In his prime — and it was not a long prime — nobody hit a majestic home run like Joey Gallo. It was something about the violence of the swing, the loopy lefty uppercut, the two-handed follow-through, and the way he’d stand up straight right after contact, a confirmation that the baseball was indeed crushed.

Those high arcing blasts powered one of the more bizarre careers of his generation. In the heart of the Three True Outcomes era, he was its emperor, threatening to lead the league in either walk rate, strikeout rate, or home runs in any given year.

Sadly, time passes. Those with prominent residences on Gallo Island now fear foreclosure proceedings. The big slugger has fallen on hard times; last week, he signed a minor league contract with the Chicago White Sox. A non-guaranteed deal with the team that just set the major league record for losses carries some pretty clear subtext. Gallo is hanging off the cliffside of his career, one finger latched to a jagged rock.

It all feels too soon. He’s just 31 years old, a normal and cool age that is in no way old. As Tom Tango’s research shows, bat speed generally starts to decline right at this point, not years before. But even at his best, Gallo lived at the extremes. In his magical 2019 half-season, which unfortunately was cut short by a broken hamate bone, he posted a .635 xwOBA on contact. Across 2,865 player seasons in the Statcast era, only 2017 Aaron Judge topped that figure.

At his apex, nobody — save for one of the greatest hitters of all-time — crushed the baseball like Joey Gallo. He paired that supreme power with some of the lowest chase rates in the league, giving him enough on-base juice to offset the batting averages that made boomers want to gauge out their eyes. That excellent plate discipline allowed him to hunt mistakes in the middle of the plate, mostly fastballs and hanging sliders. His swing was geared for these middle-middle meatballs, and his 70-grade batting eye allowed him to lay off most pitches on the black. Yes, when he got into a two-strike count and was compelled to swing, he most likely was going to come up empty. But he forced pitchers to battle.

Over the last handful of years, though, the other extreme in Gallo’s game eclipsed his prodigious power. Remember those 2,865 player seasons? Two of Gallo’s seasons rank first and second across the decade in the percentage of all swings resulting in whiffs. That decade-leading 44.3% whiff rate came in the 2023 season, when he still managed, I must note, to run an above-average wRC+.

In retrospect, it all started to go downhill after that infamous July 2021 trade to the Yankees. Gallo was coming off perhaps his finest month as a big leaguer, striking out “just” 25.3% of the time, walking nearly as frequently as he struck out, and mashing 10 homers. Painfully, he hit just .160 following the trade, and despite his 16.2% walk rate and usual home run pace, his anemic batting average turned him into a villain with the Yankees. After another dismal half-season, the Yankees shipped him off to the Dodgers; things didn’t get much better in Los Angeles, where he ran strikeout rates that dipped into the 40s for the first time.

Gallo hit free agency for the first time after that 2022 season, and since then teams have made increasingly small bets on his ability to return to his prime form. It started with the Twins in 2023, who paid him $11 million for a single year’s services. Next up were the Nationals, who handed out a $5 million deal, and he turned in his worst season yet. So now here we are, with Gallo at the bleakest end of the baseball universe.

It isn’t hard to see how things ended up like this. Gallo is a big guy who swings hard, and the bills have come due for his high-impact style of play. Over the last two seasons, he battled a sprained shoulder, a strained oblique, a foot contusion, and two separate hamstring strains, the second of which forced him out of action for nearly two months. He even came down with a case of pink eye. His body appears to be breaking down rapidly, and you can almost see the effects of this as he sets up in the box, constantly shifting and readjusting like he’s in the middle seat on a Spirit flight.

Perhaps as a result of all this discomfort, Gallo’s carrying tool is showing signs of erosion. In the second half of 2023, his average bat speed of 73.9 mph ranked in the 84th percentile of hitters. That 2023 mark is the first bat speed data available to the public, and one can imagine that at his peak, Gallo could swing a few miles per hour harder than that, ranking among the likes of Giancarlo Stanton and Kyle Schwarber as one of the fastest swingers in the league.

Gallo’s bat slowed even further in 2024. His average bat speed dipped 1.5 mph, dropping him into the fat part of the bell curve, only a tick above the major league average of 71.3 mph. His once-excellent plate discipline now looks more like passiveness. White Sox manager Will Venable says Gallo will primarily play first base. He is definitively an aging slugger, and his career depends on whether he can revive his famous power skills.

It’s possible that some of Gallo’s bat speed decrease was intentional; in 2023, only Trey Cabbage squared up fewer balls, and that mark improved slightly in 2024. But it’s Joey Gallo. If you have him on your team, you don’t want him trading off power for contact because he’s never going to make enough contact for that to matter. You want him swinging out of his shoes, walloping tanks into the stratosphere.

As my editor Matt Martell pointed out, the White Sox have an institutional history of old slugger resuscitation attempts. There were the ill-fated midseason acquisitions of Manny Ramirez and Ken Griffey Jr., a deal for post-peak Andruw Jones, even the four-year deal they handed out to Gallo’s evolutionary predecessor, Adam Dunn. All these guys landed on the South Side hoping to recapture the magic one last time.

Unlike those other players, though, there are no guarantees that Gallo makes the team, especially because Miguel Vargas is out of minor league options. But let’s just dream for a minute that Gallo took up yoga or any of the other offseason workout routines that prompt players to boast that they’re in the best shape of their lives. Picture this: a .190 average, a 35% strikeout rate, 30 home runs, a permanent spot in the middle of the order against right-handed pitchers. Gallo is one of the strangest and most spectacular players I’ve ever seen. I’m crossing my fingers he gets one last go.

After four season’s worth of high-profile trades, extensions, and free agent signings, the Padres have had a very quiet winter save for the headlines that their ownership battle has generated. On Wednesday, the day that their pitchers and catchers reported to their spring training facility in Peoria, Arizona, the team made by far its biggest move of the offseason, signing free agent Nick Pivetta to a four-year, $55 million deal. They followed that up on Thursday by inking lefty Kyle Hart to a one-year deal with an option.

Taken together, the additions appear to set up a trade of Dylan Cease, the top starter on last year’s 93-win Wild Card team and a pending free agent this winter. However, general manager A.J. Preller indicated that’s not the plan right now, telling reporters on Thursday, “He’s a very big part of our club. The additions the last couple days supplement what’s a really good rotation. That’s our focus here going forward — having that strong rotation.”

Of course, any decision to keep Cease could be revisited if the Padres receive an offer they can’t refuse, or if they fall out of contention this summer. It should also be pointed out that Michael King, the team’s second-best starter in 2024, is a trade candidate as well; he can also become a free agent after this season if he declines his end of a mutual option for 2026. Read the rest of this entry »

The biggest remaining free agent of the 2024-25 offseason is off the board. In a splashy signing Wednesday night, the Boston Red Sox and Alex Bregman agreed to a three-year, $120 million deal. There’s no shortage of things I want to say about this match of team and player, so let’s stop with this boring introduction already and get right into it.

The Team

The Red Sox needed Bregman, or someone like him, badly. Just one problem – there was no one else like him. When Dan Szymborski ran the numbers last week, he found that the Sox were one of the teams who would receive the greatest boost in playoff odds from signing Houston’s long-time third baseman. Per Dan, Bregman adds 10.8 percentage points to Boston’s chances of reaching October.

The Red Sox play in the toughest division in baseball. They have some holes in their lineup, particularly a decided lack of juice at the bottom of the order. Their bullpen projects well but is packed with uncertainty. A sure thing was just what they needed. Bregman is just that. Since his 2016 debut, he’s been the 10th-best hitter in baseball according to our measure of WAR. “Oh, but Ben, he’s old, he’s faded, he’s past his prime, no one cares about 2019.” Yeah, well, over the last four years, Bregman has been the 11th-best position player in baseball. So much for a decline phase.
Read the rest of this entry »

On Tuesday, pitchers and catchers officially reported to Camelback Ranch, the spring training home that the Dodgers share with the White Sox in Glendale, Arizona. Among the Dodgers reporting was a familiar face, that of Clayton Kershaw. According to ESPN’s Alden Gonzalez, the three-time Cy Young winner — who had entered free agency for the fourth offseason in a row — has agreed to terms with the Dodgers and will return for his 18th major league season.

For as much as the move was anticipated, the sight of Kershaw in camp was a reassuring harbinger of spring. Given his accomplishments and the slew of injuries he’s endured in recent years, the continuation of the future Hall of Famer’s career isn’t something to take for granted. The details of his contract have not been announced at this writing, and the deal is still pending a physical. Once it’s finalized, we can probably expect some incentives and mechanisms that help to lower the team’s tax hit, whether in the form of deferred money or a less lucrative player option for 2026. The Dodgers’ 40-man roster is full, but with the opening of camp, the team can transfer players to the 60-day injured list and free up roster spots. On Tuesday, they did just that in order to accommodate the return of Enrique Hernández, moving pitcher Gavin Stone, who will miss the whole season due to shoulder surgery, to the 60-day IL.

[Update: The deal became official on Wednesday, with River Ryan, who is recovering from August 2024 Tommy John surgery, transferred to the 60-day IL to make room. According to FanSided’s Robert Murray, Kershaw will receive a base salary of $7.5 million, and can max out at $16 million via incentives. He’ll receive an additional million apiece for starts 13 through 16, a roster bonus of $2.5 million for being active for at least 30 days, and additional $1 million bonuses for reaching 60 and 90 days.]

Kershaw, who turns 37 on March 19, could be a candidate for a 60-day IL slot himself, as he underwent a pair of offseason surgeries following a season in which he made just seven starts totaling 30 innings, the last of them on August 30. He was a bystander during the Dodgers’ championship run, though anyone who witnessed either the clubhouse festivities at Yankee Stadium — during which Kershaw shed his shirt — or the celebration at Dodger Stadium following their victory parade through Los Angeles can attest that he was no less exuberant about the team’s World Series win. Read the rest of this entry »

Kenley Jansen his headed back to Los Angeles, if only in name, on a one-year, $10 million contract with the Angels.

The 37-year-old four-time All-Star currently sits fourth all-time on the career saves list and leads all active pitchers in the category. Jansen famously did most of that damage in Dodger blue, and now at the twilight of his career, he returns to his old stomping grounds… ish. Like 45 minutes down the freeway from his old stomping grounds. Close enough. Read the rest of this entry »

For much of last summer, it looked as though Enrique Hernández had reached the end of the line with the Dodgers. For as popular as the team’s longtime superutilityman had been, his production was dreadful, and it seemed only a matter of time before he got caught in a numbers game as the team ran out of roster spots. Fortunately for both him and the Dodgers, a visit to the eye doctor helped, his production improved dramatically, and he had some huge moments in October while helping the Dodgers win the World Series. On Sunday afternoon, just before the Super Bowl, Hernández himself announced that he was returning to the fold.

Walking through the open door pic.twitter.com/hsd4IOpva6

— Enrique Hernández (@kikehndez) February 9, 2025

The statement refers to general manager Brandon Gomes’ words at the Dodgers’ recent FanFest. “Obviously, we’ll never close the door to Kiké,” said Gomes of the free agent, who has played a vital part on all four of the Dodgers’ World Series teams during the Dave Roberts era. Read the rest of this entry »

The Angels were the busiest team in baseball during the first month of the offseason, signing Yusei Kikuchi, Travis d’Arnaud, Kyle Hendricks, and Kevin Newman, and trading for Jorge Soler. Then, after a quiet period throughout December and January, they returned to action last week, agreeing to a one-year, $5 million pact with Yoán Moncada. He will reportedly take over for Anthony Rendon as their primary starter at third base.

Meanwhile, the Padres are waking from an even longer hibernation. While the Dodgers, Diamondbacks, and Giants have been hard at work improving their rosters this winter, the Padres have been quiet. Their only notable move prior to February was re-signing catcher Elias Díaz. On Friday, they finally broke their silence and added not just one, but two major league free agents: Connor Joe and Jason Heyward. The two are expected to share duties in left field. Joe will earn a guaranteed $1 million on his one-year deal. The terms of Heyward’s contract, while presumably quite similar, have not yet been reported.

Angels Sign Yoán Moncada

We should have seen this coming. Back in December, the Angels reportedly expressed interest in a trio of third basemen on the offseason trade market: Nolan Arenado, Eugenio Suárez, and Alec Bohm. They were also linked to a pair of big-name free agent sluggers entering their age-30 seasons: Pete Alonso and Anthony Santander. So, of course, the Angels found a way to get the best a mediocre approximation of both worlds.

Moncada has had a career trajectory that few, if any, can relate to. There was a time when his star was so bright that he was often mentioned in the same breath as fellow international phenom Shohei Ohtani. Even as a teenager, he looked like such a stud that the Red Sox shattered international signing precedent to give him a $31.5 million bonus, which cost them another $31.5 million in penalties. Less than two years later, he was such a highly regarded prospect that some wondered if the Red Sox made a fatal mistake by trading him to the White Sox for Chris Sale.

Of course, Moncada wasn’t the first prospect to garner so much hype, nor was he the first top prospect who failed to reach his full potential. What makes him so interesting is that he did discover his ceiling – he just couldn’t stay there. In 2019, his age-24 campaign, Moncada played 132 games, swatted 25 homers, swiped 10 bases, and produced a 139 wRC+ en route to a 5.2-WAR season. That’s the kind of player the Red Sox thought they were signing when they gave him a record-setting bonus. That’s the kind of player the White Sox thought they were acquiring when they gave up one of the greatest starting pitchers of this generation to get him.

Sad to say, Moncada has never been that kind of player again. Everyone has a theory about the cause of his decline, from long COVID to the deadened ball, but regardless of the explanation, the fact of the matter is that Moncada was not able to make a consistent impact for the White Sox from 2020-24. His bat dropped off a cliff in 2020. He bounced back to post 3.7 WAR in 2021, but after that, injuries and underperformance became the defining themes of his late 20s. From 2022-23, he put up an 86 wRC+ and just 2.0 WAR over 196 games.

Moncada got off to a nice start in 2024, slashing .282/.364/.410 over the first two weeks of the season before a left adductor strain forced him to the injured list. Although he was initially expected to return in July, his rehab was put on pause for six weeks in the summer, first due to whatever on earth “anticipated soreness” is and later because he was oh-so-vaguely “still kind of feeling something.” He finally got back to Chicago in mid-September, after tearing up Triple-A on a rehab assignment, only to sit on the bench for the worst team in modern baseball history.

The White Sox had a dozen more games to ride out and roughly 450 plate appearances to fill. And yet Moncada appeared in just one of those games and took just one of those trips to the plate. If you blinked at the right moments, you might not have realized he ever came off the injured list at all. Over those final 12 games, White Sox batters produced a 70 wRC+ and -0.6 WAR. Their designated hitters went 9-for-50 with a 49 wRC+. Their third basemen were even worse, going 4-for-44 with a -2 wRC+. Yet, the only work the White Sox offered Moncada was a 12th-inning pinch-running gig against the Angels on September 18. He struck out the following inning in his only plate appearance of the month. Nonetheless, he somehow finished the season as the most productive offensive performer on the team, because of course he did:

All that to say, Moncada’s performance in 2024 can’t tell us much about what to expect from him in 2025. Could he be the 5.2-WAR player we saw in 2019, or even just the 3.7-WAR player we saw in 2021? I mean, sure, I guess. He’s done it before, and he won’t even turn 30 until May. But Moncada put up 2.2 WAR over 208 games from 2022-24, and that’s the kind of player our Depth Charts projections expect him to continue to be in 2025 (1.3 WAR in 118 games). ZiPS is a little higher on him, while Steamer is a little lower, but ultimately, we’re talking about a slightly-below-average everyday player – if he can stay on the field enough to play every day. For many teams, that wouldn’t be enough to crack the starting lineup. For the Angels, however, Moncada could be a nice addition.

From about 2015 to 2020, Rendon was one of the few third basemen one might have picked over Moncada. The latter was a future superstar, but the former was already playing at that level. These days, Rendon is one of the few third baseman upon whom Moncada is, more likely than not, a meaningful upgrade. Here’s how the two compare according to several projection systems:

Saddled with unfair expectations as a teenager, Moncada has developed a bit of a reputation as a prospect bust. The truth, however, is that he was worth every penny the Red Sox paid him; they used him to get Sale, and Sale helped them win a World Series. What’s more, he gave the White Sox 13.8 WAR over parts of eight seasons and contributed to the team’s first two playoff runs since 2008. Overall, he provided Chicago about $110 million in value (using a simplistic $8 million per WAR estimate) while earning just a little over $70 million in salary. Perhaps he didn’t become everything he could have been, but he gave both of his teams more than he took. He can do the same for the Angels in 2025.

Padres Sign Jason Heyward and Connor Joe

On Opening Day in 2023, Juan Soto stood in left field for San Diego. The following season, the Padres braced for what could have been the worst downgrade since The Fresh Prince recast Aunt Viv. Jurickson Profar, he of the lowest WAR in baseball the year prior, was Soto’s replacement. The Friars dropped from first to 30th on our left field positional power rankings. Yet, things sometimes have a funny way of working out. Against all odds, the 2024 Padres had the top left fielder in the National League, according to WAR, for the second year in a row.

Unfortunately, the Padres then found themselves looking to replace their All-Star left fielder for a second consecutive winter. This time around, their solution is a platoon of the lefty-batting Heyward and the righty-batting Joe. And you know, for what it’s worth, both Heyward and Joe have better projections now than Profar did entering 2024:

To be crystal clear, those projections say far more about Profar’s remarkable 2024 season than they do about either Heyward or Joe. They do not suggest that Heyward and Joe this year are likely to outperform Profar last season. Nor do they suggest that either one of them has more upside than Profar did at this time last year. Heyward was an All-Star caliber player in his early 20s, and to his credit, he has enjoyed multiple bounce-back seasons over the past several years. Indeed, he is only two years removed from a strong 2023, when he put up a 120 wRC+ and 2.3 WAR in 124 games with the Dodgers. However, his 38th-percentile xwOBA that year suggested he was due for regression, and regress he did. Over 87 games with the Dodgers and Astros, he produced a 94 wRC+ and just 0.8 WAR in 2024. While the Padres are surely hoping to get something like the 2023 version of Heyward, a repeat of his 2024 is far more likely. He’s already 35 years old (he’ll turn 36 in August), and I’m more convinced by his overall 91 wRC+ and .301 xwOBA from 2021-24 than I am by his brief resurgence in 2023.

Joe is three years younger than Heyward but has never shown anything close to Heyward’s All-Star ceiling. In fact, he has never even had a year as strong as Heyward’s 2023. (There’s a reason the Pirates non-tendered Joe rather than pay his projected $3.2 million arbitration salary.) All things considered, Joe’s production over the first four proper seasons of his career has been pretty similar to Heyward’s declining performance in the same time frame. Joe has been the more consistent hitter, but Heyward makes up the difference as a better baserunner and outfield defender:

Heyward is used to working in a platoon; since 2021, only 12.9% of his plate appearances have come against left-handed pitchers. Joe, on the other hand, could benefit from less exposure to opposite-handed hurlers. He has a career 107 wRC+ against lefties and a 91 wRC+ against righties. His managers in Colorado and Pittsburgh made an effort to shield him from right-handed pitching, but they haven’t had enough quality options to use him in a genuine platoon role; 38.2% of his career plate appearances have come against lefties. Excluding his eight-game cup of coffee with the Giants in 2019, when 14 of his 16 plate appearances came against lefties, he has never had a season in which the majority of his plate appearances have come with the platoon advantage.

Are the Padres such a team to change that? They should be, although that is contingent on their making further additions. Ideally, Heyward would take the bulk of the work in left field, health allowing, while Joe would handle the short side of the platoon. However, the Padres might need Joe for more than just outfield duties – and more than just a platoon role. Considering his defensive success at first base (5 DRS, 2 FRV in 170 career games), and the massive hole San Diego has at designated hitter, I wouldn’t be surprised to see Joe playing plenty of first with Luis Arraez as the DH. Joe’s projected 95 wRC+ (per Steamer) against right-handers would be pitiful at first base, but the Padres don’t currently have many better options for either first base or DH — whichever position that Arraez is not occupying. The only player on their 40-man roster with a higher projected wRC+ against righties who isn’t already penciled into the lineup at a different position is Tirso Ornelas, a prospect who has yet to make his MLB debut.

If San Diego is going to beat its 33.2% playoff odds without making any major additions, it will need someone to step up to replace its most productive hitter from 2024. If that hero exists, it almost certainly won’t be Heyward or Joe. Instead, that production will need to come from Fernando Tatis Jr., Xander Bogaerts, Manny Machado, or, in a best-case scenario, some combination of all three. Still, Heyward and Joe are proven big league players, and there’s no doubt the Padres needed more of those on their roster. And hey, you never know. It’s not so long ago we were saying the same thing about Profar.

Tommy Pham is on the move again. The well-traveled outfielder reportedly agreed to a one-year, $4.025 million deal with the Pirates on Thursday, meaning that he’ll join his ninth team over the past five seasons and the 10th of his 12-year career. Past experience suggests he should probably rent instead of buy.

Pham, who will turn 37 on March 8, spent time with three different teams in 2024. Despite a very solid 2023 showing — .256/.328/.446 (109 wRC+) with 16 homers, 22 steals, and 1.9 WAR — with the Mets and Diamondbacks, he went unsigned through spring training before finally inking a deal with the White Sox in mid-April. He escaped their record-setting futility when he was traded back to the Cardinals (who originally drafted him in 2006) as part of the three-way swap that sent Michael Kopech and Tommy Edman to the Dodgers, and then was plucked off of waivers by the Royals on August 31. At least he’s gotten back-to-back trips to the postseason thanks to all that moving around.

Whether it was because he missed spring training, never stayed in one place for long, or was increasingly subject to the ravages of aging — spending time around those White Sox and Cardinals teams could take years off a man’s life — Pham did not play well in 2024. He hit just .248/.305/.368, setting career lows in on-base percentage and walk rate (7.3%) as well as a full-season low in slugging percentage. (He slugged .312 in 125 plate appearances during the pandemic-shortened 2020 season.) He was basically replacement level in 2024, and his 91 wRC+ fit into the weird pattern he’s shown over the past half-decade, with above-average seasons in odd-numbered years and below-average seasons in even-numbered ones. Maybe that bodes well for the Buccos. Read the rest of this entry »

Pete Alonso is going back to the Mets. It always felt like the most likely outcome, and to be honest, it would’ve been super weird to see him in any other uniform. Alonso has never been the best player on the Mets, but he does the coolest and most valuable thing you can do on a baseball diamond — hit home runs — with great frequency. That, and an affable attitude that’s endeared him to the fans, has made him an institution in Queens.

Unfortunately, there was something of a disagreement over what all those contributions were worth. Alonso returns to his team of origin on a front-loaded two-year, $54 million contract that features an opt-out. If Alonso does what he’s done his whole career, he can test free agency again next winter, having pocketed $30 million. That’s a handsome one-year salary for any player, but far, far short of Alonso’s expectations. Read the rest of this entry »

Major league job boards don’t exist, at least not for players. You can’t walk past some mythical player’s union clubhouse, see a sign that says “Team seeking middle reliever, please tear off a number and call it to apply,” and find a job that way. The team calls you, or emails your agent, and they do that after working up their own list of targets independently. Or at least, that’s what they tell us. But after seeing the Minnesota Twins acquire the same type of player for the third year running, as they did in signing Harrison Bader to a one-year deal this week, I’m not so sure.

Bader’s deal is for one year and $6.25 million, with bonuses that could kick in another $2 million. That’s a reasonable deal for a quality backup, and that’s exactly what Bader looks like. He’s put up between 300 and 450 plate appearances in six of the past seven seasons – the only year he missed that mark was in the COVID-shortened 2020 campaign. At first, that was because he couldn’t stay on the field, but in recent years, he’s turned into a defensive specialist and righty platoon bat.

How much do the Twins like those two roles? Well, in 2023, they traded for Michael A. Taylor, a defensive specialist and righty platoon bat, and then gave him 110 starts in center field. Sure, they had Byron Buxton, but that year Buxton never took the field, all the better to protect him from injuries. Taylor was so good that he got a new deal in free agency to head to Pittsburgh – so the Twins went out and traded for Manuel Margot, a “defensive specialist” and righty platoon bat. Read the rest of this entry »