Bryce Harper: Man/Child

By Adam Cancryn

Two takes on Bryce Harper, the world's best 19-year-old baseball player and youngest Major Leaguer.

Bryce Harper: Man

The first thing that you notice about Bryce Harper is that he's big. He's just an all-around large human being.

The Nationals outfielder is 6'3", 215 pounds, a frame that's even more imposing when it's consuming the left-hand batters' box, bat stretched high overhead. Bryce Harper is no 19-year-old, at least not the kind of 19-year-old that you or I grew up with. There's no hint of insecurity, none of the nervous tics or jumpiness that are trademarks of a college freshman on his way to the semester's first class, much less his first at-bat in front of 30,000 people who have already ordained him as baseball's LeBron.

Instead, Harper stepped into the box, set himself and sleepily awaited his first Major League pitch. It was a strike, low and outside, and save for the fact that the ball was instantly removed from play and authenticated, there was little indication that it meant anything special for Harper. He took two more balls, and then hit a tapper back to the pitcher. Harper sprinted to first, then peeled off toward the dugout, completing a routine start to what is already an abnormal career.

He would be retired once more, on a fly to left, before breaking through. Facing a 3-2 count, Harper connected with an outside fastball, and in seconds that fastball was slamming against the padding in center field. Those at the game said there was an audible hiss as the ball cut through the night air.

It was a man's hit, decisive and direct. Harper read two all the way and pulled into second easily. It was his first Major League hit, one executed with all the precision of a 10-year vet. The only thing juvenile about the entire sequence was the impeccably timed mooning that will forever live on in history.

Soon after, Harper would play a central role in two late-game situations. First, with an opposing runner on second, he fielded a single to left, wound up and rifled the ball home. It was powerful yet measured, a strike to the heart of catcher Wilson Ramos and seemingly to the Dodgers' chances of scoring. But Ramos would fail to secure the ball with two hands. The resulting contact jarred the ball from his grasp, and the game was tied.

That led to Harper's second chance. At bat in the ninth, he expertly served the ball into left, just deep enough to score the go-ahead run from third. Yet again, others' inexperience would counteract Harper's savvy play. This time, the excitable Henry Rodriguez cracked under pressure, uncorking a wild pitch that would allow the Dodgers to pull even at 3-3. Los Angeles would win on a walk-off home run in the 10th.

Harper spoke to the media post-game, full of well-practiced platitudes and tactically empty quotes. Then he went home, just another day in the books. For Bryce Harper, baseball is his job, and it's the same one he's been doing for nearly two decades.

Bryce Harper: Child

For all of Bryce Harper's surface professionalism, the fact remains that the Nationals outfielder is 19 years old.

He's, at most, a college sophomore. He can't legally drink, and in some states he'd be just a few months removed from his restricted license. What Harper is doing at his age might overshadow the average person's accomplishments up until that date, but he nevertheless is doing it at the same biological point in life. So while years of media attention and bright lights trained him in the ways of Major League Baseball long before he arrived there, it doesn't completely mask the reality that Harper is still a teenager who just gained entry to his dreams. And amid Harper's debut, there were certainly elements that reminded us of that.

At times, those reminders were amusing. Right before his first at bat, Harper went to get a cup of water. Whether nervous or just plain clumsy, he ended up spilling the water all over his hands.

The reminders were awkward. In a dugout interview prior to the game, Harper inserted "you know" after every two of three words of his answers. It was, you know, a little, you know, cringe-worthy to say the least, but, you know, not much worse than your average 19-year-old, you know, and besides, you know, it was the kid's big day. You know?

The reminders were downright immature. Rounding first following his first hit, Harper flipped off his helmet for no apparent reason. It's a move that little leaguers pull because they think it helps them run faster or look cooler, and it's a move that disappears as soon as those kids get old enough to realize it's just plain dumb, especially when that helmet is the only thing standing between you and the red-stitched missile bearing down on the same base that you're digging for.

Some of the reminders just made you chuckle and shake your head. Harper's helmet flip revealed his "haircut," which is best described as a cross between a mullet, a mohawk and a Dickie Bennett, and more simply characterized as an insult to hair-cutting professionals everywhere.

In between these brief reminders, Harper was putting together a memorable night, going 1-3 with a double and two RBIs. He made a perfect throw home to boot, and was instrumental in the Nats' success all the way until the end. He looked like he belonged.

But for Harper, it's not enough to merely belong. Which is why those glimpses of his teenage self are important. They reminded us that no matter how powerful and polished he is now, Bryce Harper is just a child. He's still got a lot of growing to do.

Adam Cancryn is an editor and co-founder of Began in '96.