![]() ![]() It's kind of like the military, with Danville and Gwinnett instead of Forts Bragg and Hood. Baseball's culture - uniquely unkind to prodigies - is built on earning dues, bus rides, failure, grinding, surviving and then lording that over the guys who arrive after you. Nick Wass/AP ImagesīRYCE HARPER IS the rare prodigy who appears destined to fulfill his promise. Inside this warehouse, where four-time National League batting champion Bill Madlock is one cage over employing a career's worth of expertise to teach a couple of overindulged 10-year-olds to keep their weight back, it sounds like an entire forest is falling, one tree at a time.īryce Harper wants to change baseball, but can he do it? ESPN The Magazine senior writer Tim Keown breaks down why the reigning National League MVP thinks he's the right guy to transform the game. The sound of these baseballs hitting the 34-inch, 32-ounce Marucci bat is what I imagine lightning sounds like when it splits an oak. There's an easy, liquid flow from drill to drill, a choreography of blood, with Ron pushing a double-decker shopping cart full of baseballs from station to station and musician Chris Stapleton's voice carrying that same kind of brutal grace through a tiny speaker behind home plate. He trains with his father, Ron, and the two move about the cage in silence. This Tuesday afternoon offseason hitting session is off-the-record - observation is welcome description is not - but it's no betrayal of confidence to report that Harper goes about his work with forensic vigor. Its grace is as undeniable as its brutality, and to employ it strictly for the purpose of striking a moving baseball, as Bryce Harper is doing inside a warehouse in an industrial park near the Las Vegas airport, could classify as a serious underutilization of resources. It appears to have been engineered for a different time - perhaps to slaughter animals for sustenance or enemies for land. Middleton still hasn’t started throwing off a mound, although he could start after being cleared by ElAttrache.He swing is raging and primeval, a broken dam, a convulsion. He said he’s still just throwing fastballs and changeups, due to add breaking balls in the middle of April. Ramírez, who had his surgery about three weeks before Middleton, has been throwing off a mound for about six weeks. Both pitchers are rehabbing from Tommy John surgery. JC Ramírez and Keynan Middleton will return to Southern California for follow-up appointments with Dr. Tropeano said he’s about a month away from being able to pitch in a game. Nick Tropeano, who had a setback with his shoulder before spring training, said he’s planning on having his long toss out to 180 feet by the end of the week, and then he could begin throwing off a mound next week. Ausmus said he’s “on track” and will get in a game “sooner than later.” … ![]() Justin Upton still hasn’t played in a Cactus League game because of tendinitis in his knee. Heaney missed one start with elbow inflammation, but he threw a bullpen session on Tuesday and reported to Ausmus on Wednesday that he felt good, Ausmus said. …Īngels manager Phil Nevin says he was angry with team’s effort earlier this season, but not nowĪndrew Heaney has been cleared to start the Angels’ Cactus League game on Friday. The next step would be taking batting practice off a coach throwing overhand in the cage, but there’s no timetable for when that would occur. Shohei Ohtani said he feels fine five days into his program of hitting soft toss from coaches. It’s all up to him, what he personally wants to do.” ALSO I don’t think any one person is going to sway Mike. ![]() I’m a Laker fan, so I know all about tampering. “I know it could be considered tampering. “Everybody can say whatever they want,” pitcher Tyler Skaggs said. It’s always been a big deal.”Įlsewhere in the Angels clubhouse, Harper’s comments were greeted with a shrug of the shoulders. It’s reported more because of social media, but I don’t know that it’s any bigger of a deal. I don’t know if it’s a bigger deal or not (now). “There is a rule against tampering for a reason,” Angels manager Brad Ausmus said Wednesday. Harper’s average annual salary leaves room for Trout, and Harper has been recruiting him publicly. The completion of Harper’s 13-year, $330-million deal with the Phillies last week only increased that talk. There has been rampant speculation for years that Trout would wind up with the Phillies, who play less than an hour from his New Jersey hometown, after the end of his contract with the Angels. ![]()
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