John Anotonoff/For the Sun-Times
There was a blissful innocence in Cody Bellinger’s magnificent ascent to the top of the baseball universe.
How could he have known at the time that it couldn’t get any better?
‘‘I was just doing it,’’ he says, ‘‘just showing up and doing it, focusing on the next day, trying to be the best. I didn’t feel a lot of emotion toward it — and I definitely didn’t understand how amazing it was.’’
Not as he swatted his way with the Dodgers to a unanimous selection as 2017 National League Rookie of the Year, nor as he followed that up by winning NL Championship Series MVP honors and playing in his first World Series in 2018, nor even as the lefty-hitting center fielder put himself on the short list of the best players in the big leagues in 2019 by winning Gold Glove and Silver Slugger awards to go with his first NL MVP trophy.