Bryce Harper endures fiery ejection, fuels teammate

Frustrations are alive amongst the Philadelphia Phillies early in the season, and Bryce Harper is not afraid to show it.

Harper faced an early ejection in Monday night’s matchup against the New York Mets. He was tossed out of the fourth inning after giving home-plate umpire Mark Carlson a piece of his mind. This would mark the first ejection from a member of the Phillies since 2015.

Delays and debacles

The evening hadn’t begun with the smoothest of starts. A 95-minute first pitch delay due to the rain brought an early inconvenience.

Harper took with Carlson’s strike zone, where he felt the Phillies weren’t receiving any relief. A strike called on Cesar Hernandez drove Harper to express his emotions from the dugout, and Carlson’s listening ear gave way to the ejection. Harper then engaged in a relentless fury and began to mouth off in his first ejection of the entire season. It became the 12th ejection of his entire career.

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Harper reflected on the tirade when he spoke to the media, and acknowledged his responsibility to be a better player.

“I’m usually 0 to 100 anyways. If you look at all of my ejections, it’s usually pretty calm and then ‘bam’. Once it happens, I try to let it out I guess,” Harper said. “But, like I said, that can’t happen. I gotta stay in that game, gotta be there for my team, for this organization, my fans as well. Gotta be better.”

The result of the outrage frustrated fellow teammate Jake Arrieta, who emphasized the effect of Harper’s ejection on the team’s overall morale.

“Emotionally, it should have given us a boost, but it didn’t,” Arrieta said. “We were flat. Dugout was flat, defense wasn’t good, didn’t throw the ball well as a staff overall.”

Ultimately, the game ended in a 5-1 loss, which became their fourth loss in five games.

Up ahead

The Phillies will wrap up their series three-game series against the Mets on Wednesday, April 23.