Rookies of the Year: Sentimental Value

 

Just because I called both of these doesn't mean that I agree with them.

Of any of these awards, the Rookie of the Year award is the most likely to vex me, because the MLB has managed to make so many rules to classify what makes a 'great rookie', which they don't always follow. Like, a rookie can debut midway through the year and not get a Topps rookie card until the following year yet still qualify for the award, yet if they appear in games in one season that isn't full and make a definitive impact while they're there, they can't qualify. Luis Gil and Randy Arozarena did not deserve Rookie of the Year awards because they weren't rookies. Luckily, both Nick Kurtz and Drake Baldwin made the cutoff for Topps Update, and played almost the entire season in the majors, so there's no loopholes or anything there.

It really comes down to nuance. Can you definitively say that this player made the most impact of any first-year player in the league? One of these, I say absolutely. The other is more complicated. 

Nick Kurtz is the one I agree with, because for a month and a half he was one of the single best hitters in baseball, and finished the year with a 1.002 OPS. Kurtz hit 36 home runs and 86 RBIs in 117 games, the majority of those homers coming in an unbelievable midyear stretch. Said stretch also included an absolutely wild four-homer game against the Astros. The A's are a rebuilding team putting down a ton of great young players they can build on, and Kurtz is absolutely one of them. It's even to the point where Kurtz lapped Jacob Wilson, an early-season ROY candidate who started the All-Star game for the AL but struggled after getting hurt in said game. Wilson and Kurtz were both important to the A's season, but Kurtz is the next step for the A's towards competing again, and you can see it already. So him I completely agree with. That's absolutely the Rookie of the Year in the AL.

It's Drake Baldwin that is confusing me. Because I don't know what he really represents in regards to shifting the story of the season.

Let's look at Drake Baldwin in context of the 2025 Atlanta Braves. Baldwin is the 3rd-best Brave statistically, after Matt Olson and Chris Sale. Sale was limited by injuries for about a month or so. The majority of the Braves that would have lapped Baldwin's 3.3 WAR, such as Ronald Acuna, Spencer Schwellenbach or even Jurickson Profar, Reynaldo Lopez or Spencer Strider, were all limited by injuries. Most crucially, the team's starting catcher, Sean Murphy, who is the highest paid catcher in baseball by the way, missed some time due to injuries early, then only hit .194 the rest of the season, despite continuing to be an excellent defensive catcher. 

It comes down to this: if the Braves do not have an absolutely cursed year, Drake Baldwin does not get chances to start, and does not become a major player for this team. Further, even with the opportunities given to him during this cursed season, Drake Baldwin was only an ensemble piece of this Braves team. The Braves were not the Drake Baldwin show this season, like the A's were the Nick Kurtz show, because the Braves still relied on Matt Olson, Ronald Acuna, Grant Holmes, Michael Harris and Hurston Waldrep. Baldwin was, at the very least, reliable, hitting .274 with 19 homers and 80 RBIs, with slightly-below-average defensive numbers. He was a solid piece of a Braves team that was doomed from the start, and Baldwin made them only slightly less doomed than they already were. Considering the fact that Sean Murphy is still on this team, and is better defensively, I genuinely do not know if the Braves will get 5 to 10 more years of Drake Baldwin behind the plate, or even if that's something they want.

To me, the NL's Rookie of the Year this year was Cade Horton. Dude popped into the Chicago rotation midyear, went on an incredible run, became one of their most indispensable pitchers, and made them the low-key wild card juggernaut they became. To the point where they honestly struggled without him in the playoffs. Cade Horton is a big piece of why the Cubs made the playoffs, and a big piece of why they didn't make it to the World Series is that Cade Horton wasn't there every three games. That guy made or broke a season of a major competitor, and that's a more accurate ROY to me. Baldwin was very good for a mediocre team, and took full advantage of the opportunity given to him. 

I knew he'd win Rookie of the Year because sportswriters love that sentimental stuff. Baldwin appeals to the idea in many writers' association guys' heads of 'the guy that pops in unexpectedly and saves the team'. And they don't think it through enough to ask if he really actually saved the team. The people who voted Drake Baldwin to win the Rookie of the Year fell in love with the idea of Drake Baldwin over what Drake Baldwin actually was. And yes, there are lots of Braves fans who can speak to how Baldwin excelled this year, and how he was one of their best pieces, but even they'll admit that he has his limitations, and even they'll admit that they're not sure how much of a ceiling he has. So it's really a vexing outcome.

I could be very wrong, and Cade Horton could be the flash in the pan I was thinking Baldwin would be. But just from where I'm sitting, I think this is a move that won't age well. Still, congrats to both winners. May the glory never end.