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All the athletic ability in the world doesn't help if you have trouble hitting a breaking ball.

Because of the football injury, we never got to see Bo at his best. From his rookie season (1987) thru his last healthy season (1990), he was making quantum improvements from year-to-year and had already achieved a dominant level of performance (1990 OPS+ = 142). Improved strike zone recognition was driving these improvements.

As a professional baseball analyst, I believe Bo's next five years would've been his best years -- probably generating OPS+ of 150-and-up. Which is to say he would've been 50% more productive than the average player in the AL.

That's interesting speculation, but you'll probably find the baseball archives littered with statistics of players who seemed to be on the verge of greatness before injuries cut their careers short. In his best year he hit .272, and his career average was .250. Personally, I don't see how someone improves dramatically beyond those numbers after the age of 27.

The other thing I noticed about his career stats was that he averaged a little over 120 games played in those seasons you mentioned. Was this because of injuries, or did he cut his baseball seasons short to play in the NFL?