Hello, we are the replacements | Baseball Prospectus

Image credit: © Jeff Hanisch-Imagn Images

Translated by Marco Gámez

Very often we look to the future during the winter season: where is it going? [inserta el nombre de un agente libre] And how does that impact your new team’s lineup? But every transaction has two sides–just as important as what awaits a player who moves away are the friends they left behind. How will his previous team handle the production that goes with that player? This year’s group of free agents isn’t really star-studded, but we’ve already seen some of the highest-profile bats change uniforms, such as Willy AdamesTyler O’Neill and a certain Soto you may have heard of. There are respectable hitters who haven’t signed yet, like Christian Walker y Alex Bregman.

Fans and fantasy league players alike will wonder: Who will benefit from those plate appearances left by departed free agents? Which players could step up and make a name for themselves in 2025? Using damage rate to measure the quality of batted balls, a minimum zone contact percentage of 80% as an indicator of the hitting ability tool (read Ben Zeidman’s great primer on the importance of that number here), and SEAGER to grade your swing decisions, we can try to find players with the skills necessary to flourish if given the opportunity next year. Let’s cast some nets and capture some of the most promising names.

Pavin Smith

The Diamondbacks’ ultra-productive lineup has potentially lost several important bats, such as first baseman Christian Walker and designated hitter Game Pederson; the duo that combined for 93 extra-base hits and 148 RBIs as key cogs in the middle of baseball’s highest-scoring offense last season. While it’s feasible that the Snakes could turn to the free agent pool to replace (or re-sign) one or both of these players, the emergence of another hitter late last season provides reason to believe they have a internal solution.

Pavin Smith’s three-homer game that was broadcast on national television on a Sunday night put him in the spotlight, but the reality is that his season was about much more than just that performance. In 447 plate appearances in both Triple-A and the major leagues, Smith displayed a rare combination of contact and power play; he combined a 20% damage rate with a 7.6% swinging strike rate. His proclivities for extra-base hits were augmented by his ability to hit the ball to right field (nearly 11% of all his batted balls were fly balls to the opposite side), which offset his relatively average exit velocities. Combine ball-hitting ability and optimized approach, with swing decisions better than three-quarters of the League, and you have a hitter who checks all the boxes we look for in rising stars.

In Arizona, Smith will likely end up in the big group of hitters used depending on the opposing pitcher’s hand, making him more of a replacement bat for Joc than one for Christian Walker, but he’s a good bet to be productive in the desert, no matter what role he ends up playing.

Ben Rice & Jason Dominguez

A Brian Cashman y Aaron Boone They have been tasked with the impossible this winter. Juan Soto He’s irreplaceable almost by definition, but the Yankees have to find a way to get as much of their offense back as possible. That plan surely involves adding some outside help, but there are some promising potential contributors who have already reached the majors.

You’ve probably heard of Dominguez, also known as The Martian, because he’s been receiving tons of praise for five years. Where there’s smoke, sometimes there’s fire: At three levels (including a rehab stint in low Class-A) Dominguez achieved a 90th percentile exit velocity of 107.5 mph (173 kph), a number that would have ranked between Manny Machado (107.7 mph) (173.3 kph) y Corey Seager (107.4 mph) (172.8 kph) and that he had it in the Majors this season. That prodigious, innate power is accompanied by superb restraint in the batter’s box (13% career walk rate in the minors) and an ever-improving ability to hit the ball with the bat; His contact rate in the zone has improved from 84% to 87% to 91% at all levels over the last three seasons. Even if the contact progress doesn’t last, Dominguez’s combination of power and patience could make him something of an expert on baseball’s so-called three basic outcomes at Yankee Stadium.

Less well known is catcher-turned-first baseman Ben Rice, who, like the aforementioned Pavin Smith, got his chance to star during a three-homer game this season. Unlike Smith, it was essentially downhill from there. However, there is every reason to believe that his lackluster production was due more to bad luck than to too many serious problems. Rice’s 26% damage rate on batted balls puts him in the top 20% of major league hitters. His chase rate (how often batters swing at pitches outside the zone) is in the top 15% of MLB hitters, as is his SEAGER rating.

If those numbers don’t convince you of his latent ability, consider his expected versus actual statistics during his 50-game stint in the majors:

Fifty games is not a reliable sample, but that level of underperformance is surprising to anyone, let alone a left-handed hitter who plays half of his games at Yankee Stadium. I wouldn’t bet on a repeat.

Jerar Encarnacion

The Giants already made a splash by securing the services of their (hopefully) shortstop for good by landing Adames, in order to shore up a position that has been in flux since the fountain of youth dried up for Brandon Crawford. However, they saw Michael Conforto to their rivals, the Dodgers, losing a quality hitter in a lineup that didn’t have many to begin with.

It’s a long shot, but Jerar Encarnacion He showed enough skill in his short time after signing from the Mexican League to receive more opportunity to stand out. His 90th percentile exit velocity during his time in Triple-A and with the major league team was 109.5 mph (176.2 kph), putting him in the company of Yordan Álvarez (109.6 mph) (176.3 kph), Fernando Tatis Jr. (109.5 mph) (176.2 kph) y Kyle Schwarber (109.2) (175.7). His 36% damage rate was in line with Schwarber and Juan Soto. He possesses true game-changing power, but what sets Encarnación apart from other all-or-nothing hitters is that he makes enough contact to carry that power into games with regularity. In 265 plate appearances between the minor leagues and the majors this year, he posted an 82% in-zone contact rate and a 26% strikeout rate. For the level of damage it causes on contact, those numbers are perfectly respectable.

Encarnación’s path to playing time depends largely on how San Francisco uses its designated hitter spot, but considering him an above-average everyday player isn’t too far-fetched.