![]() ![]() He’s practically doubled Harper in career fWAR, and it would take an epic collapse in order for Harper to ever catch up.īut, if we take out Trout’s out-of-this-world head start and pretend that their careers are starting over now, then who is going to be the better player? It’s not fair to do this, I know, but I’m genuinely curious to see if Harper has turned a corner and is ready to establish himself with more consistency. And, it only took one month into the 2017 season to already distinguish themselves in the eyes of the metrics. Trout and Harper are finally doing what we all thought they would do: be the best players in the Major Leagues. That’s why I’m, in a way, bringing this debate to the forefront of our collective minds. That’s the pace that has been set after one month. This season would be forever known as the year Trout and Harper finally became the two best players in the Majors, just as we all predicted. This would happen just over a half-decade past when people were predicting them to be baseball’s next big things. If both Trout and Harper capture the AL and NL MVP awards this season, then we could crown the 2017 season as when they both hit their peaks at the same time. While it’s still early, how cool would it be if Trout and Harper each won their respective MVP awards this season? The one year Harper won his, Trout finished second to Josh Donaldson, even though he easily could have won. Trout’s 2.0 fWAR and 220 wRC+, it’s pretty hard to pick out a distinguished “winner” in this debacle for the 2017 season. And, since Harper has posted a 2.1 fWAR and a 223 wRC+ through the season’s first month vs. ‘Where we are now’ is an awfully subjective sub-headline, but I mean this season. An alleged shoulder injury kept him from posting a repeat performance in 2016, but he still managed to post a solid. But, unlike Trout, Harper has not found the same consistency in his game, so he’s ‘only’ been worth 25.1 fWAR. He actually beat out Trout that year in fWAR, by a half of a win. He’s a four-time All-Star, a Rookie of the Year, and the 2015 NL MVP during a year in which he hit. He’s just 24 (most players his age are still in the minor leagues) and also has six full seasons in MLB. But, let’s not be lost on Harper, either. However, when Harper was constantly compared to Trout throughout his minor- and major-league careers, seeing Trout blow past him in performance has to be even just a bit disheartening. And, let’s be honest here, it’s pretty hard to be Mike Trout. On the Harper side of ‘where we have been’, he has certainly been good.just not ‘Troutian’. It’s no wonder why Trout has been compared to Mickey Mantle. Trout also won the MVP award in 20 (despite that 2016 team finishing in fourth place and winning only 74 games). He’s been either leading the league, or close to leading the league in wRC+, every year since 2012. ![]() He led the American League in that metric in 2012, 20. Since his true rookie season in 2012, Trout has never posted a wRC+ lower than 167, hovering between 167 and 172. Not only has Trout been the best (or one of the best) player in Major League Baseball, he has been consistently great over the course of his six full seasons in the league. Oh, yeah, he’s also been the league’s most consistent player, according to Five Thirty Eight. Over his career, he’s already accumulated 49.7 fWAR and already has passed some Hall of Famers in career WAR. So yes, Trout has been the far better player so far. It reminds me of this Sports Illustrated Kids cover (yes, I used to read that) that already made me ponder the question then: who will be the better player?Īnd now, with the two seemingly pacing the rest of the league after the start of this marathon that we call baseball, I will stir the pot, add to the intrigue and hopefully give you all some food for thought about what I believe is a new phase of the Mike Trout vs. It makes me feel like we are finally entering an era where the two players who were expected to create dinner table arguments will finally do so. Seeing Harper and Trout sit calmly at the top of this list makes me happy. The fact that the two best baseball players on the planet (let me hyperbolize for a second because many, many others have a good case) are already playing like the two best players on the planet after just a combined 229 plate appearances which tells you something about their abilities. In fact, baseball’s two wunderkinds- Bryce Harper and Mike Trout - are No. You don’t even have to go very far to see it, either. Of course, Ryan Zimmerman, Eric Thames and Mitch Haniger are all still in the Top-10 in the fWAR department, but there are many names that are already in their expected places. After just a single month of play in the 2017 Major League Baseball season, we already begin to see familiar faces across leaderboards as numbers begin to stabilize. ![]()
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