Two months ago, I identified five MLB superstars who looked capable of making serious MVP pushes after the All-Star break.
The five names were Pete Alonso, Yordan Alvarez, Bobby Witt Jr., Shohei Ohtani and James Wood.
My process was built around more than name value. I looked specifically at wOBA compared to xwOBA, searching for established stars whose quality of contact suggested their actual production might still have another level to reach.
Now it's September 16, exactly two months since the second half began.
I have enough baseball to revisit those calls.
And there is a little bit of everything here.
One player absolutely exploded. Another continued hitting at an MVP level. Injuries complicated the second halves of two others.
And then there's James Wood.
Wood was unquestionably my biggest miss from the original article.
But for dynasty managers, what has happened over the last two months might have created the most interesting opportunity of all.
Here's how my five second-half MVP candidates actually turned out.
Pete Alonso: The MVP Push Happened
Since July 16:
AVG: .293 OBP: .388 SLG: .543 HR: 15 RBI: 36 wOBA: .399 xwOBA: .423 wRC+: 161 WAR: 2.0 Hard-Hit%: 57.8% Barrel%: 16.2%
This is exactly what I was looking for.
When I included Alonso in the original article, his .355 wOBA was sitting below a .377 xwOBA. He was already having a productive season, but the underlying contact suggested there could be considerably more coming.
There was.
Over the last two months, Alonso has hit .293/.388/.543 with 15 home runs and 36 RBI. His 161 wRC+ means he has been 61% better than league average offensively after adjusting for league and park.
And somehow, the expected numbers suggest he could have been even better.
Alonso's .399 second-half wOBA trails a .423 xwOBA. His .543 SLG trails a .592 xSLG. He has barreled 16.2% of his batted balls while producing a ridiculous 57.8% hard-hit rate.
This isn't a hitter surviving on a two-month home run binge.
He's crushing the baseball.
Then came the perfect milestone.
On September 15, Alonso returned to Citi Field as an Oriole and launched career home run No. 300 against his former team. The game-tying ninth-inning shot off Kodai Senga left the bat at 109.6 mph and traveled 413 feet. It was also Alonso's 36th homer of the season.
Two months ago, the expected numbers told me Alonso's already strong production might have another gear.
They were right.
Yordan Alvarez: Still Hitting Like an MVP
Since July 16:
AVG: .295 OBP: .435 SLG: .517 HR: 8 RBI: 28 BB%: 17.9% K%: 18.8% wOBA: .392 xwOBA: .384 wRC+: 155 WAR: 1.5 Hard-Hit%: 52.9%
There wasn't much projection required with Yordan Alvarez.
He was already destroying baseballs when I wrote the original article.
The ridiculous part was that his expected numbers suggested he had actually deserved even better results.
Over the last two months, Alvarez has simply continued being Alvarez.
He's hitting .295/.435/.517 with eight home runs and 28 RBI while producing a 155 wRC+.
The .435 OBP might be the most impressive number.
Alvarez has walked in 17.9% of his plate appearances while striking out just 18.8% of the time. Combine that command of the strike zone with a 52.9% hard-hit rate and there aren't many comfortable ways for pitchers to attack him.
Unlike the beginning of the second half, Alvarez is no longer substantially underperforming his expected production. His .392 wOBA is actually slightly ahead of his .384 xwOBA during this stretch.
That's fine.
Positive regression was part of my original argument, but the larger point was that Alvarez possessed the underlying offensive profile to produce an MVP-caliber second half.
A 155 wRC+ over 51 games qualifies.
There was no dramatic correction needed.
One of baseball's best hitters just kept hitting like one of baseball's best hitters.
Bobby Witt Jr.: Good, But Not the Explosion I Expected
Since July 16:
AVG: .265 OBP: .368 SLG: .413 HR: 5 SB: 11 BB%: 13.2% K%: 17.6% wOBA: .333 xwOBA: .359 wRC+: 110 WAR: 1.7
This one is more complicated.
The huge second-half offensive explosion I was looking for hasn't happened.
Witt has hit .265/.368/.413 with five home runs since July 16. A 110 wRC+ is certainly productive, but it's nowhere near the MVP-level offensive production I was projecting.
However, the original reason I included Witt hasn't disappeared.
His .333 wOBA still trails his .359 xwOBA.
His .265 average trails a .278 xBA.
His .413 slugging percentage trails a much stronger .473 xSLG.
Even two months later, the expected numbers are telling me Witt has hit the baseball better than his traditional results indicate.
There's also an important piece of context.
Witt went on the injured list in July with lower-back tightness, the first IL stint of his MLB career. He missed 11 games before returning on August 5 and immediately went 3-for-5 with a two-run double.
Despite that interruption, Witt has still accumulated 1.7 WAR in just 41 games during this sample while stealing 11 bases.
So I wouldn't call this a complete miss.
But it also wasn't the offensive eruption I envisioned.
The interesting part is that the exact underlying discrepancy that originally put Witt on my list remains present in September.
I'm still waiting for the results to completely catch up.
Shohei Ohtani: Injuries Changed the Story
Since July 16:
AVG: .246 OBP: .332 SLG: .467 HR: 8 RBI: 22 wOBA: .336 xwOBA: .364 wRC+: 111 xBA: .278 xSLG: .504 Hard-Hit%: 49.6% Barrel%: 12.8%
A .246/.332/.467 slash line with a 111 wRC+ would be perfectly respectable for most major-league hitters.
Shohei Ohtani isn't most hitters.
By his standards, this has clearly been a disappointing two months.
But this is also where simply looking at the box score would miss a major part of the story.
Ohtani's .336 wOBA is significantly below his .364 xwOBA. His .246 batting average trails a .278 xBA, while his .467 slugging percentage trails a .504 xSLG.
He's still hitting the baseball hard, too.
Ohtani has produced a 49.6% hard-hit rate and 12.8% barrel rate during the sample.
The bigger problem has been health.
Ohtani has dealt with left knee soreness dating back to June and a lingering right biceps issue that eventually affected both his hitting and pitching progression. He missed four consecutive games earlier this month, briefly returned, and was subsequently placed on the 15-day IL.
As of September 15, Ohtani had resumed hitting off a tee, although the Dodgers had not established a firm return date. His IL placement was backdated to September 8, making September 23 the earliest he can return.
That doesn't turn my original prediction into a win.
But it does explain why this isn't a clean evaluation.
Ohtani's underlying offensive numbers continued to beat his results. The massive second-half run I envisioned simply never materialized while he was dealing with multiple physical issues.
Sometimes my process is wrong.
Sometimes something happens that the numbers couldn't predict.
In this case, health changed the equation.
James Wood: My Biggest Miss Might Be the Biggest Buy
Since July 16:
AVG: .226 OBP: .339 SLG: .340 HR: 2 RBI: 11 SB: 6 BB%: 15.0% K%: 29.1% wOBA: .302 xwOBA: .324 wRC+: 87 Hard-Hit%: 52.1% Barrel%: 11.3%
Let's get this part out of the way first.
James Wood was my biggest miss.
There's no reason to dress it up.
I identified Wood as someone capable of making an MVP push over the final months of the season.
Instead, he's hit .226/.339/.340 with two home runs and an 87 wRC+.
That's not an MVP run.
It's not even above-average offensive production.
But what happened over the last two months and what Wood represents going forward are two completely different questions.
And that's where I'm paying very close attention from a dynasty perspective.
Wood is still just 23 years old.
His second-half .302 wOBA is poor, but his .324 xwOBA is better. His .226 average sits below a .241 xBA, while his .340 SLG trails a .366 xSLG.
Those aren't enormous gaps.
The contact-quality numbers are much more interesting.
Wood has still produced a 52.1% hard-hit rate.
His barrel rate is still 11.3%.
The raw ability to absolutely destroy a baseball hasn't gone anywhere.
The biggest red flag remains the strikeouts.
Wood has struck out in 29.1% of his plate appearances during this stretch. That's the part of his profile I'm actually watching rather than simply staring at the batting average.
There is a difference between a young hitter losing the traits that made him special and a young hitter struggling to consistently convert elite physical tools into production.
Wood still possesses the traits.
That's why I think this might be a buying opportunity.
Fantasy managers are emotional.
Two months ago, Wood looked like one of the most exciting young assets in baseball. After a disappointing stretch, the conversation naturally changes. The .226 average gets noticed. The lack of home runs gets noticed. The strikeouts get noticed.
Good.
Let them notice.
Because if the Wood manager in my dynasty league has become legitimately concerned about what they've watched over the last two months, I'm asking what it costs.
BUY.
BUY.
BUY.
I'm not buying the 87 wRC+.
I'm buying a 23-year-old with enormous raw power who is still hitting more than half of his batted balls at 95 mph or harder, still producing a double-digit barrel rate and still showing the plate discipline to run a 15% walk rate.
There are flaws here.
There is also an enormous ceiling.
My original MVP prediction was wrong.
That doesn't mean my original evaluation of the talent was.
And if two bad months have created even a modest discount in dynasty leagues, Wood might actually be more interesting to me today than he was when I wrote about him in July.
Final Thoughts
The purpose of going back to an article like this isn't to pretend every prediction I made worked.
It's to see whether my process held up once real baseball happened.
Pete Alonso is the obvious home run.
He entered the second half with expected numbers pointing toward more production and responded by hitting .293/.388/.543 with 15 homers, a .399 wOBA and 161 wRC+. Two months later, he has career home run No. 300 and has been one of baseball's most productive hitters.
Yordan Alvarez didn't need a breakout. I just needed him to continue performing at an MVP level.
He did.
Bobby Witt Jr. hasn't produced the offensive explosion I expected, but injuries shortened his sample and his expected statistics continue running comfortably ahead of his actual production.
Shohei Ohtani is the hardest player for me to evaluate because the underlying numbers remained stronger than the surface results while lingering knee and biceps problems eventually put him on the IL.
And James Wood?
I missed.
But being wrong about what a player would do over the next two months doesn't automatically mean I was wrong about the player.
If anything, Wood is now the name I'm watching most closely.
The market loved him when everything was going right.
Now I want to see how much that perception has changed when things aren't.
If his dynasty manager is panicking, I'm buying.
Two bad months haven't changed the talent that made me so high on James Wood in the first place.
They may have just made him cheaper.