About The All-Star Break: Revisiting My Predictions
- Tim Kabel
- 8 hours ago
- 3 min read
About The All-Star Break: Revisiting My Predictions
By Tim Kabel
July 16, 2025
***
Before the season began, I made predictions about how many home runs each of the Yankees’ regulars, or at least the players who were supposed to be regulars at the time, would hit. As promised, I am checking in on those predictions today to see how they look at the nominal midpoint of the season.
Austin Wells. 25
· Paul Goldschmidt 28
· Jazz Chisolm, Jr. 31
· Anthony Volpe 16
· Oswaldo Cabrera 15
· Jasson Dominguez 31
· Cody Bellinger 42
· Aaron Judge 54
· Ben Rice 37
Total: 279
Let's look at them one by one:
Austin Wells has 14 home runs so far. He has started to heat up recently. Barring injury, I feel that 25 is still a realistic number for him.
Paul Goldschmidt went through a rough patch but is still hitting.287 for the season. However, he has not hit many home runs. He only has 8. At this point it, seems that my prediction of 28 was off. However, if he winds up with 15-20 home runs and still has a relatively high average, it will be a successful season for him.
Despite being on the IL earlier this season, Jazz Chisholm, Jr. has 17 home runs. Despite his lackluster performance in the Home Run Derby, I believe he will still hit at least 31 home runs this season. He may also become more aggressive on the base paths in a desire to have 30 home runs and 30 stolen bases.
Anthony Volpe is struggling offensively this season. Unless he is traded, he will remain the starting shortstop for this season. He has 10 home runs. So, despite his struggles, adding 6 more does not seem to be out of the question.
Oswaldo Cabrera is likely out for the season. He comes off the list. I expect the Yankees will acquire a third baseman who can hit a fair amount of home runs after the All-Star break.
Jasson Dominguez has played somewhat inconsistently this season, which may have prevented him from getting on a roll. He has been getting hot lately and has really picked up his offense. Although I believe he will have a very solid season when all is said and done, I misjudged his power output. In time, I firmly believe that he will hit over 30 home runs in a season. It just won't be this season. Still, if he finishes with between 15-20 and has 30 stolen bases, that will be a tremendous rookie season.
Cody Bellinger had a slow start this season but has rebounded. He is batting .282 and has 16 home runs. Many of his home runs have come recently. So, I think he could wind up with more than 30, but my original prediction of 42 was too high.
Aaron Judge is doing what he always does, except he is hitting for a much higher average. He has 35 home runs already. Unless he gets injured, I think my prediction of 54 is quite safe.
Ben Rice has seen his playing time greatly reduced with the return of Giancarlo Stanton. Rice still has 14 home runs, but with his reduced playing time, he will never make my predicted total of 37. He should hit over 20 and is having a solid year.
Since Trent Grisham was not projected to be a regular, I did not make a prediction for him. His 16 home runs are a very solid contribution.
Giancarlo Stanton has contributed 4 home runs since his return from the IL. It is hard to predict with any degree of certainty how many home runs he will hit for the rest of the year because he is so streaky and injury prone.
My predicted total for the team was 279 home runs which caused a fair number of guffaws. However, the team now has 151 home runs. For them to hit 128 more over the rest of the season is not out of the question.
That is the review of my home run predictions for the season at the All-Star break. I missed a few by quite a bit. A few others I predicted accurately, at least so far. Let's see what the rest of the year brings.
