WASHINGTON — Before and after the madness in the nation’s capital, Ryan Zimmerman was the calming voice of reason. Bryce Harper was coming back to D.C. on Day 6 of his official Phillies career, and everyone, including Harper himself, knew the love and hate would be at extremes all day and night.
"It's OK if nobody did anything wrong. Nobody has to be a bad guy,’’ Zimmerman pointed out in front of his locker, in a longer version of the tale he told in the same spot after Tuesday night’s game at Nationals Park. "I know that's boring, but it's OK. It is OK. Everyone can be happy."
Everybody was, from time to time and moment to moment, depending on what Harper did each time he took the field or went to the plate in his longtime home ballpark. It mattered a lot that he was the bad guy to Nats fans when he struck out the first two times he faced Max Scherzer. It mattered at least as much, if not more, that he was the good guy to the Phillies fans who took over the ballpark in the later innings — when he doubled, then singled in a run, then hit a ball nearly into the Schuylkill River in the eighth inning, flipped his bat, then did seemingly a half-dozen different celebratory greetings with teammates after crossing the plate.
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The obstacle of running the gauntlet of Nationals Park for the first time was over. The fact that his new fan base made it feel like Citizens Bank Park South eased the awkward transition for Harper.
"I understand the game; I understand the fan and player interaction and things like that," Harper said after his 3-for-5, three-RBI night and his team's 8-2 rout. "Having them back at home, knowing they're cheering and screaming at me through their TVs and stuff, and also having the huge section in right field, really fired me up.
"It's truly exciting to see that this place was filled with Philadelphia fans as well as Nats fans."
That has to sting the locals, many of whom tired of the tables being turned on them and surrendered the park to the Phillies faithful late in the evening. Expect it to continue to sting Wednesday afternoon for the brief series' finale … and for a long time to come, in all the trips Harper and the Phillies make during his 13-year free-agent deal.
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There had always been a chance that the Nationals and their more vocal supporters (or Harper-phobic supporters, at least) would go through a beatdown like this in the face of their catharsis. As much as everyone in a uniform — players, coaches and managers — preached keeping an even keel just to be able to perform amid the chaos, there was a worst-case scenario — that the Phillies would work them over, and Harper would swing the most damaging weapon.
He whiffed on those first two at-bats not because the surroundings got to him, but because Scherzer was his usual untouchable self. The next time up, Harper was better, and against the bullpen, far, far better.
"I don't really worry that much about my surroundings," he said. "It's a little different coming back here and getting booed, but for me, it’s exactly like going to another ballpark and facing someone that's lights-out electric like Max.
"So I just go out there and try to play my game," he continued, "and understand that I have teammates in that dugout that are going to pull for me every single day, I have the city of Philadelphia behind me each and every night, and if I have that, then nothing else matters to me."
Zimmerman, the elder statesman in the Nats' clubhouse, understood that.
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"I'll always appreciate him and wish him the best of luck," he said. "Not when they're playing us, obviously, but I hope he's a Hall of Famer and he breaks home run records. I've been with him since he was a teenager, I've seen him grow up as a person — not more than as a player because he has become a way better player, but seeing him grow up as a person.
"It's OK for everybody to be happy. Someone doesn't always have to be mad. It seems like that nowadays that there's always someone that needs to be upset. But it's OK for everyone to be happy."
So far, happiness is hard to come by for the Nationals. They’re now 1-3, their bullpen has been a disaster the last three games, they’ve lost both games Scherzer has started despite him giving up just one earned run … and they also lost shortstop and No. 2 hitter Trea Turner indefinitely to a broken finger in his first plate appearance.
Any other time, it would have been easier to pass off the cold start and bad luck as just that, with April 2 being way too early to panic. But the eyes of the baseball world were on the Nats on Tuesday, and not only did they not put on their best face, they couldn't even hold home-field advantage in their own park.
Harper said that with everything surrounding this game, he was "just trying to soak it all in, soak it up a bit and enjoy the day."
Him soaking in the roar of the crowd in Washington was not the way the Nationals envisioned their 2019 season beginning.
