Bryce Harper put on a show in his first rehab outing. How many more does he really need?

Harper reached base four times and hit two home runs in his first rehab outing, but he is determined not to rush his return to the Phillies.

Bryce Harper watches his solo homer against Gwinnett in the first inning while he begins his rehab assignment at Lehigh Valley Iron Pigs in Allentown, Tues. Aug. 23, 2022.Read moreSTEVEN M. FALK / Staff Photographer

by David Murphy | Columnist

Updated Aug. 24, 2022, 5:00 a.m. ET

Published Aug. 23, 2022, 9:02 p.m. ET

ALLENTOWN, Pa. — A short distance away from where a long-haired show dog was helping to throw out the first pitch, a gaggle of fans and cameras was forming around a tunnel on the third base side of the infield. It may have been a Tail Waggin’ Tuesday at Coca-Cola Park, but the featured attraction on this particular night had two opposable thumbs, one of them surgically repaired.

When Bryce Harper finally emerged, he did so to a chorus of cheers and shutter clicks, jogging out onto the field for the first step of what the Phillies hope will be a quick journey back to their lineup. Less than 15 minutes later, he was jogging around the bases, his mammoth first-inning homer off Jared Shuster having come within 30 feet of exiting the building entirely.

By the end of Harper’s first of what is expected to be a week’s worth of rehab starts — after he’d drawn a couple of walks and hit another home run in his fifth and final plate appearance — only two questions remained.

How much more rust does Harper have to knock off?
Might it make sense for him to do the rest of the knocking against major league pitching?

“We’re gonna take it one game at a time,” Harper said after hitting two homers and reaching base four times in his first live game action since fracturing his thumb on June 25. “Understanding that tonight was great, but at the same time I need the at-bats, see different pitches, different guys, different angles. Understanding how my body is going to react, what my thumb is going to be like and just try to go from there.”

Harper has more than earned the right to take all the time he needs. It’s easy to look at his performance on Tuesday night and conclude that it would behoove the Phillies to have him work out whatever kinks remain while actively playing in their lineup. Yet baseball is as much a game of comfort and confidence as it is of physical capability. If Harper doesn’t feel ready to return to the active roster, then it doesn’t really matter how he looks.

Reaching that comfort zone is likely to require more than the five plate appearances he took in his rehab debut at Lehigh Valley. At least, if history is any indication. Heading into Tuesday, the plan called for him to spend the rest of the week with the IronPigs in advance of a potential big league return on Monday. That’s a fairly typical schedule for a player who has been sidelined as long as Harper.

“I have to understand that I need to see pitches,” Harper said. “I mean, I need to see and understand that going out there at the big league level, it’s tough to get at-bats where nobody cares. Everybody cares up there. If I see pitches here and it’s not that great, or I can play two days and take a day off or three days and take a day off, it’s great. Up there, I can’t play two days and take a day off. Being able to be down here, understanding and controlling each situations that we’re in. Just trying to control the situation that we’re in.”

Yet Harper’s talent is far from typical. Same goes for his team. The Phillies entered Tuesday with a 1.5-game cushion in the wild-card race and a remaining schedule that pegged their odds of making the playoffs at 88%, per Baseball-Reference.com. Yet they also entered it with a 5-7 record in their last 12 games, a stretch that had seen them average just 3.2 runs and absorb the potentially devastating loss of closer Seranthony Domínguez to the injured list. The Phillies will play five games between now and Monday. That’s roughly 13% of their remaining schedule.

At the same time, Harper has taken a deliberate approach to his recovery from the beginning. In fact, that mentality is one of the reasons he consistently turns in performances like the one we saw in Lehigh Valley on Tuesday. From the batter’s box to his body to his off-the-field routine, Harper has always shown an ability to train his entire focus on the here and the now. One of the things that separates elite competitors from the rest of us is their understanding of their bodies. Harper has spent the last two months building up to the day when he will return to the Phillies as the same player he was before he landed on the injured list. And even if it takes until Monday to do that, his team will still be feeling awfully good about its chances from there on out.

That being said, Harper did not rule out the possibility of a change in plans. He is not currently expecting to play the field during his rehab outing. On Tuesday, he said he could not see himself playing right field for the Phillies in September, given the current state of the damaged ligament in his throwing arm. That puts him in a different position than a lot of players who use these stints to get back into playing shape.

For now, though, the Phillies can take comfort in knowing that the reigning NL MVP is well on his way back to the lineup. This was only one step, yes. But it was clearly a big one.