Welcome to Week Six of our Patience or Panic series! Here, we look at notable underperformers and try to provide some answers. What’s going wrong? What’s going right? How might the second lead to the correction of the first? And most importantly, what value might they be?
Jackson Merrill, OF, San Diego Padres
Sometimes lost amongst Paul Skenes’ 2024 NL Rookie of the Year win is the performance of the award’s runner-up, Jackson Merrill. As a 21-year-old rookie, Merrill hit .292/.326/.500 with an .826 OPS and a 130 wRC+. He not only finished second in Rookie of the Year voting, but ninth in MVP voting. And if that wasn’t enough, he nabbed an All-Star nod and a Silver Slugger. As far as debuts go, it can’t get much better.
Which makes it all the harder to square Merrill’s 2026 season. As of now, Merrill is hitting .211/.276/.333 with a .609 OPS and 73 wRC+. He’s not even average. He has just three home runs, 15 RBIs, and six doubles. It’s hardly the numbers one expected following 2024.
So, what’s wrong? To some degree, it’s a simple answer. He’s not doing anything extraordinary. In 2024, Merrill didn’t cheat anything, with elite-expected numbers to back up his production. This season, he’s still not getting cheated; He’s just not executing the way he once did. His expected batting average is .223, his expected wOBA is .301. Nothing’s amiss about this slow start. It’s, well, what should be happening given Merrill’s numbers.
Speaking of numbers, a simple comparison might clear up the confusion of what’s going on. While never truly elite, Merrill was really good at a few things in 2024: He barreled plenty of balls, maintained a steady exit velocity, didn’t whiff, and, for the most part, he didn’t strike out at an abnormal rate. Most of all, he had an elite Launch Angle, hitting the sweet-spot 39.6% of the time and finishing in the 94th percentile in 2024. And in 2025, he finished in the 99th percentile. Nowadays, though, none of those things is true.
Merrill’s Barrel% is down. His exit velocity is in the 42nd percentile, his Launch Angle Sweet-Spot% is in the 29th percentile, his Whiff% is in the 35th percentile, and his K% is in the 40th percentile. He’s not torching balls, hitting them to maximize his swing, and he’s swinging through pitches aplenty, often leading to a punchout.
But Merrill’s most damning change is how little he’s squaring up balls. A swing won’t always be perfect. Maintaining a launch angle like Merrill’s is hard work. But if a hitter can routinely square up a ball, he’s still doing something right. Except Merrill’s Square-Up% is in the 2nd percentile. 2nd. That’s sixth-lowest in all of baseball. The only caveat here is that Merrill never squared up balls at an elite rate. Even in 2024, when things were perfect, he finished in the 50th percentile. Still, it’s a mighty drop off.
All that said, there are some silver linings. Merrill’s Barrel% is strong. As is his HardHit%. Not elite, but positive nonetheless. And with a BB% that’s only risen with each passing year, he’s adding value. Just not the kind he, the Padres, or fantasy owners would like.
The Verdict: Proceed with caution. There’s not a ton here to believe in other than past heights. Nor has recent play been indicative of a changing tide. And most concerning is this: Merrill’s only gotten worse since 2024. 2025 wasn’t as kind as 2024, and 2026 has been even less so.
Pete Alonso, 1B, Baltimore Orioles
From an NL Rookie of the Year runner-up to the 2019 winner, let’s talk about Pete Alonso.
A look at the big, important numbers suggests Alonso doesn’t belong in this conversation: His .743 OPS, while not great, is a strong mark for the start of May. The same could be said for Alonso’s 109 wRC+. He’s statistically an above-average bat with an All-Star pedigree. If this is how he’s starting, where might he finish? Where might the panic lie?
Well, the panic, or its potential, is found in Alonso’s average and his slugging. The Polar Bear is currently hitting .214, a decidedly well-below-average number. And while Alonso’s never been a contact bat, this does raise some red flags. His career average is .256, and his 2025 batting average, which partly earned him his five-year, $155 million deal with the Orioles, was .272. That alone should invite some concern.
But so what? Alonso didn’t earn that contract because he could get base hits; He earned it because of his home run prowess. This brings us to the chief concern: Alonso’s power numbers are down. His .206 ISO would be a career-worst. His .421 slugging percentage would also be a new low. The only season with somewhat similar, albeit better numbers, is 2024, the worst statistical season of Alonso’s career. Another power-related area of concern is Alonso’s Barrel%. Last season, Alonso posted a staggering 18.9%, which put him in the 99th percentile. Elite. This season, Alonso has an 11.4 Barrel%, putting him in the 73rd percentile. That -7.5% difference is the eighth-most in all of baseball. Correspondingly, Alonso has a career-worst Barrel/PA.
A possible explanation for this might be Alonso’s launch angle. Historically, sitting around 15.8 degrees, Alonso currently has a 12.7-degree launch angle, another career low. As such, he has a career-high GB% — 43.2% — and a 20.5 LD%, second-lowest of his career. And perhaps because of all this, Alonso is pulling fewer flyballs than he ever has. Throughout his career, Alonso has pulled about 20.5% of his flyballs. This season, that percentage is 12.5.
Broadly, Alonso’s swing isn’t where it needs to be. Raising his launch angle should, in theory, get more balls off the ground and possibly into the stands, leading more toward the power numbers one expects from the Polar Bear.
All this might lead people toward the same conclusion the Mets reached: Alonso is a declining power bat who will only regress with age. Yet that’s not entirely true. Alonso’s 55.7 HardHit% and 95.2 average exit velocity are both career-highs. And even with a dip in max exit velocity, going from 115.9 to 114.6, that second number still slots into the top 4% of MLB. He can tear the cover off the ball.
It gets even more confusing. Because Alonso is not overly compensating for his power struggles. He’s chasing less than ever, swinging less than ever, and though he’s striking out 23.9% of the time, he also has a 13.4 BB%, a new career-best.
The Verdict: Be patient. Might the Orioles worry over Alonso’s future? Maybe. Should they worry about his present? No. Alonso can still mash. Lately, he’s started to. Over his last seven games, he’s hitting .261/.370/.739 with a 1.110 OPS and 197 wRC+. Alonso has settled in. Now, fantasy owners should start to reap the rewards.
Carson Benge, OF, New York Mets
From an ex-Met to a baby Met, the conversation turns toward Carson Benge.
Benge, by all accounts, is a black hole kind of bat. Hitting .186/.255/.278, his .533 OPS is seventh-worst among all qualified hitters. He also touts a 54 wRC+, 12th-worst among all players with at least 90 plate appearances. As for the rest of his numbers, it’s two home runs, three doubles, and seven RBIs. That’s it. There’s no sugar-coating things. He’s been abysmal.
And to some extent, that shouldn’t be a complete shock. New York accelerated the former first-round pick’s development. He’s played just 131 minor league games, 15 at Single-A, 60 at High-A, 32 at Double-A, and a final 24 at Triple-A. Benge, admittedly, excelled at almost every level. In High-A, he hit .302/.417/.370 with an .897 OPS. And in Double-A, he slashed an even better .317/.407/.571 with a .978 OPS, eight home runs, and 23 RBIs. Really, the only level where Benge struggled was Triple-A, hitting .178/.272/.311 with a .583 OPS. Though that might’ve hindered his chances of making the Majors, Benge hit well in spring training. And with Mike Tauchmann’s injury, he became a shoo-in for the Opening Day roster.
All of this invites the question: Is Benge a Triple-A bat at the MLB level? Or, more alarmingly, a Double-A bat trying to hit two weight classes above him.
Answering that question is tricky. Because, to some degree, the answer is yes. Benge’s expected numbers are poor, his Barrel% is subpar, and his plate discipline isn’t showing a mastery of the zone. In other words, he doesn’t at least know what he’s looking for. Every at-bat is a coin flip if the odds were cut in quarters. Likewise, he’s not excelling against any one pitch. He’s hitting fastballs best, but only at a .218 clip. He’s hitting a worse .174 against offspeed pitches, and an even-poorer .105 against breaking pitches. Simply, he’s not creating any advantages for himself.
Yet some numbers do invite intrigue. A 27.6% Squared-Up Rate has Benge in the 69th percentile. And while he’s not walking, he’s not chasing drastically, either. He’s in the 63rd percentile for Chase% and the 65th percentile for Whiff%. There are no acts of self-sabotage.
If anything, Benge’s last week or so is showing signs of the opposite. Over his last seven games, Benge is hitting .261/.320/.304 with a .624 OPS. His HardHit% is on the rise overall, as are other underlying numbers. His Zone Contact% is 82.9, his average exit velocity is 90.6 MPH, and his xWBOA continues to hover near the league average after being well-below it two weeks ago.
Something equally important is how much Benge has changed his swing just this season. Over the first 20 games of the season, his intercept point, where the hitter makes contact with the ball, was 1.3 inches in front of the plate. Currently, it’s at 2.7 inches. In conjunction with it, his attack direction has gone from 10 degrees oppo to seven degrees oppo. He’s tinkering, and if the last week is any sign, it’s for the best.
Verdict: Let him play. The Mets are going to give Benge his chances. At this point, with the season sinking like the Titanic, there’s no reason not to. They’ll let the rookie take his lumps and hope someday soon he starts dishing some of his own.
