Just a reminder: Bryce Harper still has a chance to be the greatest player in baseball history | Bob Brookover

LAS VEGAS — Bryce Harper’s high school baseball field has a hill beyond the right-field fence that also serves as a place of punishment.

“It is called Reminder Hill,” said Sam Thomas, who was Harper’s coach at Las Vegas High School and remains in that role a decade later. “My players have to run a reminder if they miss a sign or if they’re late for practice or they do something they should not be doing. We remind you not to make the same mistake.”

The Reminder Hill course stretches from one light tower in center field to another near the right-field foul line at what is now called Harper Field, a tribute and a reminder that Bryce Harper was the greatest player ever to don Las Vegas High’s black-and-red uniform. Running a reminder probably means 10 to 15 trips up and down the hill, touching a fence pole each time at the top.

Harper reminisced about Reminder Hill before one of the Phillies’ exhibition games near the end of spring training in Clearwater, Fla.

“A lot of us had to run reminders all the time,” he said. “If we were late to practice or wearing the wrong thing to practice, we ran reminders. I think as a team we knew if we didn’t do something right, we knew we were going to have to run Reminder Hill, and it was just part of the way our coach went about it.”

Harper’s most memorable reminders to his high school coach came after his young phenom had scored on a sacrifice fly to give Las Vegas a walk-off victory.

“The game was tied, and Bryce walked to lead off the bottom of the final inning,” Thomas said. “I got my four and five hitters coming up with no outs. I don’t give a steal sign, but Bryce steals on the first pitch.”

Thomas glared at Harper and held up his hands to relay the point that Harper had whiffed on the sign. Harper held up his hands and shrugged.

“Now, he’s already in scoring position and nobody is out, so I tell him he’s good right there,” Thomas said. “Bryce steals third on the next pitch.”

Harper now had two tickets to Reminder Hill.

“What are you doing?” Thomas asked his star player as he stood on third base.

“I’m going to score right here on a sacrifice fly,” Harper told his coach.

“You know you missed two signs,” Thomas told Harper.

“I know,” Harper said.

As predicted, the No. 4 hitter lifted a fly ball to right-center field, Harper scored, and Las Vegas High celebrated a walk-off victory. Like any coach, Thomas was happy to have the W, but his elation quickly turned to rage when he looked at home plate and did not see Harper fulfilling his duty of raking around the batter’s box.

“I’m almost ready to lose my mind because he’s not raking the plate,” Thomas said. “I’m yelling, ‘Where’s Harper?’ One of the other kids says, ‘He’s up on the hill.’ He went and ran two reminders.”

Reminder Hill is the kind of place a high school kid never forgets, and as Bryce Harper gets set to begin the next chapter of his baseball life with the Phillies, it is a good time to remind him what he was thinking when he was still playing high school baseball for demanding Sam Thomas.

“Be in the Hall of Fame, definitely,” Harper told Sports Illustrated a decade ago when the magazine had the audacity to put a 16-year-old baseball player on its cover. “Play in the pinstripes. Be considered the greatest baseball player who ever lived. I can’t wait.”

At this point, it’s fair to say that Harper is on course to keep his date with the Hall of Fame in Cooperstown. If he simply averages the 26.2 home runs he has so far in his career, his total when his 13-year, $330 million contract expires in 2031 will be 524. A total that high used to be an automatic ticket to the Hall of Fame, but performance-enhancing drugs altered that equation.

Still, 20 of the 27 players to reach 500 career home runs are in the Hall of Fame, and Harper appears headed in that direction. It would not be surprising at all if he averages more than 26.2 home runs over the final 13 seasons of his career.

The desire to play in pinstripes will come true for Harper on Thursday when he plays his first game at Citizens Bank Park. He did not mention the color of pinstripes a decade ago, and red fit him well in Washington.

Harper’s final teenage aspiration will be the most difficult to achieve. The first seven years of his career have been sensational, but Harper would be the first to concede that Mike Trout has been the best player of his era. When Baseball America put together its team of the decade for the 2010s in February, Harper did not even get an honorable mention among the right fielders.

The Yankees’ Giancarlo Stanton was Baseball America’s right fielder, with Jose Bautista and Mookie Betts getting consideration. I’d argue that Harper belongs in that top three, but what is done is done.

Other than 2019, the Phillies do not care anymore about what Bryce Harper does in the 2010s. They are hoping he can become the National League MVP this season and the player of the 2020s. Given his age and his drive and the lineup he is likely to be surrounded by for years to come, he still has a chance to be the greatest player ever.

A run up Reminder Hill is not needed to know that’s the case.