Phillies' Dombrowski wonders if Harper can be 'elite' again - ESPN

PHILADELPHIA — Bryce Harper turned 33 on Thursday, and the celebration for the new father of four just might not stretch very far inside the Philadelphia Phillies' front office.

After a season in which Harper's .844 OPS was his lowest since 2016 and his .261 average was his worst since 2019, Phillies president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski analyzed whether Harper — a two-time NL MVP — can return to form as one of baseball's best players with six years left on his 13-year, $330 million deal.

«He's still a quality player. He's still an All-Star caliber player,» Dombrowski said Thursday as he broke down the season. «He didn't have an elite season like he's had in the past. I guess we only find out if he becomes elite or he continues to be good.»

Just good?

That has to sting for a player such as Harper who helped carried the Phillies out of baseball irrelevancy and into the playoffs for the first time in 11 years in 2022. Yes, Harper missed a month of the season as he recovered from a wrist injury, but the numbers did show an overall dip in production.

Against the Dodgers in the NL Division Series, Harper was just 3-for-15 batting with no RBI in the four-game loss.

«Can he rise to the next level again? I don't really know that answer,» Dombrowski said. «He's the one that will dictate that more than anything else. I don't think he's content with the year that he had. Again, it wasn't a bad year. But when I think of Bryce Harper, you think elite, you think of one of the top-10 players in baseball and I don't think it fit into that category.»

Phillies manager Rob Thomson said Harper — who made a Gold Glove-caliber move from right field to first base and made the fastest return to the majors following Tommy John surgery