," Kapler said. "These guys are all different in how they contribute to the clubhouse in unique and important ways. But they all do so professionally. They've all been there before, and they are all committing to be as tight as possible a unit. And we're starting to see it come together. It's starting to really, really gel."
First place on Memorial Day gets you nothing except some early-season attention. The Phillies are still crystallizing as a unit, and the challenges will continue to mount. A terrible example of that occurred shortly after the Phillies returned to the East Coast when Herrera was arrested on charges of domestic violence. He was placed on administrative leave by MLB pending an investigation. Now all eyes will be on them to see how they handle one of the most sensitive topics on today's sports landscape.
The rebuild may be over, but everyone in Philadelphia -- the organization, Kapler, Klentak and especially Harper -- still have so much left to prove.
"I don't know man, winning is exciting," Arrieta said. "We did a pretty good job of that last year up until August. We've got a better team overall. We've shown that over the first quarter of the season. If we stay healthy, we're going to be good regardless. I think we've shown that we're one of the best teams in baseball and we deserve to be in that category."