![]() ![]() Remember when he arrived at spring training in 2015 – Oh, Viera, how we miss thee – and was asked about the Nationals’ offseason signing of Max Scherzer? The days of “That’s a clown question, bro,” seem ancient because they are. He is settled, twice a father, 30 years old for all of a week. The standing out now is about baseball, and baseball only. “It makes you pop,” Harper told me back in 2015. He finished that process, it’s worth noting, by drinking salt water on the day of the photo shoot, then eating raw, white potatoes because he knew their glucose and glycine would go straight to his muscles. He once went a week consuming only juice – seven different raw juices – so when he posed without clothes for ESPN the Magazine’s Body Issue, his muscles would pop. But in a strange way – after the Rookie of the Year award in 2012, after two MVP seasons, after a 13-year, $330 million contract – Harper is less a sensation now than he was back then, in his first days as a Washington National. “He’s 30!” said his father, Ron, on the field afterward. He is a complete hitter who is in the process of owning October. He propelled them to a dominant performance in the NL Championship Series, in which he collected eight hits in five games. You just kind of expect it when he goes to the plate.”īecause his eighth-inning home run turned a deficit into a lead in the Phillies’ 4-3 victory over the San Diego Padres at sloppy and euphoric Citizens Bank Park, Harper will play in his first World Series. “He’s proved to me over and over and over again that there’s no moment that’s too big for him,” Phillies Manager Rob Thomson said. His response to the home run that won the National League pennant: a gesture to those phellow Phillies, then a slow jog around the bases, soaking it in, as if it’s exactly what he expected to do. On a soggy Sunday afternoon, when he made what was inarguably the most important and impactful swing of his career, he calmly turned to his Philadelphia Phillies teammates, who were spilling out of the dugout to fawn over him. Dang if it didn’t seem like he did it on purpose, grabbing the Hollywood spotlight and turning it directly and intentionally on himself. PHILADELPHIA – On the first hit of Bryce Harper’s major league career, a ball he absolutely scorched to the base of the center-field wall at Dodger Stadium, his helmet flew off his head as he bolted for second, freeing his flowing 19-year-old locks. ![]()
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