VIERA, Fla. – Bryce Harper said something the other day about how good the Washington Nationals could be – make that would be – and, you know, maybe it didn’t come out exactly right, but everybody seemed willing to believe the worst, because it was him and it’s just easier to think of him that way. Then they can not like him for the way he plays, for the way he worked the system, for the dig-me posture, for the hair and now – yes – for the way he likes his own baseball team.

View photos Bryce Harper boasts one of the most powerful swings in baseball. (Getty) More

That’s not quite fair. Maybe we just need our villains anymore.

Is “Where’s my ring?” any different than “We’re going to win the NL Central and you can quote me on that”?

But because Anthony Rizzo seems nice and mostly harmless and has regular old hair, his guarantee seemed nice and harmless too, and besides most folks feel kind of sorry for the Chicago Cubs.

Harper drops a little happy face on the Max Scherzer signing and it, in the words of Nationals manager Matt Williams, “blows up all over the place.”

Maybe that’s simply the cost of being Bryce Harper, who had his turn as Yasiel Puig before Yasiel Puig did, so nobody will ever forgive him for being young, feisty, special and knowing it.

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He arrived Wednesday morning at 6:30, the way he always does. The sky was dark and the lights above Space Coast Stadium were on, which lit the neighborhood and gave the place a feel of game time, only with lots of coffee and no cars or people. He ate breakfast wearing a wool cap, received some treatment, got in a workout and hit in the cage. Same thing, every morning.

He likes the pace of spring and the notion of the journey to opening day, that inch-at-a-time process that starts before dawn and ends at Nationals Park. He throws a peaceful vibe, which fits here.

“I’m still learning every single day,” he says, “no matter what. There’s so many great guys around here and this is a process. I mean, I know the game fairly well, but it’s always a process.”

They’ve asked him for consistency. In his at-bats. In his outfield play (he’ll be in right field, after two seasons in left). In his decisions on the bases. Mostly they’d like him to stay upright, then be the healthy, productive player he was late last summer and into October. Sometimes, it seems, Harper will reach for things that aren’t there – and sometimes he’ll come up bloodied for them – which maybe is what you’ll get at 22, even when that 22 is looking at its fourth big-league season.

He spent his offseason in Las Vegas, as usual. He did not hit as often as he had in past offseasons, but when he did, it was his father on the other side of the L-screen, as usual. Together, they know the swing. They know where it goes and how to get it back. That was part of the process, too, not just the batting practice but the laughs with “my Pops,” and the soft landing that is home and family.

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Those couple-hour sessions – and that life – bleed into spring, and then April, so routine follows routine follows more routine, and not long from now they’ll start counting up the results. But not yet.

“I don’t care about results this spring,” he said.

View photos Harper signs autographs before a recent spring training game. (Getty) More

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