here’s the video of the hit.
TORONTO — The ball hissed through the cool Canadian twilight, and the tale of Bryce Harper’s first season in the major leagues grew a little taller. Harper provides a new feat to marvel at almost every night. He has stolen home, roped a walk-off single, come off the bench to seal a sweep at Fenway Park and, on Tuesday night at Rogers Centre, he clobbered a baseball off the windowed facade of a restaurant that hangs perhaps 450 feet from home plate. [...]
Harper has reached base in eight of his last 10 plate appearances, the possible start to one of the monster hot streaks he has compiled each season since junior college. None of those at-bats resonated like his second Tuesday night, with nobody on base in the third inning.
In his first at-bat, Harper had rifled a groundball through the right side for a single. He dug in now against starter Henderson Alvarez with the game still scoreless. He had been selective all series. Now, just because, he wanted to hack.
“I was going up there swinging out of my shoes, first pitch,” Harper said. “I made up my mind in the on-deck circle. It could have been a curveball, 54 feet. I was swinging.”
Alvarez threw him a first-pitch change-up, an off-speed offering to get over for strike one. Harper destroyed it.
“I don’t know why the outfielder went back,” Manager Davey Johnson said.
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In 2020 when they get rid of both of them they'll win 120 games!
That much anticipated World Series preview sold out a month ago, though you can still get a few tickets through StubHub.
LINK
He is on pace for the greatest teenage season in history.
Fenway's Green Monster has probably blocked a few of those over the years.
So far the Hit Tracker era has only 14 homers hit by players in their age 19 seasons and only 9 hit by actual 19 year olds. Bryce has 7 of those 9 homers.
I didn't remember he had had that reputation for so long...
Vic Wertz has doubts.
Apparently Justin Upton hit one when he was 20 but in his age 19 season that went 438 feet. Still not as far as Harper hit that one. Too bad Upton sucks now.
Edit: Uh, big time coke to McCoy. It almost looks like I copied my first sentence from what he wrote.
I was surprised at the number of crappy players on that list. It just emphasizes how rare it is to make the bigs at 19.
We'll have to see what Hit Tracker says for Harper's shot but I kind of doubt that it will go down as a 450 footer on Hit Tracker.
After just 40 games, Harper is already #8 on the list for age 19 BB-Ref WAR.
Barring injury, he might end up with just about every significant age 19 hitting record in the book.
FP said something about Harper's back barking at him after he tried to throw Lawrie out at 3rd on a hit-and-run, and that would terrify me if I were Rizzo, because there must be an ungodly amount of torque going through his back with that swing. I think my twig frame would snap in half if I swung like that and tried to check my swing.
HR tracker says it was 438
Hit Tracker has it at 438 too. But he didn't hit it in the desert and he was actually 19, so Harper wins IMO.
Edit: Darnit! Coke again, to Pasta
I've tried to measure that one, but can't really see the impact point. However, I did figure out that the edge of the roof, where it overhangs the RF foul line, is actually closer to home plate than the foul pole - in other words, Strawberry's homer hit a spot that is way up in the air, but not very far from home plate. I can't measure it for sure unless I can time it to the impact, but I suspect it was probably only in the low 400's.
That may seem low, but to hit that spot, Strawberry had to hit the ball way too high to get maximum distance.
A very impressive feat which belongs in our collective history of home run lore, but distance is probably the wrong way to describe it...
Maybe so, but an 18 year old Harmon Killebrew, in the second game of a 1955 doubleheader against the Tigers, hit one of the longest home runs in the history of Griffith Stadium, a moon shot that landed near the top of the steep LF bleachers right near the National Boh sign, not too far below where Mickey Mantle had cleared the outer wall two years earlier. Given the height and depth of those bleachers behind the 391' distance to the wall, that shot was likely at least the equal of Harper's. It was only Killebrew's second home run of his rookie year, but it was a thing of beauty to behold.
I'll be at the Friday night game - expecting an attendance record for the series, although I'm not sure the Nationals have figured out how many "standing room" folks to let in.
By the way, I'm surprised nobody's remarked on Davey's great line at the end of this excerpt. I remember thinking the same thing as I watched it live: why is the fielder even bothering?
He did but it was probably only 75% serious. Canseco was a huge d1ck so fans liked to chant things at him. When he was seen with Madonna, fans starting chanting, "Ma-DONNA, Ma-DONNA." (their de-emphasis on the first "a" made it really stinging)
I remember a TV interview with Canseco where he said, "If people want the Pope playing for them, let's see how many runs the Pope drives in. Let's see the Pope play right field."
Classy guy.
But yeah, that shot at SkyDome was ridiculous.
I have just been informed that Harper is a Mormon, so this makes the question about celebratory beer extra stupid.
RIP, Roger Jongewaard
I think I finally decided on something like 89 CH, 96 PH, and then about 20 players later realized I need to create Mike Trout and...wow...better or worse or maybe about the same but a different shaped production...tough.
And yes, I know what you are thinking: Finally, more Baseball Pro 98 talk on Baseball Think Factory.
I've never played this game but I love this post.
I have a ball that Andruw hit into the 700 (top) level of the Vet during batting practice his rookie year. I know it was only BP but I was speechless. It landed about 20 rows from the top of the stadium. Since the Phils sucked then and it was 90 minutes before the game the entire upstairs was empty. I walked casually from my seat behind the plate all the way into LF and found it sitting on a seat.
If you're the Nationals, is it too early too start thinking about signing Harper through his prime years?
Do you think Harper/Boras will stick to their guns and shoot for FA after his age 23 season? Assuming health and a standard developmental curve, a 24 year old Harper would pretty easily get the biggest FA contract in history, no?
EDIT: Actually, 20/300 might work if it was heavily frontloaded.
<ducks>
Think I had a math fail there... it's 6 seasons to FA, right? So assuming Harper is dead set on getting to FA as quickly as possible, he'd be a FA entering his age 25 season. Yeah, unless he either gets seriously hurt or falls well short of the hype, he'll easily get a 10/300+ contract.
As great as Trout is and could be, I don't think he's a 95 power player. Then again, I have no idea what that rating really means. Scouts seem to see him more as a 20-25 HR guy with great contact, speed, defense and OBP. On the other hand, scouts also doubt whether Harper will hit for a great average or if he's more of a .280/45 HR guy.
Is a peak P(potential) Harper a peak Delgado with more power and patience? What about Trout as a peak Rickey Henderson? That's how I'd approach something like this.
Apparently the demand is so high for these tickets that they are selling individual suite seat tickets as well to this series. Prices range from $175 to $400 a ticket for those suite tickets.
The only non-suite tickets left for Saturday's game are $50 corner OF seats. Friday and Sunday is sold out except for suite seats.
I'll be going to the Rays series on Wednesday and Thursday. Hopefully despite the days off they keep the rotation order intact and Strasburg pitches in one of those games.
This season is rapidly becoming my most attended season ever.
What are the projection systems showing for Harper's career? 4,500 hits & 800 HRs? Won't be cheap, but better sign him before he gets hot.
Beat the Braves tonight one more time just for good measure, Yankees.
This might be the 1st time all those really expensive seats behind home plate are sold. Still might look only partially filled since a lot of those folks will probably spend a considerable time under the stands trying to get their money's worth on the "free" food that comes with those tickets.
See if you can guess what everyone else's least favorite thing about the Nationals playing well is.
I've always thought it crazy that your most visible seats on TV and in the stadium are priced so high that almost nobody ever sits there. The Phillies when they played at the Vet had the same problem.
Even if they go unsold you should be putting people in those seats even if they are just employees.
He's right though. Most anything that results in a broken, depressed Hutcheson moping at home, crying into his poorly fermented backwoods corn squeezins, is to be enjoyed.
Yeah, that's what I decided on. More contact, less power, more speed and defense for Trout vs Harper.
For those on the edge of their seat, Trout: 95 CH, 79 PH, 79 SP for potential ratings. I think he'll develop some pop as he fills out.
Lassus' response was worth it.
No guesses? Not one?
Sound advice. I'm an idiot for not thinking of it sooner. (Well, I'm an idiot for all sorts of reasons, but you catch my drift.)
Also: seriously, we're not allowed to needle Sam Hutcheson now? This has now suddenly been declared some sort of party foul? That's THE ENTIRE POINT OF THE NATIONALS DOING WELL, FOR GOD'S SAKE.
The groupthink has conferred and declared that the acceptable term is braggadociously.
Well said.
Also: seriously, we're not allowed to needle Sam Hutcheson now? This has now suddenly been declared some sort of party foul?
Well now--I certainly would never suggest that.
I ###### your mom too. It was a three way.
I like it when people make those announcements. It identifies the brittle, weak-minded sissyboys who needn't be taken seriously and who will be fun to needle when the opportunity arises.
the best was a thread about Lou Pinella's managing morphing into a discussion of midgets in baseball (don't ask).
But this: Bryce Harper's home run--> Joey B's mother...
That's what your mom says. But it was sort of mumbled.
Nothing is regardless of extenuating circumstances. That's what extenuating means.
So Joey's gratuitous, hateful ad hominem is just good-natured needling, but "I am so ignoring you" is douchey? Guess I need a better decoder ring or something.
Seriously: ever since kevin was perma-banned nobody has actively courted contempt around here like Hutcheson. Frankly, I find the double-standard (making excuses for his honestly ban-worthy behavior whilst blasting Joey and prattling on endlessly about how utterly, intolerably terrible he is) at work here to be appalling.
I would say the Woodpecker's 3 mom comments are more offensive than anything Joey said in this thread.
Hooray!
Yes. Yes, absolutely. Were it directed against any other Primate then I might agree with you. But Sam Hutcheson? Are you merely feigning ignorance about his thoroughly loathsome, gutter-trash comportment around here (in literally nearly EVERY SINGLE COMMENT he has ever posted, which is far worse than Joey B.'s record), or are you discrediting yourself by actually trying to defend his behavior?
Of course while Sam's entire schtick is largely a self-mocking act that succeeds as often as it fails, Joey actually takes himself seriously. Not that he should be banned** or formally ignored, but some people notice little distinctions like that.
**Nor should Kevin have been.
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Getting back to more important matters, the Braves lost again and are now five games back.
And the upcoming World Series preview in Washington looks juicier than ever as the hapless Tomahawkers prepare to get further chopped up into little pieces by the Orioles.
The details that evade people on this site amaze me.
Is there a conceivably less interesting potential WS option than Rays-Nats? Maybe Twins/Royals-Brewers or something? Good god, how shitastic would that be?
I admit I can agree with this. See, I'm reasonable.
And a plurality of Americans voted for George W. Bush, at least once. Americans are stupid.
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