ATLANTA -- Something must have been on Bryce Harper's mind when he circled the bases in the first inning on Saturday night at Truist Park.
Maybe he wanted to spark something in a rivalry that has been decidedly one-sided this year. Maybe he just wanted to have some fun. Harper smashed a solo home run to center field in a 12-2 loss to the Braves, handing the Phillies their only lead in a game they needed to win to help their faint NL East title hopes.
He rounded the bases in a glacial 34.27 seconds. It was his longest trot on an undisputed homer since Statcast started tracking them in 2015. It was the Phillies’ longest trot on an undisputed homer, too.
It followed Ronald Acuña Jr.’s 32.36-second trot on Sunday in Philadelphia.
It didn’t seem like a coincidence.
"I really didn’t think about it,” Harper said afterward. “Obviously, they're going to boo me when I come in here. They love their players. They love their team. Ronnie's a great player. He's going to do what he needs to do to help his team win. And he's done that, especially in the season series.
“Yeah, I mean, I don't really think too much about it when I'm doing it.”
The Phillies (82-67) are six games behind the Braves (88-61) in the NL East with 13 games to play. If the Braves finish 6-7, the Phils would need to go 13-0 to win the division because Atlanta has clinched the tiebreaker.
So, it’s probably time to focus on the NL Wild Card race. The Phils are one game behind the Cubs (83-66) for the No. 1 Wild Card spot. But they’re also only 1 1/2 games ahead of the Padres for the No. 2 Wild Card.
“I don’t worry about the division,” Phillies interim manager Don Mattingly said. “You always set out the year, you want to win your division. You would like to set yourself up with the bye, if you can. But none of that guarantees anything, even if you do that.
"So now, the focus is really to win every day. We’ve got to get ourselves in. And then, if you're good enough, you win. You win your series and you move on. If you're not, obviously you don't. Now, I don't think you have to win your division or get yourself a bye to be able to win the whole thing. And really, that's the goal from the very beginning. So nothing has changed that, right?”
If the season ended Saturday, the Cubs would host the Phillies in a best-of-three NL Wild Card Series at Wrigley Field. But if the Padres pass the Phillies in the final two weeks of the regular season and the Phils finish as the No. 3 Wild Card, the NL division winner with the worst record -- currently the Braves -- would host the Phils in a Wild Card Series.
Wouldn’t it be something if these teams met again at Truist Park in a couple of weeks?
“We’ve just got to take care of business,” Harper said. “We can't worry about what other teams are doing, especially when you're in this situation. We’ve got to play better baseball. If we don't, we're not going to be in. I think, as a team, we’ve just got to look in the mirror, understand what we need to do on a nightly basis and guys got to grind.”
The Braves are 9-3 against the Phillies this season, and Acuña has led the way. He is batting .478 (11-for-23) with three doubles, three home runs, eight RBIs and a 1.500 OPS against the Phillies since the beginning of last week’s four-game series at Citizens Bank Park.
"He's a great player,” Mattingly said. “For me, this is honestly nothing new. He terrorized clubs [when I was] in Miami. He's good all the time. If he's healthy and playing every day, he's always dangerous. And you could argue, probably the most dangerous guy on the field when he's healthy."
Acuña homered in the Braves’ eight-run fourth inning. The Phillies scratched Jesús Luzardo from Saturday night’s start because of a sore left shoulder. An MRI on Friday revealed no structural damage, only inflammation.
Luzardo and the Phillies hope he can pitch next week.
It made Saturday a bullpen game. After Tim Mayza opened with three scoreless innings, Brooks Raley and Grant Holman allowed eight runs (three earned) in the fourth to make it 8-1.
It took Acuña 31.57 seconds to round the bases following his homer, slightly faster than his time on Sunday.
He noticed Harper’s trot earlier in the game. He said he didn’t care.
"That's part of the game,” Acuña said. “If you homer, do whatever you want."