Harper suspended four games, Strickland gets six; both appeal

SAN FRANCISCO - Bryce Harper has been suspended four games by Major League Baseball for charging the mound yesterday after getting hit with a 98 mph fastball by Hunter Strickland, who was suspended six games for his actions.

Both players have appealed the suspensions and will be eligible to play tonight when the Nationals and Giants meet in the second game of their three-game series at AT&T Park.

The suspensions were doled out by Joe Torre, MLB's chief baseball officer, and varied somewhat from his previous rulings in similar cases involving intentional plunkings and subsequent brawls. Batters who charge the mound typically receive harsher punishments than pitchers who intentionally throw at batters, but the argument since yesterday's incident has been that Strickland deserved a longer suspension than Harper in this case.

Few, if any, came to Strickland's defense yesterday after his purpose pitch drilled Harper in the right hip, including his own Giants teammates and manager. The Nationals, as second baseman Daniel Murphy described it, felt the plunking three years after Harper hit a pair of towering postseason home runs off Strickland was "completely uncalled for."

Strickland had to be carried off the field by three teammates - including the injured Hunter Pence - after becoming enraged during the fracas.

Harper, meanwhile, was pulled out of the pile quickly and was escorted by teammate Ryan Zimmerman back to his dugout without incident moments after he charged the mound. The 24-year-old slugger's flinging of his helmet well to the side of Strickland - Was his aim terribly off, or did he purposely try to toss it away from the pitcher? - became a key point of the discussion and a complicating factor as Torre evaluated the case.

In announcing the suspensions, MLB cited Harper for "charging the mound, throwing his helmet and fighting." Strickland was cited for "intentionally hitting Harper with a pitch, inciting the bench-clearing incident and fighting."

Harper and Strickland were the only uniformed personnel ejected from yesterday's game. No other punishments were announced by MLB today.

The question now becomes whether there will be any further on-field repercussions, or whether both sides let it go.

The Nationals seemed to indicate in the aftermath yesterday they don't intend to retaliate for what they believed was Strickland acting on his own, not on the orders or the behalf of anybody else with the Giants.