With each season bringing fresh faces to the ranks of baseball¡¯s elite, we know it won¡¯t just be the usual suspects vying for MLB¡¯s top statistical honors in 2025.
What major surprises might shape the season ahead? To find out, we asked five MLB.com writers to draft dark horse stat leaders -- one hitter and one pitcher each -- across a range of categories.
HITTERS
1. Home runs: Oneil Cruz, OF, Pirates
2024 home runs: 21
Cruz¡¯s 2024 homer total was a career best, but given the amount of force he creates with his swing, you would expect him to flirt with 40-plus dingers every year.
Cruz swung at 78.6 mph on average last season, second fastest in the league behind Giancarlo Stanton. And Cruz¡¯s 75.6% fast-swing rate (his percentage of swings with a speed of at least 75 mph) put him behind only Stanton and Kyle Schwarber and just in front of Aaron Judge (75.1%).
Cruz also ranked in the 95th percentile or better in barrel rate (15.7%), hard-hit rate (54.9%) and average exit velocity (95.5 mph). Only five other hitters ranked as highly in each of those categories: Stanton, Schwarber, Judge, Juan Soto and Shohei Ohtani. Those five players each recorded a top-10 at-bat-per-HR rate last season (minimum 400 ABs). If you swing hard and make optimal contact, you are more likely to hit a home run. Pretty simple.
But Cruz¡¯s AB/HR rate last season (25.76) ranked 78th among qualified hitters. What was the problem? One easily identifiable issue was his 48.1% ground-ball rate, well above the league average of 44.4%. Soto was the only other member of that group with a ground-ball rate above 41%.
Cruz has outstanding physical strength, and he transfers that strength to his bat extremely well. With some small adjustments, he can top a home run leaderboard. -- Brian Murphy
2. Batting average: Jackson Chourio, OF, Brewers
2024 BA: .275
Having signed an eight-year, $82 million extension with the Brewers before ever playing in the Majors, Chourio made his big league debut on Opening Day last year amid considerable hype -- and proceeded to slash .207/.251/.323 over his first 51 games.
However, the highly touted prospect soon found his footing, hitting .305 with 16 homers and an .888 OPS over his final 97 games en route to a third-place finish in the National League Rookie of the Year Award voting. There was nothing fluky about that performance: He made dramatic strides in a number of key areas, swinging at fewer pitches outside the zone, striking out less and producing better contact.
With blazing speed, improving bat-to-ball skills and an all-fields approach, Chourio could be a serious batting-title contender for years to come. His potential is off the charts as he enters his age-21 campaign. -- Thomas Harrigan
3. OPS: Junior Caminero, 3B, Rays
2024 OPS: .723
Even just in the AL, the competition for the OPS crown includes Aaron Judge, Bobby Witt Jr., Yordan Alvarez and Vladimir Guerrero Jr. Gulp. Given that, you might as well aim high -- and Caminero¡¯s potential as a hitter is enormous. Briefly No. 1 overall on MLB Pipeline¡¯s Top 100 list late last season before graduating from prospect status, Caminero inspires awe with his ability at the plate from Rays players, coaches and executives. (In fact, he once inspired a rare batting-practice standing ovation as a visiting player.)
¡°I don¡¯t know if I¡¯ve seen somebody hit the ball consistently as hard as he does.¡± -- hitting coach Chad Mottola
¡°When he connects with the baseball, it¡¯s special.¡± -- president of baseball operations Erik Neander
¡°It¡¯s amazing how the ball jumps off his bat.¡± -- manager Kevin Cash
Caminero posted a .921 OPS in the Minors despite always being extremely young for his level, and he held his own last year as the third-youngest hitter in the Majors. The Rays are counting on him as a lineup centerpiece in 2025, and big things could be ahead. -- Andrew Simon
4. WAR: Corbin Carroll, OF, D-backs
2024 WAR: 4.0 FanGraphs/3.4 Baseball Reference
When you think of players with the tools to have the best all-around seasons, there¡¯s no doubt that Carroll¡¯s name will come up. He has elite speed, which helps him cover a ton of ground in the outfield. That speed, combined with his acumen on the bases, made him the most valuable baserunner in MLB in both 2023 and '24, per Statcast. His value comes not only from his ability to steal bases, but also the way he takes extra bases.
While his bat wasn¡¯t as productive in 2024 as in '23, we¡¯ve seen what he can do in that department, and there¡¯s no reason he can¡¯t regain that form. Carroll was 95th percentile in batting run value in 2023.
Covering all facets of the game at a high level is a great way to accumulate a lot of WAR. Carroll is a great candidate to do so. -- Sarah Langs
5. Stolen bases: Garrett Mitchell, OF, Brewers
2024 stolen bases: 11
This guy makes a pretty strong candidate for a future stolen-base king. Mitchell gets on base and he can definitely run (29.5 ft/sec avg. sprint speed in 2024), so it¡¯s not a question of capability. The Brewers stole the second-most bases last season (217; the Nationals stole 223) and were the best baserunning team by run value (+18 runs), so there¡¯s no reason to expect a change in strategy. Nearly a quarter of those 217 steals also belonged to Brice Turang (50), which seems like an indication that the coaching staff in Milwaukee is willing to give a young player the green light and see how it works out.
Obviously, there¡¯s a ¡°but¡± coming. Mitchell, at 26, has never played more than 69 combined games in a professional season. He set that career high in 2024, and in that first substantial look at his baserunning with the rule changes that led to a nearly 30% increase in stolen bases from 2022-23, he had 11 steals. So on the one hand, we don¡¯t know where his ceiling is, but on the other ¡ we don¡¯t know where his ceiling is. -- Shanthi Sepe-Chepuru
PITCHERS
1. WAR: Sandy Alcantara, RHP, Marlins
2024 WAR: N/A
Alcantara is back. No, really -- he is all the way back. After missing the entire 2024 season while recovering from Tommy John surgery, Alcantara was back to pumping 99 mph fastballs in his first start of Spring Training.
The Marlins¡¯ Opening Day starter is about 17 months removed from his operation. He is fully healthy and doesn¡¯t appear to have any limitations in 2025. If that¡¯s all true, Alcantara will make a serious run at being MLB¡¯s leader in WAR this season. He finished fourth with 5.9 fWAR during his 2022 National League Cy Young Award season, and his 13.2 WAR from 2021-23 tied for sixth in the Majors.
FanGraphs Depth Charts projects that Alcantara will accumulate 3.5 WAR this season. If we are truly about to see pre-surgery Sandy again -- the workhorse who averaged more than 200 innings per season from 2021-23 while registering a 3.14 ERA -- that projection will prove to be too conservative. -- Brian Murphy
2. ERA: Hunter Brown, RHP, Astros
2024 ERA: 3.49
After posting an ERA north of 5.00 as a rookie in 2023, Brown appeared to be on his way toward a similar result when he recorded a 7.71 ERA over his first nine starts last season. However, everything fell into place after the right-hander tweaked his repertoire in May, adding a sinker to his fastball mix alongside his four-seamer and cutter.
Over his final 22 starts, Brown pitched to a 2.31 ERA with 138 strikeouts and 39 walks (3.54 K/BB ratio) in 132 2/3 innings. He led MLB in fastball run value (+24) during that stretch, a stark contrast to his first nine starts (-11).
On the year, Brown tied for the MLB lead (minimum 300 batted balls) with a 30.3% hard-hit rate allowed, down from 44.4% (13th percentile) in 2023. His sinker was a big reason why -- only 11 of the 109 batted balls (11.9%) he allowed on the pitch were classified as hard-hit (95+ mph exit velocity). If he carries that success into 2025, he could be a serious contender for MLB¡¯s ERA crown. -- Thomas Harrigan
3. Strikeouts: Spencer Schwellenbach, RHP, Braves
2024 K¡¯s: 127 (in 123 2/3 IP)
In 2023, a young Braves right-hander built on a strong rookie season to lead the Majors in strikeouts (as well as wins and FIP). That, of course, was Spencer Strider. Now, setting aside team, handedness, age and experience, let¡¯s be clear that Schwellenbach is not Strider. They are very different pitchers, and Schwellenbach doesn¡¯t have quite that level of explosiveness. But is there a path to Schwellenbach making a run toward the top of the strikeout leaderboard in 2025? Perhaps.
You can¡¯t pile up K¡¯s without innings, and if you combine Schwellenbach¡¯s work in the Minors and Majors, he threw 168 2/3 in his age-24 season. With a solid grip on a Braves rotation spot, that sets him up well for 2025. And while Schwellenbach doesn¡¯t have Strider¡¯s wipeout fastball-slider combo, he brings a diverse, six-pitch arsenal (four-seamer, slider, cutter, curve, splitter, sinker). Five of those offerings boasted a positive run value last year, giving Schwellenbach myriad ways to attack hitters on any given day. He gets hitters to chase (96th percentile in 2024) and should build on his 70th-percentile K-rate moving forward. -- Andrew Simon
4. Wins: Tanner Houck, RHP, Red Sox
2024 wins: 9
Winning games is about pitching well, of course. But it¡¯s also helpful to be on a good team. With the Red Sox expected to be better all around this year, any good starter figures to be in a position to rack up plenty of wins. Houck went at least five innings in 27 of his 30 starts last season -- the minimum to qualify for a win as a starter.
Houck had 87 strikeouts on his sweeper, second most of any pitcher on sweepers last year behind only Sonny Gray (112). Behind that primary pitch, his sinker was his second-most frequently used. Inducing ground balls should serve him well this year, with a defender like Alex Bregman behind him. -- Sarah Langs
5. Saves: Justin Martinez, RHP, D-backs
2024 saves: 8
Saves are a ¡°right place, right time¡± stat, so to lead the league in saves not just by virtue of being healthy and on a team that won a lot of games, you need to be borderline unhittable -- think Ryan Helsley¡¯s MLB-best 49 saves for the 83-win Cardinals in 2024. Martinez, now 23, is entering his second full big league season. Here¡¯s how his rookie year looked:
- Avg. fastball velocity: 100.3 mph (100th percentile)
- Avg. exit velocity: 86.4 mph (94th)
- Whiff rate: 34.5% (96th)
- Barrel rate: 2.8% (99th)
- Hard-hit rate: 31.8% (94th)
- Ground-ball rate: 60.3% (97th)
So not only is there something distinctly Helsley-esque about Martinez, he also pitches for the Diamondbacks, who¡¯ve been closing by committee since 2019. He¡¯s projected to save 17 games in 2025; so is A.J. Puk. Whether the D-backs are serious about their spring closer tryouts remains to be seen, but this is a bet on Martinez taking another step forward in 2025 and proving that he is undeniably the man for the job in Arizona. -- Shanthi Sepe-Chepuru