Before this season, if you threw a paper airplane out of the stands and onto the field [not advised] with Ceddanne Rafaela at the dish, I’m pretty sure he would have swung at it. But things are changing in 2026, and we need to discuss what that means when you stack this sudden and newfound restraint atop his already wonderful bag of tools.
Up until a couple of months ago, all the things that made Rafaela a good baseball player were flashy: The speed, the clutch hits, the athleticism; and of course,
his signature ability to play gold glove defense in centerfield with the grace of a gazelle. Here’s a video showcasing some of his best defensive plays from last year:
But we’re not here to talk about those, because the thing that’s transforming Rafaela from a good to potentially great player in 2026 is far more mundane. Here’s a much shorter, and admittedly much less interesting video showcasing what’s making Rafaela so good in 2026:
That may not seem like a huge deal, but that’s Ceddanne Rafaela not swinging at a tempting pitch sweeping out of the zone, and that’s a huge change from previous seasons. It’s subtle when it unfolds early in an at bat, but it’s the key to unlocking his ceiling at the plate — And if we’re being fair, it’s a ceiling that’s far higher than he’s ever been given credit for.
Anyway, here’s what happened later in that same at-bat because he hung around with a little better count leverage and proved to Kerkering he wasn’t going to chase the sweeper:
You want a more recent example? Here’s Rafaela taking another 0-1 pitch on Tuesday. This time, it’s a slider above the zone, which is a location and pitch opponents have always used to get him to chase with great success.
Not here. Strider had to come back on the very next pitch with an offer lower and in the strike zone, and here’s what Rafaela did with that:
Rafaela has always been able to pound pitches in the zone, and for whatever reason, we’ve largely overlooked that. Perhaps it’s because of his size — he’s listed a 5’10” and a 165 pounds. Perhaps it’s because he’s a defensive first guy. Or maybe it’s because before this year, he’s swing at anything and everything.
Taking away the hyperbole and drilling down on the numbers, Rafaela swung at 59 percent of all the pitches he saw last year, which was the third most among qualified hitters in all of baseball. That was only slightly better than the 62 percent of pitches he swung at in 2024, which was good for the second most in all of baseball.
This year, out of 188 guys with at least 2.1 plate appearances per team game? Rafaela ranks 73rd in swing percentage, dropping the number to just 48.6 percent of the time.
How about just swinging at the first pitch of an at bat? In both 2024 and 2025, he did that the fourth most of any hitter in baseball. Now, from that same list of 188 players, he’s moved to 71st.
But of course the most important number when it comes to this stuff is swinging at pitches out of the zone, and there’s been major improvement there as well. Rafaela went from swinging out of the zone the most in all of baseball in 2024, to second most in 2025, to the 46th this season at 34.8 percent. Not only is he improving here, but he’s doing it with a stat that usually solidifies pretty quickly, and if that continues, you’re talking about a guy who can finish in the top ten in MVP voting over the next handful of years.
Think about it: He’s still just 25-years-old, he plays the best defensive centerfield in the sport, he’s already put up the third most WAR of anybody in a Red Sox uniform since the start of 2024, he’s got above average speed, he plays a premium position, and he’s always had a penchant for clutch knocks. What’s going to happen now if we add any semblance of plate discipline to the mix.
Well, essentially this:
We basically just need one more month of patient Rafaela at the plate for the numbers to say this is who he is now (again, plate discipline numbers solidify quick), and if that locks in, let’s just say Roman Anthony and Wilyer Abreu are going to have some competition in terms of who is the best Red Sox outfielder over the next handful of years.
