The Phillies beat the Cardinals by a 5-3 final. It was a quality win, and there will be time to discuss all of the particulars that went into it, but let’s rewind to the sixth inning of said win.

It was eventful.

Bryce Harper stepped into the box to start the inning against Cardinals reliever Genesis Cabrera. He was promptly drilled in the face with a 97 mph sinker:

Somehow, Harper:

  1. didn’t die
  2. was able to get to his feet and leave the game under his own power

True story — I woke up with a charley horse on Monday night. I rolled off the bed and gripped the sheets for a good 7-8 minutes. I was doing this weird breathing through my teeth thing. Had tears in my eyes. Meanwhile, this man gets hit in the face with a baseball. No big deal.


Harper’s response and pain tolerance were impressive, and I think this tweet sums things up pretty well:

Once the dust settled, Cabrera, who remained in the game, geared up for his second pitch of the inning — and then drilled Didi Gregorius square in the back.

The full sequence, because you actually have to see it to believe it:

Some thoughts:

  • Did Cabrera intend to hit Harper and Gregorius? I doubt it. Joe Girardi didn’t think so. Does it matter? No. If you miss by two feet inside on consecutive pitches, the guy has to get out of the game. It’s a safety issue.
  • Terrible, terrible look for home plate umpire Chris Segal. Good look for Girardi. It doesn’t really matter if Segal, who failed to remove Cabrera from the game, was within the procedural framework to warn both benches in this situation. After two guys get annihilated due to a show of absolutely embarrassing command, a manager has every right to be pissed off. Cabrera looked like a kid taking the mound for the second half of a 7u coach-pitch game, while doing so with 95+ mph velocity. Segal didn’t seem to understand the issue at hand. Can’t happen.
  • Love tough guy Cardinals manager Mike Shildt jawing back at Girardi for rightfully telling Cabrera to, as the tweet attached to the above video suggests, throw the ball over the f****  plate.
  • I’m not a big unwritten rules of baseball guy. I previously wrote about how it’s dumb to retaliate with malicious intent after a batter celebrates a homer. That said, if two guys — one of which is your most important player — get drilled on consecutive pitches, that might be a different conversation. For me, the Phillies needed to win on Wednesday night, so putting a key runner on base late isn’t the play. Around 1:30 p.m. Thursday afternoon when the Cardinals come to the plate? I’m sure some interesting conversations will be had in the late hours of Wednesday night among Phillies coaches and players about how to handle what happened here. For what it’s worth, Aaron Nola, who will start the series finale for the Phils, has hit 32 batters in 874.1 IP. I wouldn’t bet on Nola delivering any retaliation. The Phillies have an opportunity to win their first road series of the season,  their first since last August. If things open up late? We’ll see.

UPDATE: Harper checks in. He is, in fact, both alive and fine.