{"id":1615,"date":"2009-09-12T05:41:31","date_gmt":"2009-09-12T12:41:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/seamheads.com\/blog\/2009\/09\/12\/remaking-the-chosen-one\/"},"modified":"2009-09-12T09:38:55","modified_gmt":"2009-09-12T16:38:55","slug":"remaking-the-chosen-one","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/seamheads.com\/blog\/2009\/09\/12\/remaking-the-chosen-one\/","title":{"rendered":"Remaking “The Chosen One”"},"content":{"rendered":"

Hollywood script writers go back to the same well-worn ideas time and again because it requires intellectual rigor\u00c2\u00a0to create something genuine and new.\u00c2\u00a0 Baseball writers can fall into their own ruts.\u00c2\u00a0 Last year’s drum beat that Stephen Strasburg was a “once in a lifetime” talent had not reached its climax before Sports Illustrated trotted out the sequel–Bryce Harper.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0Maybe it’s just no country for old men, but my head is not ready for the remake just yet.<\/em><\/p>\n

Sports Illustrated put\u00c2\u00a0Bryce Harper on the cover of their June issue with the 2009\u00c2\u00a0amateur draft only days away.\u00c2\u00a0 \"null\"Tom Verducci of SI called Harper the next Lebron James, then with\u00c2\u00a0that hyperbole still hanging in the air, Harper\u00c2\u00a0became the next Tiger Woods–all in\u00c2\u00a0one\u00c2\u00a0June\u00c2\u00a0SI article.\u00c2\u00a0<\/a><\/p>\n

The facts about Bryce Harper are impressive, but he is only 17 years old.\u00c2\u00a0 He has the physical maturity of an adult, weighing in with 205 pounds on a 6-3 frame.\u00c2\u00a0 He seems more mature than his years, but that said, he is remarkably young.\u00c2\u00a0 He\u00c2\u00a0skipped not one but two years of high school to get his GED and enrolled in community college to make himself eligible for the 2010 draft in the summer\u00c2\u00a0before what should be\u00c2\u00a0his senior year in high school.<\/p>\n

Using an\u00c2\u00a0aluminum bat Harper hit a 500-ft home run in a derby at Tampa Bay as a high school sophomore and the legend of his power has grown exponentially with other exploits.\u00c2\u00a0 There has been no one to date to question his skillset or his decision-making.\u00c2\u00a0 Conversely, skeptics of Stephen Strasburg’s value\u00c2\u00a0abounded.\u00c2\u00a0 They questioned the many\u00c2\u00a0pitching\u00c2\u00a0prospects with unique talents that had\u00c2\u00a0flamed out well before reaching the majors.\u00c2\u00a0 Harper’s trajectory\u00c2\u00a0has less drag in that sense.\u00c2\u00a0 As a batter he is unlikely to\u00c2\u00a0fail egregiously.<\/p>\n

However, even that assumption is open to question.\u00c2\u00a0 Delmon Young is an example of a outstanding offensive talent, taken with the number one pick, who then fails to reach his well-hyped potential.\u00c2\u00a0 Of the overall number one draft picks taken in the last ten years only Joe Mauer has attained stardom.\u00c2\u00a0 The list includes\u00c2\u00a0Matt Bush–chosen as a shortstop, Josh Hamilton, and Adrian Gonzalez.\u00c2\u00a0 But of those, only Hamilton and Young were hyped beyond their realization and Hamilton’s star was diminished by non-baseball issues.<\/p>\n

At the recent unveiling of Stephen Strasburg at Nationals Park, Scott Boras was walking off the stage last when two fans standing close to the stage yelled out to the uber-agent asking whether he would be returning the next year with Bryce Harper.\u00c2\u00a0 The fans in Washington with little else to cheer but some undefined future glory are whipping themselves into a frenzy of expectation like a crowded beach that just heard the word “Shark!”<\/p>\n

Much as Strasburg became a prophet of the baseball future in DC, fans are anxiously cheering every loss down the stretch in hopes of winning the Bryce Harper derby.\u00c2\u00a0 A baseball web site in DC was following Harper’s\u00c2\u00a0first fall\u00c2\u00a0scrimmage at the College of Southern Nevada, the fine academic institution Harper chose for its ability to polish his baseball skill set.<\/p>\n

Nationals Vice-President Stan Kasten in several recent articles has talked about the importance of young pitching.\u00c2\u00a0 Grow your pitching at home and buy the bats you need.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0Kasten has articulated that strategy consistently and it is one that has been successful for a very long time.\u00c2\u00a0 So what are the real choices going to be in 2010 and are there wiser options that might compete with Bryce Harper?\u00c2\u00a0 Are there high profile pitching talents in who will come out in 2010 and could grow the Nationals?<\/p>\n

One of the higher-profile pitching talents\u00c2\u00a0is Gerritt Cole, who many\u00c2\u00a0believe\u00c2\u00a0will be taken in the first few picks in 2010 if he continues to develop on pace.\u00c2\u00a0 The UCLA pitcher was selected by the Yankees in the first round of the draft coming out of high school and has had success in each of his first two years\u00c2\u00a0for the Bruins.\u00c2\u00a0 Last season he struck out 108 in 85 innings and pitched to a 3.49 ERA.<\/p>\n

Contrasting one variable for the two players: character, one is struck that Cole turned down what would have been a huge bonus from the Yankees in 2008 to attend one of the best academic institutions in the country\u00c2\u00a0for three years.\u00c2\u00a0 Harper is enrolled at a fourth-rate community college purely to avail himself of all the bonus money Scott Boras can extort from the team that bellies up to the bar.\u00c2\u00a0 That parameter yields a stark contrast between Cole and Harper.<\/p>\n

Harper may prove out.\u00c2\u00a0 He could be another once in a lifetime talent.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0Harper may be better than Joe Mauer, better than Joe DiMaggio, better even than Rocco Baldelli.\u00c2\u00a0 But it flies in the face of the baseball traditions that I grew up with to relish the demise of your home team for the promises made by a seventeen year old.<\/p>\n

I lusted after a few seventeen year olds in my day, but you had to be careful\u00c2\u00a0which\u00c2\u00a0state you were in when you did it–lusted after them I mean.\u00c2\u00a0 So I\u00c2\u00a0am counseling caution before the Nationals schedule another bout with Boras.\u00c2\u00a0 The remake is never as good as the original\u00c2\u00a0and it might be worth asking whether an unscrupulous\u00c2\u00a017-year-old\u00c2\u00a0is really worth it.\u00c2\u00a0 Can you hear me Susie Q?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Hollywood script writers go back to the same well-worn ideas time and again because it requires intellectual rigor\u00c2\u00a0to create something genuine and new.\u00c2\u00a0 Baseball writers can fall into their own ruts.\u00c2\u00a0 Last year’s drum beat that Stephen Strasburg was a “once in a lifetime” talent had not reached its climax before Sports Illustrated trotted out […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":73,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1615","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-a-view-from-the-capital","category-general"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/seamheads.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1615","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/seamheads.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/seamheads.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/seamheads.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/73"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/seamheads.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1615"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/seamheads.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1615\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/seamheads.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1615"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/seamheads.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1615"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/seamheads.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1615"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}