The first month of the MLB season is in the books, and there were surprises all around the league. Who stood out from each team?
April is a strange month in Major League Baseball. Most hitters slump the first two weeks of the year while they figure out their swing and adjust to seeing pitchers who are no longer working on locating specific pitches in specific counts. When the gloves come off and sing training turns into the regular season, there is no surefire way to predict which pitchers and hitters will start out hot. The MLB leaderboards at the end of April have always had a few names that make you scratch your head and wonder when the regression train will pull into the station.
Teams and players around MLB will begin to stabilize as the calendar turns to May. Some of these hot starts may stick, just as the cold starts will disappear. Which player stood out as the biggest surprise from each of the 30 MLB teams? Read on to find out.
Arizona Diamondbacks: Robbie Ray
As they battle the Colorado Rockies for first place in the NL West, the Diamondbacks are one of MLB’s biggest April surprises as a whole. They were expected to hit and pile up runs, but would only go as far as their starting pitching could take them. Zack Greinke has made the necessary adjustments to pitch well with diminished velocity. He looks closer to what the Diamondbacks thought they were getting for $206 million.
In a rotation that has surpassed expectations, Robbie Ray stands out as the biggest surprise. The left-hander went 8-15 last year with a 4.90 ERA. Through five starts this season, he is 2-1 with a 3.56 ERA and 39 strikeouts in 30.1 innings. Ray is having great success with his slider this season, and has not allowed a single hit to a left-handed batter when using it.
The Diamondbacks have had one of the National League’s best starting rotations in the month of April. If the trend continues for the rest of the season, paired with their dangerous offense, Arizona might walk into the playoffs.
Atlanta Braves: Freddie Freeman
By this point of his career, Freddie Freeman has firmly established himself as an MLB All-Star. He is a career .290/.375/.491 hitter with 146 home runs and 527 RBI. The two-time All-Star is taking things to another level so far in 2017.
Freeman has started the year off hitting .381/.485/.798 with NINE home runs. He has finally begun unleashing the power in his 6-foot-5 frame. Freeman is pulling the ball at a career-high rate this year, and he has yet to hit an infield popup. There is some regression to the mean coming for Freeman, as his BABIP is close to .400 and he is hitting close to .300 on groundballs. Both of those averages are much higher than the MLB norms.
The Braves first baseman has been blistering pretty much every pitch type this season. He is batting .250 against fastballs, but has slugged .750 with four home runs against the heat. This hot start is a continuation from last season when Freeman posted a career-high slugging percentage of .569 and hit more than 30 home runs for the first time in his career. With more data available to hitters concerning their exit velocity, launch angle, and swing, this may be a sustainable start for Freeman.
Baltimore Orioles: Wade Miley
Wade Miley has been wiggling on and off the hook in each of his five starts to open the 2017 season, but the results have been much better than his time with the Orioles after the deadline last season. After coming over from Seattle, Miley went 2-5 with a 6.17 ERA in 11 starts. Chalk some of that up to bad luck. Miley had a 3.79 FIP for the Orioles last year and struck out 9.2 per nine.
Miley has been getting good results so far this season. He has not allowed more than three runs in a start, and has now allowed only five runs over his past 20.0 innings over three starts. But it’s been weird. Miley walked seven in his first start of the year, and has walked 11 over his last two starts. Sandwiched between those wild outings, Miley went 14 innings with only one walk and 19 strikeouts.
Overall, Miley has a 2.32 ERA and has allowed a .187 batting average. There are still some very real questions about how sustainable this strong start is, however, and Miley must find some way to curtail his walks.
Evan Davis of FanRag Sports tried to make some sense of what Miley has been doing so far this season.
"If you’re getting whiplash, I can’t blame you. It’s a strange profile. Miley has appeared to make a concerted effort to change that profile, too. He’s throwing his two-seamer a lot more, and he’s generating a lot more arm-side whiffs with the pitch. That said, he’s missing low and glove-side constantly. In fact, he can’t seem to locate at the knees at all."
Miley has seemed to be nibbling at the edges of the strike zone, especially against right-handed batters. Sixteen of the 19 walks he has issued have been to righties. Miley has been striking out more hitters than ever before in his career thanks to his two-seamer and cureball, but he would be better off attacking hitters early in the count and trying to pitch to contact when the situation calls for it. He will eventually get burned if his walks continue to pile up at this pace.
Boston Red Sox: Mitch Moreland
Mitch Moreland — christened Mitchy Twobags by Red Sox fans — has made it much easier to forget that David Ortiz is off enjoying retirement instead of terrorizing the American League. Moreland leads all of Major League Baseball with 12 doubles, and is hitting .273/.360/.477 with 11 RBI.
Moreland’s presence in the lineup and his ability to be more than the platoon bat the Red Sox envisioned when they signed him has allowed Hanley Ramirez to permanently slide into the DH slot. This has allowed the Red Sox to have Moreland’s excellent defense in the lineup every day, while allowing Ramirez to focus solely on hitting and staying healthy.
Moreland won the 2016 Gold Glove for Texas, and his defense has been as good as advertised. It has been his bat that has been a very nice surprise. Moreland eventually fell out of favor with the Rangers because of his inconsistent approach at the plate and limited on-base skills. Over the past four years, he batted .247/.308/.437. Moreland still exhibits fairly wide platoon splits, but has shown more power against southpaws so far this year.
That Chris Sale has been great is not a surprise for the Red Sox, but his level of dominance is a surprise. Sale has a 1.19 ERA through five starts and has 52 strikeouts and only six walks in 37.2 innings. He has struck out over 10 in four straight starts, but is only 1-2 on the year because the Red Sox have not been able to support him. Sale got out of Chicago, but apparently some things never change.
Chicago Cubs: Jason Heyward
It may be time to ease up on the criticism of Jason Heyward’s $184-million deal with the Cubs. After hitting .230/.306/.325 in his first year in Chicago and being benched in the playoffs, Heyward is off to a .282/.341/.423 start in April with 16 RBI. He may never develop a power stroke, and speculating on his untapped power is what led to the gross overpayment in free agency.
Heyward worked hard to revamp his swing over the winter, and the changes he made are paying off. The All-Star and Gold Glover has worked hard to utilize his wrists more in his swing, rather than swinging all arms.
"Heyward never blamed anything on the wrist injury last season; perhaps he didn’t even realize what was going on with his swing and why it was happening. During the winter and spring training, he began to get used to using his wrists and hands instead of his arms, as that was causing him to be late on everything. It was a work in progress, and he didn’t feel right until the season began. Scouts saw the same thing in spring training. It wasn’t clicking yet, but as the season began, the bad habits faded."
One thing that never left Heyward last year while he struggled was his defensive prowess. He won his third Gold Glove in a row, and was still worth 1.3 dWAR in right field. Already this season, Heyward has picked up 0.4 dWAR while also spending time in center field.
Chicago White Sox: James Shields
The White Sox are one of the most surprising teams in the league. After their fire sale at the Winter Meetings, they were expected to contend for the worst record in baseball, but will close April with a winning record. With very low expectations, there have obviously been a handful of very surprising performances helping to keep the White Sox afloat.
In any other year, Avisail Garcia would claim the title as most surprising player for the White Sox. He finished the month of April with a .388/.430/.638 line with five home runs and 19 RBI. Blessed with great raw tools, Garcia had batted just .250/.308/.380 over the past three seasons for the White Sox, which always made him a popular DFA or non-tender candidate. Garcia’s hot start comes with a huge caveat — it’s not sustainable in the least bit. His batting average on balls in play for the month was close to .500, but his average exit velocity and launch angle do not support such a high mark.
While Garcia has been a great story, the biggest surprise for the White Sox has been James Shield, who looked done as a useful MLB starter last season. Shields went 4-12 for Chicago last year with a 6.77 ERA and 2.4 HR/9. Through three starts in April, the right-hander has a 1.66 ERA. Sure, it’s definitely all smoke and mirrors at this point for Shields, and he has walked 5.4 per nine while allowing 1.6 homers per nine. Shields is on the DL with a lat strain, and when he does return, his ERA will eventually spike in the wrong direction, so enjoy it while it lasts.
Cincinnati Reds: Scott Feldman
After holding onto first place in the NL Central into the third week of the season, the Reds have drifted back down to earth. No real surprise that this team is not ready to contend, as they are realistically still three years away from even sniffing .500. Give the Reds credit for starting the year ready to play and jumping a few teams that will ultimately leave them in the dust by June.
Scott Feldman took the ball for Cincinnati on Opening Day — which speaks to the fact that the Reds were not expected to be very good this season. The veteran right-hander has given Cincinnati five very good starts to kick off the year. He has a 3.25 ERA, and has allowed two runs or fewer in three of his starts.
Feldman has had great success with his big sweeping curveball in 2017. Opponents are batting just .065 against his hook. He has shown enough command with his sinker and cutter to get ahead in the count and go to his curve to put hitters away.
The pitcher who was once traded for Jake Arrieta has been very steady and dependable the past four seasons, finishing with an ERA below 4.00 in each. He has a good feel for pitching to contact and has been able to use his curveball for more strikeouts this season. If this continues, the Reds will be able to flip Feldman for a nice prospect package at the deadline.
Cleveland Indians: Michael Brantley
After injuries limited Michael Brantley to only 11 games in 2016, the Indians had to be fearful that their All-Star outfielder was set to turn into the next Grady Sizemore, the former future face of the franchise who just could not stay on the field during his time in Cleveland. When he was briefly healthy last year, Brantley batted just .231/.279/.282, a far cry from the .319/.382/.494 line he put up in 2014 and 2015 with 90 doubles, 35 home runs, and 38 stolen bases.
Brantley has bounced back with a strong month of April to kick off the season, showing that he is still a five-tool player that the Indians can count on. He batted .297/.358/.514 with four doubles and four home runs. His hot start has helped the Indians make up for a slow start from their starting rotation.
With a healthy Brantley back in the mix, the Indians have one of the most dangerous and dynamic lineups in the American League. Francisco Lindor has continued taking the next step to establish himself as the premier shortstop in baseball. Jose Ramirez is also off to a strong start. Cleveland has only one dominant power threat in the lineup in Edwin Encarnacion, who is off to a slow start in his first year with the team. The rest of the lineup is capable of hitting 20-25 home runs, but is dangerous for its ability to string together doubles and stolen bases, always keeping the pressure on. It’s good to have Brantley back in that mix and doing what he does best.
Colorado Rockies: Greg Holland
When Greg Holland struggled in 2015 with the Kansas City Royals, it was evident that something was not right with his arm. The two-time All-Star would eventually require Tommy John, and missed the entire 2016 season while rehabbing. Entering the 2017 season, there were very real questions about his ability to bounce back and handle closing for an MLB team.
After April, it is safe to say that Holland has put any concerns about his elbow’s ability to hold up to the rigors of closing to rest. He has converted his first 11 saves for the Rockies, and has allowed only two earned runs. Holland has lost a tick on his fastball, but can still touch 95 if he has to. His slider has remained at 85-87 with great movement. The slider is still the strikeout pitch for Holland.
If Holland has lost anything after a year away from baseball recovering from surgery, it has been difficult to pick up. His strikeout totals are slightly down for now, but he is getting more whiffs on his fastball this season than in 2014 when he struck out 13.0 per nine. He is getting fewer whiffs on his slider, but it is still a very difficult pitch for hitters to square up. The Rockies have been searching for a closer like this for years — one with the right combination of power stuff and strike-throwing ability — who can succeed in Coors Field. Their gamble on Greg Holland coming off surgery is paying off in a big way.
Detroit Tigers: Miguel Cabrera
Even the best hitters are allowed to slump from time to time, but it is just so out of the ordinary to see Miguel Cabrera start the month of April extremely slowly. Cabrera has batted above .300 for every month of the season throughout his career, including .321/.401/.561 in April. A groin strain cut his April short in 2017, but he hit just .268/.369/.468, and needed five games to pick up his first hits of the season.
Before Cabrera landed on the DL, he had hit safely in seven of eight games, including two three-hit games to raise his batting average up from .107. It is still far too early to label this slow start and injury the beginning of the inevitable downfall of Miguel Cabrera, and he does get the benefit of the doubt until the middle of the season.
The Tigers entered the year with one of the oldest lineups in the major leagues. They have gotten inconsistent offense and starting pitching, which has led to a .500 start to the year. Cabrera’s slow start cannot continue when he comes off the DL if the Tigers are going to make it back to the playoffs this year. Cabrera’s start is not even the worst on the team. Ian Kinsler, Victor Martinez, and Justin Verlander would all like to restart the season if they could.
Houston Astros: Dallas Keuchel
If Dallas Keuchel could have guaranteed that his 2017 season would fall somewhere in between his Cy Young effort of 2015 and his injury-plagued struggles of 2016, most Astros fans would have gladly taken it. Through six starts, Keuchel is 5-0 with a 1.21 ERA and has allowed only 25 hits in 44.2 innings for a .164 BAA. Opponents have a minuscule OPS against Keuchel of .502 with a 2.41 GO/AO ratio.
Keuchel has pitched more seven innings in each of his starts this year, and has allowed more than one earned run only once. His two-seam fastball and changeup have been working to perfection. Keuchel’s sinker has been good for a grounder at a nearly 80 percent clip, and he has converted nine of 18 double-play opportunities. Even without blistering velocity, Keuchel has pounded the bottom of the zone with his sinker, and the league has not been able to do anything with it.
This is the pitcher the Astros need to put themselves over the top. Keuchel is the ace that Houston was waiting for, especially as Lance McCullers battles inconsistency. If Keuchel can continue forcing hitters to pound his sinker into the ground, he will continue to pile up wins and could make another run at the Cy Young. With a healthy shoulder, Keuchel is exceeding even the most optimistic projections that were made entering the year.
Kansas City Royals: Eric Hosmer
Eric Hosmer’s walk year could not have gotten off to a worse start. He batted just .225/.283/.294 with a single home run and six RBI. Hosmer has not necessarily been awful at the plate. He has made contact at a high rate, and with good exit velocity — above the league average by almost three mph, in fact. The problem for Hosmer has been the type of contact. He is hitting the ball on the ground in over 60 percent of his plate appearances.
Unless Hosmer can do something to change his swing and generate more lift, he will continue to struggle. Even the best MLB hitters rarely hit much better than .200 when they put the ball on the ground. On his ground balls this season, Hosmer is batting .178/.178/.178 with seven double-play balls.
The month of May will be critical for Hosmer and the Royals. They are already buried in the standings, and with another losing month, it will be time to seriously consider blowing up the team and dealing away expiring contracts like Hosmer’s. The franchise needs him to have some value as a hitter to make a trade worth it. For Hosmer, getting his swing back on track is necessary to establish value when free agency hits this winter. He is not an elite defender or power hitter, and could have a hard time finding the nine-figure deal that could carry him for the rest of his career.
On a more positive note, Ian Kennedy, Jason Vargas, and Danny Duffy have pitched very well for the Royals. Unfortunately the offense will not be able to support them until Hosmer, the heart of the lineup, gets it going.
Los Angeles Angels: Andrelton Simmons
For a team batting a collective .239/.307/.359, runs have been hard to come by. With the exception of the great Mike Trout, very few hitters in the Angels lineup are living up to the stats on the back of their baseball card at the start of the 2017 season. Los Angeles has built an aging lineup of strikeout-prone hitters around Trout.
Andrelton Simmons has stood out from the rest of the slumping lineup, and batted .284/.358/.400 in April with two doubles and three home runs. Simmons has not slugged at or above .400 since he played 49 games in his rookie year back in 2012. He also drew 11 walks in the month, which is another great sign for his maturation as a hitter. Simmons walked only 28 times in 124 games in 2016 and has a .310 career OBP.
For what the Angels had to give up to acquire Simmons from the Braves, they needed him to do more than be the best fielding shortstop in the league. His bat needed to come around to justify giving up two top starting pitching prospects. The 281/.324/.366 line Simmons posted last year was a step in the right direction, and he appears to have continued maturing and developing as a hitter over the offseason. It might be a stretch to project Simmons to push Francisco Lindor for the title of most complete shortstop in the game, but it no longer appears out of the question that he could hit 15-20 home runs a season.
Los Angeles Dodgers: Kenta Maeda
In his first year in the United States, Kenta Maeda proved to be a fine number two to Clayton Kershaw, and carried the Dodgers rotation for several months while the ace of the staff was on the DL with a back injury. Maeda went 16-11 last year with a 3.48 ERA and finished third in the NL Rookie of the Year vote. His incentive-laden eight-year, $25-million deal looked like a massive bargain for the Dodgers.
Maeda’s sophomore season has gotten off to a rough start. He went 2-2 in April with a 6.58 ERA and allowed seven home runs in 26.0 innings. Opponents batted .284 against the slight right-hander with an OPS of .877. Clearly the fly-ball pitcher has been hurt by some bad luck to start the year, but opposing hitters are slugging .583 against his four-seam fastball and .750 against his sinker. Maeda does skew extremely towards the fly ball, but his air-ground splits are even wider than last year. In his most recent start, Maeda did make progress, going seven innings and allowing only two runs. He does have good strikeout numbers on the year, and has not suffered a noticeable drop in velocity. It’s not time to hit the panic button on Maeda, but he did not endure a stretch this bad in his rookie season.
Brandon McCarthy has been a positive surprise for the Dodgers, and he is 3-0 with a 3.10 ERA after five April starts. McCarthy has made only 13 starts over the past two seasons while battling injuries. If he continues to pitch well, the Dodgers will be able to give Maeda move time to work through his early woes.
Miami Marlins: J.T. Realmuto
Fourth-year catcher J.T. Realmuto just wrapped up what may be the best month of his career to date. Realmuto batted .342/.383/.474 in April with two home runs and seven RBI. After batting .303/.343/.428 last year, the 26-yearold backstop was out to prove those numbers were not a fluke, and he is off to a very strong start to the 2017 season.
Realmuto has shown good ability as a contact hitter during his time with the Marlins. He does not walk much, but also does not strike out. Realmuto has cut his strikeout rate to 8.6 percent so fart his year. That is by far the lowest mark of his career. Realmuto has also cut four percentage points off his soft-contact rate from last year. Combining the increased rate of quality contact with the lower strikeout rate has given him a batting average that ranks among the top hitters in the National League after one month.
On paper, Realmuto’s .358 batting average on balls in play looks fluky when compared to the MLB average of .300. However, it is nearly in line with the .357 mark he posted last year while batting .303 for the entire season. If Realmuto can keep his strikeouts at this low level for the entire season, it would not be a surprise to see him better his batting average from last year. There is bound to be some decline for the catcher as the season drags on and his body wears down, but J.T. Realmuto is for real, and one of the more underrated players in the league.
Milwaukee Brewers: Eric Thames
No one knew what to expect from Korean sensation Eric Thames when he came back to MLB after three years abroad destroying the KBO. A reasonable guess would have pegged Thames for 25-30 home runs with a slash line in the neighborhood of .260/.330/.500. The Brewers obviously expected him to transition back to MLB without a hitch after letting Chris Carter, the 2016 NL home-run leader, go and guaranteeing Thames $16 million over three years.
What Thames has done so far this season has been eye-opening. He hit .345/.466/.810 in April with 11 home runs and 19 RBI. Thames also drew 18 walks as teams were hesitant to pitch to him. This impossibly hot start came out of nowhere.
Thames did most of his damage against the Reds and their mediocre pitching staff. He batted .440/.576/1.400 with eight home runs against the Reds in April. Why they continued pitching to him is beyond comprehension. Lest you get the impression that Thames struggled against the better teams, he batted .471/.571/.882 in five games against the Cubs.
The fact that Thames has barely swung at any pitches outside of the strike zone has helped fuel his hot start. Playing in Korea where pitchers rely heavily on junk and deception to get outs instead of velocity may have helped Thames hone his approach at the plate. He has refused to get himself out so far, and has been more than happy to take a walk if pitchers will not challenge him. Whether or not this can continue remains to be seen, but Eric Thames is coming off one of the best Aprils by a hitter in MLB history, and no one saw that coming in their wildest dreams.
Minnesota Twins: Ervin Santana
Ervin Santana went 4-0 with a 0.77 ERA in the month of April, and did not allow more than a single run in any of his four starts. He leads MLB in ERA, WHIP, and hits per nine. Opponents are batting a measly .116 against Santana with a .376 OPS. This ridiculous start is completely out of the blue for a pitcher who has always been among the most consistent mid-rotation starters in the game, but never an ace.
Santana has been one of the best in MLB at generating weak contact this season. He has piled up weak ground and popouts all year, and is not necessarily just getting lucky on hard-hit balls being hit right at fielders. Opponents are batting .049 against his slider this year, and have not done much better against his fastball.
Of course, Santana is due for some sort of regression to the mean. His low ERA has been helped out by facing the Royals once and the White Sox twice, but he has shut down the Indians and Rangers in his last two starts. If he can continue living on the edges and the lower third of the strike zone, Santana will continue getting plenty of weak contact.
The Twins have a young ballclub and rotation, and Santana’s reliability could help them surpass expectations after a disastrous 2016 season. Miguel Sano has rebounded after a down year, and Byron Buxton is showing signs of finally being able to handle MLB pitching.
New York Mets: Jay Bruce
Were it not for Jay Bruce, the Mets could be looking at an even worse start to the 2017 season. Riddled by injuries, the Mets are in last place, looking up at the red-hot Washington Nationals with an inconsistent offense. Bruce batted .292/.370/.584 in April, carrying the offense through the absences of Yoenis Cespedes, Lucas Duda, David Wright, and Travis d’Arnaud.
Bruce leads the Mets with seven homers and 19 RBI. He has helped redeem himself to Mets fans after batting .219/.294/.391 after being acquired from Cincinnati at the deadline last season. Bruce has always had a reputation as a streaky hitter during his 10-year career, and there is no real way to determine when his current heater will end.
The Mets have also gotten more production out of Michael Conforto than expected. Their first-round pick in 2104 has struggled to establish his presence in a crowded lineup filled with corner outfielders. The injury to Cespedes and the struggles of Curtis Granderson have opened the door for Conforto to see more playing time, and he has taken the opportunity and run with it. He is hitting .321 on the year with an OPS of 1.055 and six home runs and 13 RBI. Even when Cespedes is healthy, Conforto will have to continue seeing regular at-bats. He has earned them, proving himself as much more than a platoon option off the bench.
New York Yankees: Aaron Judge
There are a handful of players who could earn the title of biggest surprise for the Yankees, who are themselves one of MLB’s biggest April surprises with a 15-8 record. Starting pitchers Michael Pineda and Luis Severino have combined to go 5-2 with an ERA near 3.00 and 70 strikeouts in only 55.2 innings. Pineda has finally been able to consistently command and locate his fastball, while Severino’s work with Hall of Famer Pedro Martinez on a changeup this offseason is paying huge dividends.
Pineda and Severino are wonderful surprises for a team that was supposed to have trouble with starting pitching, but the biggest surprise for the Yankees by far is right fielder Aaron Judge. The biggest man in MLB batted .303/.411/.750 in April with 10 home runs and 20 RBI, putting himself right up there with teammate Gary Sanchez for hottest start to a career. Judge has become a force at the plate, and the rest of the league has not yet figured out his revamped swing. Anything near the strike zone has been sent a long, long way by the 6-foot-7 outfielder.
The Yankees have also gotten a scorching start from second baseman Starlin Castro, who hit .352/.398/.549 with five home runs and 16 RBI in April. Castro delivered a big two-run home run to tie the game for the Yankees last Friday in a crazy comeback win over the Orioles. He has always had five-tool talent, but was hampered by his own laziness and mental shortcomings. There will be a bit of a regression for Castro and Judge, but this Yankee lineup is firing on all cylinders and playing with an incredible energy.
Oakland Athletics: Andrew Triggs
Entering the 2016 season, Andrew Triggs was a journeyman minor-league reliever who had only one career start to his name. That’s not to say he did not have good numbers in the minor leagues. Triggs saved 17 games in the Baltimore system in 2015 and pitched to a 1.03 ERA in 61.0 innings of work. Unfortunately, a 26-year-old, soft-tossing, right-handed reliever at the Double-A level does not draw many looks from the MLB front office, and the Orioles released Triggs leading up to the 2016 season to make room for Pedro Alvarez.
Having seen what Triggs has done so far this season, that is a move the Orioles would like to have back.
Triggs went 4-1 in April with a 1.84 ERA and allowed only one home run in 29.1 innings for the A’s. He has built upon a nice debut in Oakland last summer where he went 1-1 with a 4.31 ERA in 56.1 innings. Triggs has allowed earned runs in only one of his five starts this year.
The right-hander works with a cutter-slider-sinker mix on the mound, and throws all three pitches in any count. That allows him to keep hitters off balance. Even though he barely touches 90 mph, his deception leads to soft contact at a very high rate, especially on the ground. There is plenty of room for regression with Triggs, but he has been a great story so far this season. He has very little margin for error against big-league hitters, and soft-tossers like him have found early success in their careers before the league wises up to their arsenal. He has also never thrown more than 70 innings in a season, and will be making a massive jump in innings as a full-time starter.
Philadelphia Phillies: Jeremy Hellickson
The Phillies attempted to hold an auction for Jeremy Hellickson at the trade deadline last year, could not find an offer meeting their high asking price, and decided to hold onto him in hopes of collecting a draft pick after he turned down the qualifying offer. Hellickson threw a bit of a monkey wrench into their plans by accepting the one-year qualifying offer, but in the end, the Phillies may actually be grateful that he did.
Hellickson went 4-0 in the month of April with a 1.80 ERA, allowing only two home runs in 30.0 innings. He has pitched into the seventh inning twice, and has issued only three walks this season. Hellickson has always pitched to contact, never striking out more than eight batters per inning in a full season. He is taking that to another level this year, and has struck out only 11 batters, for a strikeout rate of 3.3 per nine.
As a fly-ball pitcher, Hellickson has only gotten 32.3 percent of his contact on the ground this year. That would be the lowest rate of his career by a wide margin. He has also allowed only 4.4 percent of his fly balls to leave the yard so far this year, which is far below his career average and the MLB average. No one has been able to figure out his changeup this year, and Hellickson has used it more than any of his pitches. Hellickson’s fastball and sinker have been hit well for average, but are still being kept in the park.
Pittsburgh Pirates: Jameson Taillon
The Pirates opened the 2017 season with two of their top prospects in the starting rotation, Jameson Taillon and Tyler Glasnow. Of the two, Glasnow is seen as having higher upside, but he has struggled to locate the ball in the strike zone and has walked 13 in his first 14.2 innings this season. Taillon has been much better, and is 2-0 with a 2.08 ERA.
Taillon throws four pitches, and relies most heavily on his four-seam fastball, sinker, and curve. His curve has been his most effective pitch, and his sinker has generated groundballs at a high rate. Taillon will give up his fair share of hits as a sinkerballer, but will not get burned by extra-base hits.
Ivan Nova has also surprised by continuing his run of phenomenal command that started when he was traded to the Pirates at the deadline last year. He is now 3-2 with a 1.50 ERA in 36.0 innings with two complete games and a shutout. Nova has walked only one hitter so far this year. In his 16 starts with the Pirates, the right-hander has struck out 74 while walking four. This may go down as the greatest transformation of a struggling pitcher in MLB history if it continues to stick. Nova was taken for granted when the Pirates traded for him and re-signed him, but the magic of Ray Searage has turned him into a legitimate ace who cannot miss the edges of the strike zone.
Now, if the Pirates could just do a little hitting at the plate, their top three of Nova, Taillon, and Gerrit Cole just might have a shot at leading the team back to the playoffs. Andrew McCutchen and Gregory Polanco are still looking for their stroke at the plate, and no one has been able to replace Starling Marte.
San Diego Padres: Manuel Margot
By this point of the season, it has become painfully obvious that the Padres are one of the worst teams in the league. They have a run differential of -31 and do not have a starting pitcher with an ERA below 4.00. Their Opening Day starter currently has a 5.82 ERA, and their offense ranks 14th in the NL with an OPS of .686.
Wil Myers has continued hitting at an All-Star level, and may finally put together a whole season of elite production. He was one of the best hitters in the league in the first half last year, but slumped in the second half. Rookie Manuel Margot has given the Padres a surprising amount of offense through the month of April.
Margot has had his growing pains, and his .261/.293/.405 line in April ended down precipitously from its highest points of the first two weeks of the season. Margot’s approach will come around at the plate, and he is still only 22 for most of this season. He has time to tighten his strike zone and take a more disciplined approach to hitting. Margot has wowed in the outfield — that part of his game is already among the best in the game. The potential is still there for this young center fielder to develop into an All-Star caliber leadoff man.
San Francisco Giants: Matt Cain
If teams like the Daimondbacks and Rockies are the biggest upside surprisers downside surpriser in the league. The Giants went 9-17in April, and are now 39-59 since last year’s All-Star Game, the worst record in the league in that time period. They started this season with-priced closer Mark Melancon and ended it in the same way. Some things never change for the Giants,
Around the diamond and up and down the rotation, the Giants have disappointed so far this year. Surprisingly, Matt Cain has been very good so far. The veteran right-hander who has battled injuries for years, went 2-0 with a 2.30 ERA in 27.1 innings. It was his best start to the year for Cain since injuries first began bothering him in 2013.
Cain’s body is finally allowing him to contribute to the Giants like they envisioned when signing him to a long-term contract. He has been able to finish his pitches and bring the ball down in the strike zone, allowing him to avoid hard-hit balls despite lost velocity. Cain is getting one of the highest groundball rates of his career. While the rest of the roster continues to underachieve, Cain cannot be given any of the blame, which is a nice change.
Seattle Mariners: Mitch Haniger
Seen as more of an accessory to the big names in the Jean Segura-Taijuan Walker trade, Mitch Haniger has been the best all-around player on the Mariners this season. The former first-round pick in 2012 batted .342/.447/.608 in April with four home runs and 16 RBI. Unfortunately for the scuffling Mariners, Haniger strained an oblique and is now on the disabled list. Losing his bat and glove will not make it any easier for Seattle to climb above .500 after going 11-15 in the first month of the season.
Oblique injuries can linger for MLB hitters, and there is a good chance Haniger is on the 10-day DL for much longer than 10 days. When he does return, it may be hard for him to carry his lofty slash line much longer. The average exit velocity of his contact this season is below the MLB average, and his batting average on balls in play is a sky-high .418. For now, it seems as though Haniger was the lucky beneficiary of some good luck and change to a new league where the pitchers are not keyed into his holes.
Haniger did not have high expectations on his shoulders entering this season, but James Paxton did. The big left-hander finished April with a 3-0 record and 1.39 ERA in five starts. This is the pitcher the Mariners and their fans have been waiting on for years. Paxton is finally healthy and shutting down the league. He leads the Mariners in all major statistical categories for pitchers, and is prepared to take over for Felix Hernandez as the staff’s ace.
St. Louis Cardinals: Mike Leake
Mike Leake is now in his eighth season in the big leagues, and by now, it is well-established exactly who and what he is as an MLB starter. Leake has built a reputation as a dependable right-hander who can give his team a chance to win most nights. He has never made an All-Star team or led the league in a statistical category. That makes it that much more surprising that Leake is the National League’s ERA leader after the first month of the season with a sparkling mark of 1.35.
Leake did not allow a single home run in the month of April, and walked a career-low 1.4 per nine. He has never strung together a stretch this dominant in his career, but has been very good at limiting the long ball. Leake allowed 1.1 home runs per nine in a noted hitter’s park when pitching for the Reds.
An improved cutter may be fueling Leake’s hot start to the 2017 season. The cut-fastball is one of the more difficult pitches to harness, but Leake is getting significantly more movement when he throws it this year. As a result, opponents are batting .132 against his cutter this season after batting .266 off it last year and .256 in his career. As the cutter becomes better understood by pitching coaches around the league, it will become more common to see pitchers like Leake dominate without exceptional velocity. If he can continue hitting the right parts of the strike zone and throwing his cutter, Leake will continue to pitch like an ace. His 1.95 FIP certainly indicates that he is far from a fluke.
Tampa Bay Rays: Corey Dickerson
Always a trendy contender in the statistical community, the Rays have started 2017 with an inconsistent start thanks to their offense’s inability to reach base at a regular basis. You can’t blam outfielder Corey Dickerson for that, however. He has been one of the best hitters in the American League, and batted .330/.379/.636 in April with six home runs and 10 RBI. The Rays have installed Dickerson at the top of their lineup, and he has not disappointed, hitting .301/.354/.603 from the leadoff spot.
Dickerson’s first season outside of Colorado could not have gone worse. He hit just .245/.293/.469 and looked like a product of the thin air of Coors Field. Dickerson did have 63 extra-base hits in his first year with the Rays, showing that there was raw power in his bat. He just struggled to make consistent contact at different points in the season.
Dickerson’s outfield mate Steven Souza has also made big strides at the plate for Tampa Bay this year. He was a .234/.308/.404 in his first three seasons in the big leagues with 310 strikeouts in only 251 games. Souza batted a robust .330/.411/.543 in April with four home runs and 17 RBI. With his emergence as a top offensive producer, the three-way trade involving Wil Myers, Trea Turner, and Joe Ross no longer looks that lopsided for the Rays.
Texas Rangers: Joey Gallo
Joey Gallo’s immense raw power is no surprise to anyone who has even a passing interest in minor league baseball. The big first baseman hits moon shots. Some of his April home runs reached parts of Globe Life Stadium that most MLB hitters can only dream of. Gallo finished April with seven home runs and 14 RBI to go with a .550 slugging percentage and .880 OPS.
Gallo is never going to fool anyone for a batting champion, and he struck out 32 times in April. Contact is always going to be fleeting for him, but that isn’t what he’s going up the plate to do. The Rangers do not need Gallo to slap singles up the middle. His job is to send high, arching home runs into the upper deck.
The Rangers would likely welcome a do-over on their month of April. Three losses were pinned on closer Sam Dyson, whose pitch-to-contact approach may not last much longer in the ninth inning. If the Rangers are going to catch the streaking Astros, they will need more home runs from Gallo, and fewer bullpen meltdowns.
Toronto Blue Jays: Jose Bautista
After an embarrassing trial of free agency, Jose Bautista seemed poised to enter 2017 as a man on a mission, looking to prove to everyone who passed on him that there was still plenty left in the tank. Bautista has always seemed to feed on perceived slights more than any other player in baseball. Instead of setting the world on fire in April, however, Bautista fizzled at the plate.
Bautista batted a miserable .178/.309/.244 in the month of April with only one home run and 30 strikeouts. With Josh Donaldson continuing to nurse a calf injury, the Blue Jays needed Bautista to step up and carry them one last time. At 36, that may be too much to ask of the right fielder.
The Blue Jays were one of MLB’s most disappointing teams in the month of April, and Bautista was not alone in struggling at the plate. Devon Travis and Russell Martin’s struggles may have been even worse than Bautista’s. That’s to be expected of Martin, as he has caught well over 1,000 games in his MLB career. Travis was expected to lead the lineup from the leadoff spot after returning from injury last year to be a dynamic force at the top of the order.
With one of the oldest rosters in the league, the Blue Jays slow start should not have come as such a big surprise. Their playoff hopes took a big hit with an 8-17record in April.
Washington Nationals: Ryan Zimmerman
Bryce Harper batted .391/.509/.772 in the month of April with nine home runs and 26 RBI. Despite those ridiculous numbers, Harper does not lead the National League in any of the three Triple Crown categories. How crazy is that?
Ryan Zimmerman has been the story of MLB so far this season, and batted .420/.4858/.886 in April with 11 home runs and 29 RBI. He leads the National League in all three categories of the Triple Crown. Zimmerman’s resurgence after batting .232/.288/.413 over the past two years while dealing with a number of injuries. The Nationals have a scary lineup that is running roughshod over all of baseball, and there are no easy outs. Zimmerman is on another level, and he, Harper, Daniel Murphy, and Trea Turner have become like a cheat code.
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The biggest change for Zimmerman this year is the type of contact he is making. The All-Star had one of the best average exit velocities when putting the ball in play last year, but hit far too many balls right into the ground. Zimmerman has shaved 11 percentage points off his groundball rate from 2016 to this year. His contact rate statistics remain mostly unchanged. Perhaps a healthy body and a willingness to embrace a fly-ball swing has helped Zimmerman return to his previous All-Star levels. There may be hope for Eric Hosmer yet.