PHILADELPHIA -- Bryce Harper hit his longest home run since 2023 on Monday night -- and then he hit an even longer one the very next inning.
Harper crushed his first homer of the night a Statcast-projected 440 feet into the second-deck in right-center field in the sixth inning. It was his longest home run since Sept. 23, 2023, but it took him less than an hour to top it.
In the seventh, Harper unleashed a missile off the facade of the second deck in right-center. It traveled a Statcast-projected 448 feet. Harper accounted for two of the Phillies’ four home runs in their 12-7 rout of the Mariners in the series opener at Citizens Bank Park.
So, after not hitting a 440-foot home run for nearly two full years, Harper hit two in a single night. He’s the only player in MLB this season with multiple 440-foot homers in the same game -- and the first Phillies player to do so since Statcast began tracking in 2015.
“I think the last 30 games have been really good,” said Harper, who has 22 extra-base hits (including 11 home runs) and a .956 OPS over his past 30. “Been hitting for power, been hitting the best I can. … But big night for the whole offense.”
Philadelphia finished with a season-high 21 hits. Every Phillies starter had at least one hit before the third inning. It was the first time they’d done that since Sept. 28, 1963, according to the Elias Sports Bureau.
Perhaps even more important than the big game from the offense was the fact that Ranger Suárez looked far more like the version from his dominant first half than the one from his recent struggles. Entering the night with a 6.59 ERA over his past five starts, Suárez turned in 6 2/3 innings of two-run ball against the Mariners.
The lefty turned in the first 10-strikeout, zero-walk outing of his career.
“He was really good, really good,” manager Rob Thomson said. “That was his best start in a while.”
The complete team effort came just hours after news that staff ace Zack Wheeler underwent a successful thrombolysis procedure to remove a blood clot in his right upper extremity on Monday morning. The Phillies are unsure when, or if, Wheeler will return this season.
In the meantime, everyone in the rotation will be asked to carry a bigger load -- particularly Suárez.
“Obviously, we don’t know how long he will be out and, personally, I just want him to recover as quickly and as good as he can,” Suárez said via an interpreter. “Coming into the stadium today, maybe that’s what we’re all thinking as a starting staff: We lost a great pitcher, we lost a great player and we just have to perform as best as we can so we can try to fill those shoes.”
Suárez certainly did his part in a much-needed bounceback outing. So, too, did Trea Turner.
Turner finally hit his first home run of the season at Citizens Bank Park -- a three-run shot that blew the game open in the second. It was also the 1,500th hit of his career. He finished the night 4-for-6 with five RBIs.
“When you lose a player of that caliber, it’s definitely going to hurt a little bit,” Turner said of Wheeler. “We don’t have to rely on one person. We can all step up a little bit. We can all play a little better defense, we can all pitch a little better, we can all hit a little better. Play as a team and I think if we all pick up a little bit of slack, we can get the job done. But we’re going to miss him."
Just about everyone picked up the slack on Monday. Along with the contributions from Harper, Suárez and Turner, J.T. Realmuto hit his first homer since July 25, and Nick Castellanos recorded his second straight multihit game after going 1-for-33 (.030) over his previous eight games.
It all came on a night when the priority for everyone in a Phillies uniform could not have been further from a baseball game. From a baseball perspective, however, it was a perfect example of what it will take to compensate for the loss of Wheeler, however long that may be.
“It's something that's hard to put in the back of your mind and not think about,” Harper said. “But obviously Zack wants us to go out there and play our game and be good and get deep into the playoffs and win a World Series.
“That's the goal and he wants us to do that.”