José

Ramírez

Ramírez led off the third inning with a solo homer off Jack Leiter to put the Guardians on the board. He then singled, stole second, and scored in the fifth. Ramírez would reach for a third time on a walk in the sixth. The 33-year-old third baseman is hitting .242/.349/.434 with 10 homers, 39 runs scored, 33 RBI, and 23 steals across 289 plate appearances. The 23 steals have Ramírez tied for the MLB lead with Bobby Witt Jr. and Nasim Nuñez.

J-Ram is off to a hot start this week at Yankee Stadium, as he doubled three times in Tuesday’s series opener. His 21 stolen bases lead the American League, and he trails Nasim Nuñez by one for the MLB lead. Prior to 2024, Ramírez never had a stolen base attempt rate higher than 3.5%, per Statcast. He’s been at 4.5% or higher in each of the past three seasons. The power is down so far this season, but 40+ bags appear to be a given for a third consecutive campaign.

Ramírez had three doubles for the fifth time in his career, making him the active leader there. Nolan Arenado, Freddie Freeman, Paul Goldschmidt and Bryce Harper have done it four times apiece. Ramírez came into the night hitting .178/.220/.267 in his previous 12 games.

After striking out three straight times and going hitless in four at-bats prior to extra-innings, Ramírez extended Cleveland’s lead with a double into the left-center field gap against Tigers lefty reliever Tyler Holton that brought around Angel Martínez with a key insurance run in the 10th inning.

Ramírez’ home run was his eighth of the year. The 33-year-old third baseman piled on with a solo shot off Emmanuel De Jesus in the ninth inning. Ramírez also helped break open the game with a two-run double that gave the Guardians a 7-1 lead in the sixth inning. He’s hitting .240 with 30 runs, 22 RBI and 20 stolen bases this year.

Ramírez is batting just .227/.353/.384, but he’s now the major league leader with 20 steals, overtaking the Nationals’ Nasim Nuñez. It seems like he’s gunning to set a new career high for the third year in a row after finishing at 41 in 2024 and 44 last season.

It was his first three-hit effort of the season, even if two of the hits were singles and he didn’t provide much juice with them. Ramírez fought hard to undo his ghastly 25 at-bats in March with a .250/.384/.500 April, but he’s hit just .216/.359/.255 in May and entered play today with a .207 average for the season. This effort raised it to .220. The underlying metrics continue to believe that Ramírez will pull out of this, as he has a .370 xwOBA against a .318 actual wOBA. It is worth noting that his strikeout rate has creeped up to 14.2 percent this year, but fantasy managers should expect him to come alive sooner rather than later.

Ramírez continues to be one of the hottest hitters in baseball, reaching base safely in two of his five plate appearances in this one, after homering four times over his previous seven contests. The 33-year-old fantasy superstar has raised his batting average nearly 100 points, from .133 on April 7 to .230 in just 12 games.

Ramírez ambushed a first-pitch fastball from Orioles’ left-hander Trevor Rogers for a 408-foot (106.2 mph EV) solo shot in the fourth inning that made it a 2-0 ballgame. He then replicated the feat in the fifth, that time belting a 1-1 changeup for a 379-foot (103.6 mph EV) solo shot to left that made it 6-4. With the two-hit attack, the superstar third baseman is now hitting .229/.354/.494 with six homers, 12 RBI and 10 stolen bases on the season.

Well, it seems like the Orioles’ plan was to not let Ramírez beat them in this one. With that intention, they succeeded. Only one of these walks was ‘intentional’ by the letter of the law and that was the only time Ramírez came around to score. Otherwise, they were careful and he didn’t try to be the hero. It’s just a shame that his teammates couldn’t do more with their opportunities in a game the Orioles wound up coming from behind to win. He’s still getting his this season on the whole with four home runs and a league-leading nine stolen bases.