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wouldn't that logic have kept him from going into a JuCo wood-bat league rather than his junior year in HS?We keep saying that he's a once in a generation prospect, but then want to treat him the same as any other prospect. So far it seems as if he's doing pretty well at the instructional league. I believe AFL starts tomorrow, so we should know something pretty soon.
Kilgore reports the Nats are sending him home for now, but will decide this week if they want him to join the AFL in the next few days.http://voices.washingtonpost.com/nationalsjournal/2010/10/bryce_harper_heads_home_for_no.html
He showed in the instructional league he wasn't in over his head
Nats Enquirer puts a marker on June 17th at Harper's debut in the bigs (of 2011):http://www.nationalsenquirer.com/2010/10/nationals-sending-bryce-harper-to-arizona-fall-league.html(it's a joke)
Nationals hitting coach David Eckstein will spend time in Arizona and tutor Harper, who showed off his power by hitting several balls over the fences during batting practice in Washington after being drafted."We're going to tweak his stroke and his approach at the plate," Rizzo said.
"I think in the next couple years we will be the Yankees of the N.L. East. I have been telling everyone that. We are going to roll. We are going to win some world series. That is everyone's goal. (Field coordinator) Bobby Henley preached that from day one. 'We are going to win the N.L. East someday.' I really believe that. Hopefully, we bring a couple of world series to Washington, D.C."
Oh no!!!Harper will turn into a .240 hitter with 15 HR power by the time Eck is done with him.
I saw Bryce Harper go 0-for-4 with two strikeouts. I saw him take a batting practice where he failed to hit a single home run. And I can say, unequivocally, that Harper is the best player I saw in Arizona, and one of the two best prospects in baseball. Swings this mature, with the balance, the extension, the load and the transfer, don’t find themselves with teenagers often.
Bryan Smith's first live impressions at the AFL are here. http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/index.php/my-bryce-harper-experience/I love the clincher:
The other thing worth pointing out, that has nothing to do with his physical tools or swing, is that it’s clear that Harper is a baseball rat. What Jason Grey wrote on Twitter Monday is absolutely true: “You can tell Bryce Harper not used to sitting – for multiple games constantly on front step of dugout fidgeting with a glove & ball or a bat.” When the Scottsdale offense registered the third out, Harper was always the first out of the dugout. When he was not up at the plate, he was always on the top step, and the most vocal of any player. Normally, make-up stories don’t do it for me, but I think Harper being a baseball rat is going to be a massive help in marrying his potential with his ultimate results.
It's a funny sort of article to find on Fangraphs given that it is completely about Harper's intangibles, with a token mention of high strikeout/LD rate at the end in a nod to the community of that site. It's kind of refreshing to hear Bryan Smith raving about someone being a "baseball rat."
