Bryce Harper's first hit as a member of the Phillies was a home run.

Harper hit a 1-1 pitch from Atlanta reliever Jesse Biddle into the right-field seats for a solo homer in the bottom of the seventh inning Saturday in Philadelphia, extending the Phillies' lead to 7-4.

Major League Baseball Players Association executive director Tony Clark scolded the MLB and its teams for making a game out of the arbitration process by awarding a toy championship belt to the team deemed having done the best to keep salaries down.

"That clubs make sport of trying to suppress salaries in a process designed to produce fair settlements shows a blatant lack of respect for our Players, the game, and the arbitration process itself," Clark said in a statement issued Friday.

Brewers reliever Corey Knebel is done for the season, after deciding to undergo Tommy John surgery to repair a partially torn ulnar collateral ligament in his right elbow.

"I decided to go with surgery," Knebel said. "It's just going to be better to do it now and come back next year."

The Los Angeles Dodgers beat the Arizona Diamondbacks 12-5 on Thursday, crushing an Opening Day-record eight home runs in the process.

The eight home runs tied a franchise record for a single game -- also done May 23, 2002, when Shawn Green hit four -- and marked the first time in the live ball era that six players on any one team went deep on Opening Day.

"It's probably not going to always be like that," Cody Bellinger said, "but it's great to start off the season like that."

Max Scherzer has passed Mike Trout as baseball's highest-paid player at $37.4 million.

The average Major League salary dropped for an unprecedented second straight year on Opening Day, falling about $36,000 to approximately $4,375,000.

However, that decline was due to signing bonuses in new deals for several superstars.

Trout was highest paid last season at $34.08 million, but his new deal dropped his salary for this year in exchange for a $20 million signing bonus.

The five highest-paid players are all pitchers, with Arizona's Zack Greinke second at $32.4 million, followed by Boston's David Price and the Los Angeles Dodgers' Kershaw at $31 million each, and Washington's Stephen Strasburg at $30.7 million.

The Boston Red Sox are baseball's biggest spender for the second-straight year, according to a study of Major League salaries by The Associated Press.

Boston's payroll began the season at just under $222 million. The figure was the lowest for a top payroll since 2012.

The Chicago Cubs were second at $209 million, followed by the New York Yankees at $207 million, the Los Angeles Dodgers at $191 million, Washington at $185 million and San Francisco at $176 million.

Only five teams are under $90 million: Oakland ($88 million), Baltimore ($78 million), Pittsburgh ($77 million), Miami ($71 million) and Tampa Bay ($61 million).

The New York Mets will reportedly put top prospect Pete Alonso on their Opening Day roster.

Alonso, 24, hit .285/.395/.579 with 36 homers and 119 RBI in 132 games across Double-A and Triple-A last season.

The Tampa Bay Rays are exploring the possibility of using blue lights to tint the roof of Tropicana Field in hopes of making it easier for players to track fly balls during games.

The lights are part of a new LED lighting system installed throughout the team's home park.

They'll be used this season pending approval by Major League Baseball.

The Boston Red Sox will use a new closer with Craig Kimbrel lingering in free agency.

With Opening Day on Thursday, Alex Cora declined to reveal who will close for the Red Sox.

"I'm not going to name a closer. I've been saying it all along," Cora said. "I don't think there's a structure or a script you have to follow.

"Tomorrow, people will see what we're going to do. I feel fine. I'm OK with it."

The Red Sox open their title defense against the Seattle Mariners.

Francisco Lindor has had a setback in his recovery from a strained right calf muscle.

Lindor sprained his left ankle while running the bases in a minor league intrasquad game at the team's spring training home in Arizona.

An MRI on Lindor's ankle found a mild to moderate acute sprain, according to the Cleveland Indians.

Because the timetable for that injury had not yet been finalized by the team's medical staff, Lindor's return from the ankle sprain was still being determined.