And the horse you Roden on

Alan Roden (TOR): 2-3, 2B, HR, 2 R, 2 RBI.

On this Jackie Robinson Day, where it felt like EVERYONE hit a homer, let’s focus on someone who got the first of their career. Alan Roden was the Blue Jays’ #5 prospect this season (according to MLB Pipeline) but was added to the club’s 40-man roster going into Spring Training and played his way onto the team. So what else do we know about him?

A physics major at Creighton (school nickname: the Blue Jays), Roden played all four years and flirted with a .400 batting average throughout his college career. Selected in the third round of the 2022 draft, his contact skills continued to shine. In three seasons in the Minors, Roden kept his average around .300 and his OBP at or above .400, and started developing both his power and speed. Last year, splitting time in AA and AAA over 126 games, he slashed .293/.391/.865 with 16 homers and 14 steals.

Roden is one of those players who might not be great at one single thing, but his history shows a cerebral player who’s solid in just about everything. In other words, he’s got a good foundation and won’t hurt you.

Two-and-a-half weeks into his Major League career, Roden’s statcast numbers have not been great (let’s be honest, he’s in the lowest tenth percentile in most categories). But that will happen when you go fifty plate appearances without your first barrel.

His performance last night will start to pull up those percentages. Facing one of the league’s best young pitchers in Spencer Schwellenbach and leading off in the bottom of the third, Roden took a 94-mph cutter the opposite way for a double, hitting it 104.4 mph off the bat. He’d come around to score Toronto’s first run of the game. He’d then account for the team’s next two runs with a line-drive homer off Schwellenbach, hooking a first-pitch curveball into the right field bleachers (this time at 106.4 mph, so that’s two barrels in one game).

Given his on-base skills, Roden was rumored as a leadoff candidate during Spring Training. Toronto’s been mixing up their lineup early on but appears to have settled on Bo Bichette batting first, followed by Guerrero and Santander. Andres Gimenez batted cleanup for a bit, then Springer moved into that slot before getting injured. Needless to say, there’s some flux here, and Roden may have an outside shot at cracking the top half of the order by season’s end. Either way, there’s a bright future here.

 

Let’s see how the other hitters did on Tuesday

Alex Bregman (BOS): 5-5, 2B, 2 HR, 2 R, 4 RBI.

Think Boston’s a good fit? The expectation was that Bregman would be peppering line drives off the Green Monster in Fenway, but he went over the wall twice in Tampa’s Steinbrenner Field in his first career five-hit game. In the early going, Bregman’s a bit of a different hitter—his average exit velocity is up by 4.3 mph over last year, and his barrel rate is a career-high 8.9%. He appears to be selling out a bit for that newfound power, as his K-rate has jumped to 22.5%, a stark difference from his 13.5% career rate (he’s also only walking 5% of the time, compared to 11.8% on his career). Still, you can’t knock the results: he’s batting .357 with a 1.099 OPS in April. Just note that Bregman was placed on the Paternity List after the game and will be out until Friday as he welcomes an addition to his family.

 

Dylan Moore (SEA): 3-5, 2 HR, 2 R, 4 RBI.

Dylan Moore versus right-handed pitchers: .176 batting average, .222 OBP, .398 OPS. Dylan Moore versus lefties: .421 average, .500 OBP, 1.553 OPS. Against Reds’ lefty Nick Lodolo, the Mariners batted Moore in the leadoff spot, and the move paid off—after a first-pitch whiff, Moore put the next one over the wall in center field. He’d pound a single in his next at-bat, then put another ball into the seats in the fifth for his second homer of the game. Of course, once the righty relievers came on, Moore struck out twice. So if you have Moore on your team, you should know when to play him (and when not to).

 

 

Austin Hays (CIN): 2-4, HR, R, 4 RBI.

With the Reds down 4-3 in the bottom of the fifth and two men on, Hays deposited a 95 mph fastball from Luis Castillo over the centerfield wall. In his first game this season (after a nice Spring, Hays strained his calf and went on the IL just before Opening Day), Hays brought in half the Reds’ runs and looked like a lineup fixture. Facing the righty Castillo, the Reds slotted Hays fifth in the lineup and benched Spencer Steer (who hasn’t looked right all year). A former doubles machine in Baltimore, Hays should stay around the middle of the order in Cincy, where some of those doubles will go for homers. If he keeps this going, he’ll be a popular waiver pickup.

 

Austin Riley (ATL): 2-3, HR, R, RBI.

Look who’s waking up just when the Braves need him? Riley’s 2024 was a disappointment, as he dropped from 37 homers the year before to 19, but his advanced metrics were perhaps the best of his career (and he was limited to 425 at-bats). Usually a slow starter, Riley struggled out of the gate along with the rest of Atlanta’s lineup, batting just .111 after seven games with one homer. But he’s now hitting .365 in April and has three homers in the last two nights, upping his season average to .300. It wasn’t enough for the Braves, however, who lost again.

 

Anthony Santander (TOR): 2-3, HR, R, 3 RBI.

Santander had been scuffling in his first two weeks as a Blue Jay, falling to a .178 average with zero home runs as of April 8. But he’s been putting it together the past week, with a six-game hitting streak and two homers in his last four. His strike-out rate is still decent for a slugger (and was under 20% last year), so he should normalize pretty quickly even if he falls well short of last year’s 44 home runs. I’m still trying to figure out how his 2024 OPS was only .814 with that many dingers.

 

 

 

Jonathan Aranda (TBR): 2-3, HR, R, RBI, BB.

Aranda and Aranda he goes, with two round-trippers in this one, as the Rays are pouring in runs in their AAA park. Aranda’s Statcast metrics are special—he’s in the top 1% in xwoBACON, Hard Hit %, and xSLG, and is barreling at an insane 21.6% rate (and it was over 15% last year, so the jump is not unheard of). The only problem is the platoon-happy Rays are sitting him against lefties, where he’s just 0-for-4 this year, albeit with a couple of walks and an HBP.

 

Manny Machado (SDP): 1-4, HR, R, RBI.

In his age-32 season, Machado is on pace to score well over a hundred runs and has his average comfortably above .300. And though he didn’t have a steal in this game, he’s got six of them already, far outpacing his career high of 20 way back in 2015 (he had just 11 last year). He’s yet to be thrown out so expect him to keep running. Battling to a full count last night against Shota Imanaga, Machado fouled off a few more pitches before launching a solo shot to left-center, the only run the Padres would score in the 2-1 loss. Machado looks healthier than he’s been in years and will hit for average and power if he stays that way.

 

Zac Veen (COL): 0-3, 2 Ks.

After a torrid Spring, it looked like Veen might make the big league squad out of the gate. He instead was sent to the Minors, but after crushing PCL pitching for a week to a .387 batting average, Colorado brought him up.  He’s bounced around the order, batting seventh initially but getting a shot at leadoff. Still, Veen’s initial foray into the Majors can best be termed a work in progress, as he’s started 3-for-27 with just one extra-base hit. A speedster in the Minors, Veen’s only got one stolen base attempt and was thrown out rather easily. The Rockies go back to Colorado this weekend, so we should plead for some patience for the former first-round draft pick to get his bearings, but time is running out.