Every year on Opening Day, I ask the FanGraphs staff to predict the season’s award winners, playoff field, and eventual World Series Champion. Those predictions tend to be heavily influenced by our playoff odds, projections, and prospect rankings, and while I appreciate the instinct to lean on data to make our guesses more educated, the results can feel a little chalky at times. That’s why this year, I’ve asked our writers to make another prediction — a bold prediction. One that might be a little spicy, or perhaps a little silly. A prediction that eschews the obvious, but is still grounded in reality, even if only by one foot. Twenty-five of our writers across FanGraphs and RotoGraphs answered the bell, including me. Will any of these predictions prove to be correct? Who knows! Let’s watch 2,430 games and find out. – Meg Rowley
The Marlins Will Be the First Team Ever With Fewer Than 20 Starting Pitcher Wins
In 2023, the A’s went 50-112, the worst record in baseball. Just 20 of those 50 wins were credited to their starting pitchers, tying a record set by the 1899 Cleveland Spiders. Excluding 2020, that’s the fewest starting pitcher wins for any team in AL/NL history since 1888, when the NL moved to a 140-game season. In 2025, the Marlins will break the 20-win barrier.
Starter decisions have been in decline for a while. In the modern era, five of the six teams with the fewest starter wins played in this decade (my sincerest apologies to the 1981 Mets; I promise Dwight Gooden and Ron Darling are coming soon). Accelerating the trend is the continued proliferation of something we don’t yet have a name for: the opposite of the super team. Somebody will break the 20-win barrier and soon.
The boldness comes in picking Miami, which doesn’t have the worst rotation. The Marlins rank 24th in our Depth Charts thanks to Sandy Alcantara, a star and a workhorse with 14 wins in 2022. However, he missed the 2024 season due to Tommy John surgery, and even if he’s the Sandy of old, he’ll presumably be on an innings restriction. Our projected standings have Miami scoring the second-fewest runs in baseball; hard to get leads. Their bullpen ranks 27th; easy to cough them up. Obviously, the White Sox would be the safer pick, because – holy Toledo – they rank last or second to last in all three categories. But something about this Marlins team makes me even more worried. – Davy Andrews
Matt Olson Will Not Lead the League in Defensive Innings Played
What do we know about Matt Olson? Apart from his piercing blue eyes and sweeping lefty power stroke, we know he hates to sit. Olson has played every available game in five of his seven full seasons in the majors, including the past three. He’s played more defensive innings than anyone in the league in each of those three years.
That’s because the Braves, under Brian Snitker, value lineup stability. So when a star wants to play as much as possible, they’re happy to indulge him. Since joining the Braves in 2022, Olson has started 485 out of a possible 486 games at first (don’t worry, he moved in as a defensive replacement mid-game in the one he didn’t), and played 4,310 1/3 out of a possible 4,331 1/3 innings.
That’s going to change this year. Olson has only been on the IL once in his entire career, for 41 days in 2019 due to a fractured hamate bone, but the possibility of another freak injury remains. More than that, the Braves couldn’t run out their preferred lineup last year because of an epidemic of injuries; of Atlanta’s starting position players, only Olson, Marcell Ozuna, and Orlando Arcia compiled 500 or more plate appearances.
As his stars approach or surpass the age of 30, I imagine Snitker will place more (in other words, any) emphasis on load management in order to keep guys in better shape down the stretch. An iron man streak is cool, but with two notable exceptions, they don’t raise a flag for it. – Michael Baumann
Roki Sasaki Will Finish Outside the Top Three in NL ROY Voting
Let me be clear: I want Roki Sasaki to be good. And maybe he will be, even this year! But I have juuuuuuust enough concern about his fastball shape (will he and the Dodgers figure out a fix for its dead zone movement profile?) and velocity (will he get back to sitting 100-102 mph, or will he be more in the 96-98 range with the occasional 100?) to feel okay about calling my shot here. His splitter might be the best pitch on the planet, but if he’s not getting his fastball by hitters, that might not be enough.
This year’s NL rookie class probably won’t be as stacked as last year’s, but there’s still enough talent to keep Sasaki out of the top three. Matt Shaw, Drake Baldwin, Dylan Crews, and AJ Smith-Shawver are all in our Top 100 and on Opening Day rosters, and fellow Top 100 prospects Andrew Painter, Chase Dollander, Dalton Rushing, Jordan Lawlar, Brandon Sproat, Alex Freeland, Kevin Alcántara, and Rhett Lowder aren’t far behind them. – Jon Becker
No Team Will Improve by More Wins Than the White Sox
Do you know how bad the White Sox were last year? You know the broad contours – 121 losses, -306 run differential, the kind of season that lives in fans’ memories for a generation. But did you know that they had 18 different hitters below replacement level, and ran out 11 different pitchers who threw 10 or more innings with a FIP of 5.00 or higher? Did you know that they led the league in blown saves despite rarely having a lead to begin with? Everything, absolutely everything, went wrong.
So this year, if those things even just approach league average, the White Sox might bounce back in a big way. I’m not saying they’ll contend for the playoffs – these are bold predictions, not speculative fiction. But if they win 61 games, that’d be a 20-game improvement on last year, and they’d still lose 101. That wouldn’t have been the biggest improvement in wins last season; the Royals improved by a whopping 30. But I don’t see as many candidates for a huge gain this time around, and even though the White Sox have already traded most of their best players and might yet move a few more, they’re starting with a big edge just in terms of regression. It’s hard to be that bad twice in a row, and I think that the White Sox will surprise people on their way to missing the playoffs this year. – Ben Clemens
A Starter Will Win a Cy Young with 150 or Fewer Innings Pitched
The BBWAA and the baseball-watching public sort of did just a teensy bit of crossing the ol’ Rubicon in the 2021 NL Cy Young race. There were mitigating circumstances to giving the nod to Corbin Burnes over Zack Wheeler despite 46 1/3 fewer innings pitched, like not wanting post-COVID year innings restrictions to dictate the answer to who shined brightest on the mound.
But 2025 has rolled around and mitigating circumstances remain the norm. The continued proliferation of Tommy John surgery means a larger swath of the pitching population is building up their innings base at any given time. College pitchers arrive in affiliated ball with more developed arsenals than ever, and undergo a three-year build-up to a full pro workload where 180 innings is the ideal. We process outings in whiff rates and stuff grades, and while length is needed and believed to be an eventual byproduct of our collective drive to see the nastiest pitcher ever emerge from this literal arms race, it’s not the prime directive. This is a team sport, and we’re increasingly not banking on one man running the marathon by himself.
Could Paul Skenes win a Cy by making 24 excellent starts before getting shut down for a minor late-season issue on a Pirates team going nowhere? How about Shohei Ohtani achieving newfound levels of brilliance but only for a half-season? Or maybe it’ll be something as simple as George Kirby being the best pitcher in the AL after missing a month with a shoulder injury. Maybe it’s too soon for this prediction, but things certainly aren’t moving in the other direction. – James Fegan
The Dodgers Will Break the Record for the Most Pitchers to Record a Save in a Single Season
The 2024 Dodgers had 14 pitchers record a save, tied with the 2021 Rays for the most in a single season. Had either Joe Kelly or Ryan Brasier converted one of their blown saves, they would have broken the record. On paper, this Dodgers team is one of the strongest in major league history, giving them plenty of save opportunities, and since they don’t tend to designate a true closer, it feels like there’s a good chance that they’ll break the record this year. Provided they stay healthy, Tanner Scott, Kirby Yates, Blake Treinen, Alex Vesia and Anthony Banda are all locks to record a save. Evan Phillips and Michael Kopech should get saves when they come back from the injured list. Ben Casparius and Luis García are two newcomers who will likely snag a save or two. With the Dodgers, there’s always a name or five that pops up, so I’m sure there are other pitchers who I haven’t mentioned here who will notch saves as well. The Dodgers came close to breaking the record last year; this year, I think they break through. – David Gerth
Shohei Ohtani Will Pitch in Relief and Notch at Least One Save
Shortly before camps opened, the Dodgers made clear that they didn’t expect Shohei Ohtani to pitch before May. The three-time MVP was not only rehabbing from his second UCL reconstruction (done in September 2023) but also a November 2024 surgery to repair a torn left labrum, and he had get his swing in order, too. Though he progressed to the point of throwing bullpen sessions, the Dodgers hit the pause button once he made his Cactus League debut on February 28. Earlier this month, the team announced that Ohtani would not face hitters before the Tokyo Series.
Now the Dodgers face the prospect of ramping up Ohtani’s pitch count and intensity level without the benefit of game experience. He’ll have to throw simulated games instead of going out on a rehab assignment.
My bold prediction is that as he builds up, the Dodgers — who have no shortage of starters, including rehabbing ones, but also some injuries in their bullpen — will add a competitive element by using him as a reliever, first as part of planned bullpen games and in lower-leverage spots. The gambit will pay off down the road when the two-way superstar is called upon to close out a game. It may not be as dramatic as the ninth inning of the 2023 World Baseball Classic championship, when he struck out then-Angels teammate Mike Trout, representing the tying run, to clinch the title for Samurai Japan, but it will be something to remember. – Jay Jaffe
Miguel Amaya Will Finish the Season With at Least 2.5 WAR
The ATC projections expect Miguel Amaya to accumulate 1.5 WAR in 2025, a mark that 70 catchers reached in 2024. The 26-year-old Cubs backstop is primed to better that mark in 2025. Amaya slashed .271/.316/.444 in the second half last year, a huge leap over his first-half .201/.266/.288 performance. And that improvement shouldn’t be attributed to good BABIP luck. Amaya cut his strikeout rate nearly in two, from 21.5% in the first half to 11.4% in the second. While his hard-hit rate stayed the same between 2023 and 2024, he increased his zone contact rate, giving himself more opportunities to put the ball in play.
Don’t forget about the defensive aspect; Amaya upped his Defensive Runs Saved totals from 2023 and reached five by 2024’s end. That may be middle-of-the-pack accumulation among all 2024 catchers, but there’s still room to grow. Amaya lost significant development time due to the pandemic and Tommy John surgery.
Amaya’s playing time is uncertain in 2025. He played in 117 games in 2024, but every projection system on his player page suggests he’ll play fewer this season. Will the Cubs give him enough to accumulate 2.5 WAR? The team’s offseason acquisition of veteran catcher Carson Kelly, whose career .681 OPS bests Amaya’s .660, suggests not. Things will have to come together for Amaya in 2025, but he has the potential to be a top-20 catcher. – Lucas Kelly
Ceddanne Rafaela Will Win a Gold Glove and Be Worth at Least 4.0 WAR
Ceddanne Rafaela made his major league debut with the Boston Red Sox late in the 2023 season and proceeded to log a 74 wRC+ and 0.1 WAR over a 28-game extended cup of coffee. Last year, he was in the bigs for the duration and finished with a 79 wRC+ and 0.9 WAR over 152 games. A free swinger who has at times been overmatched at the plate, Rafaela owns a 2.9% walk rate and a 27.1% strikeout rate in 660 career plate appearances.
I expect markedly more success for the 24-year-old Willemstad, Curaçao native in 2025. With a season-plus of big league experience under his belt, and a full-time role in center field after having to split time between his best position and shortstop due to team need, Rafaela is poised for a breakout. ZiPS is cautiously optimistic — a 95 wRC+ and 2.5 WAR — but I’m expecting much more. Bullish on his near-term future, I’m predicting that Rafaela will record a wRC+ of 110 or better, and 4.0 or more WAR — numbers in line with what Corbin Carroll put up last season with the Arizona Diamondbacks.
I’m also predicting a Gold Glove. On par with Jackie Bradley Jr. — Boston’s best defensive center fielder in decades — Rafaela is truly elite. Unburdened by having to move between the infield and the outfield, his brilliance should shine through. As for the bat, Rafaela hit well in the minors, and the tools are real. With a better calibrated approach, the production is about to match the promise. – David Laurila
A Catcher Will Win MVP
It is incredibly rare for a catcher to win an MVP award. The combination of the demands on their bodies and the need for the occasional day off means they play fewer games than their everyday-playing peers, which limits their ability to accumulate some of the stats voters care about. They are often physically compromised by the constant barrage of foul tips and stray backswings that take a chunk out of the unpadded parts of their bodies, which impacts their ability to perform on offense. No catcher has won an MVP award since Buster Posey in 2012. The last guy before Posey was Joe Mauer in 2009. As many pitchers have won MVP awards since that time.
How many “outs” (in the poker sense, not the baseball sense) do I have for this bold prediction to come true? Let me start with my actual NL MVP pick, Brewers catcher William Contreras. Contreras, who has had two consecutive 5-WAR seasons, is among the most physically impressive hitters in baseball regardless of position. He was among the game’s leaders in hard-hit rate (49%) last year, and he looks even bigger and stronger this spring than he did in 2024. He’s also adjusted several aspects of his swing, from his batting stance to his leg kick to the angle of the bat as his hands load; there have been multiple tweaks here. Contreras averaged just six degrees of launch last year and still slugged .466. If he can get to more power this season, we’re talking about potential MVP offensive output.
The other two prime candidates are newly extended Mariners catcher Cal Raleigh and Orioles backstop Adley Rutschman. Our projection system’s darling at the position is Raleigh. He was 11th in baseball in barrel rate last year and has averaged 30 homers the last three seasons. Adley’s career began with two consecutive 5-WAR seasons before he was dinged up and less productive for a large portion of 2024. In searching for a dark horse candidate, I want a backstop whose backup is a good enough caddy for them to also see 20 or so starts at 1B/DH, the way Salvador Perez did last year. D-backs catcher Gabriel Moreno (backed up by Adrian Del Castillo), Dodgers catcher Will Smith (Dalton Rushing eventually) and maybe even Austin Wells (J.C. Escarra and others) fit the bill, especially if injuries suffered at 1B/DH force other dominoes to fall. – Eric Longenhagen
Only One Team From the AL East Will Make the Playoffs
Thanks to the injuries to Gerrit Cole and Luis Gil, the Yankees’ odds of making the playoffs have fallen almost 10 points from where they were at the beginning of spring training. The AL East was always going to be one of the most competitive divisions in baseball, but the door to the division title — and really the entire American League — has been blown wide open over the past month. No team in the AL is projected to win more than 86 games, while 11 are projected to win at least 82, a huge morass of flawed squads that includes every team in the East.
Every team in the division has plenty of question marks as they enter the season. Along with the Yankees, the Red Sox and Orioles both have troubles in their starting rotations; Boston has talent but a ton of injury risk, while Baltimore chose not to find a replacement for Corbin Burnes and is dealing with health issues of its own. The Rays are hoping to see a big breakout from Junior Caminero, but the rest of their lineup might not hit enough for it to matter anyway. The Blue Jays are stuck in desperation mode, with Vladimir Guerrero Jr. and Bo Bichette playing out their final years of team control, and their offseason additions might not be enough to push them over the hump.
I can’t tell you which team will emerge from this muddle, but my prediction is that the only AL East team to make the playoffs will be the division winner, while ascendant teams from the other two divisions take all three Wild Card spots. – Jake Mailhot
Corbin Carroll Will Become the Fifth 20/20/20/20 Player Ever
There have only been four 20/20/20/20 seasons in major league history; that is, 20 doubles, 20 triples, 20 homers and 20 steals. The four players to do it? Frank Schulte in 1911, Willie Mays in 1957, and then Curtis Granderson and Jimmy Rollins, who remarkably did it in the same season (2007).
It takes a precise combination of power, speed and instincts to pull off this feat. A player needs to have enough pop to hit 20 homers, but not so much that the majority of his extra-base hits land in the seats. He also needs the speed to steal bases and stretch singles into doubles and doubles into triples. His instincts must be sharp, so he can know when to attempt the extra base without running into outs. It also helps to hit atop an explosive lineup, allowing for more opportunities to reach all four benchmarks.
Corbin Carroll is only 24 and has fewer than 1,500 career plate appearances, meaning he’s still probably a few seasons away from his homer-hitting peak, and he’s one of the game’s best baserunners. Despite his first half struggles last season, he hit 22 doubles, 14 triples and 22 homers, while stealing 35 bases. The Diamondbacks led the majors with 5.47 runs per game in 2024, and their offense could be even better this year. Carroll possesses the proper tools and plays for the right team to join this rare club. – Matt Martell
The Orioles Will Miss the Playoffs and Fire Mike Elias
The Orioles were a team on the rise in 2024. They won 91 games and the AL East, and their roster was full of amazing young talent. However, in spite of a surplus of young, controllable hitters, they declined to make a trade or sign a top tier free agent this winter to address their one glaring need: starting pitching. They allowed their ace, Corbin Burnes, to walk away in free agency, and now they’ve lost Grayson Rodriguez, their top young pitcher, to a lat strain that has him on the IL to start the season. To address their pitching woes, the Orioles added Charlie Morton and Tomoyuki Sugano, but these older hurlers aren’t the same caliber of pitcher as the ones the Orioles have lost. Their only real big offseason acquisition was signing the oft-injured Tyler O’Neill, which does not outweigh the loss of All-Star outfielder Anthony Santander and tied up money they could have used in pursuit of Burnes or another frontline starter.
In contrast, the Red Sox added Alex Bregman, Walker Buehler, and Aroldis Chapman this offseason, and have young talent of their own that’s close to storming the big leagues. The Yankees added Paul Goldschmidt and Max Fried to their already stellar core, and in spite of losing Gerrit Cole and Luis Gil, they have a comparable rotation and a deeper bullpen than Baltimore. The Blue Jays had a disappointing offseason of their own, losing out on Juan Soto and Roki Sasaki, but they did add Santander, Jeff Hoffman, and Max Scherzer. And while the Rays’ big additions involved Danny Jansen and a hurt Ha-Seong Kim, they have proven that they are capable of remaining competitive even with a limited budget.
Reports this offseason suggested that general manager Mike Elias was unwilling to spend money in spite of new owner David Rubenstein being willing to do so. Elias has been the leading voice in the Orioles rebuild, but that also means the burnt of a disappointing season would fall directly on him. I think it’s unlikely that he’ll actually end up being fired, but if the Orioles have a disaster season after two straight years of being swept out of the playoffs in the first round, it might be on the table after Elias purposefully sat on his hands this offseason. – Justin Mason
No Starter Will Throw More Than 115 Pitches Or Face More Than 32 Batters in a Game
In 1988, the first year of pitch tracking, starting pitchers threw at least 115 pitches in one out of every five games. Fans were just as likely to watch a 115-pitch start as they were to watch an outing from their team’s ace. Thirty-six years later, fans were as likely to see a 115-pitch start as they were to see a no-hitter. Only four starters reached 115 pitches in an outing last season — and three of them did so in Canada, where they count pitches using the metric system — and of those four, only two surpassed 115 pitches: Kevin Gausman (118) and Bowden Francis (117). I predict that 2025 will be the first year in the pitch tracking era in which no starter throws more than 115 pitches in a game.
To make things more interesting, I’m also predicting this will be the first year in recorded baseball history that no pitcher faces more than 32 hitters in an outing. To face 32 batters in a start is to make it past the halfway point of the order for a fourth time. In an age where teams are keenly aware of the times-through-the-order penalty, it’s a real achievement for a starter to face the meat of the opposing lineup four times in a single game. In 2024, 10 pitchers faced at least 32 batters in a start, but only three faced 33 or more. I don’t expect anyone will reach the six-hole for a fourth time in 2025. – Leo Morgenstern
The Chicago Sky Will Win More Games in June Than the Chicago White Sox
The boldness of this prediction is a function of the number of games played per month by a WNBA team relative to an MLB team. The Sky will play 10 games in June, while the White Sox will play 26. The Sky don’t project as a dominant team this season. They’ve completely re-tooled their roster since winning the title in 2021. Now they profile as a young-but-talented team on the rise, with the potential to get hot for brief stretches, but they’re likely to finish around .500 by season’s end. Elsewhere in Chicago, the White Sox won 41 games last year and project at the bottom of the league again this season. Looking at June’s slate of games, the Sky face a relatively light schedule, while the White Sox play only three games against a team projected under .500. Should the White Sox replicate their .253 winning percentage from 2024 in June of 2025, then the Sky would need to go 7-3 to best their cross-town baseball counterparts. Thus, it is improbable, but not impossible, that the Sky outpace Jerry Reinsdorf’s baseball team, while also playing more exciting basketball than Reinsdorf’s other Chicago team. – Kiri Oler
Jacob deGrom Will Win His Third Cy Young Award
Jacob deGrom is still the best pitcher in baseball, and with a freshly repaired UCL, I believe he will win the AL Cy Young and punch his ticket to Cooperstown.
We saw Justin Verlander return from the procedure in 2022 and post one of the best seasons of his career at age 39, with a 1.75 ERA, a Cy Young, and a World Series Championship to boot, lending further credence to the idea of the “Tommy John Honeymoon.” For his part, deGrom returned at the end of last season and looked almost as good as he ever has, with his 115 Stuff+ still leading the way among all starters who pitched in the majors in 2024 (min. 10 IP). He has also talked about making a concerted effort to dial down his velocity and stay within the 95-96 mph range, which in theory should help him stay on the mound.
The Rangers will surely be careful with their prized starter, but even if they limit him to around 25 starts and five to six innings per outing, we’re still talking about deGrom throwing 125-150 innings, and he is more than capable of winning the Cy Young if he reaches that threshold. There are many voters who still put a lot of stock in pitcher win totals, and deGrom should be in line for double-digit wins even if he does miss some time due to the Rangers’ incredible lineup, which might be the best in the American League. My prediction for his final line: 145 innings, a 2.75 ERA, a .95 WHIP, 200 strikeouts, 14 wins, and a place firmly cemented among the game’s all-time greats. – Joe Orrico
Victor Scott II Will Lead Cardinals Batters in WAR
Victor Scott II is a former top prospect, topping out at no. 4 in the Cardinals organization and no. 88 overall here at FanGraphs. After the team lost Dylan Carlson just before Opening Day last season, Scott was rushed to the majors as the team’s starting center fielder despite having not recording a single PA at the Triple-A level. He proceeded to disappoint at the plate, and while his performance was better after a demotion to Memphis, it still worked out to a lethargic 84 wRC+.
Fast forward to spring training of this year and something may have clicked. Scott walked at a 15.7% clip, lowered his strikeout and swinging strike rates back down to where they sat in the minors, and posted a surprisingly strong 25% HR/FB rate and .372 ISO. While a home run here and there could be due to good fortune, it’s hard to fake four of them. This is particularly true for a guy who has never posted a HR/FB rate higher than 8.1% or an ISO higher than .167 over his entire professional career.
As a 70/70 fielder, Scott could also contribute significant value with his defense, though here I’m banking on improvement from his 3 OAA/-1 DRS last season. If his defense improves to anything close to what his prospect grades suggest he’s capable of, we could be witnessing a transformation into a true all-around player.
The highest projected WAR on the Cardinals’ offense sits at 3.6, a maximum that ranks just 24th among teams. It makes leading the team a bit less challenging than if Scott donned a Dodgers or Yankees uniform, for example. So if his spring is any indication of what’s to come, a breakout might be in the, uhhh, Cards. – Mike Podhorzer
Triston Casas Will Lead All AL First Baseman In wRC+
Among AL first baseman, Triston Casas is currently projected to have the fourth-highest wRC+ by both ZiPS and Steamer, and the third highest by OOPSY. The common denominators in his way to claiming the top spot? Yandy Díaz and Vladimir Guerrero Jr., two of the top first base hitters in the sport over the last three seasons. This is a big bet on the left-hander to continue the ascent he started in 2023, when he had a 130 wRC+ across 502 plate appearances.
Even with Casas’ struggles last year – both pre- and post-injury – I remain extremely optimistic about his offensive profile. His swing is one of my favorites in the game. His upper body mobility is the catalyst for swing variance, allowing him to manipulate his shoulder plane – and as a result, his barrel plane – which should help him get to pitches all over the zone. Really, that’s the foundation I look for in any hitter. But when you have 93rd-percentile bat speed to go along with it, like Casas did in his healthy 2023 season, it’s an easy sell for me. Now, that might not automatically make you better than Vladdy, but it’s the recipe I look for when trying to reason through who could defy expectations. With better health this season, I expect Casas to be aggressive in the zone like he was in 2023 and make the most of his swing skills and power. – Esteban Rivera
Porter Hodge Will Finish in the Top Five in Reliever WAR
Porter Hodge’s fastball is a unicorn. He cuts it a ton — it actually averaged a half-inch of glove-side movement in 2024 — and he throws it with enough backspin to generate around 14 inches of induced vertical break. The result is a pitch that is basically the holy grail for relievers: a heater with the horizontal break of a cutter and the vertical carry of a four-seamer. David Robertson and Kenley Jansen have built incredible careers spamming this type of pitch.
These days, Robertson and Jansen sit around 92 or 93 mph. Hodge sat 96 this spring; his extension (7.3 feet) means his effective velocity is more like 98. This is essentially a Tyler Glasnow or Dylan Cease fastball in terms of its effective velocity and movement, but with one key difference. Both Glasnow and Cease throw from way over the top, while Hodge is throwing from a true three-quarters slot. The pitch doesn’t just have ridiculous outlier movement, that movement also deviates significantly from batters’ expectations.
Hodge pairs that heater with a slower version of Orion Kerkering’s sweeper, averaging 83 mph and 17 inches of horizontal break. Hitters swung and missed on 51.8% of their swings against Hodge’s sweeper last year, up there with the best whiff rates of any pitch in the sport. The fastball ought to neutralize damage on contract; the sweeper will help him rack up the strikeouts. All he needs is league-average control, and Hodge will be on his way to a top-five reliever fWAR season. – Michael Rosen
Kumar Rocker Will Win AL ROY
Kumar Rocker had a rough spring training, with a 9.00 ERA and nine walks over 13 innings. However, his stuff and velocity have looked normal, and all of the projection systems at FanGraphs believe in him, not least OOPSY, my own new projection system. The Rangers have lost Jon Gray and Cody Bradford to injury already, so Rocker will get an opportunity to prove himself in their rotation to start the year. He compiled a rough four walks and four strikeouts across his first three spring appearances, but looked much better in his final two starts, striking out eight batters in each game while averaging 97.3 mph with his fastball. While Jasson Domínguez, Kristian Campbell, Roman Anthony, Jacob Wilson, and Jackson Jobe are the heavy AL Rookie of the Year favorites entering the season, I think Rocker has as good a chance as any of them to snag the award. – Jordan Rosenblum
A Shortstop Will Win MVP
We live in a golden age of shortstops. Gone are the days when glove-first leather wizards dominated the position. As Kiri Oler noted in the introduction to her shortstop Positional Power Rankings, today’s shortstops can field and hit. Last season, only first basemen, right fielders, and DHs posted a higher combined wRC+ (a 104 for shortstops vs. a 107 for first basemen and right fielders, and a 108 for DHs), and even that’s a little misleading, since plenty of shortstops DH when they need a half day off. These guys aren’t languishing at the bottom of the lineup, they’re key cogs, making slick throws one inning and hitting home runs the next.
That’s what makes the position’s MVP drought so surprising. The last shortstop to win an MVP award in either league was Jimmy Rollins in 2007; Alex Rodriguez took home the prize in the American League that year, but by that point, he was a third baseman, just as he was when he won it in 2005. Before Rollins, it was A-Rod in 2003, his final season with the Rangers, and then Miguel Tejada in 2002. A non-Shohei Ohtani pitcher has won more recently (Clayton Kershaw in 2014)! Well, that all ends this year. This season, a shortstop will win one of the MVP awards.
Perhaps the star power at the position makes this prediction feel a little chalky. Bobby Witt Jr. might have already rendered it moot had his 10.4-WAR 2024 campaign not run into the brick wall that was Aaron Judge and his career-best 11.2 WAR, 218 wRC+ showing. Shortstop boasts Gunnar Henderson, Francisco Lindor, Corey Seager, and Elly De La Cruz among its denizens. Dansby Swanson, Willy Adames, Carlos Correa, Trea Turner, and Xander Bogaerts call it home. Five of the 15 shortstops on our Top 100 Prospects list are expected to see time in the majors this year, with a few of those guys ticketed for everyday roles. But also, 2007! Jimmy Rollins! If you’re not named Judge, Trout, or Ohtani, it’s been tough sledding in the MVP race of late. Judge has the best projection in baseball this year, and Ohtani is set to resume his two-way domination at some point during the season. There are so many good players in today’s game. But many of those good players are shortstops, and this is the year that one of them finally breaks through again. – Meg Rowley
The Nationals Will Have a Top 10 Offense by wRC+
The young Nats atop the lineup garner most of the attention and rightfully so, as our projections anticipate solid seasons from CJ Abrams, Dylan Crews, and James Wood, including a spicy 124 wRC+ for Wood. Abrams and Crews are projected to be closer to league average, though both have the skills to easily exceed that level. I like Crews to beat his projected mark and land closer to a 110-115 wRC+. But those three alone can’t bring this prediction to fruition. Offseason acquisitions Josh Bell and Nathaniel Lowe delivering plus seasons while established Nats Luis García Jr. and Keibert Ruiz are at least league average will be instrumental in bringing this home.
Bell returns to the park where he’s posted an .899 OPS in 587 plate appearances. Lowe brings a sharp 127 wRC+ over the last three seasons with him from Texas to Washington, and gets an improved home park in deal. García might fall back a bit from his career-best 111 wRC+ last year, but as long as he’s around his 97 mark from the last three seasons, that will work. Ruiz is looking to move in the other direction after a .232 BABIP held his wRC+ to just a 71, but he was at a palatable 94 in 1,091 PA before that. I could’ve gone with a WAR prediction to leverage Jacob Young’s elite center field defense, but I can eat an 80-something wRC+ from him if just a couple of the other guys exceed expectations. And of course, team-wide health will be a major factor as well. – Paul Sporer
The Arizona Diamondbacks Will Finish Within Five Games of the Los Angeles Dodgers
While there’s very good reason to project the Dodgers to win more games than the Diamondbacks, I think people are being too hasty in just handing Los Angeles the NL West. The Dodgers were already a great team before this winter, so their offseason moves do more to greatly improve the team’s downside than make 105 wins or some other crazy number its median projection. The Diamondbacks have a lot more downside, but with some good health luck, their talent is enough to plausibly go toe-to-toe with the superior squad out of Chavez Ravine. They might not take the division, but there’s a good chance they make it a race. – Dan Szymborski
Both MVP and Cy Young Awards Will Go to First-Time Winners
I wanted to add Rookie of the Year as well, but I guess that’s a given, huh? This prediction, of new blood at the top of the awards voting, means the MVPs won’t be Aaron Judge, Shohei Ohtani, Freddie Freeman, Mookie Betts, or Bryce Harper, among others. It means Blake Snell, Chris Sale, Corbin Burnes and Tarik Skubal (again, among others) won’t win a Cy Young. There are some big risks in here (Judge, Ohtani and Skubal in particular are favorites), and translating odds to percentages, the bookmakers give this just a 13% chance of happening – basically the same odds as the Athletics making the postseason. But there’s so much emerging talent – Bobby Witt Jr., Gunnar Henderson, Paul Skenes, Garrett Crochet, Elly De La Cruz – plus so many established talents who have never won – Francisco Lindor, José Ramírez, Zack Wheeler – that I think we’ll get some new names winning hardware. – Chad Young
The Athletics Will Play .500 Ball This Year
I think the West Sacramento Athletics will surprise by playing decent baseball in a down American League West, and could even play .500 ball if they fill a few of their remaining pitching holes. They aren’t going to be pushovers like the White Sox, Marlins, and Rockies. They’re moving on up.
The Athletics’ hitting won’t be the issue. The lineup might lack superstars, but it’s deep. We rank them as the league’s 13th best unit, with each starter projected to post a wRC+ over 100. And there is some upside to the group. Seth Brown, Miguel Andujar, Brent Rooker, and Gio Urshela are the only rostered hitters who are over 30 years old. If one of the bats breaks out like Lawrence Butler did last season, it could push them up even further.
The problems are on the pitching side, though even there, there’s a path to the A’s exceeding expectations. The combination of JP Sears and new additions Luis Severino and Jeffrey Springs gives the team three average starters, but the back of the rotation presents a weakness. Still, there’s reason for some optimism. Mitch Spence, J.T. Ginn, and Osvaldo Bido each throw a variety of pitches; focusing on their best offerings could help to turn them into average major league starters, and average is fine when you’re aiming for a .500 record. Last season, each of those three threw two secondaries with a swinging strike rate over 14% (a 13.2% SwStr% is the league average for starters); Ginn had two over 17%. If just two of these arms can put it together, things are looking up.
Meanwhile, Mason Miller, José Leclerc, and Tyler Ferguson should allow the team to at least hold any leads that make it to the seventh inning, though things are admittedly shaky after that. The hope is that an arm or two will emerge (e.g. Lucas Erceg in 2024) to allow the bullpen to take over if the team is leading in the fifth or sixth. It isn’t a guarantee, but again, this isn’t about making the playoffs; it’s about being respectable. – Jeff Zimmerman
