Garcia Media Life

So how good is he?  Very good.  Not great because he’s only 19.  There is no telling what he’ll be four years from now but the potential is out of this world.  There is no doubt. Bryce Harper is a once-a-generation player.  Here are the stats from Baseball Almanac that prove it.

A lot of folks have run comparisons of Harper against other 19-year-olds in baseball history, but what I’ve done is compare him to the first full seasons of 15 other players, 14 of them in Baseball’s Hall of Fame (Ken Griffey Jr. isn’t eligible yet).  The age range is 19-24 years old.  For most of them, these are their rookie seasons.  For some, it’s their 2^nd or 3^rd year in the major leagues, but the earlier years were statistically insignificant.

In order to do this properly, I have projected from Bryce Harper’s 1^st 100 at-bats to how he would perform if he played every single one of the remaining games of the season.  Here’s how Harper would do this year based on what he’s done so far.

Bryce Harper (projected though end of 2012 season):

So how does that stack up against the first full seasons of these 15 gentlemen?  (Babe Ruth is the oldest at 24 because he was a pitcher for his first few years; his stats are from his first season as a position player in 1919)

In batting average, Harper is middle-of-the-pack, but better than Willie Mays, Mickey Mantle, Ken Griffey Jr., Hank Aaron, Ernie Banks, Johnny Bench and Billy Williams.

In On-Base-Percentage (hits plus walks), it gets better.  Bryce Harper is ranked 6^th, exceeded only by Frank Robinson (who had one of the best rookie seasons in history), Mel Ott, Jimmie Foxx, Ted Williams and Babe Ruth.

In slugging percentage (total bases divided by at-bats), Harper is 5^th behind only Jimmie Foxx, Frank Robinson, Ted Williams and Babe Ruth.

Here’s how Harper ranks in these various categories against our list of 15 of the greatest players of all time.

Sixth in At-Bats means he’s established as an everyday player in his first season, and for a 19-year-old means he’s up there among the youngest day-to-day players in the history of the game.

Sixth in HR’s speaks for itself, but I suspect he’s got a better track record ahead of him on dingers as the weather heats up and he gets even more confidence and experience.

There’s no way he’ll end up as 1^st on this list in triples.  But it does show his base-running aggressiveness.  Mickey Mantle was faster, timed at just over 3 seconds from the left-handed box at home running to first.  But as we all know, Harper just hustles- his aggression compensating for his good but not amazing speed.

Third in walks is a great stat that separates this young man from anyone before him at his age. Except Ted Williams.  Williams and Babe Ruth have more walks in their first full offensive seasons.  This means pitchers are already pitching around Harper and that he has a keen eye and tremendous discipline at the plate.  These are not the normal traits for a young player.  The only other 19-year-old on the list- the great Mel Ott- drew only 52 walks to Harper’s projected 74.

Yet he strikes out a lot, second only to Eddie Murray.  Harper still has a few holes in his swing or like his idol, Mickey Mantle, he swings hard; “swings violently” is the often used description.

He’s last in RBI.  But that’s not his fault.  He has to have runners on base.  It’s too early to tell if he’s lacking in the clutch component.

And, of course, these are just hitting stats.  There’s nothing here on his laser arm which only seems to throw to home, even at ill-advised moments, but as good as anything Roberto Clemente threw from the outfield.  These stats don’t measure his base-running aggressiveness which is memorable; from making lazy outfielders pay by legging out doubles, consistently advancing from first to third with less than two outs, to running ground balls into infield hits.  Oh, yeah, he stole home for his very first SB of his career.

His fielding is hilarious.  Playing all three outfield positions fearlessly, strange things happen to him out there.  Usually he overcomes every odd angle he runs to fly balls with sheer athleticism.  Or he can completely lose the ball in a grey sky with absolutely no clue where it’s headed.  Or he bobbles a hard-hit fly and it bounces off his mitt and he catches it again.  Or it falls out of his glove and he catches it with his bare hand.

Yes, The Kid is quite the adventure in every way you can think of.  Think of this.  If you ever get the chance to go see him- it will be the same as your grandparents or parents having gone to a ballgame to witness Mickey Mantle, Willie Mays, Hank Aaron or Ted Williams.  Except he’s a teenager.

This is once in your life.