Outfielder – Bryce Harper
The player that has divided opinion more than any other among Washington Nationals fans, is Bryce Harper. A torrid start followed by the longest slump of his career leaves his season in no man’s land.
We’re used to scorching starts from Harper, his career OPS in March and April is 1.055. 2018 was no different as he posted an OPS north of 1.000 until the last couple of days in April.
But since the calendar turned to May and beyond, it’s been brutal. He’s barely hitting over the Mendoza line, and the strikeouts have caught up to him with 56 in that spell, compared to 22 walks.
And yet somehow despite all of this, he leads the National League in home runs with 19. The power is never going to go anywhere, now it’s just a case of zoning in and staying within himself.
Over the last six games, he’s hitting .375 with all of his hits going for doubles. Could he finally be locking in again, and ready to correct that average. Boy, we sure hope so.
We saw Paul Goldschmidt go from sub-par performance to more Goldschmidt like numbers recently. Why can’t Harper to the same?
He’s still doing a fine job compared to the rest of his peers in baseball, given all of the walks and home runs. But, evaluating his season to date, you have to be disappointed with the outcome given the MVP caliber player he can be. C+