Top stories of 2017: Harper's knee injury

As we count down the final days of 2017, we're counting down the most significant stories of the year for the Nationals. Some are positive. Some are negative. All helped define this baseball season in Washington. We'll reveal two per day through New Year's Eve, continuing right now with ...

No. 7: Bryce Harper's knee injury

As he took the field on Aug. 12 - after waiting out a 3-hour, 1-minute rain delay - Bryce Harper was about three-quarters of the way through a potential MVP season.

Though teammates Ryan Zimmerman and Daniel Murphy had perhaps received more attention earlier in the year for their dominant performances, Harper had been able to sustain his success and carried a .327/.420/.616 slash line, 29 homers, 87 RBIs and 92 runs into that night's game against the Giants. If he could simply maintain that pace over the season's final seven weeks, he would be in line for his second MVP award in three years.

And then came that fateful ground ball to first in the bottom of the first, with Harper busting down the line in an attempt to beat it out. In lunging for the base, his spikes slipped right across the top of the bag, causing his left knee to hyperextend and his entire body to tumble to the ground.

As Harper lay writhing in pain, clutching his leg, what remained of a sellout crowd after the long rain delay watched in stunned silence. In that moment, it was entirely appropriate to wonder if Harper's season had just come to a screeching halt - and if the Nationals' chances for success in October had just taken a massive hit as well.

Roughly 12 hours later, official word finally came down, and it wasn't nearly as dire as initially feared. Harper had not torn his ACL, nor suffered damage to any other ligaments. He did have a significant bone bruise as a result of the hyperextension, but he would not require surgery and the Nationals had reason to believe he'd return to play again in 2017.

"Pretty remarkable, in my mind," general manager Mike Rizzo said the morning after, "just seeing the type of injury that he had."

The Nationals did dodge a major bullet in the end, but that doesn't mean they didn't still suffer some damage. Harper missed 6 1/2 weeks, returning only for the final five games of the regular season. His knee may have been healthy enough to play by then, but his game was far from peak form.

And that left Harper as something less than his full self when the Nats faced the Cubs in the National League Division Series. He did enjoy one big October highlight moment: his game-tying homer in the bottom of the eighth of Game 2 on South Capitol Street, but that was pretty much his lone highlight of the series.

Harper otherwise went 3-for-18 in the NLDS, with an RBI double in Game 5, but no other run-scoring hits. He wasn't among the most significant reasons the Nationals lost, but in a series that included a pair of agonizing, one-run defeats, even one more hit from the young star might have made the difference.

We'll never know for sure what might have been had Harper not suffered his injury. Maybe he would have won the MVP and carried the Nationals lineup in October when he was most needed. Maybe he would have cooled off down the stretch and still been a non-factor in the playoffs.

What we do know is this: The Nats are only guaranteed of one more season of Harper in their uniform. They've had six previous chances to win a championship with him and been unable to do it. But it would have been nice if the most recent chance came with their biggest star fully healthy.