The 10 MLB trends that ruled the first half -- and whether they'll continue

The first half of the MLB season is in the books. Well actually, we've played nearly 60% of the schedule, but everyone still denotes the first and second halves of the season around the All-Star break.

So, now that the All-Star festivities are behind us, let's look back at the storylines that dominated the first half and how they might play out the rest of the season.

Before we begin, let's hand out some honorable mentions that didn't make our list of the top 10 storylines: the Baltimore Orioles and Atlanta Braves' disappointing seasons; the Houston Astros rolling to a lead in the AL West despite Yordan Alvarez's injury, losing Alex Bregman and trading Kyle Tucker; Jacob Wilson's .332 average as a rookie; Matthew Boyd's incredible year for the Chicago Cubs; Jacob deGrom's comeback; Eugenio Suarez's four-homer game; and Denzel Clarke's dazzling catches in center field for the Athletics.

OK, now let's dig into the top 10 storylines of the 2025 season so far.

1. Chaos in the American League East

The AL East has gone through enough plot twists this season to fill a whole series of David Baldacci novels -- and we haven't even reached August.

The New York Yankees looked as if they would run away with the division early, building a seven-game lead in late May, but they've gone 11-18 since June 13 and have dropped to second place, creating a panic among their fans. The Toronto Blue Jays, on the other hand, won 10 in a row in late June and early July to surge into first. The Tampa Bay Rays, playing in a spring training facility, went 33-22 in May and June -- a period in which they were second in the majors in runs scored -- but have gone 3-9 in July to fall into fourth place. The Baltimore Orioles? They fired their manager and might trade half the team at the trade deadline.

But the Boston Red Sox have been the biggest melodrama of all. The Rafael Devers saga, which began in spring training, included complaints about his DH role, a terrible start at the plate, some hot hitting, a refusal to play first base and then concluded with the shocking trade to the San Francisco Giants, which came hours after Boston had just completed a three-game sweep of the Yankees. A six-game losing streak soon followed as the Red Sox organization was dripping with bad karma.

But this is baseball, where the narrative can flip in a hurry: The Red Sox won their final 10 games heading into the All-Star break, have climbed into a wild-card position, are only three games out of first place and just got Bregman back from the injured list.

"I do think there's a real chance that at the end of the season, we're looking back and we've won more games than we otherwise would've," chief baseball officer Craig Breslow told reporters after the Devers trade. He might be right -- at least if the pitching can deliver the way it did in that 10-game win streak, when the staff had a 1.90 ERA.

Will it remain a storyline? Absolutely. Sure, the expanded wild-card race makes division races less important than they once were, but teams still want to win the division and avoid that best-of-three wild-card round. Plus, the potential of a four-team race makes the AL East the most exciting race to follow in the second half. Though all four teams could still make the playoffs, that's no guarantee as the Seattle Mariners currently hold one of the wild-card spots ahead of the Rays.

2. The suddenly very interesting NL Central

The Cubs have a powerhouse lineup with MVP candidate Pete Crow-Armstrong, fellow All-Star starter Tucker, the scorching-hot Michael Busch, who is fifth in the majors in OPS, and Seiya Suzuki, who has 25 home runs and 77 RBIs. They have an All-Star pitcher in Boyd, Shota Imanaga has a 2.65 ERA and the bullpen has been very good. And that's not even mentioning their catchers, who have 20 home runs, 65 RBIs and the second-highest OPS in the majors.

Despite all of that, the Milwaukee Brewers are only one game back.

How is that possible? They find ways to score runs without relying on the long ball; they're 23rd in the majors in home runs but seventh in runs scored, with their speed and aggressiveness on the bases helping there. As always, they somehow find enough pitching, and the anonymous-but-hard-throwing bullpen threesome of Trevor Megill, Abner Uribe and Jared Koenig has turned into one of the most imposing late-game trios.

Will it remain a storyline? Yes, the Brewers are absolutely the real deal, running off seven wins in a row before the All-Star break. They do begin the second half with a tough trip against the Los Angeles Dodgers and Mariners, with a home series against the Cubs after that to close out July, but there's a reason the Brewers have made the playoffs in six of the past seven seasons: This team knows how to win.

They've also recently added two key players in Brandon Woodruff, finally back from shoulder surgery, and rookie flamethrower Jacob Misiorowski, who is 4-1 with a 2.65 ERA in five starts, dominating with his fastball that averages 99.3 mph. Indeed, Misiorowski looms as one of the most important players the rest of the way: If he keeps this going and with Woodruff looking like his pre-injury form -- 18 strikeouts and no walks in his two starts -- the trio of Freddy Peralta, Woodruff and Misiorowski will be a scary rotation to face in October.

3. The epic American League MVP race

We all know the details of this one:

• Behind curtain No. 1: Cal Raleigh, on pace for an AL-record 64 home runs (he currently has 38) and putting together perhaps the greatest offensive season ever for a catcher.

• Behind curtain No. 2: Aaron Judge, on pace for 11.8 WAR and putting together one of the greatest offensive seasons in the sport's history.

It's hard to believe a catcher might hit 50-something home runs -- or more -- and not win the MVP award, but that's what might happen. Voters are WAR-focused these days, and Judge has a chance for only the sixth 12-WAR season by a position player (three of the previous five are by Babe Ruth). That probably makes Judge the favorite, especially since he's not far behind Raleigh with 35 home runs and is probably one of his patented hot streaks away from getting back on pace for another 60-homer season.

Will it remain a storyline? Let's hope so. Remember, we were in a similar situation a year ago with an epic three-player race between Judge, Bobby Witt Jr. and Gunnar Henderson, only to see Judge pull away to an eventual unanimous selection over Witt. It's hard to imagine Raleigh keeping it going at this rate, especially given his heavy workload behind the plate (he's third in the majors in innings caught), and he has been a little one dimensional in July (he has only five hits, all of them home runs). Judge is the heavy betting favorite at -600 to +325 for Raleigh, according to ESPN Bet.

4. Pete Crow-Armstrong leads the National League MVP race

As a rookie in 2024, Crow-Armstrong hit .237/.286/.384 with 10 home runs in 123 games -- not exactly numbers that would have projected him as an MVP candidate the following year. But he has emerged as not only one of the most exciting players in the majors, but one of the most valuable as well. With 25 home runs and 27 stolen bases, he's on pace for a 40/40 season, and with help from some superlative defensive metrics, he leads the NL in both Baseball-Reference WAR (5.2) and FanGraphs WAR. (4.9), beating James Wood (4.4) in the former and Shohei Ohtani (4.3) in the latter.

Crow-Armstrong would certainly be one of the most surprising MVP winners ever, and one of the most distinctive. His .302 OBP would be the lowest for an MVP position player, beating Zoilo Versalles' .319 mark from 1965. Only 10 MVP winners have had an OBP below .350. He'd also be the first center fielder to win NL MVP since Andrew McCutchen in 2013.

Will it remain a storyline? Yes. With Crow-Armstrong's ultra-aggressive approach at the plate (he has the highest chase rate in the majors among qualified batters), it figured pitchers would eventually figure out how to exploit that. But they haven't so far and PCA, while not possessing huge raw power, continues to barrel up baseballs. Looming in his rearview mirror in the MVP race: Ohtani, who has now added pitching to his repertoire and is slowly working up to a starter's workload. He leads the NL in home runs, slugging, runs scored, OPS and total bases. ESPN Bet has made him the favorite at -700, with Crow-Armstrong at +750. Keep your eye on Juan Soto and Kyle Tucker as well.

5. The Dodgers are unbeatable ... no, they're just very good ... actually, they're mediocre

That 8-0 start, following the offseason additions of Blake Snell, Roki Sasaki and Tanner Scott, created talk that the Dodgers might be one of the greatest teams of all time. Well, they aren't.

Despite an inconsistent first half, one full of more pitching injuries and some subpar performances from the likes of Mookie Betts and Michael Conforto, the Dodgers are still on pace for 97 wins. A 2-7 slump heading into the break highlighted some of their issues: Betts has a sub-.700 OPS, Freddie Freeman is hitting .197 with one home run over his past 32 games, Scott has seven blown saves, the rotation ranks just 20th in the majors in ERA (and last in innings pitched) and the bullpen ranks 24th in ERA. Oh, and the Dodgers have churned through 35 different pitchers this season.

Will it remain a storyline? Check back in October, when the Dodgers will try to become the first team since the 2000 Yankees to repeat as World Series champs.

6. The Detroit Tigers have the best record in baseball

As good as the Tigers have looked, having the best record (59-38) in the majors at the All-Star break was still unexpected: They were 18th in our preseason Power Rankings, with a projected record of 83-79, and only 11 of our 28 voters picked Detroit to win the division. Tarik Skubal has been great, as expected, but nobody had Javier Baez and Zach McKinstry making the All-Star team on their bingo card. Gleyber Torres, with a .387 OBP, has been one of the best offseason signings, and former No. 1 picks Spencer Torkelson and Casey Mize are having their best seasons.

Will it remain a storyline? The Tigers should remain in the race for best record the rest of the way. But their final series before the break exposed a potential weakness. The Mariners swept the three-game series in Detroit, scoring 35 runs -- 23 of which came against the bullpen. Tommy Kahnle, part of the late-game duo with Will Vest, gave up four runs Saturday and three Sunday. Vest blew a 4-3 lead in the eighth Sunday, before Kahnle gave up back-to-back homers in the ninth. The Tigers will no doubt be looking for some relief help at the trade deadline.

7. Tarik Skubal, Paul Skenes and an incredible season for pitchers

Skubal and Skenes started the All-Star Game -- and that pair has been leading the way in what has been a stellar season for starting pitchers. At the break, we had 19 qualified pitchers with an ERA under 3.00, which would match 2022 as the most since 2014 (when there were 21). There are another five pitchers, who aren't currently qualified, with at least 80 innings and an ERA under 3.00, so the total could climb by the end of the season. Four of those pitchers also had an imposing strikeout rate above 30%: Skubal (33.4%), Zack Wheeler (33.0%), Garrett Crochet (31.2%) and Hunter Brown (31.1%). MacKenzie Gore, with a 3.02 ERA, is also above the 30% mark.

Skenes has been the bad-luck pitcher of the season, maybe of the century: He's 4-8 despite an MLB-best 2.01 ERA, but he might still be the Cy Young favorite. He could become the first Cy Young winner with a losing record (Jacob deGrom went 10-9 with the Mets in 2018 and Felix Hernandez went 13-12 with the Mariners in 2010).

Will it remain a storyline? Sure. With so many pitchers having great seasons, Skubal and Skenes hardly have the Cy Young Awards wrapped up, with Crochet and Wheeler essentially in a statistical deadlock with them right now. Brown was in the AL mix before giving up 10 runs in his final two starts before the break. Keep an eye on deGrom, who is 9-2 with a 2.32 ERA and has already pitched his most innings since 2019.

8. Juan Soto's topsy-turvy tenure with the New York Mets

In his first month with the Mets, Soto hit .241/.368/.384 with only three home runs. Then he hit .219 in May. But the Mets were winning, and the statistical evidence showed that Soto was hitting the ball hard and taking his walks -- meaning, it was really the same old Soto, except the hits just weren't falling. Since June 1, he has hit .311/.455/.659 with 14 home runs and now ranks among the league leaders in many categories. Despite the slow start, he's on pace for 6.5 WAR, which isn't quite what he did with the Yankees last season (7.9) but is right in line with his career average per 162 games (6.3). In other words, he's the same Juan Soto, except his best hitting has come as the Mets have scuffled after their hot start.

Will it remain a storyline? With the Mets battling for the NL East title with the Philadelphia Phillies, you bet. One thing to watch: While the overall offensive numbers are creeping back into typical Soto territory, he has hit only .183/.330/.390 with runners in scoring position and .176/.337/.340 with men on base. According to Baseball-Reference, he has a .783 OPS in high-leverage situations, .773 in medium leverage and 1.053 in low leverage. The Mets are paying Soto a lot of money to produce in those high-leverage moments, so if they are to beat out the Phillies, he will need to pick it up in those situations.

9. Young sluggers burst onto the scene

We saw James Wood and Junior Caminero in the Home Run Derby, and both are having outstanding first full seasons in the majors. Wood has 24 home runs and ranks eighth in the majors in OPS. Caminero has 23 home runs, but not the overall offensive numbers that Wood has. A year ago, Nick Kurtz had just been drafted in the first round by the Athletics out of Wake Forest and now he has mashed 17 home runs in 58 games after beginning the season in Triple-A. Over his past 26 games, he has hit .295/.385/.737 with 12 home runs and looks as if he's developing into one of the best power hitters in the game.

Still looking to get on track is Jac Caglianone, also in his first year out of college. He reached the majors with more hype than Kurtz but has struggled with a .140 average and four home runs through 35 games, although he flashed his light-tower power with one blast of 466 feet. These players are all 22 years old. The game is in good hands.

Will it remain a storyline? Yes and no. Caminero's Rays are the only team in the playoff hunt right now, though Caglianone's Kansas City Royals are close enough to potentially get back into the wild-card chase. Wood's season has sort of flown under the radar playing for the Washington Nationals, but he has an OPS+ of 160. In the wild-card era since 1995, only five players in their age-22 season have reached that mark: Mike Trout (2014), Bryce Harper (2015), and Juan Soto, Vladimir Guerrero Jr. and Fernando Tatis Jr. all in 2021. That's not bad company to be part of.

10. How many games will the Colorado Rockies lose?

After a 9-50 start left them on pace to lose 137 games, it looked as if the Rockies might shatter the Chicago White Sox's modern record of 121 losses from last season. The Rockies won three in a row at that point and had another four-game winning streak later in June, but then went 4-14 in their final 18 games before the break. That left them with a 22-74 record, still on pace to finish 37-125. They have played a little better: They had a minus-77 run differential in March/April and minus-106 in May but were minus-38 in June. They're back to minus-32 so far in July, with losses of 10-2, 10-2, 10-3 and 9-3 so far this month. It's impossible to know which direction this will go the rest of the way.

Will it remain a storyline? It appears so. It might come down to the wire, and the Rockies finish the season with trips to Seattle and San Francisco.