ATLANTA — Bryce Harper’s misplay in right field put his team in a hole Wednesday afternoon at Truist Park.
The nine-time MLB All-Star’s home run an inning later put the Philadelphia Phillies in position for a comeback win that extended their postseason.
Alec Bohm hit a go-ahead, two-out homer for the visitors in the top of the 10th inning, and the sixth-seeded Phillies held on to beat the third-seeded Atlanta Braves 4-3 and force a decisive third game in the wild-card matchup of the National League East rivals.
The Phillies — who went just 4-9 against the Braves during the regular season while finishing six games behind the division champions and didn’t clinch the NL’s final wild card until the final day of the regular season Sunday — rallied with back-to-back homers from Kyle Schwarber and Harper in the eighth after trailing 3-1 in the seventh. Harper’s homer made up for a crucial fielding mistake an inning earlier.
“I wasn’t not trying to hit a homer, I can tell you that,” Harper, the NL MVP in 2015 and 2021, said with a smile.