At long last the long saga is over, according to Jon Heyman the Phillies will be signing free agent superstar Bryce Harper. Jeff Passan of ESPN reports the deal is for 13 years and 330 million, the biggest surprise is that the contract does not include any opt outs.
The move most likely makes the Phillies strong NL East favorites and they already added Andrew McCutchen and JT Realmuto along with their already solid core. Their starting pitching is a bit of a question mark, but the offense could be good enough to offset any concerns.
For Philly, Harper brings a 30 home run bat along with very good on base skills. He rebounded after a rough first half last season with a very impressive .300/.434/.538 line. According to most metrics he was not a good defender at all last year with a DRS of -26, but he has been a solid defender in years past so this seems like it could be an outlier.
The Cubs have long been connected to Harper, and frankly it's a bit of a disappointment they didn't sign him, but at 13 years I can understand the hesitation to not want to give him that many years. But still, Harper is a 26-year old generational talent and those types of talents rarely become available on the open market and for the Cubs to claim "broke" is somewhat disappointing especially with their willingness to open their pockets in the past.
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