5 MLB Teams That Will Surprise and 5 Teams That Will Disappoint in 2025
The Colorado Rockies and Tampa Bay Rays have not yet played their first game of the 2025 Major League Baseball season, so let's squeeze in one last bit of preseason predictions, shall we?
Declaring surprises and disappointments is always a fun one to bookmark for later in the year, when, inevitably, one of the surprise picks is hanging out in the basement of its division while one of the disappointment picks has cemented itself as a top-five candidate to win the World Series.
But most of these predictions will be correct.
Probably.
To ensure we bounced around the country with these 10 selections, a minimum of one team from each division is included, as well as a minimum of three teams from each "region"—i.e. at least three combined teams from the AL Central and NL Central.
Surprises are teams that should finish multiple games above their win total line, while disappointments should finish multiple games below it. (Though, it's worth noting win totals sum to 2,439 and there are only 2,430 games in a season. Hope springs eternal in spring, but maybe hammer some unders?)
PECOTA projections and DraftKings win totals for each team were captured on Wednesday morning.
Surprise No. 1: Cincinnati Reds
1 of 10
2024 Record: 77-85
2025 Win Total Line: 78.5
2025 PECOTA Projection: 74.3 wins
First things first, the Reds should have had a winning record last year.
That's not even an "If they had stayed moderately healthy" hypothetical statement. The math says it. Their Pythagorean record was 82-80, as they scored more runs than they allowed. In that sense alone, they were one of the unluckiest teams in the majors, only the woebegone White Sox posting an actual record (41-121) more games behind their Pythagorean record (48-114).
But they also had rough luck as far as player availability was concerned. Matt McLain missed the entire season. Christian Encarnacion-Strand played in just 29 games. Noelvi Marte was suspended for half the season and only played in 66 games. TJ Friedl managed to play in 85. That's a combined total of 180 games played out of a possible 648 from what may well have been 3 through 6 in the order.
That seems relevant.
Most of the starting rotation spent at least some time on the shelf, too, most notably Hunter Greene missing six weeks late in the season right as he was beginning to creep onto the NL Cy Young radar.
Ten of the 11 players who made at least 200 plate appearances (plus McLain and Encarnacion-Strand) are back for Cincinnati. The only exception is Jonathan India, who it traded for Brady Singer to improve the rotation. The Reds also acquired Gavin Lux, Jose Trevino and Austin Hays, added Taylor Rogers to the bullpen and brought Terry Francona out of retirement to oversee what they've got brewing.
They probably won't win the NL Central, but they will get back to a winning record and at least put up a fight for a playoff spot.
Disappointment No. 1: Minnesota Twins
2 of 10
2024 Record: 82-80
2025 Win Total Line: 84.5
2025 PECOTA Projection: 87.4 wins
It's apparent from the win totals among the non-White Sox portion of the AL Central—Minnesota at 84.5, Detroit and Kansas City at 83.5 and Cleveland at 82.5—that this division is as wide open as it gets.
Might as well just throw a D4 and see where that gets you for forecasting a winner.
Why the Twins, though?
What part of their offseason brought so many people from "They finished in fourth place, 10.5 games back last season" all the way around to the "But I think they're the team to beat" way of thinking?
Was it the Pohlad family announcing in October that it wants to sell the team, and then recently claiming to be several hundred millions dollars in debt, per The Athletic?
Or was it the five months in between, during which time they just about indisputably lost more production (Carlos Santana and Max Kepler) than they gained (Ty France, Danny Coulombe and Harrison Bader)?
If the assumption with this "84.5 wins" line is that Royce Lewis, Byron Buxton and Carlos Correa will combine to play in about 84.5 percent of possible games in 2025, maybe I could get behind that projection. But don't we know better by now than to believe that will happen? One-third of that oft-injured big three is already on the shelf, Lewis opening the year on the IL with a moderate hamstring strain.
More than anything, that's the hurdle I can't get past.
Buxton hasn't made 400 plate appearances in a season since 2017. Lewis has yet to reach that mark in his career. Correa's medical records were problematic enough to make multiple franchises back out of a long-term offer a few offseasons ago. Yet, FanGraphs has each one projected for at least 500 plate appearances.
Can we just bet against that happening instead of the win total?
Surprise No. 2: Boston Red Sox
3 of 10
2024 Record: 81-81
2025 Win Total Line: 86.5
2025 PECOTA Projection: 80.0 wins
Spoiler alert: We've got two AL East Disappointments coming up later on the list, so we'd better balance the scales a bit with a positive surprise pick from that division.
Now, by no means is that one of the main reasons for rolling with the Red Sox here, but not buying what half of the other teams in the division are selling does make it a little easier to be all-in on Boston.
The pool of talent Boston has in its lineup after the addition of Alex Bregman is slightly absurd. Connor Wong had a .758 OPS last season, and he's probably going to spend most of the season batting eighth or ninth. Roman Anthony might be the best prospect in all of baseball, and he opens the year at Triple-A Worcester, along with Masataka Yoshida, who now needs to be able to handle playing the field with Rafael Devers serving as the primary DH.
On the pitching front, they'll eventually have both Lucas Giolito in the rotation and Liam Hendriks at closer after they missed all of last season. They also added Garrett Crochet, Walker Buehler and Aroldis Chapman this offseason.
FanGraphs now rates Boston's starting rotation as fourth-best and its bullpen as ninth-best. Given how unimpressive this pitching staff has been over the past six years, allowing the seventh-most total runs in the majors, what a drastic difference that would be.
If the Red Sox actually do end up with a top-five rotation and a top-10 bullpen to go along with what might be a top-five lineup, that should be enough to flirt with 100 wins, no?
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Disappointment No. 2: San Diego Padres
4 of 10
2024 Record: 93-69
2025 Win Total Line: 85.5
2025 PECOTA Projection: 85.7 wins
For the time being, let's assume the Padres aren't going to have a fire sale at the trade deadline—that they aren't going to unload all of Dylan Cease, Michael King, Luis Arraez and Robert Suarez before subsequently devolving from a roughly .500 team into one that loses nearly two out of every three games, a la the 2021 Chicago Cubs—even though you almost have to believe it to be a possibility.
Do they have enough on the roster to win at least 86 games and try to contend with the Dodgers and Diamondbacks in the NL West?
It's plausible, sure.
Cease and King could repeat the 2024 campaign that resulted in Cy Young votes for each of them. Jackson Merrill could avoid the dreaded sophomore slump while starring in center field again. Perhaps their biggest (by far) offseason acquisition, Nick Pivetta, benefits from the move to Petco Park and posts a sub-4.00 ERA for the first time in his career.
However, it feels like an awful lot needs to go right in order for this team to come anywhere close to matching what it did last year. And opening the season with starting pitchers Yu Darvish (elbow) and Matt Waldron (oblique) on the IL isn't a great first step in that direction.
The Padres already lost Ha-Seong Kim, Jurickson Profar, Kyle Higashioka and Donovan Solano in free agency and didn't do much of anything about it. Maybe Elias Diaz matches Higashioka's production from last season, but the chances of a Jason Heyward/Connor Joe platoon making San Diego forget about how valuable Profar was last season are quite slim.
They still have several big time stars in the lineup, but a sharp decline in teamwide offensive production is a distinct possibility here, particularly if any of the core six spend time on the IL.
They also kind of ignored losing Joe Musgrove for the year six months ago? Pivetta was more of a Martín Pérez replacement than a Musgrove replacement, but he's indisputably the No. 3 starter now with both Darvish and Waldron out.
Fingers crossed with some combination of Randy Vásquez, Stephen Kolek and Kyle Hart at Nos. 4 and 5 in the rotation for the foreseeable future.
Surprise No. 3: Athletics
5 of 10
2024 Record: 69-93
2025 Win Total Line: 71.5
2025 PECOTA Projection: 71.8 wins
One gigantic variable with this team that no one quite knows how to even attempt to account for is how this whole "temporary home in a Triple-A stadium in West Sacramento" factor is going to impact the play of the formerly Oakland, not-yet Las Vegas Athletics.
If nothing was changing on that front, there would be no doubt in my mind that the A's win at least three more games than they did last season.
They didn't lose anyone from last year's roster more consequential than middle reliever Scott Alexander, and they added a ton. The A's traded for Jeffrey Springs, signed Luis Severino, José Leclerc, Dylan Floro, Gio Urshela and Luis Urías and they're expecting a whole lot more out of rookie shortstop Jacob Wilson after his cup of coffee in the majors last fall.
Severino and Springs are the big ones, as this rotation was rather dreadful last season.
Honestly, how is upgrading from 32 starts' worth of Ross Stripling (85.1 IP, 6.01 ERA), Joe Boyle (47.2 IP, 6.42 ERA) and Alex Wood (39.1 IP, 5.26 ERA) to Severino and Springs not worth at least a few wins for this franchise?
Also, while we don't know how the venue change will impact the team, can Sutter Health Park really be any worse than playing home games in front of a mostly empty and dilapidated O.Co?
Fans are understandably furious with the change, but less raw sewage in the dugouts and fewer possums in the press box might be a plus for the players' day-to-day attitude toward coming to the park.
Will they flirt with a playoff spot or an AL West crown? Most likely not.
But could they make a legitimate run at a .500 campaign? If the two new starting pitchers stay healthy, it's more than plausible.
Disappointment No. 3: Baltimore Orioles
6 of 10
2024 Record: 91-71
2025 Win Total Line: 87.5
2025 PECOTA Projection: 87.3 wins
Long before the spring training injuries began to mount, the Orioles already had to overcome two major losses in Corbin Burnes and Anthony Santander.
With all due respect to free-agent acquisitions Charlie Morton and Tyler O'Neill, not exactly one-for-one swaps there.
Replacing Santander with O'Neill might be a negligible drop if they're lucky. However, backfilling the ace's spot in the rotation with a 41-year-old who last season posted his worst FIP since 2010—in part because he lost about 1.0 mph on every part of an already-not-that-fast pitching arsenal—feels rather ominous.
But at least Félix Bautista is back, right?
With high hopes for year No. 2 of the Jackson Holliday experience?
Perhaps Coby Mayo and Heston Kjerstad also make big second-year leaps?
And maybe Tomoyuki Sugano ends up being about as good as Kodai Senga was for the Mets two years ago?
All reasonable expectations, but optimism has been tamped down a bit with both Grayson Rodriguez (elbow/triceps) and Gunnar Henderson (intercostal strain) opening the year on the IL.
We'll see how long Rodriguez ends up being on the shelf, but it could be catastrophic for Baltimore if it's any significant length of time. They brought back "was still available in late March for a reason" 37-year-old Kyle Gibson to fill in for however long G-Rod is out.
There's hope Kyle Bradish will be able to return at some point in the second half of the season, but he had his Tommy John surgery in June last year. At best, he makes a few late-season appearances like Jacob deGrom did for the Rangers last September—and possibly for a team just as hopelessly out of the playoff picture if this rotation ends up ranking bottom-five in the majors.
Surprise No. 4: Detroit Tigers
7 of 10
2024 Record: 86-76
2025 Win Total Line: 83.5
2025 PECOTA Projection: 78.0 wins
On the one hand, PECOTA really does not care for the Tigers this season.
On the other hand, PECOTA's projections from late March 2024 were off by at least 10 games on 11 different teams and somehow managed to not correctly project the exact win total for any of the 30 MLB clubs. It can be a useful gauge, but let's not pretend it's gospel.
But, really, why is PECOTA so low on Detroit?
Sure, the 31-13 finish to last season was unsustainable—and frankly incomprehensible to this day, as the Tigers didn't even average 3.2 IP per start while churning through openers and pushing the bullpen to its absolute limit. However, they were on pace for about 76 wins before that finishing flourish, and they added way more this offseason than they lost.
They brought back Jack Flaherty after trading him to the Dodgers last summer, giving Tarik Skubal a solid running mate again. (They also signed Alex Cobb, though he's already dealing with a hip injury and we shall see when he actually gets on the mound.) Detroit also signed Gleyber Torres to bolster an infield that left a lot to be desired last season, and it added both Tommy Kahnle and John Brebbia to the bullpen mix.
There's also rookie Jackson Jobe, for whom the Tigers have high hopes. They're hardly alone in that, either, with MLB.com rating him as the fifth-best prospect in baseball. And he doesn't need to be Paul Skenes to make an impact here. If he's a suitable No. 4 starter in 2025, that would be massive for Detroit.
And while paying any mind to spring training numbers is a great way to drive yourself batty, it feels notable that Spencer Torkelson went 17-for-50 with five home runs. If he can rebound to 2023 numbers (31 HR, 94 RBI) while Jobe becomes an AL Rookie of the Year candidate, Detroit might mess around and earn the AL's No. 1 seed.
Disappointment No. 4: New York Mets
8 of 10
2024 Record: 89-73
2025 Win Total Line: 90.5
2025 PECOTA Projection: 91.3 wins
It is entirely possible the Braves (93.5 win total), Phillies (91.5) and Mets (90.5) will all exceed expectations. Let us never forget the 2015 season, when the Cardinals (100 wins), Pirates (98) and Cubs (97) posted the three best records in the majors despite all playing in the NL Central.
But you had to know we'd be picking one of the three NL East teams to disappoint, right?
It's really just a question of which one we have the least faith in.
For me, it's definitely not the Phillies. If anything, they're a better surprise candidate than a disappointment candidate, as I feel they have the best shot at toppling the Dodgers and winning it all.
With Atlanta, the offense (if and when Ronald Acuña Jr. is back at full strength) looks stout, but it's perfectly fair to question whether Chris Sale and Reynaldo López will be as healthy and productive in 2025 as they were in 2024. However, the "when healthy" quartet of those two and Spencers Strider and Schwellenbach ought to be sensational.
At any rate, it's certainly better than what the Mets are bringing to the pitching table, which is why they might be a bit underwhelming.
The offense should be dynamite. Going Francisco Lindor, Juan Soto and Pete Alonso at the top of the order might as well be the start of an All-Star Game lineup. If Mark Vientos repeats what he did last season while Brandon Nimmo bounces back from a bit of a down year in 2024, even better.
But comparing the top four arms in each of these three rotations is almost laughable.
With Sean Manaea and Frankie Montas both sidelined, and Kodai Senga not starting until the fifth game of the season while continuing to build back strength after missing most of last season, the Mets went with Clay Holmes on Opening Day, with Tylor Megill and Griffin Canning slated for the rest of the series in Houston.
Maybe you can look at that and feel good about 91 wins, but I sure can't.
Surprise No. 5: Los Angeles Dodgers
9 of 10
2024 Record: 98-64
2025 Win Total Line: 103.5
2025 PECOTA Projection: 104.3 wins
The surprise here, of course, isn't a proclamation that the Dodgers are going to be good.
Everyone already expects that to be the case.
They are the clear favorite to win the World Series at +290. Their -500 line to win the NL West? It's the only instance of any team in any division having shorter than 50/50 odds. And at -2500 to make the playoffs, they might as well just take that line off the board now.
No, the surprise here is that the Dodgers will clear their win total with room to spare, flirting with the 116 record set by the 1906 Chicago Cubs and matched by the 2001 Seattle Mariners.
The depth of talent on this roster is just preposterous.
James Outman finished third in the NL Rookie of the Year vote two years ago, and they can't even find room for him on their bench. And once Hyeseong Kim is good to go, Andy Pages is probably getting booted back to Triple-A, too.
At full strength, their 12th-best starting pitcher is Bobby Miller, who struggled last season, but entered 2023 as a top 30 overall prospect before having a great rookie year. On any other roster, he'd be a bounce-back candidate as a middle-of-the-rotation starter. In L.A., he needs two more pitchers to join the five already on the IL just to get another shot.
Their fourth-best option for saves is probably Blake Treinen, and he had two wins, two holds and three saves in the 2024 postseason.
The Dodgers are more loaded than they were a year ago, when they won 98 games despite being afflicted by an injury bug that would have destroyed most teams.
So many things would have to go wrong for them to not win at least 100 games. My official guess is 114.
Disappointment No. 5: New York Yankees
10 of 10
2024 Record: 94-68
2025 Win Total Line: 89.5
2025 PECOTA Projection: 85.3 wins
Three weeks ago—before we knew about Gerrit Cole's Tommy John surgery, but after we knew neither Luis Gil nor Giancarlo Stanton was expected to be available for Opening Day—New York's win total on DraftKings was 91.5.
I know this because that's when our "buying or selling noteworthy win totals" article published, and I was already a big fan of the under 91.5 line for the Yankees.
Now with Cole gone for the year, both Gil and Stanton out for at least two months and Clarke Schmidt also opening the year on the IL, even this updated 89.5 line feels aggressively high.
It's not so much that 90 wins is out of the question. After all, the Yankees do still have Carlos Rodón, Max Fried and Marcus Stroman, not to mention Aaron Judge, Anthony Volpe, Austin Wells, Jazz Chisholm Jr., Cody Bellinger and big plans for Jasson Domínguez. If both Fried and Judge stay healthy, they could be the Cy Young/MVP combo that carries the Yankees to 90 wins.
What feels off, though, is the notion that the Yankees are going to have the best record in the American League, the next-highest win total being Baltimore and Houston tied at 87.5.
Conversely, PECOTA now has the Yankees at 50/50 to even make the playoffs, with Texas, Houston, Seattle, Minnesota, Baltimore and, fractionally/incredibly, Toronto all projected for more wins than New York.
If the only choices here are picking the Yankees as either the AL's No. 1 seed or missing the postseason, the latter does seem more likely.
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