Héctor, Prince of Troy
Héctor Rodríguez (CIN): 3-6, 2 HR, 2 R, 2 RBI.
Héctor Rodriguez led the Reds to victory in San Francisco last night in a wild comeback. The Reds rookie has been struggling in his first exposure to major league pitching, sitting against two lefties this week and hitting in the bottom of the order when he plays. He made his first cameo in the leadoff spot last night, and it worked out to the tune of a 3-6, 2 HR, 2 R, 2 RBI line. Rodriguez was on base five times, reaching on a fielder’s choice and an error in addition to his three hits. The big night lifted his season line to .220/.291/.440, just 2 points below average by wRC+.
Rodriguez is a hard swinger with extreme chase issues. He swings the bat 75 mph and can generate exceptional power from it. Four of his five batted balls cleared the 100 mph mark last night, including his second homer of the night leaving the yard at 115.2 mph. His two homers last night give him thirty on the season after he hit 27 in 104 games in Triple-A. His Triple-A line of .274/.347/.533 is a bit deceiving, though. That’s only 24 percent better than league average by wRC+, although Rodriguez is young for the level, having turned 22 during spring training. The concerning issue is his chase rate. Rodriguez has swung at 38.5% of balls in his short time in the majors. Lest you think that’s just a young hitter pressing to win a job, he also swung at 37.4% of balls in Triple-A this year. He’s trending in the right direction, at least, after chasing more than 50% of balls in his first two minor league seasons, and 46.2% of them in 2025. The Reds have experience developing this skill in their hitters – Elly De La Cruz now has a 71st percentile chase rate after debuting at 32.7% – but Rodriguez is on a whole other level. Whether this works at the major league level will be determined by whether he can make pitchers throw him something in the zone.
Let’s see how the other hitters did Wednesday…
Shay Whitcomb (SFG): 2-4, 2B, HR, 2 R, 2 RBI.
Whitcomb was on the other end of Rodriguez’s barrage, doing what he could to spark the Giants’ offense. The game was a slugfest, with Whitcomb’s third homer of the season giving the Giants a 6-2 lead that they’d extend to 9-2 before the Reds scored 7 in the 9th to win it. Whitcomb’s time in the majors this season has not bred confidence. He’s chasing 42.1% of pitches and swinging at only 58.8% in the zone, leading to a 42.9% strikeout rate and a 2.9% walk rate. There was a time, back in 2023, when Whitcomb looked like he might turn into a low-average, power-and-speed contributor in the mold of a Jarren Duran or Cam Smith, but the hit tool has been exposed in each opportunity to face major league pitching. He might get some run down the stretch for a bad Giants team, but you should only be interested in the very deepest of leagues.
Connor Norby (COL): 2-4, HR, 3 R, 5 RBI, BB.
Norby and the Rockies demolished the Nationals 13-1 in DC last night. The Nationals threw a bullpen game, which is a problem when you have the second-worst bullpen in the game by FIP/xFIP. Norby walked in the 5th inning and scored on a Troy Johnston homer, the first of two homers in the inning. He put the game fully out of reach in the 7th inning, crushing a grand slam to left-center to extend his hitting streak to 11 games. Norby’s played each of the last four games for the Rockies and could add triple position eligibility soon if he doesn’t have it already (14 games at third, 13 games at second, including the last three).
Kyle Schwarber (PHI): 2-5, 2B, HR, 2 R, 3 RBI.
Schwarber led off this one with a rocket double to right field at 107.9 mph, then came around to score on a Bryce Harper homer. The Phillies never looked back, shutting out the Mariners for a 6-0 victory. Schwarber added his 40th homer of the season the next inning, taking a 99-mph four-seamer from Bryan Woo deep to right field. Schwarber’s showing a couple of signs of aging, with his bat speed ticking down a few tenths of a mile per hour each season, and his chase rate increasing to its highest rate since the COVID-shortened season in 2020. It’s incredibly graceful aging, though, and Schwarber is still a joy to watch hit.
Tristan Peters (CHW): 3-4, 2B, HR, 2 R, 2 RBI.
Peters and the White Sox took down the Rangers in a key matchup of AL wild card contenders. Peters isn’t going to wow you on any Statcast metrics with his performance last night, but it worked out for the White Sox center fielder. Peters’s 12th homer of the year barely qualified as a hard-hit ball, but he muscled it out to right field. The homer gave him 5 consecutive games with home runs, and Peters’s run has made him a strong fantasy asset this season. He’s got a nice combination of power and speed, plus his excellent batting average, all of which have him as the 43rd-best outfielder this season.
Miguel Vargas (CHW): 2-3, 2 R, RBI, 2 BB, SB.
Vargas continued his breakout season, reaching base in four of his five plate appearances. He nearly made it five for five, but had a 7th-inning walk overturned on an ABS challenge. Vargas also got a little help from the Rangers defense, with his first single being a bloop behind first base. I won’t say that most first basemen would have, or should have, caught the ball, but I will say that Joc Pederson definitely isn’t the guy you’d want out there trying to field it. That bloop single gave Vargas his RBI, as Peters came in from third on the play. Vargas’s other single was more authoritative, a 103 mph line drive that allowed him to show off his legs on the basepaths before scoring on a Sam Antonacci single.
Ben Rice (NYY): 1-2, HR, 3 R, RBI, 3 BB.
Peter Lambert and the Astros pitching staff took one look at Rice mashing a 107.4 mph homer and decided they didn’t want to play with him anymore last night. After Rice’s 35th homer of the year in the first inning, Rice drew walks in the 2nd, 7th, and 8th innings, scoring in the latter two of these. Rice has been cold in August, posting a .156/.309/.325 line that’s only good for an 86 wRC+. He had a similar cold month in June, though, before tearing the cover off the ball in July, so we can hope last night’s game signals his bat heating back up.
Jazz Chisholm Jr. (NYY): 3-3, 2B, R, RBI, BB, SB.
Jazz has had a down season by his standards this year, with his strikeout rate creeping a couple of percentage points upward every season in New York. He had no issues making contact with Astros pitching last night, though, rapping three hits between 101.6 and 103.6 mph. He added his 36th steal of the season as well. Fantasy managers almost surely won’t get the 30-30 season he put up last year, but he’s still got an excellent shot at 60 HR+SB in a different composition.
Christian Encarnacion-Strand (BAL): 4-5, 2 2B, R, 2 RBI.
The rebirth of CES continues, with the one-time top prospect leading the Orioles to an 8-7 victory over the Cardinals. Perhaps most surprisingly, Encarnacion-Strand denied Alec Burleson extra bases in the 9th inning, knocking down a 108.7 mph line drive and converting it into a groundout. On the other side of the ball, CES earned his offense with four hard-hit liners, each of which had an expected average of .490 or better. He struck out once, which is still a bit of an issue, but this version of CES is at least playable as a low-OBP masher, something along the lines of discount Luis García Jr..
Javier Sanoja (MIA): 3-4, RBI, 3 SB.
Sanoja doesn’t hit the ball all that hard, but he does hit it often. Just over 86% of Sanoja’s plate appearances end with a ball in play, and he has made it work this year with a .280/.318/.420 line that is 2 percent better than league average by wRC+. Sanoja took advantage of Connor Wong behind the plate, adding a full third of his seasonal stolen base total in one game. Wong has allowed nearly 86 percent of stolen base attempts to succeed this season, and upwards of 80 percent for his career. If you’re playing in daily leagues, this is something to target – Otto Lopez added two steals in the game, as well as one for Heriberto Hernández.
Featured image by Ethan Kaplan (@djfreddie10.bsky.social on Blue Sky and @EthanMKaplanImages on Instagram)
