Bryce Harper: Flourishing Major League Baseball Player

Are the Nationals playing their best outfielders, game in and game out?

As our Grant Brisbee recently pointed out, we should expected a second-half slump from the Nationals’ teenager ... and that’s exactly what we’ve gotten: Since the 12th of June, Harper’s been terrible, with a .211/.277/.322 batting line. And yet he continues to play almost every day.

And, lo, he has been slumping. On June 12, Harper went 3-for-4 with a home run to bring his average/on-base/slugging up to .307/.390/.553, good for a .943 OPS. That would be otherworldly for a teenager in 2002, much less the pitcher-friendly 2012. He was a titan, a devourer of worlds, an instant All-Star. While the MVP was still something of a stretch, he pretty much had the Rookie of the Year locked up.

Since that game: .208/.281/.300, with three homers and 53 strikeouts in 207 at-bats.

Angel Hernandez is a bad umpire.

There are controversial opinions among baseball fans. This is not one of them. Opening an article with that sentence is like proclaiming, “Baseballs … should not be oblong.” There are more divisive stands to take.

I was an idiot when I was a teenager. You were an idiot when you were a teenager. If you’re still a teenager, well, you seem nice, and thanks for coming to the site, but you’re about to do something really stupid. You should probably put down those car keys and sit on your hands for a couple of years.

Now it’s Ozzie Guillen as agent provocateur, trying to goad Harper into doing something stupid.

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(That’s Sen. Harry Reid from Nevada, home of noted clown-disparager Bryce Harper.)

But it’s become a thing, a meme. It might not be up there with “talking about practice” or “playoffs?” in the soundbite hall of fame, but it’ll do for the short term. I’ve watched it 15 times, and I can’t figure out why people think it’s interesting. I guess it’s as simple as “clown question” terminology punctuated by a non-ironic “bro” = funny. Okay. And another day goes by where I’m ecstatic that no one recorded the things I said when I was 19 and solicited the world’s opinions on them.

So on tap for today: Bryce Harper talk, Bryce Harper talk, Bryce Harper talk. Did you see? Did you hear? Clown question, bro. Lisa needs braces. Clown question, bro. Lisa needs braces. Clown question, bro. Lisa needs braces.

On average, about 63 percent of all pitches are fastballs. Middlebrooks, to date, has seen about 69 percent fastballs. Youkilis is probably right - an adjustment is probably coming. Eventually. Middlebrooks will be tested.

Harper debuted in the majors weeks ago. Both Montero and Trout debuted last season. Montero came to the plate 69 times in a Yankees uniform. He hit the ball exceptionally well. He saw about 66 percent fastballs. One could say that pitchers wanted to see if he could take the heat before going to more offspeed stuff. I don’t know if that would be true, but one could certainly say that.

And so on. When Harper was first promoted, Nationals officials acknowledged that it was happening before they wanted it to, and there was reason to wonder whether Harper was ready to play at the highest level given his minor-league performances. Since Harper was promoted, he’s answered all the questions, and though he doesn’t yet have a home run, he’s done just about everything else. To address Wagner’s question, yes, there are things Bryce Harper can’t do. The list of them is shorter than it is for most other baseball players.

About that:

I mean, through five games, Bryce Harper has batted .375 with four doubles. He’s looked outstanding in the field as well. The Nationals were probably wondering how Harper would adjust to the majors, since his numbers in the minors were fairly unspectacular. He’s ... he’s had no problem adjusting, so far. What Rizzo said is obvious. Of course the Nationals can’t demote a guy playing like Harper’s playing. Even if this wasn’t the plan, a good young player is a good young player.

It all led Jerry Crasnick to issue the following remark:

Clearly, Harper isn’t giving the Nationals the attendance boost that Strasburg did in 2010. It’s very early, but we’d expect the boost to be the biggest early. Now, there are reasons for this. Most significantly, Harper is an everyday position player, while Strasburg is an every-five-days starting pitcher. You’d think that a starting pitcher would draw better than a position player, because a starting pitcher is involved in half of the game, and doesn’t get just a handful of at-bats. And a starting pitcher has more opportunities to wow. More opportunities to show his talent to the world. Fans are more likely to go to the ballpark specifically to see an ace than they are to go to the ballpark specifically to see a guy bat four times and maybe make a play or two in the field.

If the Washington Nationals had their druthers, Ryan Zimmerman would be healthy, Michael Morse would be healthy, and Bryce Harper would be down in triple-A, getting valuable seasoning and beating up on dudes. Pitchers, mainly, and not with his fists. But Zimmerman’s hurt, and Morse’s hurt, so Harper’s in the show ahead of schedule. He’s two games in, and he has two hits.

In the Washington Post, Adam Kilgore writes about Harper, and Harper’s first two games. Here’s the intro:

There’s a pretty good chance that you’re already sick of the Bryce Harper hype. You’ve already got into a fight with your friends while debating whether “Hype Harper” or “Bryce Hyped-er” sounds better (answer: “Brype”, one word, like Ichiro).

But the guy is a freaky, preternatural talent. This isn’t the first hyped debut of a teenager, but it’s the first from a kid who made his debut on the cover of Sports Illustrated when he was 15. This is a hype that’s been building, building, building for almost four years now. Even better: Harper seems like an interesting character, in which the word “interesting” can be defined in both a positive and negative context depending on who’s doing the defining. He isn’t going to be boring.

That could have been the game-winning RBI, but after Ramos added another run with an RBI single, Henry Rodriguez allowed the Dodgers to score twice in the bottom of the ninth. And in the bottom of the 10th, Matt Kemp golfed a walk-off home run to center, leaving Harper with loss in his first MLB appearance.

For more analysis and discussion of the Nationals and Harper’s debut, visit Federal Baseball and SB Nation DC.

In 82 plate appearances with triple-A Syracuse, Harper has batted .250 with one home run, nine walks, and 14 strikeouts. Last season, in 147 plate appearances with double-A Harrisburg, Harper batted .256 with three home runs, 15 walks, and 26 strikeouts. Harper mashed last year in single-A Hagerstown, but the real challenge is in the upper minors, and Harper has yet to conquer those. Statistically.

If you care about spring training, Harper’s batted .326, but he hasn’t gone deep, and besides, that’s spring training. I shouldn’t even be talking about it.

Of course, given that Harper is still a raw prospect, some might be concerned what this promotion means for his service time and future team control. Answer:

Harper will make his debut tomorrow, according to Adam Kilgore, which suggests he’ll be in the starting lineup.

Harper, 19, has had a middling-to-decent start to the year in triple-A -- impressive, of course, when you consider he’s still a teenager, but nothing suggesting that he was a no-brainer call-up who had the best chance to help the Nationals right away.

Now it appears that, although Harper may indeed make it to the Major Leagues during the 2012 season, he won’t be on the team on Opening Day.

The official Washington Nationals PR Twitter feed announced on Sunday that Harper was one of three players cut from the Spring Training roster and reassigned to AAA Syracuse.

Having been briefly sidelined by a calf injury, Harper recently admitted that he probably wasn’t going to make the team. But Wednesday, the team said he still has a chance. Adam Kilgore:

Here’s what that actually says: the Nationals have not specifically decided that Bryce Harper won’t make the team out of camp. It’s March 14. Why would they have decided that already? There’s time to let things play out. Maybe Harper bats .500 and slugs .900. Maybe somebody else gets hurt. Maybe Harper buys everybody in the front office a new car.

But a calf strain might ruin the narrative. From Jon Heyman:

Slugging wunderkind Bryce Harper, 19, admitted today he doubts he can make the Nationals after missing a few key games with a calf issue. “Probably not,” he said in answer to a question about whether he can still has a chance to be picked to go north with the team.So instead of doing what most 19-year-olds are doing right now -- getting ready for graduation or planning spring-break shenanigans -- Harper will likely go to triple-A and wait for the call. This is probably better for the Nationals, both on the field and for future balance sheets, but it sure isn’t as much fun for us.

Can we let Bryce Harper be Bryce Harper for now, when he’s 19 and still learning the ways of the world? Can we appreciate his personality, letting him grow and mature, without asking him to be a plastic player filled with false humility? Can we encourage him to be as honest and open as possible, letting him experiment with the boundaries, instead of turning him into a colorless cliche machine who never says anything remotely interesting or stimulating?Harper’s two latest sins: preferring the Cowboys over the Redskins, and saying he admired Joe Namath. Wait, wait. Settle down a bit before you overreact and do something you regret. While liking the Cowboys does cause syphilis and cold sores, it shouldn’t be a big deal if a player does a little good-natured trolling of his Twitter followers.

Alas, Harper already deleted his Twitter account and started in with the clichés.

Kerzel’s list of five things is one part physical, and four parts mental. Harper has the five tools, and he can probably hit right now, but not being a jackass is an underrated sixth tool. Whether or not he has that one is still an open question.

But Davey Johnson was the manager who insisted Gooden was ready at 19. Now, Johnson will have input into the same decision regarding Harper. It won’t be an easy call.

Unless he starts the season in the majors. From Jon Heyman:

“We’re take a look at him and see where he’s at developmentally. If we feel he’s ready to play at the major-league level, we’re not going to restrict him,” Nationals general manager Mike Rizzo said by phone. “We’ll be cautious yet open-minded. If he gives us the best chance to win, we’ll keep an open mind and see where it takes us.”