Phillies' Turner recalls Harper's "crazy" reaction to signing
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- Trea Turner just got off the phone with his agents, telling them he wanted to sign with the Philadelphia Phillies. Then his phone rang. It was his old and now new teammate, Bryce Harper.
"I swear within a minute," Turner said on "The Chris Rose Rotation" podcast, "Bryce called me. I'm like, 'How the hell did Bryce find out already?' He was just so excited. It was kind of crazy how quickly I got that phone call from him, so that was pretty cool. It just shows you how bad he wants to win and how excited he was."
Turner recalled the story on the latest episode of Chris Rose's Jomboy Media podcast, released Thursday, but the Phillies' new shortstop said Harper "actually kind of left me alone a little bit" during the free agent process.
Turner and Harper are no strangers. The pair played together with the Washington Nationals from 2015 until 2018.
Harper left Washington to sign a 13-year, $330 million contract with the Phillies in 2019, and Turner joined forces this past winter on an 11-year, $300 million deal.
The 29-year-old Turner joined Philadelphia after playing the past season-and-a-half playing with the Los Angeles Dodgers.
Turner says he's only ever played with two famous baseball players in his career -- Harper and his former Dodgers teammate, Mookie Betts.
"I know people aren't going to see it this way, but I think after playing with the Dodgers, there's only two famous baseball players I've ever played with -- like famous," Turner said. "Everyone thinks baseball players are famous, but we're really not."
Turner pointed to Harper and Betts being in the spotlight more and doing a lot of things he, himself, doesn't like doing or wants to do.
"It's just a different atmosphere for them," Turner told Rose. "You want to play the game, you want to go home to your family and those guys are just asked so much to do so many different things and be perfect all the time. Those two guys have been really, really good throughout their careers. I think they're great for the game. They're awesome dudes, I love playing with both of them."
"I just think, man, he's famous. It's weird. It's different," Turner added. "You think you make a lot of money, you do this and people recognize you, but they're on a whole other level. It's impressive how they deal with it as human beings, just be a good person every step of the way."
Turner currently is away from the Phillies to play for Team USA in the World Baseball Classic, along with his Phillies teammates Kyle Schwarber and J.T. Realmuto. Harper would have joined them, but he's recovering from Tommy John surgery.
Harper reported to spring training in Clearwater, Florida, on Wednesday.
On the podcast, Turner recalled how Phillies fans treated him when he played in Philly with the Nationals, how former Phillies outfielder Jayson Werth reacted to the boos and his excitement to face his former teammate Max Scherzer, who's with the Mets.
