The Bryce Is Right: MLB Players Belong in the Olympics
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Bryce Harper was on a Barstool Sports podcast a few days ago in which he voiced his firm belief that MLB should allow its players to participate in the Olympics. For the first time since 2008, baseball will be an Olympic sport when the games start up next summer in Tokyo. But even though baseball was an Olympic sport before, from 1992-2008, only amateurs and minor leaguers participated because MLB didn’t want it interrupting their season. Now is time to change that, says Bryce Harper.
“It is such a travesty to me. The 2020 Olympics in Japan, and you’re not sending big league guys? Are you kidding me? You want to grow the game as much as possible and you’re not going to let us play in the Olympics because you don’t want to lose out on money for a two-week period? Ok, that’s dumb.” Harper went on to say, “You have Shohei Ohtani going back playing for Japan, facing Mike Trout…just imagine that. Can you imagine being in a foreign country, standing on the line, listening to your anthem blare? Dude, there is nothing better. It fires me up sitting here. There’s nothing better.”
Thank you Bryce Harper. Thank you for strongly voicing your opinion on this because not only does baseball belong in the Olympics, it absolutely needs to be represented by Major League players. So what if it interrupts the season for a couple of weeks? As much as I love the Braves and MLB, there would be nothing I would want to watch more when the Olympics started up than the best players representing our great country on the biggest stage in the world. Just imagine the pride that Americans would feel watching the best talent from our national pastime compete against the best talent of other countries who adore baseball as well.
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And the people who claim the best players wouldn’t play in the Olympics for fear of injuries can think again. Sure, there will be some who won’t, but then you have others like Bryce Harper who wouldn’t think twice. With the Olympics being only every four years, you may have superstar players who only want to do it once for the experience of it. And that’s fine because in four more years we’ll have plenty of new talent in the game that will want to have the same experience. An opportunity to represent your country playing the game you love is something that most players would jump at. And as competitive as all these guys are, who wouldn’t want to have a gold medal placed around their neck? No matter what a player’s MLB accomplishments end up being, a gold medal would be right there at the top once it’s all said and done.
Lastly, Harper is right on when he says it would be an excellent way to grow the game. If you’ve been watching the ESPN Michael Jordan documentary “The Last Dance,” then you know the huge impact Olympic teams can have on the entire world. The 1992 Dream Team influenced kids from all over the world to pick up a basketball, many of which wound up coming to America to play in the NBA. It also took viewership of the NBA to new heights around the world as people got their first glimpse of just how talented NBA players are. The same thing would happen with players from the MLB. Baseball is America’s game and some of the greatest talent in the world is from here. If they were able to showcase their talents to people around the world who’ve never had much of an opportunity to watch them play, it would do great, great things for the sport of baseball and MLB.
I don’t know the possibility of MLB actually postponing its season and letting its players play in the Olympics every four years, but to me it’s a no brainer. Competing for your country is on another level than competing for your MLB team. It would be perhaps the greatest opportunity of a sports player’s life. And like I’ve already said, it would help grow the MLB brand around the world. It would be a win-win. Maybe it will happen and maybe it won’t, but for now I’m just glad a player with such significance like Bryce Harper spoke directly in favor of it. Go USA!
https://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/29148039/mlb-dumb-keep-major-leaguers-playing-olympics
Garett