Geraldo Perdomo isn’t going to win the National League MVP.
That doesn’t mean the Arizona Diamondbacks shortstop, in one of the surprises of the entire MLB season, isn’t deserving of intense consideration.
Perdomo could always field. But now, he can hit.
And that combination not only has put together one of the best seasons in the league; it has also pushed the Diamondbacks on a late-season surge within 1.5 games of the final NL Wild Card spot with 11 games to play.
Perdomo enters Tuesday night with the third-best Wins Above Replacement total calculated by FanGraphs in the NL. He’s at 6.6 fWAR. That’s behind just Shohei Ohtani’s 6.8 fWAR and Trea Turner’s 6.7.
A 25-year old switch-hitter, Perdomo has greatly improved the quality of his contact this season.
“This season, Perdomo isn’t crushing pitches like Ohtani, but he is making better contact, and the jump in his xwOBA from 2024 to ‘25 is second only to Toronto’s George Springer,” writes MLB.com’s Brian Murphy in the site’s daily newsletter. “He has 19 homers after hitting 14 over his first four Major League seasons (1,206 at-bats). His wRC+, which was 85 for his career through last season (100 is league average), is now at 138. He has stolen a career-best 26 bases. All the while, Perdomo has remained a plus defender and has gotten even tougher to strike out. And he’s a key reason why the D-backs, who were sellers at the Trade Deadline, are very much alive in the Wild Card race.”
He’s essentially improved by 50% as a hitter, stolen a bunch of bags and continued to field like a Gold Glove shortstop.
Baseball is a funny game. Sometimes, something just clicks.
Perdomo’s world-class hand-eye coordination in the field has now translated to the plate, and it has been an incredible force in the Diamondbacks’ surprising second half.
Who knows whether this continues into the future for Perdomo. But right now, he’s one of the best players in the entire sport.
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