That's a comparison that I've seen made fairly often, and it is a legitimate one, but Tracy Jones has never seen Jay Bruce play and has never shown
any kind of acumen for interpreting numbers. I'm gonna respect him even less if he starts acting like this is a comparison that he actually came up with and has made.

As far as how Bruce compares to Walker, Larry had a cup of tea at 22 and was starting in the majors at 23, though Larry missed a year of time with an injury. Still, Bruce is a year or so ahead of Walker's pace. They're very similar size-wise and are both left-handed hitters. Their defensive skillsets are similar, both with decent range and good arms. Bruce is a future RF by most accounts, but I've heard that for the time being he's still a good defensive centerfielder.

At the plate, Walker and Bruce have similar swings, which is where the comparison mainly comes from. Statistically, Bruce has shown a better ability to hit for average and much more gap power, but Walker showed more homerun power and speed in the minors. Bruce strikes out a bit more than Larry did and also walks a little less. Perhaps somewhat interestingly, Walker's minor league track record didn't give much insight onto what kind of major league player he was, other than a very good one. Larry hit for significantly higher averages in the majors, but the homerun power wasn't quite as evident even when he spent most of his career in Coors (though Coors surely helped his average). As Larry's career pressed on, his strikeout rate dropped dramatically and his walk rate went up. On the basepaths, Larry stole 230 career bases and was a consistent base-stealing threat until he was past 30. Bruce has already seemingly dropped the stolen base from his arsenal, with just 7 in 13 attempts this year.

The final part of Larry's game that should be mentioned is a negative -- it was a pretty good bet that he'd miss at least 20 games every year. If he had managed to stay healthy, Larry was not a Hall of Very Good player, he was an dominant, Hall of Fame player. He ranks 19th on the career OPS list, and with Coors taken into account, ranks 72nd on the career OPS+ list -- exactly equal to Ken Griffey, Jr. and Duke Snider, and better than hall of famers like Reggie Jackson, George Brett, and Carl Yastrzemski. And he won 7 Gold Gloves to go along with that.

So in essence, I agree with Tracy Jones that Jay Bruce compares favorably to Larry Walker, but I really don't think it's his place to be making that comparison. I simply can't see any reason to find him credible unless he actually gave credit to where he heard it.