Julio Rodríguez Joins What May Turn into a Bumper Crop of 30-30 Players

In the second, the house run was large. With the Mariners trailing 5-3 within the backside of the tenth inning in opposition to the Angels on Monday night time, needing a win to remain half a recreation forward of the Rangers within the race for the third AL Wild Card spot, Julio Rodríguez chased a low sinker from José Marte and swatted it over the middle subject wall into the No Fly Zone, the non-public cheering part of T-Mobile Park the place the J-Rod Squad sits. The 402-foot blast was Rodríguez’s thirtieth of the 12 months, that means that it not solely tied the sport, it made the 22-year-old heart fielder the third-youngest participant to affix the 30-homer, 30-steal membership.

Counting to the purpose the place the gamers joined the membership by reaching the second milestone, solely Mike Trout (21 years, 54 days in 2012) and Ronald Acuña Jr. (21 years, 248 days in 2019) reached 30 homers and 30 stolen bases in the identical season at a youthful age. Alex Rodriguez, like Julio Rodríguez, reached the mark in his age-22 season — and is the one different Mariner to perform the feat, however he was 23 years and three days previous when he notched his thirtieth steal in 1998.

The bummer of all of it was that the Angels scored three runs within the prime of the eleventh, and the Mariners went down so as within the backside of the body, dropping 8-5 and dropping half a recreation under the Rangers, with the Blue Jays (whom the Rangers beat on Monday) simply one other half a recreation forward. Understandably, that left Rodríguez in a less-than-celebratory temper. Via the Seattle Times’ Ryan Divish, he mentioned, “You know me, you know what I’m about whenever I step on field… It’s tough to talk about the good things you are doing, when us collectively, we’re not doing good. It is always about winning first for me. That’s why we’re here. As cool as it sounds, the 30-30 club, what I’m about is winning.”

The excellent news is that Tuesday night time’s wins by the Mariners and Rangers left Seattle and Toronto each 80-65, tied for the third AL Wild Card spot, half a recreation under the 80-64 Rangers. The Astros (82-65) are just one recreation forward of the Rangers and 1.5 forward of the Mariners in a wild three-team race for the West. As for Rodríguez, he grew to become the forty fourth participant to succeed in 30-30, matching his jersey quantity (“That’s a really cool stat,” he famous). The feat has been achieved a complete of 67 occasions, and that quantity could possibly be rising. In reality, this 12 months there’s an opportunity we could get a file variety of 30-30 members.

Rodríguez is the second participant to succeed in 30-30 this season, after Acuña, who hit his thirtieth homer on August 31 to go together with what was then 61 steals (he added his 62nd later in that recreation). That was already an unprecedented mixture, and with six homers and three steals since, he’s as much as 36 of the previous and 65 of the latter, with sights set on the primary 40-70 season in main league historical past. Meanwhile, 4 different gamers at the moment have at the least 25 homers and 25 steals, giving them cheap photographs of reaching 30 in each classes, and two others have an out of doors likelihood of crashing the get together as effectively.

To give us an concept of what their chances are high, I not solely included every participant’s rest-of-season ZiPS projection, I requested Dan Szymborski to provide ZiPS odds on them reaching 30 in every class and finishing the combo. I additionally requested him to supply odds for Acuña reaching 40 homers and 70 steals:

Two factors are value making an allowance for. First, these odds don’t account for human nature within the type of the likelihood {that a} participant nearing the stolen base milestone would possibly begin making an attempt to steal extra continuously, an motion that’s rather more inside his management than, say, a sudden want to hit extra homers (which often doesn’t finish effectively). Second, every participant’s house run and stolen base odds aren’t completely impartial, as a result of when a participant homers, he’s disadvantaged of an opportunity to succeed in base and steal — although that’s a tradeoff most gamers (and their groups) would make.

With that out of the best way, a couple of factors about every of the possible 30-30 members.

• Witt has already banked one of many two milestones, and is the one hopeful whose rest-of-season projection pushes him over the road; the remaining have to do higher than their median projections — which is usually what good and nice gamers do. If not for Acuña, Witt’s stolen base complete could be the very best for any 30-homer participant since Mike Trout swiped 49 luggage in 2012.
• Tucker, who has hit precisely 30 homers in every of the previous two seasons, has his work lower out to make it a threepeat in that class, however however, he’s already set a brand new profession excessive in steals and has been profitable at an 84.9% clip this 12 months, which is nice (however not one of the best right here).
• Turner had 12 homers via his first 120 video games with the Phillies however has been on a rampage recently, hitting 14 in his previous 21 and batting .400/.439/.933 (257 wRC+) in that span. Thanks to his homer and steal in opposition to the Braves on Tuesday night time, his odds of reaching 30-30 greater than tripled from the day earlier than, from 2.9% to 9.3%. He has an affordable shot of finishing what he fell wanting doing in 2021, when he hit 28 homers and stole 32 bases. Just as notable as his scorching streak is the truth that he not solely has an excellent higher stolen base success fee than Tucker or Lindor, he has but to be caught stealing this season — one thing I had not realized till scripting this after which checking to substantiate that sure, Michael Baumann lined that floor on Tuesday. Nobody within the post-1960 growth period has been excellent whereas stealing greater than 23 bases; Chase Utley went 23-for-23 in 2009, a cornerstone season in his upcoming Hall of Fame case.
• Lindor has set a brand new carer excessive in steals as effectively. In reality, his complete is as many as he had in 2021 and ’22 mixed, which explains why his odds to succeed in 30 in that class are so low; ZiPS doesn’t suppose he can maintain this clip. His 92.9% success fee (26-for-28) suggests in any other case, so I’d take into account that 5% likelihood of reaching the membership to be a major underestimate.
• After homering on Tuesday night time in opposition to the Dodgers, Tatis wants six extra, and his monitor file suggests he can produce a flurry of them. That leaves him with a combating likelihood of becoming a member of the membership in what has in any other case been one thing of a disappointing season after lacking all of final 12 months on account of accidents and a PED suspension.
• Carroll is the opposite hopeful in addition to Witt who’s already reached one of many milestones, and he too has an elite stolen base success fee (90.4%). However, he’s hit simply six homers since his early July proper shoulder points, together with solely two in August and one in September, so it appears unlikely he’ll instantly rediscover his energy and regain misplaced floor.

As for Rodríguez, his membership within the membership is only one aspect of an unbelievable second half (.353/.398/.656, 189 wRC+) that has made up for a tepid first half (.249/.306/.411, 100 wRC+). The surge has pushed him to six.0 WAR, 0.6 forward of his Rookie of the Year marketing campaign and second amongst AL place gamers behind solely Shohei Ohtani. If not for the two-way surprise, he’d be battling the red-hot Corey Seager for MVP votes. And after all, the truth that he’s doing this because the Mariners are battling for a playoff spot is all of the extra spectacular.

Speaking of MVP votes, Acuña’s milestone combo could assist him stave off a late cost from Mookie Betts, who has taken over the most important league WAR lead (8.0 to 7.1 for Acuña) and the NL wRC+ lead (173 to 168). Already he’s simply the third participant to steal at the least 50 bases whereas hitting at the least 30 homers, after Eric Davis (37 homers, 50 steals in 1987) and Barry Bonds (33 homers and 52 steals in 1990), in addition to one in every of 14 gamers to succeed in 30-30 a number of occasions. Bonds shares the file with father Bobby Bonds at 5 occasions apiece. Regardless of what number of extra bases he steals, if Acuña does attain 40 homers, he’ll change into simply the fifth member of the 40-40 membership, after Jose Canseco (1988), the youthful Bonds (1996), A-Rod (1998), and Alfonso Soriano (2006)

Back to the aspiring 30-30 members, the almost definitely final result is that one or two of those gamers attain the twin milestones. If two accomplish that, that might tie the one season file, which has been reached 3 times, however simply as soon as on this millennium:

What’s driving this 12 months’s potential bumper crop is the return of the stolen base because of the brand new guidelines — specifically the pitch clock, the restrict on pickoff throws, and the marginally bigger bases — at a time when house run charges are close to their all-time excessive. Stolen base makes an attempt per recreation are up 32% over final 12 months, from 0.68 per recreation to 0.9 (notice that each one of those charges are expressed as per group per recreation). We haven’t seen gamers run this usually since 2011, after they tried 0.93 steals per recreation, and just one different time on this millennium have they been above 0.9 (2001, additionally 0.93), the place they have been above 1.0 yearly from 1975–97. With stolen base success charges at an all-time excessive of 80.1%, profitable steals per recreation are up 40% over final 12 months, from 0.51 per recreation to 0.72, the very best fee since 1997 (0.73).

Meanwhile, the speed of 1.22 homers per recreation is the fifth-highest ever, having risen from 1.16 since I checked in on the All-Star break, however nonetheless effectively off the file of 1.39 house run per recreation set in 2019. Thus the speed of house runs plus steals per recreation is the very best ever, with the bizarre house run spike of 1987 driving the next-highest fee:

While Rodríguez may get to 40 steals, the heavy lifting of reaching main milestones in these classes is finished for now. Still, I can’t wait to see what else he has in retailer for us this season.