The Strongest Positions on the Remaining NL Contenders

With six days left in the regular season — and six games for most teams — three teams have clinched their respective divisions (the Brewers, Guardians, and Phillies), and two others have clinched playoff berths (the Dodgers and Yankees). That leaves 10 teams fighting for seven spots, but even with the playoff field not fully set, we thought it would be a fun and worthwhile exercise to highlight various facets of the potential October teams by going around the diamond to identify the strongest and weakest at each position in each league.

This is something of an offshoot of my annual Replacement Level Killers series, and in fact even some confirmed October participants have spots that still fit the bill as true lineup sinkholes — think first base for the Yankees and Brewers, to pick one position from among the aforementioned teams — but this time with no trade deadline to help fill them. For this, I’ll be considering full-season performance but with an eye to who’s best or worst now, with injuries and adjustments in mind. Unlike the Killers series, I’ll also be considering pitching, with the shortening of rotations and bullpens part of the deliberations.

For the first installment of this series, I’ll focus on each position’s best among the remaining National League contenders. In this case that limits the field to the Phillies, Brewers, Dodgers, Padres, Mets, Diamondbacks, and Braves, with the last three of those teams fighting for two Wild Card spots.

Catcher: William Contreras, Brewers

Over the past two seasons, just three catchers have put up five-win seasons, namely Adley Rutschman in 2023 (5.4 WAR), Cal Raleigh this year (5.0 WAR), and William Contreras, twice (5.8 WAR last year, 5.4 WAR this year). The now-26-year-old backstop has set career highs in games (150), games caught (116), homers (23), average exit velocity (92.8 mph), hard-hit rate (49.3%), and more, all while hitting a robust .285/.367/.475; his 133 wRC+ is tops on the remaining Brewers, since the resurgent Christian Yelich (153 wRC+) is done for the year due to back surgery. Contreras’ pitch framing has fallen off sharply relative to last year, from 14.4 runs above average to 2.2 by FanGraphs’ measures, and from 7 above average to 1 below in Statcast’s methodology. Still, he’s plenty solid defensively while providing exceptional offense for the position.

First Base: Bryce Harper, Phillies

Freddie Freeman’s consistency helped make him the game’s top first basemen in recent years, but he’s had a slightly off season with the bat (no .300 batting average or .500 slugging percentage), and missed time due to a broken finger and his son’s frightening bout of Guillian-Barré syndrome. Bryce Harper, who played just 225 games in 2022–23 while dealing with a partial UCL tear, Tommy John surgery, and a mid-season move to first, finally got a relatively full and normal campaign in. Despite a 30-game home run drought from August 10 through September 13 (a span during which he nonetheless hit .324/.400/.460), he’s had a typically strong performance at the plate, batting .285/.372/.525 (145 wRC+) with 29 homers and 5.1 WAR, second among all first basemen behind Vladimir Guerrero Jr. Despite having played just 303.1 innings at first base prior to this season, he’s fared well by the metrics (5 FRV, 3 DRS, 0.8 UZR) as well.

Second Base: Ketel Marte, Diamondbacks

Around the time both Michael Baumann and Dan Szymborski touted Ketel Marte as being worthy of consideration in the NL MVP race in August, the 30-year-old switch-hitter aggravated a left ankle sprain that he originally suffered on August 10. He ended up missing 19 games, but even so, he’s practically lapped the field, performance-wise; his 6.1 WAR is not only tops among all second basemen, it’s 2.3 wins ahead of the second-ranked Jose Altuve, and 3.6 ahead of the second-ranked second basemen from among playoff-bound NL teams, the Mets’ Jose Iglesias (OMG). Marte has hit .295/.373/.565 while setting career highs in homers (35) and wRC+ (152). He’ll won’t bring home the hardware, but he’ll be on MVP ballots for sure.

Shortstop: Francisco Lindor, Mets

While Shohei Ohtani grabbed the spotlight with his pursuit and singularly spectacular capture of the 50-homer and 50-steal milestones, the back injury that has limited Francisco Lindor to a single inning since September 13 has probably decided this year’s NL MVP race once and for all. It’s only a slight stretch to say that Lindor got it from carrying the Mets, as 14 of his 31 homers either tied the game or gave his team the lead, including six from August 17 through September 11. He’s hit .297/.370/.551 (158 wRC+) with 22 homers since the start of June, when the Mets were 11 games under .500, and .271/.342/.494 (135 wRC+) with 31 homers, 27 steals, and 7.4 WAR overall. Beyond the slow start, it’s been a stellar campaign, an absolute joy to watch.

Third Base: Eugenio Suárez, Diamondbacks

For the first four entries above, my choices mirror the NL WAR leaderboards as applied to the winnowed field. Here, while the Phillies’ Alec Bohm — who has put together the best season of his five-year career — has a slight edge on Eugenio Suárez (3.9 to 3.7), I’m opting for the latter based on the arc of his season and his longer track record at this level of performance. As I wrote last week, Suárez struggled from March through June (.196/.279/.312, 67 wRC+), but since July 1, he’s been on a tear, batting .315/.361/.630 with 23 homers; his 166 wRC+ in the latter span is the 10th-best in the majors. The biggest reason for the turnaround appears to be Suárez taking the Diamondbacks’ advice to incorporate the Trajekt Arc — a new robotic hitting machine that marries video of a pitcher’s delivery at game speed with an accurate approximation of his offerings, release point, and tempo — into his pregame routine. He’s performed dramatically better against every pitch type since then, making him one of the game’s most dangerous hitters of late.

Left Field: Jackson Chourio, Brewers

Jurickson Profar has bounced back from a dreadful 2023 campaign to put together the kind of year talent evaluators envisioned when he was anointed the game’s no. 1 prospect back in 2013 — it’s just that nobody thought it would take until he was 31. His 4.5 WAR and 143 wRC+ are both better than Jackson Chourio’s 3.8 WAR and 119 wRC+ (.273/.328/.469), but the latter, a 20-year-old rookie who himself was fifth on our preseason Top 100 Prospects list this spring, has broken out after a rough start. Chourio hit just .210/.254/.327 (61 wRC+) through May, but has batted .303/.362/.536 (145 wRC+) with 16 of his 21 homers and 14 of his 21 steals since June 1. He’s just the third 20-year-old ever to have a 20-homer, 20-steal season, after Vada Pinson (1959) and Mike Trout (2012), and he’s played outstanding defense (12 DRS, 8.6 UZR, 6 FRV) at the two corners as well, with more innings in left field (695.2) than right (466.1).

Center Field: Jackson Merrill, Padres

Another rookie, another Jackson. Neck-deep in shortstops but ankle-deep in outfielders, the Padres decided to continue experimenting with their 2021 first-round pick in the outfield, having begun to do so near the end of last season, with Jackson Merrill spotting in left field at Double-A San Antonio. Despite having played just 46 games above High-A, he so impressed the team this spring, first in left and then in center, that he skipped Triple-A completely and has emerged as one of the Padres’ top players. The now-21-year-old has hit .292/.326/.503 (131 wRC+) with 24 homers, 16 steals, and 8 FRV (also 5 UZR and -1 DRS); his 5.1 WAR leads the team and is tied with Harper for seventh in the NL. Of those 24 homers, nine have either put the Padres into the lead or tied the game, six of them in the seventh inning or later, including two walk-offs.

Right Field: Mookie Betts, Dodgers

After splitting his time between right field, second base, and shortstop in an MVP-worthy campaign last year, Mookie Betts spent the first two and a half months of this season at short, a situation necessitated by Gavin Lux’s slow return from the torn ACL that led to last year’s original shuffle. After missing eight weeks due to a fractured left hand, he returned to his old domain in right field and looked right at home. Overall, he’s hit .295/.380/.505 (147 wRC+) with 19 homers, 16 steals, and 4.6 WAR in just 110 games (a 6.8-WAR pace). Sure, he’s played just 37 games in right in 2024, but heading into October, he’s clearly the guy you’d want out there.

Designated Hitter: Shohei Ohtani, Dodgers

Unable to pitch this season after undergoing a UCL repair last October, Ohtani decided to grow his game in another direction and wound up becoming the first player ever to pair 50 homers and 50 steals. He has a league-leading 53 of the former plus 55 of the latter, and reached both plateaus in the aforementioned three-homer, two-steal, six-hit tour de force. Even without an inning in the field, his 8.3 WAR leads the NL, as do his .640 SLG and 177 wRC+. Not only is he likely headed towards his second third MVP award, he finally gets to showcase his spectacular abilities in the postseason for the first time.

Starting Rotation: Phillies

Over the course of the full season, the Braves and Phillies have had the NL’s top two rotations, with the former owning a slight edge in ERA (3.66 to 3.72), a more substantial edge in FIP (3.49 to 3.87), and a modest edge in WAR (16.4 to 15.8). However, those numbers are distorted by the Phillies giving 15 starts to Taijuan Walker, who has posted a 7.18 ERA and 6.96 FIP but who obviously won’t be taking the ball in October. The front four of Zack Wheeler, Aaron Nola, Cristopher Sánchez, and Ranger Suárez is in pretty good shape heading into the playoffs, even with Nola struggling to keep the ball in the park lately.

By contrast, the Braves recently lost Reynaldo López to a bout of shoulder inflammation, his second trip to the injured list in as many months; he missed three weeks in late July and August due to a bout of forearm tightness. What’s more, Chris Sale’s average fastball velocity fell 1.7 mph from August (95.4) to September (93.7), a notable concern given that he’s already thrown more innings this year (177.2) than in any season since 2017 — so much so that he’ll only start once this week, on extra rest, instead of twice on normal rest even with a playoff berth hanging in the balance. The team’s likely playoff rotation of Sale, Max Fried, Charlie Morton and rookie Spencer Schwellenbach — whose 154.2 innings in the minors and majors is 89.2 more than last year — is still a very good one if everyone’s healthy, but if I’m splitting hairs, these concerns bump them down a notch.

Bullpen: Brewers

This was a tough call, because the shape of a bullpen evolves over the course of a long season, particularly thanks to deadline moves. The Brewers’ bullpen owns the majors’ second-lowest ERA (3.20) and eighth-lowest FIP (3.83) overall, and it’s been even better in the second half (2.93 ERA, 3.33 FIP). Closer Devin Williams, who didn’t make his season debut until July 28 due to stress fractures in his back, has posted a 1.37 ERA, 1.89 FIP, and 46.3% strikeout rate in 19.2 innings since returning, though he’s dealt with shoulder soreness along the way. Setup men Trevor Megill and Jared Koenig have been less effective of late than over the course of the season — which gives me pause in this context — but the opposite is true for Aaron Ashby and Joel Payamps, Milwaukee’s other higher-leverage guys.

The other team I gave strong consideration here to was the Padres, who have been similarly strong in the second half (2.87 ERA, 3.00 FIP) thanks in large part to the deadline pickups of Jason Adam, Tanner Scott, and Bryan Hoeing, who together have combined for a 1.43 ERA and 28.6% strikeout rate in 69.2 innings post-trade, with middlemen Jeremiah Estrada and Adrian Morejon pitching well, too. The only reason I didn’t put the Padres first here is the ongoing struggles of closer Robert Suarez, who has yielded a 5.79 ERA and 4.61 FIP since August 8 while allowing runs in eight of his 19 appearances and blowing three saves. The left-handed Scott, who has notched 18 saves with the Marlins and four with the Padres, does offer an alternative, but my concerns about Suarez are enough to push the needle towards Milwaukee.

Defense: Brewers

This one wasn’t tremendously close. Milwaukee ranks third in the majors in DRS (66 runs), fifth in FRV (26), and sixth in UZR (19.1), with the Diamondbacks the only NL contender who surpasses them in any of those categories (26 UZR). Shortstop Willy Adames‘ defensive metrics are weak, but second baseman Brice Turang, third basemen Joey Ortiz, and right fielder Sal Frelick each lead the majors in at least one metric, and their other outfielders (Chourio, Garrett Mitchell, and Blake Perkins) are strong as well.