When Kris Bryant entered the league in 2015 he took it by storm. He was one of the rare players who hit for contact and power and played multiple positions at an elite level. In his first two years with the Cubs he won rookie of the year, NL MVP, and the Hank Aaron award. He looked destined to run the league for the next 15 years. But things didn’t go his way.

He was great for the rest of his time in Chicago. He didn’t win any more major awards but he kept up his averages. His average stayed around that .275 range and he was still hitting for power. Though he couldn’t quite regain what he had had in his first two years he had still cemented himself as one of baseball’s best players. But that’s when things started to go downhill for him.

In 2021 he was traded to the San Francisco Giants for two prospects, Alexander Canario, and Caleb Kilian. The Giants were in the middle of a 107 win season and they were hoping to make a push. They didn’t win it all like they wanted though. Bryant finished the year in San Francisco pretty good, batting slightly worse than he did in Chicago but still above average. Bryant entered free agency after that year and ended up signing a 7 year, 182 million dollar deal with the Colorado Rockies.

He was expected to be the new face of the team with Trevor Story signing with the Red Sox just 4 days later. Bryant was getting paid an AAV of around 26 million a year and was supposed to be the man. Instead injuries struck. He was diagnosed with a chronic back issue that kept him out of the lineup for almost 80% of the Rockies games since he signed. He has played 170 games out of the Rockies 773. He has missed 600 games in 5 years and has only played in 11 since 2025.

Bryant was poised to rule the league but because of injuries he was just never the guy who he was supposed to be. He went from being the guy to rival Mike Trout to just being another guy who can’t stay in the lineup. He became the Ben Simmons of baseball. He could have been so much more but his back gave out and ruined his career.

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