Nationals OF Bryce Harper crashes into wall, blames himself for loss

“I’m not speaking badly about anybody” doesn’t carry a lot of weight when you’re 1) speaking about a specific non-play by a specific player and 2) claiming a 4-year-old could do what a 20-year-old baseball phenom could not.

I wonder if his precocious son knows about waste pitches and quality strikes, and that even a light-hitting player like Gregor Blanco can mash a belt-high hanger?

If you didn’t know any of the context behind this, you’d be hard-pressed to say, definitively, that he either slowed up or had decided to play it on a bounce, but discussing the matter is pointless, as Harper himself said that the wall was a problem for him:

Comak later tweeted that Harper could not stop mentioning the fact he should have caught the ball, and that fear of the wall was something he was just going to have to get over. Given some time, Harper very likely will get over his collision, and fear of another one.

It was a horrifying moment last night in Chavez Ravine when Bryce Harper ran at full speed into an unpadded section of the right field wall, suffering a laceration that required eleven stitches and a jammed shoulder.

All of this intensity, hustle and #tWtW (“the Will to Win,” for those of you who aren’t in the know) are tremendously entertaining to watch on the baseball field. And there’s no doubt that Bryce Harper is one of the most talented young players in baseball history. He’s only 174 games into career and has already been worth about seven wins above replacement. I mean, look at this list of the most valuable players through age 20, according to Baseball Reference: