Two 2025 predictions for every MLB team: American League East
Spring Training is fast-approaching, here are two predictions for every team in the American League East.
The beauty of baseball is its randomness.
While there are factors and warning signs that can predict future performance, the game's year-to-year parity creates fascinating storylines.
It’s not always in a positive manner either. Stars regress, sometimes heavily, after truly elite seasons. On the flip side, sometimes a player who looks like a bust can redeem himself in a big way.
Starting with the American League East, here are two predictions — one positive and one negative — for each team ahead of the 2025 season.
Starting with the reigning AL champions.
New York Yankees
Positive - LHP Carlos Rodón is the team’s best SP in 2025
When general manager Brian Cashman inked the southpaw to a six-year deal ahead of 2023, he expected Rodón to be an All-Star caliber arm.
Unfortunately for them, that hasn’t been the case thanks to injuries and inconsistent performance.
However, after the All-Star Break, the 32-year-old posted a 2.91 earned run average in 12 starts. During that stretch, he basically eliminated the cutter — opponents hit .353 against it — from his arsenal while increasing his changeup and curveball.
Diversifying his repertoire even more could do him some good as well, but coming off of a fully healthy campaign as opposed to a nightmarish 14-start 2023 will have his body better equipped to maintain peak performance.
I expect him to outplay his current projections, posting an ERA around 3.40 with over 200 strikeouts in 2025.
Negative - OF Aaron Judge is the only hitter with 150+ plate appearances and a wRC+ over 115
The Yankees have had a busy offseason despite losing All-World hitter Juan Soto to the New York Mets. However, their lineup still isn’t super impressive beyond Judge.
Giancarlo Stanton is another year older, Jazz Chisholm is good but never sustainably a very valuable bat, Anthony Volpe has shown no signs of being an above-average hitter, and newcomers Cody Bellinger and Paul Goldschmidt are adults in the room but not the caliber you’re scared of in 2025.
Judge will still dominate, among if not the best hitters in the sport, but the rest of the Yankees lineup is just OK.
Baltimore Orioles
Positive - Tyler O’Neill will have a better 2025 than Anthony Santander’s 2024
Let me stop you before you call me crazy: I don’t mean O’Neill will threaten the 50-homer plateau. I’m saying that, on a rate basis, the veteran corner outfielder will post better than the 2024 markings of the switch-hitting Santander.
The two were pretty on par in 2024 as it is, but with anticipated more volume from O’Neill, I think the changes he made to his swing and running — essentially going to the Stanton School of Not Sprinting — are sticky and will preserve his body as he ages.
I think O’Neill plays in the neighborhood of 130 games, especially with more opportunities to DH, and challenges a 140 wRC+ with 40 homers. I also think he’s a dark horse candidate to represent the Orioles at the All-Star Game.
With Baltimore bringing the left-field fence in again, the fit is just tremendous.
Negative — RHP Grayson Rodriguez’s Year 3 leap isn’t significant enough to anchor the rotation
Rodriguez is an intriguing arm with a lively heater and a knack for wracking up the punchouts.
He also saw a 2.2 percent increase in his strikeout-to-walk rate in his sophomore season.
That said, this year brings new expectations. There was an expected learning curve in 2023, he had Corbin Burnes ahead of him in 2024. This year, he’s got Zach Eflin, but I don’t think the Orioles rotation can be great without Rodriguez emerging as the bonafide Ace of the staff.
I don’t think the Orioles rotation, or Rodriguez himself, ends up being bad, but the staff is more in the 12-to-15 range of the league as opposed to in the five-to-seven range.
Boston Red Sox
Positive: Rafael Devers finally eclipses the 40-homer plateau
It’s been a long time coming for Devers, who has three 30-homer seasons including 38 in 2021. It seemed as if the 2024 campaign would be the franchise face’s first taste of that mark before injuries became too much to bear in the second half.
At the All-Star Break, Devers was homering at a 38-homer pace prorated over his season total 138 games. However, he finished with just 28.
A healthy Devers has become hard to fathom in the second half of recent seasons, but with potentially more opportunities to be a designated hitter, he can buck that trend and give the Red Sox 145 to 150 games of excellence.
Negative: Catcher defense remains among the worst in baseball
Connor Wong said he wanted to become a much better defender this winter. However, given where he found himself at the end of 2024, it’s hard to imagine a world where even a dramatic improvement thrusts him into the top half of the league’s catchers in blocking and framing.
The Red Sox also traded for Carlos Narvaez and claimed Blake Sabol off waivers. While the former is a glove-first option, it’s uncertain if the bat is viable to take a sizeable chunk of playing time. The former can hit a little bit, but the glove was well below-average in his one full MLB season.
Tampa Bay Rays
Positive: The rotation is healthy and among the five-best in Major League Baseball
Even though the Rays traded Jeffrey Springs to the Athletics, they still have a surplus of talent in their rotation with Shane McClanahan, Taj Bradley, Ryan Pepiot, Shane Baz and Drew Rasmussen.
Not to mention Zack Littell has a 3.56 ERA and a 17.0% strikeout-to-walk rate in 43 starts since Tampa Bay claimed him from the Red Sox in 2023.
That rotation is full of potential, even if it takes McClanahan time to return to pre-surgery form. That group will be annoying for opposing hitters.
Negative: The offense doesn’t generate enough power to consistently score runs
Individually, the Rays have a lot of talent in their lineup. Whether it be the rather unknown Junior Caminero, Josh Lowe or veterans Yandy Diaz and Brandon Lowe, there’s potential for that lineup to play up in 2025.
However, there’s also a generous amount of swing-and-miss to their repertoire and while someone like Caminero is immensely talented, I’m not too sure a projected middle third featuring Christopher Morel and Danny Jansen can anchor a team to a top 10 to 12 offense.
Toronto Blue Jays
Positive: Vladimir Guerrero Jr. stacks elite seasons for the first time
In what could be his final season in Toronto, though reports indicate there’s ongoing dialogue between the two parties on an extension, Guerrero is poised to net a hefty pay-day with another season the caliber of his 2024.
However, he’s yet to stack consecutive seasons as an elite hitter. Yes, he followed up his 2021 with a 132 wRC+ and 32 homers, but his fWAR almost halved and his walks decreased with an increase in Strike 3.
Coming off a season with a 165 wRC+, Guerrero was in a potentially problematic spot being the only truly feared hitter in his lineup. That was until Toronto inked outfielder Anthony Santander — who hit 44 homers in 2024 — to a five-year deal Monday.
Having him protect Guerrero should create more RBI chances for the star first baseman in his age-26 season.
Negative: Kevin Gausman continues downward trend
Don’t get me wrong, Gausman is still a very capable pitcher and even amidst some nagging stuff last season turned out a year that a lot of pitchers would kill for. However, he’s 34 years old and his strikeouts dropped nearly 10% on a rate basis from 2023 to 2024.
A low strikeout rate coupled with a low ground ball rate, pitching in the American League East, doesn’t seem like a recipe for great success.
I don’t think he’s going to have an ERA around five, but I could see it trend into the low-four-range.
