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10 MLB Hot Takes on Mike Trout, Central Division Races, Shohei Ohtani and More
How hot is too hot for Major League Baseball hot takes?
Maybe next time a snowstorm threatens to postpone a Rockies game in early May, the grounds crew can sprinkle some of these hot takes onto the grass at Coors Field to help expedite the melting process.
For each of these hot takes, we've assigned a hypothetical Scoville Units rating, presenting them in ascending order from "kind of spicy" (100-5,000) to "you're going to need to sign a waiver before consuming" (1,400,000+).
While we wouldn't necessarily endorse betting a mortgage payment on any of these predictions coming true, each one is plausible, even the more far-fetched ones near the end.
Unless otherwise noted, statistics are current through the start of play on Wednesday.
Boston Red Sox Still Make the Postseason
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Scoville Units: 5,000 (Jalapeño pepper)
We're starting things out at just 5,000 Scoville Units.
That's a jalapeño pepper level of spice—which can be a lot to take when you're not ready for it, but a joke if you're searching for some serious heat.
And Boston rallying from its Alex Cora-firing start to still make the postseason fits the bill.
In the woebegone American League, the Red Sox are just 1.5 games back from a wild card spot, and seem to have already turned a corner.
Caleb Durbin and Marcelo Mayer are no longer black holes in the lineup, batting .283 over the last 10 games compared to .181 during the team's 9-17 start. Jarren Duran is still battling some horrific BABIP luck, but has three homers in his past five games to make up for it. Meanwhile, the unspeakable power of Payton Tolle's mustache seems to have ignited the portion of this pitching staff that isn't on the IL.
Sonny Gray threw five shutout innings in his IL return on Wednesday. The hope is that Garrett Crochet will return in about a week. And perhaps that is when the Red Sox really begin to make their climb.
But if you require a little more heat on this hot take, just know that it's rooted in the belief that the AL East could produce all three of this league's wild cards.
The Tony Vitello Experiment Lasts a Maximum of 162 Games
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Scoville Units: 50,000 (Cayenne pepper)
Still nothing too absurd here.
We're looking at cayenne/tabasco pepper range, as we do occasionally see a manager replaced before getting a second season, and things haven't exactly gone according to plan for Tony Vitello and the San Francisco Giants.
In the past two decades, it has happened five times:
However, what hadn't happened in the past two decades (or ever) is an MLB team hiring a college coach without previous MLB/MiLB coaching experience, and the experiment has been a catastrophe.
As with any hot seat conversation, it's tough to say how much of the blame can be pinned on Vitello.
Is it his fault that Rafael Devers, Willy Adames and Matt Chapman each have an OPS at least 150 points below their career norm?
And is it Vitello's fault that Logan Webb is struggling while neither the Tyler Mahle nor Adrian Houser gambles have paid off?
All we can say for sure is that this offense cannot score. The Giants have already been shut out seven times and are on pace to score 513 runs.
Excluding 2020, the 121-loss 2024 Chicago White Sox (507 runs) were the only team in the past decade to finish below 550. If they actually continue on that trajectory, Vitello might not even last until Game 162, let alone get brought back in 2027.
Biggest Trade Deadline Fire Sale: Toronto Blue Jays
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Scoville Units: 100,000 (Thai pepper)
Plenty of teams could cobble together quite the deadline fire sale if they find themselves out of the running 12 weeks from now.
Baltimore has Taylor Ward, Trevor Rogers, Chris Bassitt, Andrew Kittredge and Ryan Mountcastle among its impending free agents, plus Adley Rutschman, Dean Kremer and Tyler O'Neill on its list of players with one year of team control remaining.
While the Cubs look to be in great shape, they've got a dozen impending free agents, including Shota Imanaga, Ian Happ, Seiya Suzuki, Jameson Taillon and Matthew Boyd.
And if Carlos Correa's season-ending injury leads the Astros to decide to really burn it down by putting Yordan Alvarez on the trade block with two $26M years left on his deal, things could get wild in Houston this summer.
However, Toronto is our pick for the team most likely to put a bunch of desirable assets on the trade block.
First things first: It wouldn't be an "everything must go" type of fire sale. It certainly wouldn't include Vladimir Guerrero Jr., who is signed through 2039 and isn't going anywhere. Neither is Dylan Cease (signed through 2032), Alejandro Kirk (2030), Kazuma Okamoto (2029) or Trey Yesavage, among others.
But if the Blue Jays are unable to turn things around, they have Kevin Gausman, George Springer, Daulton Varsho, Shane Bieber, Eric Lauer, Max Scherzer, Yimi Garcia and Myles Straw (club option) on their list of impending free agents, plus both Jeff Hoffman and Jesús Sánchez scheduled to hit free agency after next season.
Those 10 players have a combined 2026 luxury tax hit of $107.4M. If they were to trade all 10 away at the deadline, it would trim their payroll by about $35M and reduce their tax bill by about $24M. That would be roughly $60M in savings, without even considering the potential prospect haul.
Would be a tough pill to swallow just nine months after making a World Series, but it might be better than doubling down if they're too far gone.
Both Chicago Teams Win Their Division...
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Scoville Units: 200,000 (Habanero pepper)
Projecting the Cubs to win the NL Central is about as spicy as sinking your teeth into a Granny Smith apple. They were the preseason favorite and have only reinforced that notion, even in what has been a loaded division.
Rather, the Habanero half of this hot take is that the White Sox will win the AL Central—which was a +9000 proposition in mid-January, but you can still get at +1400 on FanDuel.
The main argument for the White Sox is that someone has to win this pathetic division.
Detroit was the clear pick before the season began, but the Tigers lost Tarik Skubal to elbow surgery on Monday, followed by the Framber Valdez...incident...on Tuesday. Save for rookie Kevin McGonigle, they've been underwhelming and now could be headed for a full-blown downward spiral.
Cleveland is the next-best option, tied for the division lead at 18-19. However, there are a lot of holes in the lowest-scoring lineup of the division, and Tanner Bibee is nowhere near the ace he used to be. Maybe rookies Parker Messick, Chase DeLauter and Travis Bazzana prove to be enough, but we all know this team isn't spending much of anything to get better at the trade deadline.
Kansas City has caught fire with nine wins in its last 11 games, but they are still sub-.500, searching for anyone to post an .800 OPS and praying that Cole Ragans (10 HR, 21 BB in 32.1 IP) eventually comes around.
And, well, Minnesota isn't winning this division, either, so why not the White Sox?
Munetaka Murakami has been sensational, with Colson Montgomery and Miguel Vargas also doing some heavy lifting in the lineup. That trio has combined for 30 home runs. Meanwhile, the starting rotation has been nails, led by Davis Martin and a solid start to Noah Schultz's MLB career.
Two other key factors to consider:
...While Neither Central Division Produces a Wild Card Team
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Scoville Units: 225,000 (Fatali pepper)
For the AL Central portion of this defense, just scroll up a bit. That division's overall record presumably won't be as terrible as it was in 2023 (358-452), but 81-81 just might be enough to win this five-car pile-up.
But the NL Central entered Wednesday collectively 27 games above .500, occupying four of the top five spots in the "it's early May, why would you even look at this?" wild-card standings.
To suggest that no one from that division will get a wild card spot is slightly insane.
For starters, it implies that three NL East/West teams will secure those wild card spots, and the Dodgers/Padres runner-up is the only obvious candidate to do so at this point in time.
The Phillies have also been hot, so we'll dub them the second wild card in this scenario.
However, the third is certainly not going to be the Rockies or the Nationals, and it almost certainly isn't going to be the Marlins or the Giants. That leaves us with either the Mets figuring things out and going on a tear as they did over the final four months of the 2024 campaign or the Diamondbacks heating up, perhaps with Corbin Burnes anchoring their post-ASG push.
It simultaneously implies a fair amount of fading by the non-Chicago portion of the NL Central.
St. Louis is ahead of schedule and could sink like a stone, as it did in the second half of last season. The Jordan Walker breakout has been an awesome story, but the Cardinals don't have a "good enough to win 90 games" starting rotation.
Cincinnati is overachieving in a different way, three games above .500 with a minus-25 run differential. The "we'll just win every close game" worm has already turned with four consecutive losses by a single run. The Reds' rotation has also been a mess lately (aside from Chase Burns) as they wait for Hunter Greene and Nick Lodolo to make their 2026 debuts, and two-thirds of this lineup isn't scaring any opposing pitcher.
Pittsburgh making the postseason and getting rewarded for actually trying to improve in the offseason for a change would be fantastic, but depth is a major concern in the Steel City. Even at almost full strength (only Jared Jones is on the IL), there are holes in both the lineup and the rotation. Even a mild rash of injuries could leave them up a creek without a paddle.
And, well, I refuse to count out the Brewers, who consistently do more with less and have made the postseason in seven of the past eight years. But it's a hot take, so maybe we end up with some poetic scenario in which Freddy Peralta tosses a gem on the final day of the regular season to give the Mets the tiebreaker edge over the Brewers for the final spot.
A New York Yankee Wins AL MVP...But It Won't Be Aaron Judge
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Scoville Units: 350,000 (Red Savina Habanero)
Aaron Judge is a three-time AL MVP who has an MLB-best 14 home runs and a 1.060 OPS for what is clearly the best team in the American League right now. He is the clear favorite for AL MVP.
But let's have some fun with this one.
We actually could make this much spicier, as it is extremely intentional that we aren't explicitly saying "Ben Rice" in the headline of this hot take—even though he is by far the likeliest candidate at this point in time.
Rice is triple-slashing .343/.455/.759, leading the majors in both on-base percentage and slugging percentage. The Yankees were concerned enough with his RHP/LHP splits to bring back Paul Goldschmidt to serve as the potential right-handed half of a first-base platoon. But after a rough first two weeks against southpaws, Rice presently has an even better OPS (1.324) against lefties than he does against righties (1.172).
This comes on the heels of the final two months of 2025, in which Rice hit .297/.354/.571, homering in nearly six percent of his plate appearances and blossoming into enough of a Plan A for the Yankees to say "thanks but no thanks" on Pete Alonso in free agency.
But there are other options in pinstripes.
Cam Schlittler and Max Fried are the co-favorites for AL Cy Young now that Tarik Skubal is on the shelf. It doesn't happen often, but it's possible one of them pitches well enough to join Clayton Kershaw and Justin Verlander in MVP pitching lore.
Cody Bellinger has also been scorching hot lately with eight extra-base hits and a 1.828 OPS through five games in May. It's unlikely he'll end up with enough total bases (currently at 65) to keep pace with Rice (82) or Judge (83), but he does play great defense and may well lead the team in WAR.
And though this hasn't been an issue in four of the past five seasons, there's always the possibility of Judge missing a month on the IL and really opening the door to a teammate.
Shohei Ohtani Wins His First Cy Young Award...But Not His Fifth MVP
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Scoville Units: 500,000 (Chocolate Habanero)
As of Wednesday morning, FanDuel had Shohei Ohtani listed at -360 to win NL MVP and +700 to win NL Cy Young.
That means implied odds of 21.74 percent to not win MVP and 12.5 percent to win Cy Young. Multiply those together, and there's a 2.7 percent chance both occur, a +3580 bet slip if you could pick against players winning MVP and parlayed those odds.
That's pretty doggone spicy.
Though the odds are longer, the pro-Cy Young stance is the easier one to take at the moment.
Through six starts—all quality starts—Ohtani has gone 37.0 innings with an MLB-best 0.97 ERA and an MLB-best 0.81 WHIP. He did show a bit of mortality on Tuesday night in allowing a pair of solo home runs to the Astros, but he has been just about flawless on the mound.
The one significant cause for concern is how infrequently Ohtani pitches, because of the added day of rest he gets between starts. He's on pace to make just 27 starts, as opposed to the "more standard for an ace" 32-34. It's plausible he won't even log enough innings to qualify for the ERA crown.
Then again, Paul Skenes placed third in the NL Cy Young vote as a rookie with 23 starts and 133.0 innings pitched in 2024, so there could be unimpeachable arguments for Ohtani if he gets to around 150 innings while maintaining his dominance.
On the anti-MVP side of things, though, Ohtani has just an .814 OPS after ending each of the previous three seasons north of 1.000. Though his hard-hit percentage (48.4) is still well above the league average, it is nowhere close to where it has been in recent years (closer to 60). [Ohtani typically does his best hitting in June, though, so let's see where things stand then.]
Meanwhile, Matt Olson and the Atlanta Braves are on quite a tear.
The every-single-day first baseman had another clutch home run in a win over Seattle Tuesday night. Olson is now batting 9-for-15 (.600) with four home runs in the ninth inning or later, leading the majors in runs, doubles, RBI and total bases.
Olson has a great early case for NL MVP. So do Cincinnati's Elly De La Cruz and Philadelphia's Bryce Harper, the latter likely to really surge in the MVP odds if the Phillies are able to claw their way back to postseason contention.
Don Mattingly Wins NL Manager of the Year
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Scoville Units: 750,000 (Ghost pepper)
Dating back to 1983, the Baseball Writers' Association of America has been awarding a Manager of the Year in each league on an annual basis—including one split vote between Texas' Johnny Oates and New York's Joe Torre in 1996.
All told, that's 87 Managers of the Year.
And of that bunch, only two (2.3 percent)—Florida's Jack McKeon in 2003 (75-49) and Colorado's Jim Tracy in 2009 (74-42)—were mid-season replacements after disappointing starts.
Could Don Mattingly become the third member of that club?
Early returns are certainly encouraging. Since taking over for Rob Thomson after a 9-19 start, Mattingly has led the Phillies to a 7-1 record, including two walk-off victories in one day, as well as a pair of shutouts.
Granted, the Phillies could not have picked a better spot in the schedule to give Mattingly a chance at a hot start, sweeping the hapless Giants and taking three out of four in Miami before a homestand against the A's and Rockies. Before the season even began, this was a two-week stretch that had "10-3 or better" written all over it.
All the same, it at least appears as though the managerial switch—in conjunction with Zack Wheeler returning just days before Mattingly's promotion—was just what the doctor ordered for this ball club.
But even more so than the 2-out-of-87 historical side of things, here's the spicy part to backing Mattingly for NL MOY: Walt Weiss exists and Atlanta has been historically good in his first year at the helm—one year after a wildly disappointing campaign with largely the same cast of characters, no less.
Even though part of his job has been just writing Matt Olson, Ozzie Albies, Drake Baldwin, Austin Riley and (prior to his injury) Ronald Acuña Jr. into the starting lineup every day, he is pressing all of the right buttons for the team with the best record in baseball.
Unless Mattingly brings the Phillies back to within shouting distance of the Braves in the NL East, Manager of the Year probably won't be much of a race. But never say never.
Mike Trout Will Be Traded
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Scoville Units: 1,000,000 (Trinidad Scorpion)
From a purely logical point of view, this one isn't actually all that hot.
But if and when we start getting legitimate Mike Trout trade rumors, the flames will be palpable.
The Angels have been a mess for more than a decade, very well on their way to an 11th consecutive losing season. Yet, at no point during that run have they ever admitted defeat, persistently spending like a contender while never performing like one—seemingly always saddled with a bottom-five farm system, too, at least over the past couple of seasons.
But what choice did they have? The $245M Anthony Rendon contract was an all-time failure, and the oft-injured Mike Trout certainly hadn't been living up to his 12-year, $426.5M contract over the past five years. Because of that duo, the Halos had $75M worth of untradeable assets on an annual basis, entering every offseason in a big hole.
For the first time in a long time, though, they have a chance to hit the reset button and replenish one of the worst farm systems in MLB.
They do still owe Rendon a deferred $38M spread out over the course of the next three seasons, but that albatross of a contract is effectively gone. And though the team is on pace for what would be the worst record in franchise history (61-101), Trout has gotten out to a "definitely All-Star, maybe fringe MVP" start to the year with 11 home runs, an MLB-leading 36 walks and a 1.000 OPS.
There has never been a better time to talk about trading him away.
Including the entirety of this season's salary, Trout is still owed $177.25M through the end of 2030.
Given his age (Trout turns 35 this August) and his injury history (Trout missed 51 percent of Angels games from 2021-25), the Halos would probably need to retain a not-insignificant chunk of that remaining contract in order to get a deal across the finish line.
But once they actually put him on the trade block and discover what other teams would be willing to give up to get him, we'll be on the fast track to a blockbuster.
Jordan Walker and Mickey Moniak Will Both Start in the All-Star Game
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Scoville Units: 1,500,000 (Carolina Reaper)
If our hot take here was simply that these two players deserve to be All-Stars, that would be a gigantic nothing burger.
Jordan Walker has 10 home runs and a .961 OPS. Mickey Moniak has 11 home runs and the second-best OPS in all of baseball (1.123). And as far as National League outfielders go, the pair entered Wednesday in a three-way tie with Andy Pages for the best FanGraphs WAR.
Saying they should start the All-Star Game isn't a hot take.
It's a current fact.
Even saying they ultimately will be named All-Stars isn't all that hot. If not Moniak, who does represent the Rockies? And even if St. Louis ends up getting just the one mandatory roster spot, there's a good chance right now that it would go to Walker instead of JJ Wetherholt.
But to say that the No. 1 overall pick in the 2016 draft (Moniak) and the consensus top-five prospect heading into the 2023 campaign (Walker) actually will start the All-Star Game is arguably our most Carolina Reaper-ish stance of this entire exercise.
Being named an All-Star starter means winning a popularity contest, and neither the Rockies nor the Cardinals has even come close to having a player survive "Phase 1" of fan voting over the past two years, let alone win the honor in Phase 2.
Is it possible, though, that we have spent enough of the early season marveling at this pair of fulfilled former promises that Moniak and Walker could actually win that popularity contest?
Or is it simply going to be the likes of Juan Soto, Kyle Tucker, Ronald Acuña Jr. and Fernando Tatis Jr., even though they have been nowhere near as deserving in the early going?
Yeah, you're right. We know the answer.
But we can still dream.
