Picking the Biggest Shocker For Every MLB Team in 2024

With any given MLB season, the only sure thing is that not everything will go according to plan.

Teams can only hope that whatever surprises happen are pleasant ones.

Naturally, this isn't always the case.

What we're going to do here is illustrate the point by singling out the most shocking surprise each team has gotten in 2024.

These cover both the pleasant and the unpleasant kinds, and they focus on individual players and groups of players.

Want a taste? Very well, then: A certain New York Yankees reliever has more blown saves this year than he'd had in his entire career coming into 2024.

Let's go in alphabetical order by city, checking off three teams at a time.

Arizona Diamondbacks: Splurging on Starting Pitching Has Backfired Last winter, the Diamondbacks did what all teams should do after winning a pennant: spend.

They most notably threw cash at two starting pitchers, signing Eduardo Rodriguez and Jordan Montgomery for a combined $105 million.

Yet whereas the two hurlers would have combined for a 3.24 ERA and 341.1 innings as teammates in 2023, this year they've spat out a 6.04 ERA over 162.1 innings.

Whether either is a viable postseason option is an uncomfortable question for the organization right now.

Atlanta: The Vanishing of Their Historic Offense Atlanta's offense wasn't merely good in 2023.

It was literally "on par with the 1927 Yankees" good, indeed tying that fabled club in wRC+ .

Basically all their core hitters had a career year.

How Atlanta's offense went from that to basically a league-average unit in 2024 is a long story, but not a complicated one.

Save for Marcell Ozuna, all the returning members from last year's offense either got hurt or just stopped producing.

Baltimore Orioles: Who Knew Anthony Santander Had This in Him? Though it was his seventh year with the Orioles and ultimately a good one, it felt in 2023 like Santander was just another guy in Baltimore's lineup.

That can happen when a guy is competing for oxygen with young stars like Gunnar Henderson and Adley Rutschman.

This is certainly not the case in 2024, wherein Santander has climbed to fifth on the all-time list for switch-hitters with a 44-homer outburst.

Not a bad season under any circumstances, but least of all with free agency looming for him this winter.

Boston Red Sox: Jarren Duran Is a Superstar Now Duran was a pleasant surprise in 2023, emerging from somewhere outside the Red Sox's plans at the beginning of the year to become a solid everyday outfielder by the end of it.

In doing so, he rightfully earned a place in the club's plans for 2024.

Still, him posting more WAR than Shohei Ohtani is not something anyone could have envisioned.

And Duran has gone about it every which way, tallying 83 extra-base hits, 34 stolen bases and 17 Defensive Runs Saved in the field.

Chicago Cubs: They Didn't Have a Bullpen...Until They Did Out of the core relievers the Cubs had coming into the year, pretty much all of them are now out of the picture.

And lest anyone forget, this bullpen was one of the worst in baseball by way of a 4.61 ERA through the end of May.

Ever since then, though, its 3.35 ERA is tied for the fifth-best in all of MLB.

That's the Craig Counsell effect for you, though it never hurts when a team digs up a strikeout afficionado like Porter Hodge.

Chicago White Sox: At Least Garrett Crochet as a Starter Worked Out So, the White Sox's 2024 season.

It's pretty bad! And you don't need to go pry up many floorboards before you see the rot that has caused this house to deteriorate so dramatically.

Still, at least Crochet has had a good year.

He has a 3.61 ERA in 31 starts, and he would be leading all starters in strikeout rate if he had enough innings to qualify.

Enjoy him while you can , White Sox fans.

Cincinnati Reds: The Shine Really Wore off Alexis Diaz It's largely because of injuries that the Reds have failed to build on last year's 82-win breakout.

But whereas such an outcome is always a threat to every team, the Reds had no way of knowing that their ace closer would fall apart in a different way in 2024.

After largely dominating throughout 2022 and 2023, Diaz has a modest 4.07 ERA and is one of the biggest strikeout rate decliners of this season.

Call it a hunch, but he may have worked just a little too hard as he appeared in 71 games last year.

Cleveland Guardians: This Is One of the Best Bullpens Ever The Guardians, on the other hand, don't have a closer problem.

Emmanuel Clase has been electric in the ninth inning, posting a 0.61 ERA and saving 47 games in 50 tries.

And yet, that Cleveland's bullpen is not merely The Emmanuel Clase Show must be acknowledged.

Its 2.59 ERA is more than half a run better than the next-best pen, and its 1.04 WHIP is tied for the fourth-best ever in the live-ball era .

Colorado Rockies: Brenton Doyle Is a Good Hitter Now Doyle was a defensive menace in center field en route to winning a Gold Glove in 2023, racking up 19 Defensive Runs Saved in a little more than 1,000 innings.

It was too bad, then, that he was also the worst hitter in baseball .

He has flipped the script in a dramatic way in 2024.

He's not merely still an elite defender, but also the single most improved hitter in the National League.

Frankly, his defense plus a .768 OPS, 23 home runs and 29 stolen bases makes him a legit star.

Detroit Tigers: The Deadline Decimated and Supercharged Their Pitching The Tigers' entire season is, of course, a surprise.

But what especially defies logic is the pitching-fueled run they've gone on since the trade deadline, in which they have a 32-17 record and a league-best 2.82 ERA .

This is happening without Jack Flaherty and without Andrew Chafin, and with basically only two reliable starters in Tarik Skubal and Keider Montero.

The lesson, it seems, is that a little creativity can count for a lot.

Houston Astros: Their Rotation Is Thriving Despite Justin Verlander Houston's pitching has also been thriving since the deadline, especially where its rotation is concerned.

That's where newcomer Yusei Kikuchi has been a big help in the unit posting a third-ranked 3.13 ERA and a league-high 293.1 innings dating back to July 31.

Not helping, however, is the lone future Hall of Famer among the bunch.

Verlander, who won his third Cy Young Award just two years ago, has frankly looked washed as he's put up an 8.89 ERA in six starts since coming off the injured list on August 21.

Kansas City Royals: Their Starting Pitching Has Had a Real Glow-Up We might as well stick with the starting pitching theme here, as there really isn't a better explanation for how the Royals have gone from 106-game losers in 2023 to the doorstep of the playoffs in 2024.

Their rotation's ERA has gone from 5.23 all the way down to 3.56, and not merely because of newcomers Seth Lugo and Michael Wacha.

Cole Ragans' breakout is ongoing, and Brady Singer's return to form is one of the more under-covered stories of the season.

Los Angeles Angels: Mike Trout Somehow Got *Less* Durable Save for Zach Neto's breakout, there isn't much about the 2024 season that bodes well for the Angels' future.

But certainly nothing bodes worse than Trout, who had already missed 51 percent of all games between 2021 and 2023, finding a new durability nadir.

His second knee surgery in August officially left him stuck on a career-low 29 games for the year.

Though the Hall of Fame remains somewhere in his far-off future, it's now that much harder to even feign optimism for the three-time MVP's near future.

Los Angeles Dodgers: You Really Can Never Have Too Much Starting Pitching Perhaps this space should be dedicated to Shohei Ohtani, but him finding new and exciting ways to make history is actually on-brand .

More shocking is the current state of the Dodgers starting rotation.

It came into the year as one of the deepest and most talented such units in the entire league.

Cut to now, though, and it's headed to the playoffs with at most two viable starters .

For as much as their front office has mastered in terms of player ability, clearly the Dodgers still have a lot of work to do in terms of player availability.

Miami Marlins: Remember When They Had Too Much Starting Pitching? Speaking of utterly decimated starting rotations, remember when the Marlins actually had a surplus of starters ? That was only two years ago, believe it or not.

How they went from that to arguably the worst rotation in baseball in 2024 ought to be a complex story, but it's really quite simple: They traded Pablo Lopez for one-and-a-half years of Luis Arraez and everyone else got hurt.

Milwaukee Brewers: No Corbin Burnes? No Problem.

It wasn't a surprise when the Brewers traded Burnes, the 2021 NL Cy Young Award winner, in February.

But in the aftermath, there was the question of how they would keep runs off the board sans him and Brandon Woodruff, who would be recovering from shoulder surgery .

With the team's ERA now slightly lower than it was in 2023, it's fair to say they've figured it out.

You can point to any number of unsung heroes, including ascendant rookie starter Tobias Myers and a bullpen that has dominated in the second half .

Minnesota Twins: Royce Lewis Has Flipped the Script It's honestly hard to drill down on any one thing here.

There's been an inherent unpredictability to the Twins' season, as it's mostly consisted of them gaining, losing, regaining and re-losing their footing.

It's been an especially odd year for Lewis, however.

The early portion was more of the same, in that he was very powerful but oft-injured .

In the second half, though, the opposite has been true.

He's been able to stay off the IL since coming off it back on July 26, yet has homered just once in his last 37 games.

New York Mets: This Thrown-Together Rotation Is Elite Contrary to the star-studded roster they arranged for 2023, the Mets came into this year with a few core stars paired with a gaggle of temps.

Nowhere was that more evident than in the rotation, which was not projected to be very good.

It has held its own throughout 2024, however, and now it has a 2.44 ERA in 24 games since August 29.

Luis Severino, Sean Manaea and Jose Quintana, each of whom is likely to file for free agency in a few weeks' time, are all hot at the same time.

New York Yankees: Clay Holmes Used to Be a Sure Thing The year Holmes has had pretty much mirrors that of the Yankees in general.

It started out great, but at a certain point things became a grind.

Holmes' ERA was still 0.00 after his first 20 appearances.

It is 4.91 ever since then, and this 13 blown saves put him in territory where not a single reliever went between 1988 and 2023.

Holmes is still a two-time All-Star and he's not entirely outside Aaron Boone's circle of trust.

But whatever he is, he's not an ace closer anymore.

Oakland Athletics: Lawrence Butler Looks Like a Building Block Butler wasn't on many radars coming into this year, and the A's even banished him to the minors for about a month between May 13 and June 18.

At the time, his major league OPS was .555.

Since his resurfacing, though, he's hit .300 with 20 home runs while going 15-for-15 in stolen bases.

Never mind just one of Oakland's best players.

The 24-year-old has been one of the top players in the American League.

Philadelphia Phillies: Taijuan Walker Has Gone Full Bust The Phillies have lived a charmed life in 2024, getting both good offense and good pitching as they grabbed the NL East lead early and then ran away with it.

The back end of their rotation has nonetheless been a persistent annoyance, and that comes down to Walker.

Signed to a four-year, $72 million contract before the 2023 season, the righty has been eminently hittable in racking up a 7.10 ERA in 19 appearances this year.

Pittsburgh Pirates: It Was a Good/Bad Year for Oneil Cruz The Pirates might not have anticipated Paul Skenes having a historic rookie season .

But then again, maybe they did.

He was their No.

1 pick just last year, after all.

As to other centerpieces, it's been a weird year for Cruz.

On the one hand, his .786 OPS, 21 homers and 22 stolen bases prove he can be an impact offensive producer.

On the other, he played his way off shortstop and he hasn't exactly looked like a natural in center field.

San Diego Padres: Their Best Hitter Is...Jurickson Profar? Personally, I kept waiting for it.

You know, for the inevitable slump that would dislodge Profar from his place among MLB's top hitters.

It felt like it just had to happen.

Yet it never did.

The only time he really came close to slumping was in August, yet that's behind him now.

He still leads the Padres with a .382 on-base percentage, and his 29 batting runs are basically the inverse of the minus-34 batting runs he had entering 2024.

San Francisco Giants: Camilo Doval Has Pulled a 180 The range of outcomes before the Giants seemed limitless at the outset of this season, but they at least seemed to have some predictability in the ninth inning.

That would be home to Doval, who led the NL with 39 saves last season.

Like Diaz and Holmes, though, Doval has had a rough one.

His ERA has shot up from 2.93 to 5.05, and there isn't another NL pitcher who has added more to his walk rate from 2023 to 2024.

And with 10 runs allowed in 11 September appearances, it's not getting better.

Seattle Mariners: It Took Until September for Julio Rodriguez to Show Up To be fair, Rodriguez did his darndest to get the Mariners into the postseason.

Go back 26 games to August 28, and he's hitting .359 with nine home runs.

Until that date, however, the two-time All-Star was sitting on just a .660 OPS for the year.

That was close to 200 points below his normal operating level across 2022 and 2023.

You just have to wonder where Seattle would be now if he'd gotten hot just a little sooner.

St.

Louis Cardinals: Paul Goldschmidt and Nolan Arenado Never Really Showed Up It's nuts to think that it was only two years ago that Goldschmidt and Arenado teamed up for 65 home runs and 15.4 WAR , resulting in them occupying two of the top three slots in the NL MVP voting.

A downturn in 2023 might have rearranged the Cardinals' expectations for the two stars, but that doesn't make this year any less of a bummer.

Indeed, Goldschmidt and Arenado haven't even been even a league-average duo in combining for 37 homers and 3.3 WAR .

Tampa Bay Rays: They Remain Undefeated at Finding Pitching The Rays have never felt especially relevant this year, yet they've also never gone further than five games below .500.

It took until Wednesday for them to get eliminated from the playoff field.

More recently, a pitching staff mostly made up of unknowns has posted the second-lowest ERA of the second half at 3.19.

It's classic Rays, as they've consistently ranked in the top half of the American League in ERA even as their cast of characters has constantly changed.

Texas Rangers: Their Offense Went the Same Way as Atlanta's Granted, the offense the Rangers had in 2023 wasn't quite as good as Atlanta's.

But it was still scary, going off for 233 home runs even before they used the dinger to cut a path through October to World Series glory.

The Rangers are nonetheless the AL's answer to Atlanta's offensive decline .

And nobody has fallen off more than Adolis Garcia, who's gone from an .836 OPS and 39 homers to a .679 OPS and 24 homers.

Toronto Blue Jays: A Totally Lost Year for Bo Bichette The Blue Jays were only ever going to contend in 2024 if everything went right, up to and including Bichette recovering from an injury-marred second half in 2023.

The opposite happened, of course.

The two-time All-Star shortstop is going to end up playing only half a season because of injuries , and he's otherwise one of the five biggest offensive decliners from 2023 to 2024.

Washington Nationals: The Year They Won the Juan Soto Trade It's never fun to trade a franchise player, and doing so carries the risk of the move aging poorly.

Just ask the Red Sox, who reaped next to nothing from their trade of Mookie Betts.

Mercifully, the 2022 trade of Soto has gone the other way for the Nationals.

Of the many pieces in that deal, this year saw CJ Abrams become an All-Star, James Wood enjoy a rookie breakout and lefty MacKenzie Gore strike out 172 batters in 160.1 innings.

All three are 25 and under and controlled through at least 2027.

Stats courtesy of Baseball Reference , FanGraphs and Baseball Savant ..

This article has been shared from the original article on bleacherreport, here is the link to the original article.