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‘Always Sunny’ star reaches out to Bryce Harper on Twitter, slugger responds

Jason Rowan
| March 13, 2019

“It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia” not surprisingly has had several classic episodes revolving around the City of Brotherly Love’s professional sports teams.

Perhaps the gold standard of said sports-centric bits from the iconic series has to be Season 5’s “The World Series Defense,” in which we learn character Mac has long idolized then-Philadelphia Phillies star Chase Utley.

So much so, in fact, it is learned in the episode that Mac, portrayed by “IASIP” creator and star Rob McElhenney, penned a child-like letter to Utley in which he inquires about the potential of the two one day “having a catch.”

The best part? Utley later actually responded to the fictional letter from a fictional character.

Which brings the story to the present day in the real world. Earlier this week, McElhenney, who actually hails from Philly and is indeed a Phillies fan, found himself caught up in the Bryce Harper frenzy currently taking over the baseball-crazy Pennsylvania city.

McElhenney, in a tweet directed at Harper, riffs on the classic Utley letter by asking the new Phillies star about a possible game of catch. McElhenney also references a bit from the iconic Season 4 episode, “The Nightman Cometh.”

Harper, in a move that will further ingratiate him to the denizens of Philly, responded to the tweet.

McElhenney then replied to Harper’s response by tagging Mike Trout in a tweet, which is of course due to Harper actively recruiting the Los Angeles Angeles superstar amid some chatter of potential tampering.

Odds are McElhenney will not receive a response given what Trout had to say about Harper’s controversial statements about him. It was worth a shot, though.