Who is he and where did he come from?
He’s Braiden Ward and he hails from the greater San Diego area, where he attended the phenomenally named El Capitan High School. The greatest Red Sox player of all-time is a San Diegan, of course, as is Marcelo
Mayer. But Ward doesn’t have quite the baseball pedigree that those guys do, having been selected in the 16th round of the 2021 draft out of the University of Washington.
The Sox acquired him from Rockies yesterday in exchange for reliever Brennan Bernardino.
What position does he play?
He’s a versatile glove man who has spent time in both the outfield and infield, but he’s primarily a center fielder, and you’ll understand why when you read the first sentence of the very next section.
Is he any good?
Let’s start with this: in 97 games last year, Braiden Ward stole 57 bases and was only caught 7 times. Over the course of his minor league career, he has stolen a total of 211 bases while only being caught 33 times. For reference, David Hamilton stole 185 bases while being caught 32 times in the minors. Ward is one of the fastest men in baseball.
Unfortunately, speed alone is not enough to get a player to the big leagues. So does Ward have the goods in the rest of his game? Well, sadly, he has no power to speak of, having posted a career minor league slugging percentage of just .382. He just doesn’t hit the ball hard at all, putting up a sixth percentile average exit velocity in AAA last season.
But what he does do is make contact, hit the ball to all fields, and control the strike zone. His 14.1% strikeout rate in 2025 would have been the 17th-best mark in all of AAA had he qualified, and his walk rate was above average for AAA as well. On top of that, he’s said to be a strong bunter and gets hit by pitches a lot. He’s been hit by a pitch 53 times over the past two seasons, the third-most across the entire minor leagues during that span.
To me, he looks like a prime candidate to visit the hitting lab to try to increase his bat speed. If he can add a modicum of power to his game, he can be a big league regular.
Show me a cool highlight.
Is stealing home the coolest thing a baseball player can do? He’s done it multiple times, including in a game in which he went 3-3 at the plate and stole six bases overall.
What’s he doing in his picture up there?
“Always cheezin” according to the caption he himself wrote when he posted that picture on his very active Instagram page. And let me tell you something: the evidence suggests that Ward is in fact always cheezin.
Here he is cheezin while holding a freshly hooked trout:
Cheezin in black and white:
Cheezin and showing off his core while dressed as Slutty Woody for Halloween:
And even using his pinkies to enhance his cheezin at this sausage fest of an ugly sweater party. You don’t need to do that, Braiden! You have dangerous amounts of cheez already!
What’s his role on the 2026 Red Sox?
He’s not going to start the year on the big league roster, but he’ll make an appearance here and there. And if he can make some real improvements to his swing, then he can turn himself into a useful depth piece next season and maybe a big league regular in the future. At the very least, he gives Craig Breslow flexibility to ship out David Hamilton in a trade, and he’s certainly a guy who could contribute with a key stolen base at some point.
