NEW YORK — Carlos Rodón was cruising until he wasn’t. After shutting out the Red Sox for the first four innings on Sunday night in the Bronx, Rodón scuffled while facing Boston’s hitters a third time, serving up two homers and allowing five runs before making an abrupt departure in the sixth inning of what became an 11-7 loss. It was a rare bum note from the 32-year-old lefty, who has stepped up to help the Yankees overcome the losses of Gerrit Cole and Luis Gil, pitching well enough to merit All-Star consideration.

Through four innings of an AL East rubber match between the first-place Yankees (39-25) and fourth-place Red Sox (32-35), Rodón had allowed only one hit and one walk while striking out four. He hadn’t thrown more than 16 pitches in any inning, had gotten first-pitch strikes against nine out of 14 hitters, and had allowed just one hard-hit ball: a 109.9-mph grounder by Ceddanne Rafaela that became an infield hit in the third. That play was compounded by a Jazz Chisholm Jr. throwing error, but it turned out to be of no consequence.

In the fourth inning, Rodón issued a two-out walk to Carlos Narváez, who to that point was just the second hitter he’d fallen behind 2-0 all night. It was the start of a trend. He went 2-0 against Abraham Toro before getting him to pop out to lead off the fifth, and after falling behind Trevor Story, induced him to pop out as well. To that point, he had retired 14 out of 16 batters, but he would get just one of the next five. Rafaela, the owner of a 42.7% chase rate (fourth-highest in the majors) wouldn’t bite at any of Rodón’s first three pitches, all well outside the zone, and ended up drawing a rare walk. Two pitches later, Kristian Campbell sent an up-and-away fastball just to the left of the foul pole in Yankee Stadium’s short right field, a towering 99-mph, 38-degree drive that didn’t slice. The runs snapped Rodón’s 18-inning scoreless streak, which dated back to the final inning of his May 16 start against the Mets. The homer was much less emphatic than Aaron Judge’s 108.6-mph, 436-foot blast off Red Sox starter Hunter Dobbins in the first inning, but it tied the game nonetheless. Rodón then struck out Jarren Duran chasing a low-and-away slider to end the frame. It was his 15th whiff on the night (six via his slider, five on his sinker, three on his four-seamer, and one on his change-up), and his fifth and final strikeout. Read the rest of this entry »

Few things tickle my fancy like a baseball player up to no good. Blue Jays reliever Brendon Little presently holds this distinction. Take a gander:

That’s Ramón Laureano swinging at Little’s knuckle-curve, which Little bounced off the front edge of home plate. Here’s another (pardon Matt Olson’s cameo):

Read the rest of this entry »

Below is an analysis of the prospects in the farm system of the Texas Rangers. Scouting reports were compiled with information provided by industry sources as well as our own observations. This is the fifth year we’re delineating between two anticipated relief roles, the abbreviations for which you’ll see in the “position” column below: MIRP for multi-inning relief pitchers, and SIRP for single-inning relief pitchers. The ETAs listed generally correspond to the year a player has to be added to the 40-man roster to avoid being made eligible for the Rule 5 draft. Manual adjustments are made where they seem appropriate, but we use that as a rule of thumb.

A quick overview of what FV (Future Value) means can be found here. A much deeper overview can be found here.

All of the ranked prospects below also appear on The Board, a resource the site offers featuring sortable scouting information for every organization. It has more details (and updated TrackMan data from various sources) than this article and integrates every team’s list so readers can compare prospects across farm systems. It can be found here. Read the rest of this entry »

Ron Washington has formed strong opinions over his long time in the game. One of them is built on old-school common sense. The 73-year-old Los Angeles Angels manager doesn’t believe in hefty hacks from batters who don’t possess plus pop, and that’s especially the case when simply putting the ball in play can produce a positive result. Which isn’t to say he doesn’t like home runs — “Wash” is no fool — it’s just that he wants his hitters to play to the situation. Moreover, he wants them to play to their own strengths.

The subject came up when the veteran manager met with the media prior to a recent game at Fenway Park. Zach Neto had gone deep the previous day — it was his 10th dinger on the season — and Washington stated that he doesn’t want the young shortstop thinking home run. I proceeded to ask him if he likes any hitter thinking home run.

“That’s a tough question,” he replied. “You’ve got guys that are home run hitters — that’s what they do — and you’ve also got guys that are home run hitters who are ‘hitters.’ There are guys that can walk up to the plate, look for a pitch, and take you deep if you throw it. Neto is not one of them.

“The game of baseball has transitioned itself to the point where everybody is worried about exit velocity and launch angle,” added Washington. “Even little guys have got a launch angle. They’re supposed to be putting the ball in play, getting on the base paths, causing havoc on the base paths, and letting the guys that take care of driving in runs drive in the runs. But for some reason, the industry right now… everybody wants to be a long-ball hitter. And I see a lot of 290-foot fly balls. I see a lot of 290-foot fly balls where they caught it on a barrel. If you caught the ball on a barrel and it only went 290 feet, you’re not a home run hitter. I see a lot of that.”

What about hitters that do have plus power? Does Washington like them thinking home run? That follow-up elicited any even lengthier response. Read the rest of this entry »

Happy Saturday, everyone, and welcome to the first edition of the FanGraphs Weekly Mailbag! We’ve got a lot to cover today, including how to fix the Braves, how the Orioles might fare if they sell at the deadline, the most fun plays to lead off games, and so much more.

But before we get there, I’d like to remind all of you that while anyone can submit a question, this mailbag is exclusive to FanGraphs Members. If you aren’t yet a Member and would like to keep reading, you can sign up for a Membership here. It’s the best way to both experience the site and support our staff, and it comes with a bunch of other great benefits. Also, if you’d like to ask a question for next week’s mailbag, send me an email at mailbag@fangraphs.com.

OK, that’s enough housekeeping. Let’s get to the first question, which comes to us from one of our international readers!

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I’m just wondering if it’s weird that the Twins have had two seasons in a row with winning streaks equal to or greater than 12 games after an absolutely garbage start. We didn’t even have a magic piece of preserved meat this year. Can we read into these tea leaves at all? Does God exist and, assuming they do exist, what has Minnesota baseball ever done to them? — Incomprehensibly Irrational in Ireland

After doing some Stathead research, it seems that you might not be “Incomprehensibly Irrational” after all, because you’re onto something here. The Twins are the second team in the Divisional Era to have winning streaks of 12 or more games in back-to-back seasons. Cleveland won 14 straight games in 2016, from June 17 through July 1; the next year, from August 24 through September 14, Cleveland ripped off 22 straight wins, the longest single-season winning streak since at least 1901, which is as far back as Stathead’s research goes. Those Cleveland teams were both really good, though. The 2016 club went to the World Series, and was 35-30 entering play on June 17; the 2017 team won 102 games, most in the American League, and was 69-56 entering play on August 24.

The closest comparison I could find to these Twins are the Chicago Cubs in 1927 and 1928. Chicago won 12 straight games in 1927, but that streak began on June 5 — later than the two Minnesota streaks. Those Cubs started slow, too, though 4-7 is not as rough a start as the Twins of the last two years, who were six games below .500 when their winning streak began last season and as many as eight games below .500 this year. Also, by the time the 1927 Cubs began their winning streak, they were three games above .500, at 22-19. The next year, the Cubs had a 13-game winning streak, beginning on May 5, when they were three games below .500. They finished the season 91-63, good for third in the National League.

So, all this is to say the Twins are the only team ever to begin winning streaks of 12 games or more before the start of June in back-to-back seasons, and if you extend the timeframe to the first week of June to also include the 1927-28 Cubs, the Twins are still the only team to win at least 12 games in consecutive seasons after being more than three games below .500 in each year. Sure, that’s a specific subset with a lot of qualifiers, but the Twins are a weird team! Late last August, as part of the cross-country road trip that I wrote about for FanGraphs, I stopped and saw a Twins game at Target Field. Despite their place in the standings — they were 72-60 and held the third Wild Card spot — they looked completely dead. Their outfield play was sloppy; their plate appearances were uninspired. Watching them against the Braves, another disappointing team, I could feel Minnesota’s pending collapse. Hopefully, for both you and my grandma, who is a die-hard Twins fan from Brainerd, Minnesota, the 2025 Twins won’t endure the same fate down the stretch as last year’s club did. Considering their rotation has the most WAR in the majors and Byron Buxton is (knock on wood) healthy and performing well, I think there’s a fairly good chance that they will be just fine.

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What is the most fun play to lead off a game? – Ben Lederman

Such a delightful question, Ben! I immediately thought of an inside-the-park home run, and I mean a clean one, without any errors that would put the “little league home run” asterisk on it. Give me Oneil Cruz at Coors Field, rocketing a line drive into the right-center gap in a game when the Rockies are giving Brenton Doyle the day off. Cruz blasts the ball so hard that it caroms off the wall at a weird angle, and because of the unexpected direction of the ricochet, it takes backup center fielder Mickey Moniak a little more time to pick it up. Cruz is rounding third when Moniak unleashes a perfect throw to cut-off man Ezequiel Tovar, who fires a nearly flawless one-hopper home. In a single motion, catcher Hunter Goodman snags it off the bounce, drops to his knee, and swipes his mitt to his left. Simultaneously, in an attempt to avoid the tag, the 6-foot-7 Cruz leaps head first toward the area where Goodman had been squatting before the pitch and extends his left hand to the point of the plate. It’s bang-bang. The umpire signals safe!

I also asked some of my FanGraphs colleagues what they thought. Here’s what they had to say:

Davy Andrews: I might argue for a crazy wild pitch, one that hits way up high on the net or sails way behind the batter. It really makes you wonder what’s going to happen next, and whether the game is going to get weird immediately.

Ben Clemens: I’m a defense-first guy, so I want to see this: Leadoff hitter hits a ball in the gap and gets thrown out trying to stretch it to a double.

James Fegan: A brawl to lead off a game really puts you on watch for the next nine innings.

Jay Jaffe: I’ll go with a little league home run.

Esteban Rivera: I always love a long at-bat to start a game, like at least 10 pitches.

Leo Morgenstern: I’m going simple. I think it’s just a no-doubter, first-pitch home run.

Kiri Oler: I know it’s not technically a “play,” but I like a nice bee delay to start a game.

Davy Andrews: Yeah, I’d like to change mine to that one.

Kiri Oler: I just think we can all use a friendly reminder that as much as we might like to think we’re in control, Mother Nature still runs things around here.

Jake Mailhot: A home run (little league or standard fare) is probably the right answer, but I’ll argue for a three-pitch strikeout with three whiffs. Immediately puts you on notice that the pitcher is feeling it today, and something might be cooking.

Lucas Kelly: Bunt single.

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As a Braves fan, my question is about the Braves offense – namely, how do you fix it? With so many lineup regulars locked into multi-year contracts, and nothing of note in the minors, is there anything even to be done except wait it out? The Braves fired their third base coach and brought back Fredi González, which seems like the kind of move that was only made because Alex Anthopoulos has too much respect for Brian Snitker to fire him midseason. I’m afraid that what we’ve seen from the Braves in 2024 and 2025 is closer to what they truly are, as opposed to the wonderful 2023. Should I have any reason for optimism that they will rebound? — Matt W., Nashville

The Braves are in a tough position if they want to fix their offense. They don’t have a lot of ready help in the minors, as you note, and don’t appear to have a lot of surplus talent to trade, but one position where they could afford to make a move is at catcher… where they did just get help from the minors and created a surplus. With top prospect Drake Baldwin breaking camp with the team and thriving in tandem with Sean Murphy, the Braves have an enviable pair of backstops, but that may be a luxury they have to forgo to fill other needs. They could sell high on Murphy, who has rebounded from a rough 2024 to hit for a 123 wRC+ and is signed through 2028. Good catching is always in short supply, and the Braves do have James McCann, a competent if unspectacular backup, stashed at Triple-A Gwinnett. Sure, it would be a bummer to trade a productive hitter away from an offense that needs help, but with Marcell Ozuna parked at DH, either Baldwin or Murphy is sitting on most days.

Additionally, the Braves do have a few below-market contracts, which gives them some room to maneuver; they can shake things up if they want to. Ozzie Albies is making $7 million this year with options at the same price for each of the next two. A team that’s more committed to winning than bean-counting could just eat his remaining commitment or sell low and trade for a better second baseman — not that it can be easily done without weakening some other part of the roster or system. Michael Harris II, who’s signed through 2030, has been terrible at the plate, but speed and defense give his value a floor, making him a buy-low possibility for a team willing to supply more immediate help in return.

Beyond that, there’s reason to wait — and even be optimistic. Jurickson Profar will be eligible to return from his 80-game PED suspension on June 29. That should help in left field, where Alex Verdugo and friends have combined for -1.0 WAR. It’s also not unreasonable to hope for some positive regression from Matt Olson and Austin Riley, both of whom have scalded the ball but are well short of their expected numbers. Ronald Acuña Jr. has hit well since coming back, and while it hasn’t coincided with a team-wide offensive outburst yet, the odds of one are certainly better with him in the lineup. — Jay Jaffe

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A lot of readers are probably well-versed on the 20-80 scouting scale, but can you give us more context on what that translates to at the major league level? It’d be interesting to hear some examples of 50/60/70 shortstops, who has a 30 hit tool, who has 70 power, etc. — Satya

I think there are useful modern applications for the traditional scouting scale. It’s a concise way to paint a fairly detailed picture of a player’s skill set. This sort of scale (where 50 is average and each integer of 10 represents a standard deviation from the average) was built to help describe distributions across any sort of population, like the size and color variation in carrots, or the rates of traffic accidents at different times of day, or, in our case, the distribution of talent across high-level amateur and pro baseball.

We have so much more data to consider now then we did when this scale was initially conceived as a potential means of communicating scouting information across a department of people without computers. Here are some of the statistical baselines and distributions that I use as a reference when interacting with in-kind minor league data for position players — we can do pitchers another time. I’m generally able to pull this information from FanGraphs; there’s often a big league equivalent to whatever minor league data I’ve gotten my hands on that’s accessible using our leaderboards and custom reports.

Here are the league-wide averages across the last 10 years for many of the statistical categories I think are meaningful when assessing players. The upward trend in some of the power metrics is a reminder that these scales shift and change. You can also play with the individual positions to get an idea of just how high the bar is at first base compared to catcher or center field.

Let’s start with some metrics that help measure a player’s hit tool:

Here are some examples by position, using full-season 2024 numbers:

This is a crude assessment. Note that there are plenty of hitters toward the bottom of the contact rate leaderboard who have high batting averages. Those guys are crushing the baseball when they make contact and netting more hits per ball in play; a hitter’s strength and power also impact the way their hit tool actually plays. These metrics are more indications of pure barrel feel, and I think that’s supported by the above list of names.

Next let’s look at raw power:

The league-wide average has been steadily creeping up over the last 10 years or so at every position but first base. Here are position-by-position deltas for hard-hit rate over the last 10 years:

Remember these deltas are in percentage points, not percentages. For shortstops, this is a 33% increase on balls put in play at 95 mph or more since 2015. Here are the players with top marks in these statistical categories:

There are no real surprises here. You can play with the leaderboards across positions, handedness, age, or various windows of time and learn more. Once you know the big league average and the standard deviation, you can basically ballpark everyone’s raw power as you surf around. Again, it’s crude, but it’s a piece of the puzzle for any prospect.

For speed, Statcast’s sprint speed is a great way of measuring a runner’s top speed. It’s giving you feet/second in the runner’s fastest one-second window. Base-to-base times (most commonly home-to-first times) give you a little better idea of a runner’s speed over a longer distance. You get some combination of top-end speed and acceleration in the home-to-first times, though beware of the jailbreak-style hitters whose times are better than their pure speed. Home-to-first times are most often what’s generating the speed grades you see in scouting reports. The players with 30 feet-per-second sprint speeds and home-to-first times hovering around 4.10 seconds are who you can safely call 80-grade runners. Most of those guys will run four flat or below on their best bolts.

As for defense and throwing, that’s something I gauge visually. I often look at Clay Davenport’s site and scope out the really big numbers in either direction as a flag that I need to assess a player’s defense, either through tape study or by communicating with scouts. Here is one totally subjective example of defenders at each grade and position (please excuse my name abbreviations):

— Eric Longenhagen
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Assuming they are healthy at the trade deadline (not a given at the moment), what would be a fair return for each of Cedric Mullins and Ryan O’Hearn? Can the Orioles expect/hope to get Top 100 pitchers for them? – Ben from Boston, FG Member since 2021

If O’Hearn and Mullins are both healthy come July and their performance hasn’t disappeared, I can imagine the O’s doing well in short-term returns. A Top 100 pitching prospect is a fairly big ask, because you’re only trading two months without an extra year as the kicker, and around 100, you’re at names like Carson Whisenhunt or Tink Hence. It’s not completely outside the realm of possibility, of course, because right now there don’t appear to be a lot of sellers with talent to target, as teams like the White Sox and Rockies have a fairly empty cupboard. Rather than focusing on one particular pitching prospect, the Orioles might use such a trade to instead pick up a few lower-ranked pitchers who have some kind of plausible upside, and see how things shake out. If the O’s are still struggling to crack .500 in late July, and Mullins and O’Hearn remain on the roster and unsigned to extensions, it would probably be malpractice if they start August in orange and black. — Dan Syzmborski

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This question is for any of the blog writers, but I had Michael Rosen in mind: How often do you find yourself 5-10 hours into researching an article and then reach a null hypothesis? Do you try to publish these anyway in some other format? This also doubles as a question about your process for picking research topics and then pursuing them: Do you do them one at a time? Multiple irons in the fire? How (if at all) do you collaborate with the other writers on staff? — Kevin Li

I try to avoid excessive dead-end research as much as possible by doing a bunch of work on the front end. If I find something that looks promising, I’ll pitch the story and start writing in earnest, but for every thread that’s worth pulling on, there are a bunch more where I write, like, 10 lines of code and realize I’m working toward a dead end. And the other writers have been super helpful when I’ve got a gap in my knowledge of some specific area of analysis, like hitting mechanics. I think I’ve sent over half the staff a Slack message at some point asking for help on one question or another. — Michael Rosen

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about Spencer Strider’s concerning performance, how he and Sandy Alcantara remind us that comebacks from elbow surgery aren’t automatic, and whether things are lookng up for the White Sox on and off the field. Then (32:23) they bring on top-tier Patreon supporter John Thomas to banter about his background as an EW listener and baseball fan, answer listener emails (42:34) about the future of baseball’s historic cathedrals, whether sabermetrics inevitably promotes efficiency and specialization, whether Mariano Rivera delayed the reimagining of bullpen roles, the evolution (or devolution) of framing, and a rotation of Paul Skenes clones, and then Stat Blast (1:38:33) about the Rockies and the best-ever infield defenses, Devin Williams and the worst holds, and notable matchups between minor leaguers and rehabbing big leaguers.

Audio intro: Xavier LeBlanc, “Effectively Wild Theme”
Audio interstitial: Jimmy Kramer, “Effectively Wild Theme”
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It’s not the results. I mean, it’s not not the results. Nobody feels good about an 0-4 record or a 5.68 ERA. But while the top line numbers are reason enough to worry about Spencer Strider, changes to his delivery and pitch shapes point to deeper concerns. The 26-year-old right-hander has made just four starts this season, but it’s reasonable to ask whether he’ll ever regain the form that just two years ago made him one of the most dominant forces in the game.

First and foremost, this stinks. Strider is a charismatic young player who’s easy to root for. When he’s at his best, standing bow-legged on the mound with his muscles threatening to shred his uniform pants, blowing 100-mph heat past anyone unlucky enough to find themselves in the batter’s box, he’s appointment viewing. After a cup of coffee in 2021, Strider burst onto the scene a fully-formed ace in 2022, laying waste to the league with a 98-mph fastball, a wicked slider, and a rumor of a changeup. From 2022 to 2023, his 2.43 FIP was the best among all starters, and his 10.3 WAR trailed only Kevin Gausman’s 10.7. Strider’s 3.36 ERA was 16th-best among starters with at least 300 innings pitched, and he looked for all the world like he would spend the rest of the decade as a true ace. Four games back from the internal brace surgery that wiped out nearly all of his 2024 season, we’re forced to reassess. Read the rest of this entry »

It’s been a frustrating season for Mark Vientos. After two years of trying to stick with the Mets, he broke out by hitting 27 homers in 111 games last season, and handled third base well enough to look as though he’d locked down a regular job. Yet this year, he’s regressed on both sides of the ball, and on Tuesday night in Los Angeles, he added injury to insult when he strained his right hamstring. The silver lining is that the 25-year-old slugger will get a chance for a reset once he’s healthy, and in his absence, the Mets have an opportunity to sort through their talented but still largely unproven assortment of young infielders.

Vientos’ injury occurred in the top of the 10th inning in Monday night’s opener of a four-game NLCS rematch between the Mets and Dodgers in Los Angeles; the series was an exciting one full of late-inning lead changes, with the two teams emerging with a split and three games decided by one run. Los Angeles had tied Monday’s game in the bottom of the ninth on a Shohei Ohtani sacrifice fly, and New York answered by scoring runs with back-to-back hits to start the 10th. With two outs and runners on the corners, Vientos had a chance to break the game open. He’d been hitting the ball hard lately but not getting great results, and when he smoked a 97-mph grounder to the right of shortstop Hyeseong Kim, it appeared to be more of the same. Kim reached the ball before it cleared the infield, but his throw to first base was an off-line one-hopper. It didn’t matter, as Vientos had fallen down before making it halfway down the line, because his right hamstring seized up.

On Tuesday, the Mets placed Vientos on the injured list and sent him back to New York to determine the severity of the injury. Manager Carlos Mendoza said on Wednesday that Vientos has a low-grade hamstring strain and is expected to receive treatment for 10-14 days before resuming baseball activities. To replace him on the roster, the Mets recalled 24-year-old Ronny Mauricio from Triple-A Syracuse. The former Top 100 prospect (no. 44 in 2022, and no. 90 in ’23, both as a 50-FV prospect) missed all of last season due to a right anterior cruciate ligament tear suffered during winter ball in February 2024. More on him below, but first, Vientos’ struggles are worth a closer look. Read the rest of this entry »

Read the rest of this entry »

OK, I give. I did not expect the Detroit Tigers to have the best record in baseball a week into June. Or at any point in the season, to be honest. We all knew that this was a playoff team with some developing young talent still in the pipeline; a return to the postseason and a run at the AL Central title seemed like reasonable goals. But the Tigers have not only done what was expected (Tarik Skubal’s continued excellence) and hoped for (former no. 1 picks Spencer Torkelson and Casey Mize leveling up), they’ve gotten breaks they could not even have dreamed of (Zach McKinstry’s .360 OBP).

But one obvious place the Tigers were set to improve was behind the plate. Jake Rogers is a terrific defender, and not as bad a hitter as I thought before I looked up his numbers. Which is to say I thought his numbers were horrendous; they were merely bad. Rogers was one of just 12 players to hit under .200 in 300 or more PA last year; out of 286 players who hit that playing time threshold, he was in the bottom 20 in wRC+.

Great defense behind the plate covers for a lot of offensive sins, but speaking generally, playoff teams don’t like to have a guy in the lineup every day who makes outs 75% of the time. Surely, there’s a way to achieve equivalent defense without giving up quite so much offense?

Good news; Dillon Dingler is here, and he can do better than that. Read the rest of this entry »