Bryce Harper gets PRP injection; out of the Phillies’ lineup Sunday and potentially Tuesday

LOS ANGELES — You’d be hard-pressed to find a worse time to pull Bryce Harper out of the Phillies lineup than Sunday afternoon, the day after he went 3-for-4 with a home run, but the Phillies decided to stick to their original plan. Harper was scheduled to get a platelet-rich plasma injection to treat the small tear in the ulnar collateral ligament of his right elbow Sunday morning. He was out for Sunday’s game against the Dodgers, and potentially for Tuesday’s home game against the San Diego Padres.

The timing is suboptimal for the Phillies. Harper is their hottest hitter now (which is saying something, considering that the Phillies lead all of baseball with a .753 OPS). Over his past six games, Harper is hitting .609/.643/1.261. He has 24 extra-base hits this season, tops in MLB, and is the only player with nine home runs and six stolen bases.

Phillies manager Joe Girardi said the team wasn’t considering pushing the PRP injection back because of how Harper has been playing. Harper’s absence required a bit of lineup shuffling. Girardi put Alec Bohm in Harper’s DH spot, kept Rhys Hoskins at leadoff, and had Kyle Schwarber batting third.

“Without Harp, it kind of changed the lineup,” Girardi said. “So we put Schwarber at three. If we have a righty, my plan is, now I could change my mind, is to put Schwarber first. But with Harper out, we just did it that way.”

When asked if he prefers to stick with a traditional leadoff hitter who stays at the top of the lineup regardless of who is pitching, Girardi said he’s fine with platooning that spot.

“Obviously, you feel comfortable having a set lineup, but if you have a set lineup versus right-handers and a set lineup versus left-handers, they’re still set lineups, in a sense,” he said.

Right-handed starter Zach Eflin, who has been on the COVID-related IL since May 8, is still set to start Tuesday, Girardi said.