Tom Verducci

2 days ago | si.com | Tom Verducci

Here is everything you need to know about the Jarred Kelenic/Ronald Acuña Jr./Brian Snitker controversy inside the Atlanta Braves team that has been raging since it happened Saturday night. The worst part of the episode was not Kelenic’s lack of hustle or Acuña using social media to throw his manager under the bus. It was that Snitker, the Braves manager, was caught unaware of what happened on an important, highly visible play on the field.

1 week ago | si.com | Tom Verducci

Make what you will of April performances. Small sample sizes, lousy weather and quirks of the schedule can send false signals. Alec Bohm (.598 slugging) and Adolis Garcia (.585) crushed the ball last April, for instance, only to lose pop the rest of the way (.410 and .359, respectively). On the flip side, last April provided hints of breakout seasons for CJ Abrams and Elly De La Cruz. Keeping that caveat in mind, here are the seven most improved hitters in MLB this month and why they are better.

2 weeks ago | si.com | Tom Verducci

Damn the torpedoes if you like, as Milwaukee Brewers pitcher Trevor Megill did after the New York Yankees routed his team on the opening weekend of the season, but the torpedo-style bats are not worth the hysteria that home run show in the Bronx created. With the way major leaguers are hitting—or more to the point, not hitting—torpedo bats are an interesting innovation but not the game-changer they were cracked up to be.

2 weeks ago | si.com | Tom Verducci

The Toronto Blue Jays made sure Vlad Guerrero Jr. didn’t make it to free agency, where their bids for Shohei Ohtani and Juan Soto came up empty. The Jays retained their first baseman with an agreement on a 14-year deal worth $500 million. The signing is an enormous one besides the half billion dollars. Here are the biggest takeaways from the deal. 1. The two biggest contracts in baseball history by net present value belong to corner players, not athletic, up-the-middle players.

3 weeks ago | si.com | Tom Verducci

The Boston Red Sox have a Rafael Devers problem. Near the beginning of a 10-year, $313.5 million contract, Devers is no longer a third baseman and he is off to a historically bad start at the plate. Devers is 0-for-19: three groundouts to first base, one groundout to third base and a record 15 strikeouts in five games, two more punchouts than the previous high through five games set by Pat Burrell in 2001 and matched by Byron Buxton in 2017. Everyone slumps.