WASHINGTON — Bryce Harper has little regard of how he’s viewed by opposing teams and players. The reigning National League MVP is solely concerned with his own organization and teammates.

Harper made a radio appearance with 106.7 The Fan’s Grant Paulsen and Danny Rouhier on Monday, during which he was asked if he feels misunderstood in any way.

“I’ve always said if my organization likes me and the guys on the team like me, then that’s all I care,” Harper said. “I think going onto a field every single day, I want to kick your teeth in. I want to beat you by 100 runs and do everything we can to win every single game we play. You might like me after we get out of the field, but in between the lines, you’re probably going to hate me. And that’s fine. I don’t care.”

“Everything I do in between the lines is to win ball games,” he said. “I try to respect my opponents as much as I can and do everything I can, but at the end of the day, I just want to win. I just want to do everything I can to win for this organization, put my heart and soul into every single game, every single pitch and hopefully at the end of the day we can win and do things we need to do to get to that next level.

“Away from the field and stuff, when I walk out that door, I don’t care. I mean the game’s the game and that’s not just who we are, it’s just the game we play. Once you walk out those doors, you’re ‘Bryce.’ That’s how I always look at it. On the field, I’m Bryce Harper; off the field, I’m ‘Bryce.’ And that’s to my family. But when I walk out the door, I know that I have to do everything I can to help my team win and my organization and that’s what I’m going to do.”

From the onset of the regular season, Harper has made clear his intentions to help transform the game of baseball. After hitting a home run on Opening Day, he wore a symbolic hat in front of media. On it, the words inscribed: “Make Baseball Fun Again.” This came after Harper had already called the game “tired” in an ESPN interview, firmly entrenching himself in a war against the sport’s purists and unwritten rules.

Baseball Commissioner Rob Manfred agrees the game’s younger, flashier players should be embraced. Manfred went as far as to call Harper a “spokesman for this generation” several weeks ago.

“I think to the extent that you believe, and I actually do, that Bryce Harper is a spokesman for this generation, I suspect that you will see more exuberance from our players on the field,” the commissioner said.

Harper on being called a spokesman for this generation: “Any time [the] Commissioner comes out and talks about the game, and for the betterment of the game, I think it’s great being able to be at the forefront of trying to change it for the better, hopefully.

“But you know, you always have to understand that you have to respect the guys that played before you as well. And I’ve always had a love for the tradition of the game, the history of the game — the guys that played before me — and if they didn’t play before us then this game wouldn’t be here.”

“I think with the times that are changing, with social media, with kids and fans and the interaction of fans, you try to do the things you can to make the game better with that,” Harper continued. “And you have such a great core of young guys that are coming up right now, if that’s Manny Machado, or Noah Syndergaard, or Matt Harvey or Mike Trout.

“I mean you can go on and on with such a great core of guys that are coming into the game and it’s a lot of fun to be part of. I think the fans need to really enjoy that and really enjoy the betterment of the players that are coming up. It’s a lot of fun to see.”

On Sunday, the Nationals beat the Cardinals 6-1 to wrap up a three-game sweep in St. Louis, improving Washington’s first-place record to 17-7 on the season. Max Scherzer was nearly unhittable and surrendered zero runs to Cardinals hitters over 7 innings. Chris Heisey hit his third home run of the season, all three off the bench.

Of all the great storylines to come from the game, on television, ESPN zeroed in on Harper’s four-strikeout performance. Harper was asked if he struggles to remain just one of his team’s 25 players with so much individual attention on him.

“I mean I think those guys understand,” he said of his teammates. “I think they understand the media and things like that and how they want to portray people, and portray guys and teams and whatnot. But we don’t really look at that. We don’t look at the media and all the flashy stuff and everything like that.

“I think they understand that I have endorsement deals and things that I do — magazines and all that stuff. I enjoy doing that kind of stuff and I think they understand that as well. Of course, they all mess around and give me crap for it all the time, but it’s things that I like to do.”

“That’s the thing where the ‘Make Baseball Fun Again’ kind of comes in as well,” he said. “You want to try to put the game at the forefront of sports in America and the world. So you try to do the things that you can; if that ‘s with Gatorade, or if you’re on the cover of a magazine, or doing the things you can to really put the sport on the map. And I think there’s a lot of young guys that are doing that and being able to be part of that is huge.

“I try to do the best I can to tell everybody, ‘Hey, I play for the Nationals.’ And this is what I want to do. I love the city of D.C. and I try to put the city of D.C. on the map as well. And the Nationals, and the sport and all that kind of stuff. I do it for the betterment of the team, for the organization and for Major League Baseball. But the guys understand that. I love my team and I always say it every single day: I love this team and I love playing here. It’s a lot of fun. But the biggest thing at the end of the day is winning ball games, and if we have problems with that then maybe we shouldn’t be doing the other stuff.”

Follow @ChrisLingebach and @1067TheFan on Twitter.