It’s the trade deadline weekend, and everything feels awfully… quiet?
We’ve heard murmurs about Tarik Skubal, Luis Arraez, Mason Miller, and a host of starting pitchers who could be on the move. Yet, there haven’t been any of those big pre-deadline moves that get us excited about the rest of the season. Still, there likely will be movement coming any day now, and by Monday maybe it’ll feel like a whole new league. What I do know is that neither of these players should be on the move. They’re proving themselves to be core pieces of teams that are somewhat competitive.
Gabriel Moreno, C, ARI
The Gabriel Moreno breakout is upon us. There was a time when he was a Blue Jays prospect and a unanimous top-5 prospect in the sport. Catchers of his offensive profile are pretty rare, as even the best ones are traditionally boom-or-bust, but Moreno has always had a high floor and great bat-to-ball skills. Now, we are seeing the extent of his talent, and in some ways, it feels like there is still room for him to become an even better player.
One area that makes Moreno stand out is his discipline. He walks almost as much as he strikes out and is able to put the ball in play quite a bit. While yes, he may chase a bit, his chase contact percentage is 17 points higher than league average, which shows that he’s swinging at pitches he still knows he can hit. This leads to plenty of balls in play, and he hits them at a great launch angle. He is in the 88th percentile for sweet spot percentage, making great contact off the bat constantly. This leads to plenty of hits dropping in the outfield. In terms of power, Moreno isn’t going to be a big home run hitter, but he’s already one away from tying his career high. If he maintains this level of play (which spoiler alert, we believe he will), he could end up with 15-ish home runs, which is pretty good from the catcher position, especially when he gives you elite ratios and hits in a solid lineup.
Gabriel Moreno’s Process+ visualized
Verdict: Legit. This feels as legit as catcher breakouts come. We thought he’d already broken out before, as he was a useful player in the past, but now he’s becoming a guy who could be the best catcher in baseball in the near future. While this season has been awesome, his xwOBA marks show that he actually might be getting a touch unlucky, as he’s slightly underperforming his expected metrics. This is pretty rare to see from contact-first hitters, as they usually overperform expected metrics while the big power bats like Aaron Judge and Yordan Alvarez often underperform them (crazy considering how dominant these guys are). All of this is just an elongated way of saying that Moreno is great and will continue to be for the rest of the season.
Taj Bradley, SP, MIN
I actually covered Taj Bradley early in the season and was cautiously optimistic, as he looked much improved, though I had to acknowledge his track record of being inconsistent due to spotty command. He has a 3.65 ERA and 1.21 WHIP this season, which are the best marks of his career. He also has the highest strikeout rate of his career and has posted his lowest hits-per-nine this season. It really looks like anybody who believed in Bradley is being proven right, but with that said, we’ve seen entire fluke seasons before. Could this be one of them?
Let’s start with the stuff, which most fans probably had no concern about anyway. But yes, the stuff is electric. He’s averaging a tick up on the fastball this season compared to the last three, and that in itself makes a major difference. It feels like he averages more than 97 when you watch him, though, as he will light up the gun several times a game. He’s broken the 100mph threshold four times this season, and that number increases drastically if you choose to round up. Interestingly enough, this pitch actually isn’t getting more swing-and-miss this season, as it’s his secondaries that are getting the whiffs. The easiest thing to flag here is that both the cutter and splitter have more drop than they used to. This was an issue in the past with these pitches, particularly the splitter, which had a poor shape with an iVB hovering around 8 in his last season with the Rays. He’s dropped a couple of inches of perceived upward vertical movement, and the pitch is getting more whiffs. The cutter is in a similar boat, though; it might be the location that is getting Bradley the whiffs. He’s finally getting the pitch down, and batters are swinging at it with little luck.
Another major improvement for Bradley is his efficiency, which is allowing him to go deeper into games. How many times can you remember Bradley getting pulled early in a Rays game after giving up a bunch of hits and walks? Now, he’s putting up 7-inning outings on the regular, leading the Twins in innings (with one fewer game pitched than Joe Ryan). He’s a workhorse for them, and it seems somewhat likely that he will be their opening day starter when next season rolls around, especially if Joe Ryan gets traded either at this deadline or in the offseason.
Taj Bradley’s PLV arsenal analysis
Verdict: Probably Legit. I guess I can vouch for Bradley at this point. We were worried that he would never be able to string together consistent starts, but he’s done just that with the Twins. He’s hitting 100 and is getting more swings and misses on his secondaries. I’m still a bit concerned about the strike rates, which overall aren’t improved that much. But he’s striking out batters at the rate we thought he would when he first broke out for the Rays. I think he can be an ace-caliber arm in the future, though more likely a Dylan Cease-type with a higher WHIP than you’d like but excellent strikeout rates, volume, and an overall workable ERA.
