Teams | Minor League Baseball | Current People | Historical People (Gehrig) (Robinson) (Ruth)
As the biggest professional baseball league in the world, Major League Baseball has quite the list of active people associated with it, from players to managers to announcers. Here's a list of the big names to know in MLB right now.
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Infielders
- Robinson Canó, a second baseman who is currently in the Mexican League, made his name with the Big Apple's other team, the Yankees, before signing a 10-year, $240 million contract with the Seattle Mariners in the 2013-14 offseason. Following the beginning of Alex Rodriguez's decline from his age and injuries in 2009-10, Cano became generally regarded as the Yankees' best player, and possibly the best second baseman in the game, thanks to his great defensive skills and power numbers that would be impressive even if he wasn't a middle infielder. At the 2011 Home Run Derby, he won and broke the record for most home runs hit in the Final Round with several outs to spare. He was being pitched to by his dad, a once minor league pitcher who never quite made it to the big leagues. Canó was named the AL Captain of the next two derbies, but didn't have nearly as much success, and was booed relentlessly by Kansas City Royals fans at the 2012 Derby (in Kansas City) for not picking any Royals to go to the derby when he originally said he would. He had a rough first half of 2015 thanks in part to acid reflux, but managed to recover his mojo in the second half despite a sports hernia, and seems to have mostly bounced back in the years since. He tested positive in 2018 for a medicine banned because of its known use as a masking agent for PEDs, was held in violation of the anti-PED policy because the officials determined that was likely what he was using it for, and dropped his appeal, accepting an 80-game suspension. He was dealt to the Mets during the 2018–19 offseason along with closer Edwin Díaz, a trade which became much disliked by Mets fans the following season, as both Canó and Diaz had bad years in 2019. He rebounded somewhat in 2020, but was suspended for the entire 2021 season following another failed PED test. His return in 2022 was poor enough that he got cut by the Mets less than a month into the season, which was followed by stints with the Padres and Braves that went about as well and lasted about as long as his time with the Mets did.
- Kris Bryant of the Colorado Rockies was primarily a third baseman earlier in his career, though he now mostly plays left field. He has been getting attention for his amazing power since being picked 2nd in the draft by the Chicago Cubs in 2013 and has drawn many accolades for it: Over 4 consecutive years, he won the Golden Spikes Award (given annually to the top college baseball player in the United States), then the Minor League Player of the Year Award (more or less what it sounds like), then the NL Rookie of the Year, then the NL MVP (no other player ever even won all 4 of those awards at all, much less in consecutive years). Along with several other star players, Bryant was instrumental in ending the Cubs' 108-year World Series drought in 2016. Though most of his stats are impressive, he also has a reputation for being terribly un-clutch, with his hitting stats generally being worse in higher-stakes situations than they are in lower-stakes situations. With Bryant set to become a free agent at the end of the 2021 season, the Cubs, preparing to start a rebuild, dealt him to the Giants mere hours before the trade deadline, getting two prospects in a deal that most sports media believed heavily favored the Giants. Prior to the 2022 season, he signed a 7 year deal with the Colorado Rockies. His tenure with the Rockies hasn't gone very well, as he's spent most of the time injured.
- José Altuve plays second base for the Houston Astros. At 5 feet, 6 inches tall*, Altuve is the shortest currently active player in baseball, and some doubted whether someone his size could succeed at the big league level. He had some initial struggles, but since 2014 has become one of the best players in the game, twice leading the AL in batting average, to go along with lots of stolen bases and packing a pretty good amount of power for a second baseman. His development into a superstar has helped the Astros become a perennial playoff contender after years of being a laughingstock. Along with several other homegrown stars, Altuve led the Astros to their first World Series victory in 2017, thanks in part to his 7 home runs in the 2017 postseason (including 3 in one game in the ALDS), and he won his first MVP Award shortly after. His short stature has been fodder for quite a few memes over the years, and led to some baseball fans using his height as a unit of measurement called an "Altuve" (for example, Randy Johnson, at 6' 10" tall, could have his height expressed as 1.24 Altuves). However, Altuve's reputation took a significant hit over the 2019-20 offseason, when reporters exposed the Astros' elaborate sign-stealing methods in the 2017 championship campaign. As one of the faces of that team, Altuve naturally became a Hate Sink for rival fanbases, and although analyses of the Astros' sign stealing methods tend to find he didn't use stolen signs as much as many of his teammates did, he remains a target for intense boos in many opposing stadiums. He had somewhat of a down year in 2020, though he did still contribute to leading the Astros to the ALCS, and rebounded to his typical self in 2021 and 2022.
- Mookie Betts plays shortstop for the Los Angeles Dodgers, and is at least in the conversation for the title of "best player in baseball", although as of 2024 still tends to rank behind players like Mike Trout, Aaron Judge, Shohei Ohtani and Ronald Acuña Jr. (see outfielders and Shohei Ohtani folders below). He started out as a second baseman, first being called up by the Red Sox in the middle of the 2014 season—though he also played center field in that season, and moved to right field near the end of the 2015 season. During the 2023, Betts split time between right field and the middle infield for the Dodgers, and was designated as their primary shortstop in 2024. Despite being much closer in size to Altuve than to Judge (5' 9"), he has above-average power at the plate; he's also one of the relatively few members of the so-called "30–30 club" (30 homers and 30 steals in a season), reaching the milestone in 2018. He won Gold Gloves every season from 2016 - 2022 spare for 2021, finished runner up in MVP balloting 3 times (in 2016, behind Trout, in 2020, behind future teammate Freddie Freeman, and in 2023, behind Acuña Jr.), and in 2018 led the majors in batting average, slugging, and runs scored on the way to MVP honors as the Red Sox won the 2018 World Series. Betts was eventually dealt to the Dodgers (the same team his Sox squad beat in the 2018 World Series) along with starting pitcher David Price (see below) in the 2019–20 offseason, despite Betts' strong desires to stay in Boston.
- Manny Machado is a third baseman for the San Diego Padres, who also played shortstop before the emergence of Fernando Tatís Jr. (see below). Drafted #3 overall by the Baltimore Orioles in 2010, he progressed quickly through the minors, making his MLB debut in August 2012. In his first full season with the O's, he set a new MLB record for most multi-hit games before turning 21 (a record previously held by Ty Cobb), made the All-Star Game, and led the AL in doubles. On top of that, he won the AL's Gold Glove at third and the AL's Platinum Glove as the best fielder at any position—even drawing comparisons to Brooks Robinson (the third baseman for the great Orioles teams of the 1960's and 70's, who is commonly considered the best defensive third baseman in history) in the field. Machado went on to help elevate the O's out of their Audience-Alienating Era and into a period of success where they made the playoffs 3 times in 5 years, in which Machado made three more All-Star Games and established himself as a player good for 30-plus homers a season with a decent average, while retaining his top-notch fielding skills. With Machado becoming a free agent at the end of the 2018 season and the Orioles in the middle of a terrible season, the O's dealt him to the Dodgers in midseason for a slew of prospects, where he helped them to a World Series appearance. At the end of the 2018 season, he and Bryce Harper (below in the "Outfielders" folder) were seen as having the potential to sign long-term deals for at least $300 million... but wound up being the unwilling faces of a free agency market that had apparently dried up on them. In the end, Machado got his $300 million deal over 10 years with the Padres, signing shortly after the start of spring training in 2019. After four good years, including a couple of All-Star selections and a second-place finish in MVP voting in 2022, the Padres replaced that contract with a new 11-year, $350 million deal after the 2022 season.
- Bryce Harper, a first basemen and former outfielder now with the Philadelphia Phillies, made his debut in 2012 for the Washington Nationals, on the same day that Mike Trout was called up for the first time that year. While he had an impressive beginning to his career, he did tail off later in the year. Overall, however, he still had a good year - perhaps the best year ever for a 19-year-old - earning an All-Star selection and easily winning the 2012 NL Rookie of the Year. He has occasionally been compared to fellow young phenom outfielder Mike Trout - coming into 2012, Harper and Trout were widely considered the best prospects in the game and hailed for their incredible talents and potential. Like Trout, Harper possesses the tools to excel at all aspects of the game and has had success at a very young age. However, those comparisons didn't quite seem to hold up for their first few years in the league, when Trout put up otherworldly numbers while Harper wasn't able to get quite the same level out of his talent. He also suffered a few injury-related setbacks. That changed in 2015, when Harper had a historically great offensive season despite still only being 22 years old, winning the NL MVP and looking every bit as good as Trout - maybe even better. However, his performance ended up taking a massive step backwards in 2016, with him "only" being a somewhat above-average player that season. The 2017 season saw him return to his 2015 form before his season prematurely ended with an August knee injury. Then in 2018, he got off to a horrific start, but returned to superstar form after winning the 2018 All-Star Home Run Derby. Has an interesting and polarizing reputation amongst fans and other players, particularly in 2016 after an interview where he made his intention use his career to shift the culture of baseball to allow for more personality and freedom of expression without the antiquated unwritten rules of the game getting in the way, though in his "walk year"note of 2018 he toned down those sentiments. Depending on your view of Harper, this painted him as somewhere in between a punk who dishonors the game and a well-needed breath of fresh air looking to shake up a sport that had gone stale. After his MVP season, views on him as a player range from Hype Backlash* to Worthy Opponent* and, to some managers, even The Dreaded*. Along with Manny Machado, Harper had an unexpectedly prolonged free agency period, finally signing with the Phils, his previous team's hated rival, for $330 million over 13 years during 2019 spring training. He had arguably his best season in 2021, leading MLB in slugging and OPS (both raw and adjusted), and finishing in the MLB top 10 for many key hitting stats, claiming his second NL MVP award. Harper is known in recent years for his team's tendencies to choke badly come playoff time whenever he's on the field and in the lineup, dating back to the Nationals' first playoff appearance where they got as far as the Divisional Series before getting crushed, it's rather fitting that the Nationals would win the 2019 World Series (and in the process save baseball as the Astros' Sign Stealing Scandal had broke out during the Series) right after Harper signed a rich deal with the rival Phillies which showed that Harper was no more than a regular season stat padder, 2022 was an aversion as his Phillies got as far as the World Series only to collapse in typical fashion against the hated Astros with many Philadelphia fans blaming Harper for choking the Series away.
- Nolan Arenado is a third baseman for the Arizona Diamondbacks. Drafted in the second round by the Colorado Rockies in 2009, he had tremendous hitting credentials out of high school, but was viewed as somewhat lacking in the field. He vastly improved in that area in the minors, and made his first MLB appearance early in the 2013 season. Arenado went on to become the first NL rookie to win a Gold Glove at third base, and didn't stop there—he's since become the only infielder ever to win Gold Gloves in each of his first seven seasons, with said streak now at 10 after the 2022 season—tying all-but-certain Hall of Famer Ichiro Suzuki for the most consecutive Gold Gloves to start an MLB career. His hitting didn't suffer, either; he led all MLB players in homers and RBI in the 2015–19 period. Arenado signed an 8-year, $260 million deal with the Rockies in the 2018–19 offseason, including an option to become a free agent after the 2021 season. At the time, it was the richest contract on a per-season basis for a position player in MLB history, but the record didn't last long, being obliterated by Mike Trout's deal later in the same offseason. However, by the end of the 2019 season, he got frustrated with the Rockies front office and what he saw as a failure to improve the team, and after a down year in (COVID-affected) 2020 thanks to shoulder issues, he was traded to the St. Louis Cardinals. Pretty much everyone in the national media concluded that the Redbirds fleeced the Rockies, getting one of the best current infielders while not giving up any top prospects and getting the Rockies to pay over $50 million of his remaining contract. On January 13, 2026, the Arizona Diamondbacks acquired Arenado from the Cardinals along with $31 million for prospect Jack Martinez.
- Vladimir Guerrero Jr., first baseman and part-time DH for the Toronto Blue Jays, is another son of a former Dominican MLB player—in his case, Hall of Famer Vladimir Guerrero. Born in Montreal while his father was playing for the Expos, though mostly raised in the Dominican, he was signed by the Jays as a 16-year-old third baseman in 2015. Also like Tatís, he became one of baseball's top prospects, tearing up the minor leagues as a hitter. He also debuted in 2019, but not until late April; while the Jays said he had suffered an injury during spring training, conspiracy theorists latched onto the fact that if the Jays waited until two weeks into the season to promote him, they'd have an extra year of team control (through 2025 instead of 2024). Guerrero put up solid but not spectacular numbers in 2019 and the COVID-shortened 2020 season, and was moved to first base with occasional DH duty. After losing more than 40 pounds (18 kg) during the 2020–21 offseason, he fully lived up to his minor-league promise, hitting over .300, tying for the MLB home run title, leading MLB outright in runs scored and total bases, and leading the AL in on-base, slugging, and raw and adjusted OPS. He ultimately came second in the AL MVP vote only due to Shohei Ohtani's historic season as both hitter AND pitcher with the LA Angels. In the Jays' 2025 ALCS win over the Mariners, Guerrero was named ALCS MVP after hitting 3 runs with a batting average of .385 and an OPS of 1.330.
- Freddie Freeman is a first baseman for the Los Angeles Dodgers who made his name with the Atlanta Braves. Born in Southern California to Canadian parents (making him a citizen of both countries), he was signed by the Braves out of high school and first made it to The Show as a September 2010 call-up. Freeman emerged as a star in 2013, when he made his first All-Star appearance, and after a couple of injury-plagued seasons in the middle of the decade established himself as a perennial All-Star. This was capped off with NL MVP honors in the COVID-shortened 2020 season and a World Series ring in 2021, after which he signed a 6-year deal with the hometown Dodgers as a free agent for less money note . Freeman is also the only player to have been named to the All-MLB Team in each of the first five years of its existence (first team in 2020 and 2023, second team in 2019, 2021, and 2022). He was also MVP of the Dodgers' 2024 World Series win, but how he got there is the real story. In Game 1, with a bum right ankle and the Dodgers down 3–2 to the Yankees in the bottom of the 10th inning, he hit the first walk-off grand slam in World Series history. The homer drew many comparisons to Kirk Gibson's famous walk-off in the 1988 WS, given that it was also in Game 1 by a Dodger with a bum ankle. Unlike Gibson, Freeman was able to gut it out for more games... and hit a homer in each of the next three games, becoming the first player ever to homer in the first four games of a World Series. On top of that, since Freeman had homered in each of his last two WS games with the Braves in 2021, he set a new record for most consecutive WS games with a homer (6).
- Matt Olson is a first baseman for the Atlanta Braves who started his MLB career with the Oakland Athletics. A ferocious power hitter, Olson made his A's debut in 2016, although it wasn't until 2017 when he began to make an impact. That year, he finished with an OPS of 1.003 through 59 games, and he even endeed up 4th in AL Rookie of the Year voting. Olson continued to put in great performances each year with the A's. In 2019, he was a major factor in the A's making the postseason. In 2021, he made his first All-Star team and finished 8th in AL MVP voting. However, Olson's career took an interesting turn when in 2022, he was traded to his hometown of Atlanta to replace Freeman. He immediately signed an 8-year, $168 million contract, and while he mashed in 2022, his 2023 season was something truly special. Olson's 54 home runs and 139 RB Is led the majors, while his .604 slugging percentage led the NL. In any other year he would've won MVP, but similarly impressive seasons from the Dodgers' Freeman and Mookie Betts, as well as his own teammate, Ronald Acuña Jr., left him in a hilariously-misleading 4th place.
Outfielders
- Mike Trout of the Los Angeles Angels is considered by many to be the best player in baseball. Trout made his major league debut late in the 2011 season, at the age of 19, and initially struggled, despite showing some impressive skills. He was not with the big league team team at the beginning of the 2012, receiving a call up to the majors about a month into the season. Trout proceeded to set the league on fire with his hitting, baserunning, and fielding abilities, finishing near the top in several offensive categories. Trout's fantastic season sparked a discussion at the end of the season. While Detroit Tigers slugger Miguel Cabrera won the triple crown (finishing first in batting average, home runs, and RBIs, a feat that hadn't been accomplished in almost half a century), an argument using statistical analysis was made that Trout actually had the more valuable season, since his hitting numbers were close to Cabrera's, and Trout had clearly outperformed Cabrera in fielding and baserunning. Cabrera wound up winning the MVP, with Trout taking a close second. However Trout was a unanimous selection for AL Rookie of the Year (his time in the big leagues in 2011 was too short to make him ineligible for the award). He placed either first or second in the AL MVP voting for the next four years, finishing second to Cabrera again in 2013 and second to the Toronto Blue Jays' Josh Donaldson in 2015, and won the MVP in 2014 and 2016. Though he missed out on the top 3 in MVP voting in 2017, that was only because he missed six weeks due to a thumb injury that required surgery; his stats for that season (adjusted for missed time) were comparable to his past numbers. Amazingly, as good as Trout has been so far in his career, he might be getting even better, with his offensive and defensive statistics in 2018 exceeding anything he's done so far- he's hitting for more power than he has in the past, and he's noticeably improved his throwing arm, long considered one of the few minor weaknesses in his game. Nonetheless, despite leading MLB in on-base percentage and OPS that year, he was a distant second to Mookie Betts of the Red Sox (who had a pretty awesome season as well) in MVP voting. All this caused the rest of MLB to drool at the prospect of a 28-year-old Trout entering unrestricted free agency in 2020. The Angels poured cold water on all of that shortly before the start of the 2019 season, ripping up the final two years of his previous deal and replacing it with a 12-year, $430 million contract—setting a new record for the richest per-season deal in MLB history, and at the time a new record for the richest total deal in any sport.note Trout followed up his new contract with his third MVP win in 2019. However, he missed most of the 2021 season and a significant part of the 2022 season to injury. His having missed games every season since 2017 has led to him developing a reputation for being somewhat injury-plagued and let to some questions as to whether he's still truly the best player if he's struggling to play consistently, though most would still say that he's the clear best when fully healthy. His OBP of .415 going into the 2023 season is the best of any active player.
- Andrew McCutchen is an outfielder for the Pittsburgh Pirates who was considered one of the best players in the National League in the early 2010's, with the tools to excel at virtually every aspect of the game, though in recent years his skills have declined somewhat (in particular, he's lost quite a bit of speed). Previously, he had quickly become the face of the Pittsburgh Pirates after his major league debut in 2009, and in 2013 he both won the NL MVP and led the Pirates to their first playoff berth and first winning season since 1992, ending what had been the longest streak of consecutive losing seasons in the history of MLB - or any other professional North American league. He was also well-known for his long dreadlocks, until he had them all cut off for a charity auction before the 2015 season. This and many other charitable acts, as well as having another great season in 2015, resulted in him winning the Roberto Clemente Award, one of the most prestigious awards in professional baseball (Clemente being a legendary Pittsburgh Pirate himself just makes the award even more special). He had an uncharacteristically bad year in 2016, which along with some pitching injuries led to the Pirates missing the playoffs after winning a wild card spot the previous 3 years. His struggles continued at the start of 2017, but a few months into the season, he finally turned it around and started hitting like he had in previous years (though his fielding and base-stealing abilities have sadly not returned, and his hitting has generally been more good than great). Despite this, the once-again struggling Pirates traded him to the San Francisco Giants before the start of the 2018 season, but within months of his stay with the Giants, was traded later in the season to the Yankees. He signed with the Phils as a free agent after that season. He got off to a solid start in 2019, but then he suffered a season-ending ACL injury in June while running the bases. In March 2022, McCutchen signed a one year deal with the Milwaukee Brewers. But he returned to the Pirates in 2023. He then signed with the Texas Rangers in 2026.
FUN FACT: Cutch has developed an odd connection to Anthrocon, the world's largest furry convention, which happens to be hosted in Pittsburgh. On July 5, 2014, during the convention, he tweeted the word "Furries"
with no further context. He hit a home run that day. He has made a habit of posting that again each year during Anthrocon, even when he wasn't playing for the Pirates. He went .419 with three homers and 1.221 OPS during Anthrocon from 2014 through 2018 (prior to his first departure from the Pirates), and went 5-for-9 during Anthrocon when he returned to the Pirates in 2023. When he signed with the Rangers, he hit a home run in the first series of 2026 while in Philadelphia...as Dallas' furry convention, Texas Furry Fiesta, was going on.
- Giancarlo Stanton, formerly Mike Stanton, note is an outfielder for the New York Yankees. Known mainly for his incredible power, hitting lots of home runs and hitting most of them very, very far- During his time with the Miami Marlins, he led the NL in Home Runs in 2014 despite playing in one of the largest ballparks in the MLB half the time, and from his debut in 2010 to his trade to the Yankees after the 2017 season, he hit more homers than any other player in the NL despite both the unfavorable conditions of his ballpark and frequent injuries costing him playing time. note In the 2014-2015 offseason, he signed a 13-year, $325 million contract with the Marlins, both the longest and the most expensive contract in baseball history (though not the highest by average salary per year), which came as a surprise to some, given the usual penny-pinching tendencies of former Marlins owner Jeffrey Loria and Stanton's previous public disagreements with the franchise (on account of Loria's penny-pinching, they rarely ever spent money trying to field a decent team and occasionally went through fire sales, most notably a series of trades in 2012 that saw the Marlins trade virtually every player they had making any amount of money). However, Stanton's contract is heavily backloaded—the Marlins were on the hook for "only" $30 million in the first three years of the deal, and after those three cheap years were up, the Marlins' new ownership group, looking to cut payroll, traded him to the Yankees for a very light return just so that the Yankees would pay his salary. Stanton is due $77 million for the next three years, after which he has an option to opt out. He put on an amazing show in the 2016 Home Run Derby with 61 home runs across 3 rounds, shattering the old record for most home runs in the derby. And then in 2017, he became the first of two players to join the 50-homer club that season, falling just short of entering the 60-homer club (59), and ultimately winning the NL MVP award for his efforts. His then, his performance in the regular season has been mixed. While he was an All-Star in 2022, injuries, persistent strikeout problems and a reputation for being unclutch led to criticism and the occasional booing from Yankees fans. However, Stanton's playoff performances have ranked among the all-time elite, including his 2024 ALCS MVP campaign where he hit four home runs with a 1.222 OPS in five games.
- Aaron Judge, currently the joint tallest position player in baseball at 6'7" (2.01 m, or 1.20 Altuves),note More plays right field for the Yankees. He made his MLB debut as a late-season call-up in 2016, but didn't do too great at first, striking out in close to half his plate appearances that year, and he missed the last three weeks of the season with an injury, which meant that for award purposes, his rookie season would not come until 2017. Judge burst onto the national scene in that season, putting up MVP-level numbers for the first half of the season and breaking Joe DiMaggio's team record for homers in a rookie season before the All-Star break. He was chosen as an All-Star starter, and also won the Home Run Derby on the night before the game. He fell into a slump for about a month after the break, but eventually adjusted well enough to become the first rookie ever to hit 50 homers in a season, also being named unanimously as AL Rookie of the Year. He was also mentioned as a possible MVP candidate for much of the year, ultimately finishing in second place, behind José Altuve. Since Altuve is the shortest player in baseball, with a playing style almost the exact opposite of Judge's (speed and contact hitting, as opposed to Judge's hard-swinging, high-power approach), they naturally elicited lots of comparisons with each other. Best known for prodigious power; besides hitting 52 dingers as a rookie (breaking Mark McGwire's old rookie record, though Judge's record fell two seasons later to the New York Mets' Pete Alonso), he twice set records for exit velocity of a batted ball. He also became the first player in over 60 years to collect 100 walks as a rookie, but also struck out more than 200 times (placing him in the top 10 in MLB history for single-season strikeouts by a batter). One of the most prominent examples of a "Three True Outcomes" (walks, strikeouts, home runs) hitter, he ultimately set the rookie record in all three categories. He has something of a reputation as being an all-or-nothing player, subject to incredible hot streaks and horrific slumps—in addition to his positive records, he also set records for most consecutive games with a strikeout and most strikeouts in one postseason, even though the Yankees only played 13 games and didn't reach the World Series (though that record ended up being broken just two weeks later by the Dodgers' Cody Bellinger). Judge lost a good chunk of the 2018 season when a pitch hit and broke his right wrist, then lost a good chunk of the 2019 season to what was initially called an oblique strain. In spring training in 2020, it came out that the Yankees medical staff had misdiagnosed Judge, who actually had been suffering from a stress fracture in a rib that caused him to miss the first month-plus of that season. He came back healthy in 2021 except for a bout with COVID, and after turning down a 7-year deal of over $210 million from the Yankees before the start of his walk year in 2022 proceeded to have a season for the ages, contending for a Triple Crown and becoming the first player since the steroid era to hit 60 homers in a season. Judge ended with 62 homers, breaking Roger Maris' AL record of 61, and ran away with AL MVP honors. He then signed a 9-year, $360 million deal, at the time the richest in MLB history by per-season average, to stay in The Bronx. After missing a large part of the 2023 season to injury, he had a horrific April 2024 (hitting under .200) before flipping the switch, putting up historically great numbers for the rest of the regular season on his way to unanimous AL MVP honors. During this run, Judge became the first MLB player to reach 300 career homers before his 1,000th career game.note However, he had a lackluster 2024 postseason, capped off by a critical error that helped the Dodgers storm back from a big deficit in their World Series clincher. He bounced back in the 2025 regular season: his average across the first 48 games was .402, and across the whole season, he led MLB in batting average (.331), on-base percentage (.457), slugging percentage (.688), and on-base plus slugging (1.144). Yankee fans consider him the heir apparent to Derek Jeter due to their similar work ethics and professional personalities. This was further cemented in the 2022–23 offseason when the Yankees named Judge their new captain, a post that had been vacant since Jeter's retirement.
- Juan Soto plays left field for the New York Mets, and has seriously been compared to Ted Williams for his hitting potential. A Dominican who was a teammate of Fernando Tatís Jr. in the Dominican Prospect League for teenage Latin American players, he was signed by the Nationals in October 2015, proceeding to demolish minor-league pitching before an injury crisis led the Nats to call up the then-19-year-old Soto in late May 2018. As a rookie, he had an OPS of .923 in 494 plate appearances. Putting that number into historic perspective: Only 11 players in the last 100 years had that much playing time in their age-19 seasons, including four Hall of Famers—and none matched Soto's OPS. The next season, in which the Nats won the World Series, he hit 34 regular-season homers—more than either Trout, Mickey Mantle, or Williams achieved at age 20. And then in the COVID-shortened 2020 season, he missed the first two weeks after what he believed was a false positive for the virus... and proceeded to slash .351/.490/.695 (with his batting average leading the NL), giving him an OPS almost 100 points higher than any other 21-year-old in baseball history. In 2021, he led MLB in on-base and was close to the lead in almost every other key hitting stat. During the 2022 season, he turned down a 15-year, $440 million deal with the Nats, who traded him to the Padres for a treasure trove of prospects just before the trade deadline, where he joined his former Dominican teammate Tatís. In the 2023–24 offseason, the Padres, facing financial issues stemming from massive spending, as well as reeling from a disapointing 2023 season and the death of longtime owner Peter Seidler, traded Soto to the Yankees in exchange for a similar trove of prospects, where he played alongside fellow star outfielder Aaron Judge for a season. After that season, Soto hit free agency with career stats so far putting him on a Hall of Fame trajectory and entering his age-26 season, leading to speculation that his new contract might surpass Shohei Ohtani's record deal from the prior season. That speculation was right, and then some—Soto signed a 15-year, $765 million deal to move from the Bronx to Queens. The contract is the longest in MLB history and richest in all North American sports. Unlike Ohtani's deal, in which $680 million of his total $700 million was deferred, Soto's has no deferred money. While he's received occasional criticism for his antics in the batter's box, most notably a shuffle in the box between select pitches, at the same time he's quick to (silently) congratulate a pitcher who got the better of him in an at-bat. Soto has also been lauded for his humility (the shuffle notwithstanding) and a work ethic that borders on the obsessive.
- Ronald Acuña Jr. is a Venezuelan outfielder who has spent his entire MLB career to date with the Atlanta Braves and has emerged as another of the new faces of baseball. Debuting in the minors in 2015, he made it to The Show in 2018 and hit .293 with 26 homers, becoming only the seventh player to hit 25 MLB homers before turning 21 and earning Rookie of the Year honors in the process. He's gone on to make every All-Star Game played during his career (COVID-19 scuttled the 2020 edition), and reached a new level in 2023, when he became the first player ever with 40 homers and 70 stolen bases in the same season.note Acuña was the unanimous NL MVP that season.
- Fernando Tatís Jr., a Dominican right fielder for the San Diego Padres, was arguably the new face of baseball before the 2022 season (Vladimir Guerrero Jr., Juan Soto, and Shohei Ohtani may have something to say about that). The son of Fernando Tatís Sr., an MLB journeyman third baseman from 1997 to 2010, the younger Fernando was signed by the White Sox as a 16-year-old in 2015, but traded to the Padres before ever playing a professional game. He started in the minors the following year, soon cementing himself as one of baseball's top prospects. Unlike many other teams that chose to manipulate young players' service time to keep them from free agency, the Padres didn't wait to put him on their regular roster, promoting him to The Show for Opening Day in 2019. Before Tatis' season was cut short by an August back injury, he slashed .317/.379/.590 with 22 homers. His 2020 slash line wasn't quite as awesome, but still very good; in the COVID-19-abbreviated season, he led MLB in exit velocity*, percentage of hard-hit balls, and percentage of plate appearances in which he made contact with the barrel of the bat. He finished the 2020 season with 143 games played, a bit less than a full season, with a slash line of .301/.374/.582, 39 homers, 27 steals, and a Baseball-Reference WAR of 7.0, the last of these a record for any player within his first 150 games. Before turning 22. The Padres didn't wait to lock him up, signing him to a 14-year, $340 million deal in the 2020–21 offseason—the richest contract ever given to a player not yet eligible for salary arbitration. While the Padres were a disappointment in the 2021 season, Tatís wasn't, leading the NL in homers. During the 2021–22 offseason, he broke his left wrist in a motorcycle accident in the Dominican, costing him most of that season. As he was preparing to come back, he drew an 80-game PED suspension; he didn't bother to appeal it, admitting that he'd failed to read the ingredients list on a ringworm medication that happened to include a banned substance. After the signing of former Red Sox shortstop Xander Bogaerts to a 10 year contract during the 2022-2023 offseason, Tatís was moved from shortstop to right field, going from what some would call "one of the worst" defensive shortstops in the league to an absolute defensive stud in right, winning both a Gold Glove in the outfield in 2023, as well as the Platinum Glove for the entire National League.
- Nick Castellanos is a right fielder for the San Diego Padres, formerly with the Philadelphia Phillies. Castellanos is a fairly decent player in his own right, not someone particularly noteworthy for his home runs or defensive prowess, but why he's become a name to know is because he has possibly the most unfortunate timing in baseball, as he has become the Interrupting Meme of the game due to a running string of moments in which he will be at bat, the broadcasters will be discussing something unfortunate, and he will make a big offensive play in some capacity in the middle of it. It first came to prominence when he was a member of the Cincinnati Reds and Reds broadcaster Thom Brennaman said a derogatory slur into a hot mic when referring to Kansas City, then later apologized it live, with Castellanos homering as he apologized. He would later hit home runs during a broadcaster discussing Tatis Jr.'s injury and during George Gorman's obituary during a Royals broadcast, and get his first hit as a Phillie in spring training during a discussion by the Blue Jays' color commentator about the DUI arrest of Jays pitching coach Pete Walker. It later continued with home runs on the day of Dwayne Haskins' death, the anniversary of 9/11, the anniversary of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki (he hit two home runs that day for added irony), and when fans researched his career, they discovered that he hit his first home run as a professional baseball player in the minor leagues on the night that Osama bin Laden was killed, which only added to the absurdity, and then it happened again mere minutes after the announcement of Willie Mays' death in June 2024, where he walked off a Phillies game with a ground-rule double, and topped that with a home run on the day of the death of Richard Simmons and a shooting attempt on Donald Trump. Not to mention that on the day of Joe Biden's announcement that he would not seek re-election as President in 2024—which was the same day news broke that Brennaman would return to national broadcasts—and there's a drive into deep left field by Castellanos, it will be a home run. And so that'll make it a 4-0 ballgame.note The Other Wiki even has a page dedicated to the meme.
Catchers
- Salvador Pérez has played his entire career to date with the Kansas City Royals. The Venezuelan was signed by the Royals when he was 16, rising through the minors before making his major-league debut late in the 2011 season. He suffered a knee injury that cost him about half of the 2012 season, but emerged the next year as an All-Star, earning the first of his five Gold Gloves to date. In that season, he was also the catcher for Mariano Rivera's last All-Star appearance. Pérez went on to earn World Series MVP honors in 2015, and improved as a hitter. He lost the 2019 season to Tommy John surgery, but bounced back in the first part of the 2020s, most notably breaking Johnny Bench's single-season record for most homers by a primary catcher, with 48 in 2021 (broken in 2025—see below). That tied him with Vladimir Guerrero Jr. for the MLB lead, and Pérez also led the AL in RBI.
- Cal Raleigh, current catcher for the Seattle Mariners, has emerged as a superstar in this decade. He joined the M's organization in 2018 after three seasons at Florida State, and made his MLB debut in the middle of the 2021 season. While he's never hit well for average—his best season batting average so far is .247—he's more than made up for it with home run power and strong defense behind the plate. Raleigh won the AL Gold and Platinum Gloves in 2024 and has contended for Gold Gloves in his other complete seasons. As for homers, he could be counted on for 30 homers (give or take) per season until a breakout 2025 season. In that season, he hit 60 homers—surpassing Ken Griffey Jr.'s franchise record, Pérez' record for catchers, and Mickey Mantle's record for switch-hitters. Raleigh also has something of an Embarrassing Nickname—he's known as "The Big Dumper" thanks to an ample posterior.
Pitchers
- Justin Verlander, currently with the Detroit Tigers, played his entire MLB career with the Detroit Tigers before being dealt to the Houston Astros at the 2017 deadline, was one of the best starting pitchers in the game in the late 2000s and early '10s. Though his poor performance in 2014 and early 2015 cast doubt on whether he could keep it up, he was able to quickly reestablish his status as an ace; by 2016 he once again led the American League in strikeouts. Playing for the Tigers, he pretty much walked away with the 2011 American League Cy Young by winning the Pitching Triple Crown: most wins (24), strikeouts (250) and lowest ERA (2.40). He was instrumental in the Tigers running away with the American League Central division title. He won the American League MVP award that season as well, which is seldom awarded to a pitcher because of strong feelings that it should go to an everyday player, and not one who plays every four or five days. He came within a hair of winning a second straight Cy Young in 2012, finishing second to Tampa Bay's David Price in the closest Cy Young vote since 1969. In 2016, he again came within a hair of winning a second Cy Young, finishing a close (and controversial) second to Rick Porcello of the Red Sox. He again had a slow start in 2017, then improved over the course of the season, ultimately pitching tremendously well for the Astros over the final month and in the playoffs, helping them win their first World Series. He's been absolutely fantastic since joining the Astros, looking a lot more like the early-2010's Verlander who was one of the game's best pitchers than the mid-2010's Verlander who was struggling and often injured. Emphasizing that point, he finally picked up his second Cy Young Award in 2019. In 2020, delayed and cut short by COVID-19, he only pitched in the season opener before developing arm trouble; he then had Tommy John surgery that kept him on the sidelines until 2022, but he's been back to his old dominant self since returning, claiming his third Cy Young Award in 2022. He signed as a free agent with the Mets and spent several months with the team before being traded back to Houston. Off the field, he's most notable as the husband of supermodel Kate Upton. He has also thrown three no-hitters, two coming against the Toronto Blue Jays in their home stadium, the Rogers Centre. After pitching for the San Francisco Giants in 2025, he returned to his old team, the Detroit Tigers, in 2026.
- Yu Darvish, a starting pitcher with the San Diego Padres, is known for being the Michael Jordan of Japan. Yu started out as a top level prospect, with MLB teams scouting him in Junior High. However, he wanted to go with a Japanese baseball league instead. In Japan, Yu posted extraordinary numbers, with a 1.99 average ERA. At 25, he wanted to go to America, and the Texas Rangers won his services with a huge bid. He is known in MLB as having seven pitch types (in comparison, normal MLB pitchers have 3-5 pitch types). On April 2, 2013, he nearly threw a perfect game against the Astros, but it was broken up by the Astros' Marwin Gonzalez with 2 outs in the 9th inning. The question of his durability, however, is now somewhat up in the air, as he underwent Tommy John surgery just before the start of the 2015 season, didn't return until late May 2016, and was quickly put on the DL again from mid-June to mid-July 2016. He was traded from the Rangers to the Dodgers in July 2017 for the latter team's postseason run. The results of that trade were mixed—he had some good starts, some bad starts, and was absolutely destroyed by the Astros in both of his starts in the World Series. Initially, it was reported that Darvish was inadvertently tipping his pitches—in other words, his pitching patterns were such that the Astros were able to figure out what he was going to throw. While there may have been some truth to that, a more sinister explanation came out two years later, when it was revealed that the Astros had been using cameras in centerfield to steal the opposing catchers' signs throughout the entirety of the 2017 season, including the postseason (while it's an accepted, fair part of the game for baserunners to try to relay the catcher's signs to the batter, it's not allowed to use technology like cameras to assist in sign-stealing). In addition to the Astros' pitch-tipping recognition and technological sign-stealing, several pitchers in that World Series, including Darvish himself, complained about the balls being slicker than normal, making it harder to throw off-speed pitches. His struggles at first continued after joining the Cubs in 2018, as he was injured for most of that season (and not good when he was healthy), but he was much better in 2019 and became a serious Cy Young candidate in 2020 (though the Reds' Trevor Bauer ended up with that honor). He was dealt to the Padres after the 2020 season in what was widely viewed as a payroll move, with the Cubbies' main haul from the deal being four prospects, three then in their teens.
- Max Scherzer, a starting pitcher now with the Toronto Blue Jays who made his name with the Washington Nationals, joined the Nats in 2015 after having spent the earlier parts of his career with the Arizona Diamondbacks and Detroit Tigers. After some ups and downs in his earlier years, he started to put it all together with the Tigers in 2012 when he was 2nd in the league in strikeouts behind his teammate Justin Verlander, who pretty much overshadowed Scherzer during Verlander's dominant run in the early 2010's. The next year, he improved further and made himself one of the best starters in the game, starting the season 13-0, ultimately leading the AL in wins, and being near the top in several other categories, which led to him winning the 2013 AL Cy Young Award for his efforts. Two years later, he joined the Nationals, and seemingly elevated his game to a new level, though some will note that his improved statistics may be partially because of slightly weaker competition thanks to the NL's lack of a DH. He threw two no-hitters in 2015, one of which was almost a perfect game except for a controversial hit batter with 2 outs in the 9th inningnote . In 2016, he struck out 20 batters in one game, tying the record for strikeouts in a single 9-inning game—the feat was also previously achieved by Roger Clemens (twice), Kerry Wood, and arguably Randy Johnsonnote . At season's end, he was awarded his second Cy Young Award, becoming just the sixth pitcher to win the award in both leagues. He won a third Cy Young Award in 2017, making him just the 10th pitcher ever to win 3 Cy Youngs. During a 2021 season in which Scherzer was doing much better than the Nats, he was part of a trade-deadline deal with the Dodgers, who were in a playoff dogfight with the Giants and Padres and needed pitching help.* Scherzer became a free agent at the end of the 2021 season, and signed a 3-year, $130 million deal with the Mets shortly before the owners locked the players out. The new contract is the richest in MLB history by annual average ($43.3 million), surpassing Gerrit Cole's 9-year, $324 million deal with the Yankees signed in 2019. Scherzer's power-pitching style and good control leads to him regularly being among the league leaders in both getting strikeouts and not allowing walks, but he also tends to allow a disproportionate amount of home runs on the rare occasions where the batters facing him make contact. He's also well known for his heterochromia—his right eye is blue, and his left eye is brown.
- Aroldis Chapman, currently with the Boston Red Sox, is best known for his time as the Cincinnati Reds' closer. He currently holds the world record for the fastest fastball, having reached velocities as high as 106 MPH, and often throws over 100 (in fact, MLB's website had to add a special filter to their fastest pitches leaderboard due to the fact that almost all of the top 50+ have been thrown by Chapman). His high fastball velocity has made him one of the best in the game at striking people out, retiring nearly half the batters he faces that way, an insanely high number even for a relief pitcher. In early 2016, MLB gave him a 30-day suspension for a domestic violence incident that occurred in October 2015 during which he, among other things, shot a wall with a handgun 8 times in anger. That didn't prevent the Yankees from acquiring him from the struggling Reds during the 2015-2016 offseason. With free agency looming, the Yankees dealt him to the Cubs during the 2016 season, where he helped them break their "curse"; after the end of the season, he signed a big deal to return to the Yankees. While on that contract, Chapman would notch three more All-Star nods to go with his previous four, as well as AL Reliever of the Year honors in 2019, and in 2021, he recorded both his 300th save and 1,000th strikeout. However, after an injury-prone 2022 where he lost his closer spot and didn't make the playoff roster, Chapman left New York again, this time for KC. He enjoyed a career resurrection in Boston, being named AL Reliever of the Year in 2025.
- Johnny Cueto, currently a free agent starting pitcher as of 2026, was the ace for the Cincinnati Reds in the early 2010s. While other ace pitchers got more press, Cueto quietly emerged as one of the most dominant pitchers for the National League. In 2012 he won 19 games and had an ERA of 2.78. Got off to a good start in 2013 before going on the DL because of a back injury. But came back strong in 2014 by winning 20 games with an ERA of 2.25, the first pitcher in franchise history to do so since 1988. These would normally be Cy Young-worthy numbers, but Cueto, unfortunately, is also a victim of Always Second Best. Clayton Kershaw, the best pitcher in the game from 2011-2014 is also a National League pitcher and produced better numbers in 2012 and 2014, leaving Cueto to finish second in wins and the ERA title in both years. Fortunately, his great year in 2014 was recognized by his baseball peers and he won a GIBBY award for best bounce back player after an injury. Cueto is known for his pitching delivery, in which he does an almost 180 degree turn of his upper body so batters have a hard time reading him. This pitching motion, however, is what caused his back injury in 2013 and time will tell if he's able to keep doing it in the years to come. In the middle of the 2015 season, he was traded to the Kansas City Royals due to the struggling Reds needing to rebuild; though he struggled to pitch consistently well for his new team in the second half of the 2015 regular season, he would prove to be a vital piece of the Royals' starting rotation in the postseason, where he helped led the team to a World Series Championship with quality pitching, especially in World Series Game 2, where he pitched a complete game two-hitter against the New York Mets. His time with the Giants has been something of a mixed bag; he was okay in 2016, his first year with San Francisco, but has struggled heavily with injuries in the years since.
- Madison Bumgarner is a free agent starting pitcher who made his name with the San Francisco Giants. An imposing left-hander with a deceptively easy delivery (although he does everything else, including batting, right-handed), Bumgarner was mostly known for two things - being the junior member of the heralded Giants rotation (he debuted in the majors at the age of 20 and pitched in the World Seriesnote as a 21 year-old rookie), and for being the second-best left-handed pitcher in the NL West Division, overshadowed by the downright unbelievable Clayton Kershaw. However, MadBum achieved national prominence in 2014 when, with the rest of the Giants' once-vaunted pitching staff in tatters around him, he put the Giants on his back and carried them to a championship. His overall postseason stats - 52.5 innings with a 1.03 ERA, 45 strikeouts to 6 walks - were some of the greatest in baseball history, and he emphatically cemented his case by coming into the deciding Game 7 as a reliever, on two days' restnote and throwing five shutout innings for the win. His postseason stats as a whole are impressive- he has a 2.14 career postseason ERA- but his World Series stats are absolutely insane. In 36 innings over 5 World Series games in 2010, 2012, and 2014, Bumgarner has allowed a grand total of one run note , good for an 0.25 ERA. Also notable as one of the best hitting pitchers of recent years—his home run stats since 2013 would project to 30-plus homers over a full season. In fact, on June 30, 2016, with the Giants set to meet their cross-Bay rivals, the A's, in Oakland with Bumgarner starting, Giants manager Bruce Bochy announced that the team would not use a DHnote and let Bumgarner bat for himself. This would be the first time in 40 years that a team deliberately chose to let a pitcher hit instead of a DH.note The move worked–Bumgarner doubled in his first at-bat of the night, leading to a 6-run third inning for the Giants. Spent about half of the 2017 season on the DL because of a shoulder injury he got when he crashed his dirt bike, and also missed a lot of time in 2018 after breaking his hand in spring training. Signed with the D-backs as a free agent after the 2019 season, with part of the reason reportedly being his horses. While he later disputed that item, he did admit in February 2020 that he competed in rodeos as a team ropernote under the alias Mason Saunders. He does that right-handed, too. That said, MadBum and his wife live in the Phoenix area in the offseason and by all reports love it there. In 2021, he pitched a no-hitter against the Braves, although it didn’t count as it was in a scheduled doubleheader, which were 7 innings at the time.
- Jacob deGrom is a right-hander for the Texas Rangers who became one of MLB's top pitchers in the last years of the 2010s while with the Mets. He went undrafted out of high school in Florida, ending up playing college ball at Stetson (where the aforementioned Corey Kluber had played a few years earlier). Unlike Kluber, deGrom didn't start out as a pitcher, playing only shortstop during his first two college seasons until he made some appearances as a reliever late in the 2009 season. As a junior, the Hatters' coaches moved him to part-time reliever, and midway through that season moved him entirely into the starting rotation. He did well enough for the Mets to select him in the ninth round of the 2010 draft. While in the minors, deGrom had his first Tommy John surgery, but recovered well enough to make it to the majors in 2014. He was named NL Rookie of the Year that season, and went on to have a 2018 season that was spectacular in all respects except one: his 10–9 record, which was largely due to the Mets offense failing to give him any run support that would put them in the lead when he was pitching. He led the majors in ERA (1.70) and fewest homers per 9 innings (0.41), and was the overwhelming choice for the NL Cy Young Award; his 10 wins were the fewest for any Cy Young-winning starter. The following season, he started out slow, but had a mind-blowing second half, going 7–1 with a 1.44 ERA after the All-Star break. DeGrom was again a near-unanimous Cy Young Award choice. After entering free agency at the end of the 2022 season, deGrom signed a 5-year, $185 million deal with the Rangers. He later had a second Tommy John surgery, and returned from it well enough to be named AL Comeback Player of the Year in 2025. When he was healthy he's was one of the harder throwers among starting pitchers; his best pitches are a four-seam fastball and a slider, but can also effectively mix in changeups, curves, and sinkers.
- Yoshinobu Yamamoto is a right-hander for the Los Angeles Dodgers who has posted fairly impressive stats in 2024 and 2025's regular seasons, but he became a superstar in the 2025 World Series. His 3-0 record in that Series would be impressive enough: only ten pitchers in World Series history have managed it, and no one had managed it since Randy Johnson in 2001. Yamamoto managed to one-up them all in at least one respect, though: only five pitchers have ever had four career World Series victories in road games. In eight days, Yamamoto became the first pitcher ever to win three World Series road games in the same season. He also became the first pitcher to throw a World Series complete game since the Royals' Johnny Cueto in 2015, and the first person to throw two consecutive postseason complete games since Curt Schilling in 2001. Across the World Series, in 17⅔ innings pitched, Yamamoto recorded 15 strikeouts, a 1.02 ERA, and 0.679 WHIPnote , in contrast to the entire LA pitching staff's 3.95 ERA and 1.411 WHIP across the entire World Series.note Yamamoto's pitching was very clearly decisive in all three games he pitched; impressively, he retired the last 20 batters he faced in Game 2. He was impressive in Game 6, in which he pitched six innings, but what truly cemented his legend was Game 7, in which he threw 2⅔ shutout innings on an unheard-of zero days' rest. He is also the first pitcher to start and win Game 6 of a World Series, then retire more batters than any other pitcher on his team in Game 7. And, just as the icing on the cake, he was warming up in the bullpen (on one day's rest) at the end of Game 3's eighteen-inning marathon, by which point Los Angeles had already gone through all its other pitchers, because he refused to let a position player pitch. Unsurprisingly, Yamamoto won the World Series MVP in a landslide, with many commentators comparing his performance to Bumgarner's World Series performances and to Christy Mathewson's 1905 World Series performance (three complete-game shutouts in six days, a feat that has never been repeated in any World Series since, and probably never will be).
- Chris Sale is a left-handed pitcher for the Atlanta Braves who, in 2024, won the Cy Young Award, the Gold Glove Award, and the Triple Crown (leading the league in wins, strikeouts, and earned run average). Where he truly excels is in striking out batters: in 2019, he reached 2,000 strikeouts with 1,626 innings pitched (IP), breaking Hall of Famer Pedro Martinez' previous record of 1,711⅓, and in 2025, he reached 2,500 strikeouts in 2,026 IP, breaking Hall of Famer Randy Johnson's previous record of 2,107⅔. In 2021, he also tied a record set by Hall of Famer Sandy Koufax by throwing the third immaculate inning of his career (three strikeouts on nine pitches). Unsurprisingly, his ratio of 11.13 strikeouts per nine IP across his entire career is almost the best in Major League Baseball history: among pitchers with over 1,000 IP, only the Dodgers' Blake Snell has him beat (11.19 across 1,158 IP).note Sale's postseason appearances have been less impressive, but he did win the World Series with the Boston Red Sox in 2018 by recording a World Series-ending strikeout of Manny Machado. His career stats would likely be even more impressive had he not been plagued by injuries to the extent that the Red Sox' Chief Baseball Officer Chaim Bloom joked that they needed to find whoever had a "Chris Sale voodoo doll": he missed all of 2020 and most of 2021-2023, which makes his 2024 season all the more impressive. (Before 2024, his most impressive seasons were 2015 and 2017.)
- Tarik Skubal, a left-hander for the Detroit Tigers, has emerged in this decade as one of the sport's most dominant pitchers. He showed promise as a college pitcher with Seattle despite missing most of 2016 and all of 2017 to Tommy John surgery. He was drafted by the Tigers in 2018 and made his MLB debut during the COVID-shortened 2020 season. Skubal suffered another setback in late 2022 with an injury to his pitching hand that required surgery, but once he came back in July 2023, things took off. He won the AL Triple Crown, led MLB pitchers in wins above replacement and fielding-independent pitching, and was the unanimous AL Cy Young Award winner in 2024. In 2025, Skubal repeated as AL Cy Young winner after leading MLB in walks per 9 innings, WHIP,note and strikeout-to-walk ratio, and leading the AL in WAR, FIP, and ERA+,note
Shohei Ohtani
- Shohei Ohtani, currently a pitcher and designated hitter with the Los Angeles Dodgers (though he only hit in 2024 while recovering from ulnar collateral ligament reconstruction, colloquially known as Tommy John surgery), is arguably the face of baseball, and the first player to be a superstar as both a pitcher and hitter since Babe Ruth a century-plus earlier. He played for the Los Angeles Angels from 2018 to 2023 when he signed a massive contract with the Dodgers. Ohtani has set numerous records from 2021 to 2025, including becoming the first player to hit 50 home runs and steal 50 bases in the same season (Aaron Judge had previously done these in separate seasons). Several additional eye-catching records came in two 2025 postseason games. In the Dodgers' pennant-clinching NLCS Game 4, in six innings pitched, Ohtani became the first MLB pitcher ever to hit a leadoff home run, the first player ever to strike out ten batters and hit three home runs in any game, and the first pitcher ever to hit multiple home runs in the same postseason game, including one which went clear out of the stadium. He hit the three hardest balls of the night (113.6 mph or higher), threw the 11 fastest pitches of the night (99.2 mph or higher), and hit more home runs of 440 feet or longer than he had allowed in 102 career games (1). Later, in the World Series' eighteen-inning Game 3, he reached base a postseason-record nine times, in the process becoming the first person ever intentionally walked with the bases empty multiple times in one postseason game, the first person ever intentionally walked four times in one World Series game, the first person ever to hit multiple home runs in three separate games in one postseason, and the first person with 12 total bases in two separate games in one postseason. He also tied one record that had stood for over a century and another set by the most famous athlete in baseball history: the only other person who had gotten four extra-base hits in the same World Series game was Frank Isbell in 1905, and the only other person with twelve total bases in any two postseason games was Babe Ruth (on October 6, 1926 and October 9, 1928). Not to mention that he's been a league MVP four times—AL in 2021 and '23, NL in '24 and '25. Only Barry Bonds has more MVP awards (7) or consecutive MVP nods (4)—but "Shotime" has one up on Bonds in that he was the unanimous MVP all four times. The only other individual in any of the major North American sports leagues with more than one unanimous MVP award is Aaron Judge with two.
Managers
- Dave Roberts has been the manager of the Los Angeles Dodgers since 2016. The son of an African-American US Marine stationed in Okinawa and a Japanese woman, he was born in Okinawa and moved around a lot as a child. He had a moderately successful career as a player, playing for five teams over a ten-year career and known largely for his speed. His most notable play was in the 2004 American League Championship Series with the Boston Red Sox, where he was put in as a pinch-runner in the ninth inning with the Red Sox down 4-3 in the game and 3 games to 0 in the series. He stole second base and scored on a single, tying the game and sparking the only time in MLB history that a team has come back from being down 3-0 in a 7-game series; the Red Sox went on to win the World Series and end an 86-year championship drought. After retiring as a player, he coached for the San Diego Padres, filling in as manager for one game (which the Padres lost). He was named manager of the Dodgers in 2016, leading the Dodgers to their fourth consecutive NL West title and being named NL Manager of the Year. In 2017, he became the first manager of Asian heritage to lead a team to the World Series. As of 2025, he has led the Dodgers to the playoffs in all ten seasons, including nine NL West titles, five NL pennants (2017, 2018, 2020, 2024, 2025), and three World Series championships (2020, 2024, 2025). He has the highest win percentage of any major league manager who has managed over 1000 games.
Owners and executives
- Billy Beane is the Oakland Athletics' executive vice president for baseball operations, as well as a former major league outfielder. Entering the sport with high expectations due to his high school success, he performed poorly for most of his professional career, barely qualifying for a major league spot, and ultimately retired at the age of 27, accepting a job with the A's in the front office and rising to become general manager in 1998. Constrained heavily by Oakland's small budget, he constantly has to come up with ways to find players that are being undervalued by the rest of the league for Oakland to compete. He's mostly been successful, particularly during the early 2000s, when Oakland was practically the only team to embrace sabermetric principles, where they had 4 straight playoff appearances. His job got a lot harder when the rest of the league copied his ideas, but he's actively working to find other ways to stay ahead of the game, and still has been able to give Oakland a few surprisingly competitive seasons, though he's also made some less-than-stellar moves along the way, notably trading away star third baseman Josh Donaldson to the Toronto Blue Jays in the 2014-15 offseason for an underwhelming package of prospects, only to watch Donaldson win the AL MVP the following year and lead Toronto to their first postseason appearance in 23 years. After the 2015 season, Beane was kicked upstairs to oversee the A's baseball operations, while his former assistant took over the day-to-day GM job. Brad Pitt played him in Moneyball, a movie that followed the A's 2002 season. He's become one of the ever-growing list of big-name Americans (in celebrity, net worth, or both) who've invested in soccer teams, becoming part of the ownership group of Barnsley, a club currently in the EFL Championship, the second level of English soccer, in 2017. This wasn't Beane's first venture into that sport; he had previously been an adviser to Dutch Eredivisie side AZ Alkmaar.
- Theo Epstein was one of the first general managers of a big market team to copy Beane's ideas. He was first hired by the Red Sox in 2002 at the ripe old age of 28, shortly after an unsuccessful attempt by the Red Sox to hire Beane himself. Epstein's use of sabermetrics combined with a much bigger budget than the A's had an immediate impact on the Red Sox, and they won the World Series for the first time in 86 years in 2004. Following a disappointing season in 2011 that saw the Red Sox suffer one of the biggest late-season collapses in history and fall one game short of the playoffs, Epstein left the team to join the Chicago Cubs. Not content with ending just one baseball "curse", Epstein spent the next few years rebuilding the team from the ground up and in 2016, the Cubs had their first 100-win season in more than 100 years, made the World Series for the first time since 1945, and won it for the first time since 1908. Since 2024, Epstein has been a senior adviser and part-owner of Fenway Sports Group, which owns the Red Sox as well as Liverpool FC and a majority stake in the Pittsburgh Penguins.
Broadcasters
- Jason Benetti: One of the most highly regarded play-by-play announcers working today, Benetti has called a variety of sports, including MLB telecasts for ESPN, Fox, and the Chicago White Sox. Since 2024 he has been the primary TV voice of the Detroit Tigers, and as of 2026 he's also the lead announcer for NBC's Sunday Night Baseball. His crisply descriptive calls and pop culture-savvy commentary make him a popular announcer among fans.
- Bob Costas: A well-known sportscaster for NBC from 1980–2019, Costas has commentated on a wide variety of sports throughout his career but has made no secret of his particular love for baseball. In the '80s he teamed with analyst Tony Kubek to form NBC's #2 MLB crew, and when the sport returned to the network in the '90s following a four-year stint on CBS, Costas ascended to the #1 spot, calling three All-Star Games and three World Series. After leaving NBC he continued to call select games for TBS and MLB Network through 2024, after which he announced his retirement from play-by-play. In 2018 Costas was given the Ford C. Frick Award by the Baseball Hall of Fame; he has the distinction of being the first recipient to have announced the sport exclusively on the national TV level. Costas returned to NBC in 2026 as a pregame host for Sunday Night Baseball.
- Joe Davis: Hired by the Los Angeles Dodgers in 2016, Davis had the highly unenviable task of taking over from the legendary Vin Scully as the team's lead TV play-by-play voice following the latter's retirement at the end of that season, but fortunately enough he has by and large been accepted and even embraced by the fans as a worthy successor. As if that wasn't enough, he was tabbed to replace Joe Buck as the primary announcer for the Fox network's national MLB coverage in 2022 following Buck's move to ESPN and Monday Night Football. Again, Davis met the challenge, earning particular accolades for his call of Bryce Harper's pennant-winning home run for the Phillies in Game 5 of the 2022 NLCS. Given his relatively young age (35, as of 2023), it seems likely that Davis will be one of the sport's premier voices for many years to come.
- Tom Hamilton: The premier Large-Ham Announcer in today's MLB, Hamilton has called radio broadcasts for the Cleveland Guardiansnote since 1990. Immortalized (on Newgrounds, of all places) for his increasingly excited call of Cleveland's unlikely 15-14 comeback win in a 2001 game against that season's juggernaut Seattle Mariners. Hamilton is the 2025 recipient of the Ford C. Frick Award.
- Jon Miller: One of the best-known and most respected play-by-play men in the sport, Miller started calling big-league ball at age 22 with the Oakland Athletics in 1974. Over the ensuing decades he's had stints with the Texas Rangers, Boston Red Sox, Baltimore Orioles, and – since 1997 – his hometown San Francisco Giants, for whom he's the lead radio broadcaster. He also spent twenty years (1990–2010) teaming with Joe Morgan on national Sunday Night Baseball telecasts for ESPN, and called 13 World Series over ESPN Radio. Miller, who was presented with the Ford C. Frick Award in 2010, is also known for his dead-on impressions of other baseball announcers such as Vin Scully and Harry Caray.
Other
- Rob Manfred succeeded Bud Selig as commissioner in January 2015. Manfred first worked with MLB as an outside counsel in 1987, became a full-time MLB employee in 1998, and became Chief Operating Officer at the end of the 2013 season. His first significant headlines came after the the 2015 season when he shot down Pete Rose's latest bid for reinstatement to MLB. However, he would later allow the Reds to enshrine Rose in the team's Hall of Fame and formally retire his number in 2016. One of his top priorities so far in his time as commissioner has been improving the pace of play of the game, pushing for changes such as requiring batters to keep one foot in the batter's box at all times, replacing the four-pitch intentional walk with a hand signal, limiting the amount and length of mound visits by coaches and managers, and adding a pitch clock (first in minor league games and now in MLB games as well), requiring pitchers to pitch the ball in no more than 18 seconds (originally 20) when no runners are on base. Though so far he hasn't been as surrounded by controversy as some previous commissioners have been, there has been controversy over rising home run rates. Since the middle of 2015, major league baseball has seen an explosion in home runs, with rates of home runs even higher than they were during the "steroid era" of the late '90s and early 2000s. Many analysts have concluded that changes to the ball are responsible for the rising home run rates, with balls being tighter-wound than they have been in the past, causing them to fly farther. Manfred has denied making any intentional changes to the ball, despite a significant amount of evidence suggesting the ball has been "juiced" since mid-2015.