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Happy Draft Weekend everyone! The draft broadcast begins at 1 p.m. ET today, with the first four rounds scheduled for Day 1. Then, tomorrow, the draft resumes at 11:30 a.m. ET for rounds 5-20.

As always, FanGraphs has you covered with everything you need to know before, during, and after the draft. Eric Longenhagen, Brendan Gawlowski, Michael Baumann, and Meg Rowley are in Philadelphia providing coverage throughout the weekend. You can find all of our draft coverage here, or by using the navigation widget at the top of our homepage and in our draft pieces. Eric and Brendan’s updated draft rankings are available on The Board, where you’ll also find players’ scouting reports and tool grades. You can read Eric’s draft preview here, and his first mock draft here. Provided he has enough new information to merit one, his second mock draft will run today before the first round, so be on the lookout for that, too. Meanwhile, Michael wrote three excellent draft features, which you can read here, here, and here. Also, be sure to join our Day 1 draft chat, where the FanGraphs crew will be answering your questions and providing updates and analysis beginning at 1 p.m ET.

That’s the last you’ll read about the draft in this mailbag. Instead, we’ll be answering your questions about Pete Crow-Armstrong, Aaron Ashby’s propensity for wins, and games with the highest rates of true outcomes for one team. Plus, I’ll provide the answers to last week’s trivia questions about baseball stats featuring the number 250. But first, I’d like to remind you that 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 an upcoming mailbag, send me an email at mailbag@fangraphs.com. Read the rest of this entry »

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Hello. While on paternity leave, I kept a journal about baseball and my daughter, who is not named Derek Jr., but who will henceforth be referred to as Derek Jr. You can read all of the entries here.

May 17
Yesterday, when Derek Jr. was fussy, my wife played a Black Eyes Peas song on her phone and bounced our daughter on a yoga ball. Today it became clear that she considered this to be a successful experiment and that it will be a thing in our household going forward. The baby is fussy. Let’s bounce her to that Black Eyed Peas song. On repeat. Day after day. The Black Eyed Peas playing in our home. This was not a path I could have foreseen. This is not a path I would have chosen. This already seems like it will not be a path I can escape.

While I’m feeding Derek Jr. in the evening, I catch the ninth and 10th innings of the Cubs and White Sox. The 10th inning is one of the most exciting I’ve seen in a while. The Cubs start with Pete Crow-Armstrong as the zombie runner, which already makes it must-see TV. The White Sox broadcast is apparently having some sort of kids’ day celebration, and all of the graphics have a distinctly Backyard Baseball feel to them. If you’ve never played the Backyard Sports games, then this will go right over your head, but as I watch, a realization washes over me: The speedy, lanky, left-handed, red-haired Pete-Crow Armstrong is Major League Baseball’s version of the speedy, lanky, left-handed, red-haired Pete Wheeler. I mean, come on:

Season-level baseball stats are the tried and true. They’re at the bottom of your screen every time a player steps into the box to bat or onto the mound to pitch, and they’re on the leaderboards that BBWAA members peruse when deciding whom to vote for at the end of each year. But splits are what really keep the engine going. They add context. They fill in dead air on the broadcast. They clarify trends and build narratives. When you think “splits” you probably think of platoon splits or monthly splits, all of which are great and on our Splits Leaderboards. But today I wanted to get even more granular, move off the main Splits Leaderboard page, and jump into Pitch-Type Splits.

There’s far more you’re able to do on this page than I could possibly cover in a reasonably sized post, so these highlights will just be a taste to whet your appetite. Read the rest of this entry »

The 2026 MLB Draft begins tomorrow. Dreams will come true, and the course of baseball history will be altered not just by the talent of the players, but by the collective decisions of hundreds of hard-working people with teams and agencies who have been preparing for this since long before last year’s draft even began. Even though the current CBA negotiations and the owners’ proposal to maim the draft’s current format casts something of a shadow on this year’s event, it’s an exciting time for everyone, myself included. I not only get to learn about this class of players and share opinions about their baseball futures with our readers, I also get to highlight the strategies teams might use to maximize the talent they come away with. The bonus pool system, and the ways that teams, players, and their representatives navigate the “game” of the draft, is one of the things that separates baseball’s selection meeting from those of other sports. It rewards strategy, creativity and the cultivation of information that has nothing to do with hard baseball data. In this post, I’ll talk about the makeup and quality of this year’s class, take you through the pockets of players that pose difficult questions for clubs, and discuss a couple potential draft strategies, as well as which teams might best be able to execute them.

You’ll find the scouting reports and tool grades of 146 players over on The Board. Of that group, the 75 with a 40+ FV or above grade have an ordinal ranking, with the balance grouped by demographic. Brendan and I may still pepper that space with additional players between now and the draft, but they’ll be guys who fall lower on the list. The hard-ranked players are the ones who we’re most excited about. Read the rest of this entry »

With the MLB Draft just a day away, there is more information left in my notebook from the Combine than I have time to dispense. So, in the spirit of my post-draft grab bag from last season, here are some players who caught my eye (or at least my microphone) in Phoenix, whose names you ought to know come Draft Day.

Foremost among these is Jackson Flora, a right-handed pitcher out of UC Santa Barbara. I think he’s the top pitching prospect in the class. Eric Longenhagen and Brendan Gawlowski put him fourth overall on The Board; he’s the only pitcher in the top nine. And not that we care too much what other people think, but that’s very much the consensus position.

This draft has a clear top tier of Roch Cholowsky, the UCLA shortstop and presumptive top pick dating back 12 months, plus Georgia Tech catcher Vahn Lackey and Texas prep shortstop Grady Emerson. The prospect team has Future Value grades of 55 on all three of those players, then Flora with a 50, then the rest of the class starting at a 45+.

In his media scrum on Day 1 of the Combine, Flora said he was meeting with seven teams — the ones holding picks two through eight. If he doesn’t go in the first five or six picks, it’ll be a big deal.

Why? Well, I know I just wrote a big thing about how there’s no such thing as an ideal baseball body, but you can forget all that: It looks like Flora. The California right-hander is a lean 6-foot-5, 205 pounds, with mid-to-upper-90s heat that plays up due to extension and hits 100 on the gun from time to time. For hitters who get too comfortable sitting on the heater, Flora can break out a variety of pitches across the cutter-slider continuum. He also debuted a potential plus changeup during this past season.

“That pitch changed my life, made it a lot easier to get outs, so it was awesome,” Flora said. But that’s not the only improvement he made this year. “I think I was just more of a polished pitcher. Instead of throwing the ball as hard as I could all the time and just spinning it, I think I learned a lot about pitching backwards, how to execute pitches, how to pitch to my strengths and a hitter’s weaknesses… I worked a lot on the mental side of the game and my routine during the week off the field. I think that helped me a lot.”

This season, Flora went 12-0 in 16 starters, with an ERA of 1.06. Now, the run-scoring environment in college baseball has changed a lot over the past 15 years, so if you’re just dropping in for the draft, you might not have a good handle on exactly how good a 1.06 ERA is.

It’s incredibly good. The second-best ERA among qualified pitchers belonged to Oregon reliever Tanner Bradley. The only full-time starter to get within a run of Flora, Oregon State’s Dax Whitney, who only made 11 starts. Flora also held opponents to a .153 batting average, which was fourth in Division I and first among starting pitchers. Paul Skenes had a 1.69 ERA and .164 opponent batting average in his draft year, albeit against tougher competition, in way more innings, and with a much higher strikeout rate. Flora might not be quite that good, but he was basically unhittable.

It’s not surprising that Flora improved quite a bit over his time in college, because UCSB is a pitching factory. Flora is likely to be the third Gauchos pitcher selected in the top five picks since 2015, after Dillon Tate went fourth overall in 2015 and Tyler Bremner was picked second last year. Cardinals right-hander Michael McGreevy was also a first-round pick out of UCSB, and then there’s the school’s crown jewel, Cy Young winner Shane Bieber.

Gauchos head coach Andrew Checketts has made a career of recruiting smart, athletic pitchers, then coaching them up as they develop physically. None of those five pitchers, including Flora, were drafted out of high school.

“I think it’s just the culture there, just being able to have a lot of trust in the coaches and the team,” Flora said. “There’s so much respect for Coach Checketts and [assistant coach Dylan] Jones, who helped the pitchers so much. So many guys come through here, maybe I should listen to the coaches, maybe they do know what they’re doing.”

Flora was a late bloomer; he said he grew a foot over his four years of high school, and was throwing 89 to 92 mph during his senior year, but got up to 94 by the time he got to campus. Once there, he started putting on weight and gaining strength as he underwent a regimented weight training program for the first time in his life, and the velo kept ticking up.

Having Bremner as an example helped as well. Flora credited his older teammate with making him internalize how good he’d become.

“He’s telling me: ‘Dude, when you’re out there, you need to understand dudes don’t want to face you,’” Flora said. “He was also good at — and we preach this a lot at school — faceless hitters, and just working on controlling the controllables. When the ball leaves your hand, there’s nothing you can really do unless he hits the ball right back to you.”

Armed with that newfound mental strength, plus triple-digit velocity and a new changeup, Flora is set up to make the leap to the pros with ease.

…

Flora is one of the best prospects in this draft, but the best story in the class belongs to Arizona high school catcher Alain Gomez-Gudino.

Jesús Cano profiled Gomez-Gudino for Baseball America back in March, and the tale of how Gomez-Gudino came to be a draft prospect is worth reading in full. In August 2023, Gomez-Gudino, then 15 years old, left Caracas, Venezuela with his mother, sister, and stepfather. After months of planning in secret, they slipped out of town and crossed the border to Colombia, hoping to leave behind Venezuela’s repressive government and economic turmoil. They carried one bag of clothes and food, plus Gomez-Gudino’s catcher’s mitt.

Over the next 17 days, they made their way north through Central America. At one point, Gomez-Gudino had to reach into a river to save his mother, who’d been pulled under by the current, from drowning. Later, they were captured by uniformed strangers of unknown origin in Mexico, and had to plead with them to keep one of their cellphones so they’d be able to stay in contact with family.

Eventually, they arrived in Mexico City, where they waited another three months to get an interview for political asylum in the United States. It’s far from the most perilous part of the tale, but most high school baseball prospects train incessantly. I was curious how Gomez-Gudino had stayed in practice during the four months he and his family were on the road.

“I brought my catcher’s glove all the way here, and I found a ball next to a park in Mexico City,” Gomez-Gudino explained. “I gave my glove to my stepfather, and I’d warm up a bit. I didn’t play that much, just for two weeks before I came here, on a summer team in Mexico.”

Grant of asylum in hand, Gomez-Gudino’s family settled in Scottsdale. He joined the baseball team at Saguaro High School, and his baseball career took off. The webbing of that catcher’s mitt, which had made the trip all the way from Caracas, finally gave out under the force of a fastball from Cam Caminiti, Gomez-Gudino’s high school batterymate. (When they make a movie of Gomez-Gudino’s life story, they’re going to have to break the fourth wall here to reassure viewers that no, this really happened.)

Caminiti went 24th overall to Atlanta in the 2024 draft, and the scouts who’d swarmed over the young left-hander soon took notice of the switch-hitting sophomore backstop. Invites to showcases followed quickly, as did college offers, and two years later, he’s one of the top high school catchers in the class.

All this happened while Gomez-Gudino was still adjusting to life some 3,200 miles and eight countries from home.

“It’s way different [in the U.S.], because you got to go to school,” Gomez-Gudino said. “In Venezuela, it’s just baseball, baseball, baseball.”

Among the many things Gomez-Gudino lacked when he left Venezuela: Any kind of working command of English.

“I had to learn a lot, because when I came here two years ago, I had literally nothing,” he said. “Just, like, ‘Hi, how are you?’ Now, I’m still practicing. It’s not 100%, but I’m trying to get there.”

Going from zero to graduating high school and giving interviews in English in two years is no small task; Gomez-Gudino said there’s no real secret, he just listened as much as he could and asked questions when he didn’t know a word. Music and Adam Sandler movies filled in the rest of the gaps, he said.

Having been through an ordeal I could scarcely contemplate, and despite being on the older side for a high school senior, Gomez-Gudino seems noticeably youthful. He looks like a kid, an impression that was only reinforced by the fact that he smiles all the time. I found myself getting excited, because he’s committed to my alma mater, the University of South Carolina, whose baseball program is in dire need of talent.

Eric had to let me down gently with the truth: He’s probably too good to make it to campus.

Legit switch-hitting catching prospects are rare, and among Gomez-Gudino’s highlights at the Combine was a batting practice round in which he hit an exit velocity of 104 mph from the right side and 106 mph from the left side. Which isn’t in Caden Bogenpohl’s territory, but it’s not bad for an 18-year-old with some physical development left.

And who plays a premium position. As you might have guessed by how far Gomez-Gudino carried his mitt, this kid loves catching.

“I used to pitch a lot when I was a kid, but when I heard pitchers don’t hit, I [switched] to third base,” Gomez-Gudino said. “But when I saw Salvador Perez play, I just liked how he commanded the game, how he called the game, how he talked to his teammates and everything. I just said I want to be like him, to be the captain on the field, call pitches every play, every game, and be in command there.”

Someone is going to take Gomez-Gudino fairly high, and in about five years we’re going to hear this story on Sunday Night Baseball. It’s good enough to bear repeating.

…

Outside the first round, the draft can get unpredictable and mysterious, but one of the guys I’m willing to stick my neck out on is Lucas Nawrocki, a high school two-way player out of Aledo, Texas.

At just 5-foot-11, Nawrocki is a little short for a pitcher — or a power hitter, for that matter, but he put on a terrific batting practice round: 18 pitches, 10 of them put in play at 105 mph or harder, topping out at 109.7.

On the mound, the velocity isn’t especially impressive, but Nawrocki’s secondary stuff is nuts. He’s got a mid-80s kick change that drops in around 1,000 rpm, with a low-80s slider with top-shelf spin numbers: 3,000 rpm at minimum, up to 3,200 pretty easily. This breaking ball he can either throw like a sweeper and get a plate’s worth of horizontal movement, or drop vertically like a curveball. That latter version is just nasty. I don’t know how anyone hits it.

“It works really well. I can manipulate and shape my slider really easily, with that crossfire action,” he said. “I can get more depth on it whenever I want, or I can get more sweeping action whenever I want, so it’s a really neat thing… Last offseason, I was playing with it. I wanted to try to find a curveball, but then I [realized] I can get the same grip and maybe preset my wrist a little bit differently and get a lot more depth, instead of switching up the grip.”

That combination of high-spin/low-spin is incredibly rare. In the majors, only four pitchers have a breaking ball with an average spin rate of 2,900 or higher, and either a changeup or splitter with an average spin rate of 1,300 or lower: Nolan McLean, Matthew Liberatore, Clay Holmes, and Anthony Nunez.

Plus Adrian Morejon, whose average slider spin rate is 2,899 rpm as I write this now, but it was above the cutoff point two weeks ago when I found this bit of trivia and presented it to Nawrocki. I mentioned Morejon because here’s the center field camera angle for Nawrocki at PG National:

And here’s Morejon from the same angle:

A 5-foot-11 left-handed pitcher can get outs if he can kill spin on his changeup while ramping it up on his breaking ball.

Actually, with that foot position and low arm slot, Morejon was not the first name that came to mind: It was Billy Wagner. And because Nawrocki is from Texas, I thought he might’ve been inspired by watching Wagner pitch for the Astros. Obviously I asked him about it, and realized mid-sentence that by the time Nawrocki was born in December 2007, Wagner had already not been an Astro for more than four years.

Time is a cruel mistress.

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about failed former Dodgers owner Frank McCourt’s subsequent sports ownership endeavors, a claim about Jacob Misiorowski’s pitching improvement, Jackson Chourio (batting lefty) as “a baseball player,” the recent struggles of Paul Skenes and Steven Kwan, Justin Verlander’s retirement, Zack Wheeler’s continued dominance, Andrew McCutchen’s return to the minors, the Orioles’ lack of improvement, the epitome of a Little League home run, Tyler Tolbert’s contribution to one of baseball’s great mysteries, and a 2026 Dodgers first.

Audio intro: Jonathan Crymes, “Effectively Wild Theme”
Audio outro: Alex Glossman and Ali Breneman, “Effectively Wild Theme”

Link to McCourt’s new league
Link to McCourt wiki
Link to show jumping wiki
Link to Vladimir Shpunt article
Link to NPR on Fitzgerald’s quote
Link to Nickelodeon Guts wiki
Link to “Let’s go to Mo”
Link to “Aggro Crag piece
Link to Slippery Stairs video
Link to Murphy/Chourio quote
Link to Rendon lefty dinger
Link to Mr. Baseball wiki
Link to Mr. Baseball scene
Link to FG post on Skenes
Link to Sheehan on Skenes
Link to Skenes mechanics post
Link to Skenes velo tweet
Link to Skenes velo data
Link to Skenes on his velo
Link to Skenes on O’Hearn
Link to O’Hearn article
Link to Skenes hot dog ad
Link to Skenes on EW
Link to Griffin injury article
Link to sagittal band info
Link to FG post on Kwan
Link to Verlander’s retirement post
Link to Verlander Legend pick
Link to 2025 ASG box score
Link to Wheeler leaderboard
Link to Wheeler ASG article 1
Link to Wheeler ASG article 2
Link to McCutchen tweet
Link to Orioles record post
Link to Orioles WAR leaders
Link to “great call from the haters”
Link to LLHR article
Link to LLHR video
Link to Sam on the LLHR
Link to Posnanski on the LLHR
Link to BP on the LLHR
Link to FG post on the LLHR
Link to Tolbert record post 1
Link to Tolbert record post 2
Link to Dodgers extra-inning game

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I’ve been thinking a lot about the All-Star rosters this week. They’re not bad, but they’re weird, and missing many of the biggest names in the sport. That’s fine. There’s been heavy turnover atop the WAR leaderboards this year, as Ben Clemens pointed out last month, and that’s given us plenty of fresh storylines — many of which will be deservedly celebrated at the annual halftime show next week.

Still, this feels like it must matter in some way beyond an exhibition. And so I scoured the rosters, looking for a narrative to drive. One thing I noticed is, of the top 25 batters projected by FanGraphs Depth Charts, 17 did not make an All-Star team. Of those, eight are in competitive races out west.

Indeed, the stars have dimmed in the West. How these players perform after the break could determine the shape of the season still to come. Read the rest of this entry »

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