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MLB has a big messaging problem, and it's not Bryce Harper throwing a punch

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Reiter: 'Very good for Rob Manfred to not drop the hammer' on Bryce Harper

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Bryce Harper is the face of the sport baseball needs: Edgy. Funny. Transcendentally talented. And willing to rush in a fury at Hunter Strickland, fists flying, rage on full display.

In the fight that erupted Monday between the Washington Nationals star and the San Francisco Giants' long-simmering relief pitcher, we found two truths.

The first: The best of baseball -- how it's meant to be played, and how it can rise above the din and become sports' most relevant topic -- lives on, however tenuously.