The latest Kris Bryant update puts his career in jeopardy

Kris Bryant may have played his last game of Major League Baseball. That’s how bleak the back injury is getting for the former National League MVP on the Colorado Rockies.

Bryant told MLB.com on Sunday that his back isn’t responding to running but he is able to work out and so some hitting. The 33-year-old planned a phone consult for Monday and is considering an “experimental treatment” that is not surgery.

Bryant had an ablation procedure this year and has been going through a strengthening program. The disk issue he has in his back means another surgery would be a fusion. If that operation is needed, his time as a pro athlete could be over.

… With his back disk issue, #Rockies    DH Kris Bryant says a surgery would be fusion, which would make returning as a pro athlete difficult. After a strengthening program and an ablation procedure this year, he is seeking something that will get him on the field this year.

— Thomas Harding (@harding_at_mlb) July 6, 2025

Since signing a seven-year, $182 million contract with the Rockies in March 2022, Bryant has played in just 170 of Colorado’s 576 games while slashing .244/.324/.370 with 17 home runs and 61 RBI over 712 plate appearances. Bryant has been worth -1.6 rWAR over that time, which is among the least valuable players in baseball; however, the Rockies have been much better with him in the lineup. This season, a seventh of the team’s wins have come with Bryant playing, and he hasn’t taken the field since early April. The Rockies put him on the 10-day injured list on April 14 and moved him to the 60-day IL on May 11. This is the ninth time he’s been on the IL since he joined the Rockies in 2022. He is slashing just .154/.195/.205  this season.

So Bryant hasn’t been very good in the rare times he’s been available for the Rockies, who are headed for one of the worst seasons in MLB history to put the cherry on top of three consecutive triple-digit-loss years.

The 2016 NL MVP and former World Series champion is a world a way from who he was just several years ago.

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