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Bryce Harper's second Phillies homer was another beauty, and the Braves might have been little mad about it

Philadelphia Phillies' Bryce Harper, left, hits a homerun off Atlanta Braves relief pitcher Shane Carle during the seventh inning of a baseball game, Sunday, March 31, 2019, in Philadelphia. At right is catcher Brian McCann. (AP Photo/Matt Slocum)
Bryce Harper crushed another baseball on Sunday. (AP Photo/Matt Slocum)

The first series of Bryce Harper’s career with the Philadelphia Phillies is over. If it’s any indication of what’s to come, we’re about to see a whole lot of scorched baseballs and emphatic wins. Oh, and wild handshakes too.

The Phillies topped the Atlanta Braves 5-1 on Sunday to sweep the series and begin their much-anticipated season as the only undefeated team in Major League Baseball at 3-0. The highlight of the night was undoubtedly Harper’s second homer with the team.

Bryce Harper obliterates another baseball

The quick Statcast numbers for that home run: 398 feet and a 113.6 mph exit velocity, just 0.1 mph slower than his first career Phillies homer on Saturday. It ended up landing a little shorter, but this one was a clear no-doubter.

Harper finishes his first series with the Phillies hitting .333/.538/1.111, which we’re going to go ahead and classify as pretty good. The outfielder also used the series as a chance to debut a curiously high number of handshakes tailored to each teammate, another episode in Harper’s quest to show that he’s having the time of his life in Philly.

Next up for Harper: a day off and then a return to Washington, D.C., on Tuesday, where he’ll face his old Nationals team and Max Scherzer. That should make for some fun times.

Did the Braves mean to hit Rhys Hoskins?

The Phillies’ next at-bat also brought some fireworks, but more of the verbal kind. Braves reliever Shane Caller followed up Harper’s moonshot with an 0-1, 93-mph fastball that hit Rhys Hoskins on the left shoulder and nearly got his helmet.

Hoskins fell to the ground, immediately got back up and could be seen saying something that looked a lot like “you motherf-----” to amateur lip-readers.

Whether or not Carle meant to bean Hoskins in frustration mattered little to the home umpire, who quickly ejected Carle from the game. Braves catcher Brian McCann argued the call, insisting the hit-by-pitch wasn’t intentional, but that didn’t change any minds.

After the game, Carle left before the media could ask him about the incident, but Braves manager Brian Snitker insisted that the ball simply got away from the reliever, per The Athletic’s David O’Brien.

In the other clubhouse, Phillies manager Gabe Kapler sounded pretty convinced that the hit-by-pitch was intentional.

"It really pisses me off when balls go underneath Rhys Hoskins' chin," Kapler said according to NBC Philadelphia. "It really bugs me. He's one of our leaders. He is, in many ways, the heartbeat of our club. It really bothers me when it happens."

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