Alan Roden roped baseballs with regularity this spring, helping himself to land not only a roster spot, but also an Opening Day start in right field for the Toronto Blue Jays. Showing signs that he’s ready to take off at the MLB level, the 25-year-old left-handed hitter punished Grapefruit League hurlers to the tune of a 1.245 OPS and a 220 wRC+. He also coaxed six free passes and fanned just four times over his 37 plate appearances.

More than spring training results factored into his first big-league opportunity. Building on a strong 2024 season, split between Double-A New Hampshire and Triple-A Buffalo, Roden has been adding pop to his profile. Previously known more for his bat-to-ball skills than for his ability to clear fences, the erstwhile Creighton University Bluejay is now looking to lift.

Having read of Roden’s efforts to generate more power, I asked him how he’s gone about impacting the ball with more authority.

“I think it’s less of the actual impact that’s better,” Roden told me at Blue Jays camp. “It’s more the shape of the ball off the bat, directionally. The exit velocities are high enough to where if I’m getting in the air to the pull side, it’s going to go. That’s where the damage comes from, hitting the ball with more ideal launch angles.”

Roden has a B.A. in physics, so understanding the aerodynamics of ball flight, and the swing paths that produce results, comes with the territory. Explaining his mechanical adjustments was a simple exercise for the Middleton, Wisconsin native. Read the rest of this entry »

Every year, most teams hold some sort of team bonding, social event during spring training. The specifics of the event vary from team to team, but frequently they include renting out a movie theater and showing some cloying, inspirational movie like The Blind Side, Cool Runnings, Rudy, or better yet, a documentary like Free Solo. Regardless of the team’s outlook on the year, the goal is to get the players amped up for the season and ready to compete on the field, even if the competition in question is for fourth place in the division.

But what if instead of taking the clichéd route, teams actually tried to select a movie that fits their current vibe, one that’s thematically on brand with the current state of their franchise? They won’t do this because spring training is a time for hope merchants to peddle their wares, even if they’re selling snake oil to sub-.500 teams. But spring training is over. It’s time to get real. So here are my movie selections for each American League team, sorted by release date from oldest to newest.

Stay tuned for the National League movie lineup in a subsequent post. Read the rest of this entry »

It might not be long before Captain Kirk is the captain of the Starship Blue Jays. Alejandro Kirk made his MLB debut in September 2020. The only players who have been with the team for longer are Vladimir Guerrero Jr. and Bo Bichette, both of whom could leave in free agency next winter. If that were to happen, Kirk would become the longest-tenured Blue Jay just days before his 27th birthday. He could end up holding that title for quite some time, too. On Saturday, Kirk and the Blue Jays reportedly agreed to a five-year, $58 million extension. The deal, which begins in 2026, buys out the backstop’s final arbitration season and his first four free agent years, running through his age-31 campaign.

A 23-year-old Kirk burst onto the scene in the first half of 2022. He hit .315, slugged 11 home runs, and walked more often than he struck out over 83 games. His 155 wRC+ ranked sixth among qualified AL batters, far ahead of the next-best catcher. The fact that he was splitting catching duties, and thus DHing on the regular, cut into his overall defensive value, but still, Kirk ranked among the top-10 AL players in WAR. Fans voted him to be the starting catcher for the AL All-Stars, and the honor was well deserved.

Yet, Kirk has never looked like that middle-of-the-order threat since. He produced a 95 wRC+ in the second half of 2022. He followed that up with a 96 wRC+ in 2023 and a 94 wRC+ in 2024. To save you some strenuous mental math, I can tell you that averages out to a 95 wRC+ since the 2022 All-Star break. That means Kirk has been about 5% less productive at the plate than the average hitter, but, to his credit, still 5% more productive than the average catcher. His 10.3% walk rate is great, while his 12.0% strikeout rate is elite. Only seven batters (min. 1,000 PA) have a lower strikeout rate in that span, and none of them boasts a walk rate in the double digits. Unfortunately, the plus power that made Kirk such a complete hitter in the first half of 2022 has vanished: Read the rest of this entry »

In which ways would a fully-implemented Automated Ball-Strike System [ABS] impact pitching? According to a coordinator I spoke to, one effect could be a further increase in the number of power arms who can get away with attacking the middle area of the zone. Conversely, crafty finesse types will become even less common, as getting calls just off the corners will no longer be possible.

Count Chris Bassitt among those not enamored with the idea.

‘“If you go to a full ABS system, you’re going to develop more throwers and the injury rates are going to spike,” opined the 36-year-old Toronto Blue Jays right-hander. “Then you’ll have to go back to pitching. The only way to stay healthy is to pitch. That’s never going to change in our sport. No matter how many people want to do something different, you have to pitch. There are obviously a number of facets for why people get hurt at the rate they’re getting hurt, but the answer for the injury history of the sport for the last five, ten years is more throwers. I don’t agree with it.”

Seattle Mariners pitching strategist coordinator Trent Blank offered a more measured take on the ABS. Read the rest of this entry »

Jackson Jobe supplied a quality quote when asked about last weekend’s three-straight-heaters punchout of Toronto’s Vladimir Guerrero Jr..””I’m done with trying to dot a gnat’s ass,” he told a small group of reporters. “It’s, ‘Here’s my stuff. If you hit it, good. Odds are, probably not.”

Jobe is a student of the art and science of his craft, so I proceeded to ask him where he feels he is in terms development. Has the 22-year-old Detroit Tigers right-hander essentially settled into his mound identity, or is there still work left to be done in the pitch lab?

“I’d like to think I got it pretty much all fine-tuned,” replied Jobe, who is No. 9 on our Top 100. “Now it’s just learning the best way to use it, the best way to sequence it. I put my stuff up against anyone in the league on paper, to be completely honest. It’s just a matter of learning how to harness it.”

Asked about any recent changes to his pitch metrics, the rookie of the year candidate cited his slider. Read the rest of this entry »

Jeff Hoffman is a different pitcher than the one who was drafted ninth overall by the Toronto Blue Jays in 2014. The 32-year-old right-hander has changed organizations multiple times, most recently moving from the Phillies back to his original team on a three-year, $33 million contract he signed in January. He earned that deal following back-to-back years in which he came into his own on the mound. Since being signed off the scrap heap by Philadelphia prior to the 2023 season, Hoffman has made 122 relief appearances and logged a 2.28 ERA, a 2.58 FIP, and a 33.4% strikeout rate over 118 2/3 innings. Before his breakthrough, he’d appeared in 134 games with a 5.68 ERA and a 5.34 FIP over 348 1/3 innings from 2016-2022.

Expectations were high when he entered pro ball. A potential first overall pick before injuring his elbow during his draft season at East Carolina University, Hoffman ranked second on our 2015 Blue Jays Top Prospects list despite having undergone Tommy John surgery the previous summer.

What did his FanGraphs scouting report look like at that time? Moreover, what does he think of it all these years later? Curious to find out, I shared some of what our then-lead prospect analyst Kiley McDaniel wrote back in 2015 and asked Hoffman to respond to it.

———

“He broke out in the summer before the draft on the Cape, flashing an 80 fastball and 65 or 70 curveball from an athletic delivery, projectable frame and shockingly good feel to pitch given the power stuff. Read the rest of this entry »

One way to tell the difference between a baseball fan who has a life and a true sicko is whether they have strong opinions on players who sign minor league contracts and attend spring training on a non-roster invite. The person in a Cubs hat who’s stoked about the Kyle Tucker trade and knows all sorts of intimate biographical details about Shota Imanaga? That’s your friend. If they start talking to you about Travis Jankowski, they might be in a little too deep.

We sickos know that while championships can be won and glory earned on the major league free agent market, NRIs are nonetheless a meaningful collection of useful roster players. Sometimes more. I’d argue that these fringe hopefuls are the only players who truly stand to gain by their performance in camp.

Moreover, these players are by definition underdogs. They include former top prospects, guys recovering from injury, and itinerant Quad-A players hoping for one last spin of the wheel. If you weren’t interested in their progress on a competitive level, surely we can interest you in an underdog story. Read the rest of this entry »

If the winter is a time for dreams, the spring is a time for solutions. Your team may have been going after Juan Soto or Aaron Judge or Shohei Ohtani, depending on the offseason, but short of something going weird in free agency (like the unsigned Boras clients last year), if you don’t have them under contract at this point, they’ll be improving someone else’s club. However, that doesn’t mean that spring training is only about ramping up for the daily grind. Teams have real needs to address, and while they’re no doubt workshopping their own solutions – or possibly convincing themselves that the problem doesn’t exist, like when I wonder why my acid reflux is awful after some spicy food – that doesn’t mean that we can’t cook up some ideas in the FanGraphs test kitchen.

This is the first piece in a three-part series in which I’ll propose one way for each team to fill a roster hole or improve for future seasons. Some of my solutions are more likely to happen than others, but I tried to say away from the completely implausible ones. We’ll leave the hypothetical trades for Bobby Witt Jr. and Paul Skenes to WFAN callers. Also, I will not recommend the same fix for different teams; in real life, for example, David Robertson can help only one club’s bullpen. Today, we’ll cover the 10 teams in the East divisions, beginning with the five in the AL East before moving on to their counterparts in the NL East. Each division is sorted by the current Depth Charts projected win totals. Read the rest of this entry »

Drake Baldwin is one of baseball’s most-promising prospects. A third-round pick in 2022 out of Missouri State University, the 23-year-old catcher in the Atlanta Braves organization is No. 11 on our Top 100. His left-handed stroke is a big reason why. Flashing plus power, Baldwin bashed 16 home runs last season while logging a 119 wRC+ between Double-A Mississippi and Triple-A Gwinnett.

He could have pursued a career in another sport. All-State in hockey as a Wisconsin prep, the sturdily-built Madison West High School product potted 43 goals as a junior, then found the back of the net 46 times as a senior.

Why did he choose the diamond, and not the ice?

“Hockey recruiting is a little later, so I didn’t actually talk to many colleges,” Baldwin said of his decision. “I think I had a chance, and the [junior hockey] route was interesting too, but being able to go right from high school to college and start working on a degree was a more straightforward path to where I wanted to be. I mean, I love both sports. I wish I could play both of them. Baseball just came first.” Read the rest of this entry »

On Tuesday morning, legendary baseball writer Jayson Stark was at Blue Jays camp in Dunedin, Florida, where he found something he liked.

Here's another Dunedin feature I'm a fan of. Exit velocity data on the scoreboard during batting practice. Including the bunts!

— Jayson Stark (@jaysonst.bsky.social) 2025-02-25T15:36:16.065Z

The Blue Jays were posting live batted ball data during batting practice, and this is indeed cool. At the absolute worst, this is an interesting bit of information for anyone who happens to be hanging around. We all have varying appetites for data while consuming sports, but I don’t know anyone who sees a hitter put a ball in the seats and doesn’t immediately think, “I wonder exactly how far he hit that.” Read the rest of this entry »