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Ronald Acuna Jr. Did Ja Morant’s Grenade Celebration After Monster Home Run

Stephen Douglas

Ronald Acuna covers his ears after hitting a long bomb as a tribute to Ja Morant.
Ronald Acuna covers his ears after hitting a long bomb as a tribute to Ja Morant. / Dale Zanine-Imagn Images
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Ronald Acuna Jr. made his triumphant return to the Atlanta Braves lineup on Friday by hitting a lead off home run on the first major league pitch he'd seen in almost exactly a year. He celebrated his 467-foot shot by doing Ja Morant's grenade celebration.

Acuna, like Morant, is one of the most gifted athletes in his sport, but he rubs some people the wrong way. While Acuna was recovering from his latest torn ACL, he called out his manager on X for the way he handled an on-field incident earlier this season. This led to Jeff Francour saying the Braves didn't need the 2023 NL MVP.

Now Acuna is back and hitting balls like this.

With Morant using the celebration after he took some heat for doing finger gun celebrations, he explained that the true meaning behind the celebration was, "I'm going to take my words, I'm going to throw them out there, and then I'm going to block out the noise."

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Stephen Douglas
STEPHEN DOUGLAS

Stephen Douglas is a senior writer on the Breaking and Trending News team at Sports Illustrated. He has worked in media since 2008 and now casts a wide net with coverage across all sports. Douglas spent more than a decade with The Big Lead and previously wrote for Uproxx and The Sporting News. He has three children, two degrees and one now unverified Twitter account.

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