My breakout picks for the MLB season.

Federal Baseball

A breakout pick is not someone who has had a 4 fWAR season already, or a sub 3 era. I am not going to choose a regular breakout pick like Grant Taylor, a true breakout would be like a Stowers. I have applied some rules for choosing these players.

• No current top 100 prospects (MLB pipeline)
• No players with a 1.5+ fWAR season

Breakout Pick #1: Liam Hicks

MLB Baseball

Age: 26.9

Team: MIA

Position: C/1B

2025 Stats: .247/.346/.346, 6 HR, wOBA 0.313, xwOBA 0.315, fWAR: 1.0

Hicks was very exceptional at the plate with his discipline; though he lacked power, he still made very smart decisions at the plate. He said recently in an interview on the Marlins Hot Stove Show that he needed to get stronger; he put on 15 LB of weight in hopes of “swinging harder.” Liam Hicks was in the 5th percentile last year in terms of Hard Hit% and Bat speed (67.9 MPH)

Data from Baseball Savant

Liam Hicks was not fooled by pitches outside of the zone, he posted a O-swing of (17.5%) With that he was not swinging and missing much either, SwStr (5.7%) and a whiff of (15.1%). If he can tack on some power he would fill that much needed tool to go along his very good skill set at the plate. Let’s say Hicks did add some power, I would project him to break double digits in the home run column and hopefully be able to pull the ball a bit more than his mark in 2025 (14.9).

Breakout Pick #2: Clayton Beeter

Age 27.9

Team: WAS

Position: Relief Pitcher

2025 Stats: 25.1 IP, 4.26 ERA, 4.20 FIP, 1.22 WHIP, 14.4% K-BB, 0.2 fWAR

Beeter was traded for Amed Rosario on July 26, 2025, to the Washington Nationals. He then made his debut for the Nats on August 5th. He was nothing but nails. He posted a 2.49 ERA in that time. Over that time, his slider was the top pitch for Beeter, generating an insane 49.1 whiff% and 24.8 SwStr%. The righty does lack command, which, despite his insane K-rate (31.7%), would be hard to keep up with his BB rate also so high (17.9%).

His movement profile is a very hard cut ride fastball (97.5 mph 17 iVB, 2 HB) which he delivers from a high slot that he creates a very flat approach angle on (-4.2 VAA). His secondary pitch is a hard short slider at 87 MPH that kind of resembles a gyro at -5 iVB / -4 HB.

Data from Baseball Savant

Despite his control issues, the moves made by the Nationals assure me that better days will be ahead. Toboni brings the Red Sox’s Philosophy of not throwing bad fastballs. Despite his fastball popping out in the stuff+ model, it did not get the results the slider got. As of now, in spring training 2026, Beeter has increased his slider usage from 46% to 70%!!!! Although it is spring training, that should be a sign to come for the future.

2025 Stats from Thomas Nestico on his website TJstats.ca

I project Beeter with no Finnegan and Ferrer to be the high leverage and back end of the bullpen coming in the 8th or 9th inning in save or dire need situations.

Breakout Pick #3 : Juan Mejia

Kelley L Cox-Imagn Images

Age 25.8

Team: COL

Position: Relief Pitcher

2025 Stats: 3.96 ERA, 3.71 FIP, 1.26 WHIP, 16.5 K-BB%, 0.7 fWAR

Mejia was signed as an international free agent out of the Dominican Republic in May of 2017. He made his debut for the Rockies on April 24th against the Kansas City Royals. He pitched 1 inning, 1 strikeout that game on a slider, and one unearned run. It is hard to predict whether a pitcher will break out, considering they pitch half of their games at the most hitter-friendly park in all of baseball.

But I feel like Mejia is different, despite giving up a 5.98 ERA at home, his underlying metrics say he is due for positive regression, 3.98 FIP, and 3.68 xFIP. He comes with a mini cutter (12 iVB, 1 HB) and a slider, but it does move like a sweeper (1 iVB, 14 HB). He has the ability to add more pitches which will help since he gets around the ball and he is a supinator (72.3 spin eff%) on his fastball.

Data from Baseball Savant.

Colorado, like Washington, also brought in new faces to lead the pitching staff. Alon Leichman was the assistant pitching coach for the Miami Marlins. He helped call pitches from the dugout in the last 2 weeks of Miami. He was then poached by Colorado in the offseason and given the Head pitching coach job. I believe Alon is one of the better PCs in the game. He helped Mejia get behind the ball a bit more to make his fastball play more as a fastball as opposed to a cutter. His sweeper gained almost 4 inches of glove side movement, which should help well when he pitches at sea level and also at Coors. Mejia also came to camp with 2 more pitches, a cutter and a changeup, despite only being thrown 6 times combined.

2026 ST movement plots by TJstats.

Mejia can piggyback after a good year ( in Rockies standards) and carry off that momentum and bring it into the 2026 season. He posted an average exit velocity of 85.5, which will always play when you play for the Rockies, pitching at Coors Field. I project he can be right around a 3.5 era, maybe even sub 3.5? Time will tell as he will be towards the back end of the bullpen after a good year.

Thank you for taking the time to read. This was a fairly quick one, not much. I wanted to get 3 guys I felt really confident in. These guys, I think, have the best shot to break out after an offseason full of work and new management/coaching arriving. I have been MIA in terms of articles on this website, but fairly active on X, where I post plots and breakdowns every now and then. I hope to be more active when I get this coding situation down and be able to pump out more of my content rather than using other people’s stuff.

Data from Baseball Savant

Data from tjstats.ca