The Minor League Reset: Did It Work?

There are all kinds of reasons big leaguers get demoted to the minor leagues: roster crunches, injury rehab, and, of course, poor performance. Even for a weekly internet blogging fantasy baseball player, all these transactions are difficult to follow. Yet, many expert fantasy players follow them like a hawk follows a mouse running in an open field, and it gives them an edge. If there were a tool that could detect demotions, great performance during the demotion, and improved performance at the major league-level, we’d all have more time to do what we really care about: watch more baseball!

What we really want to know is, did it work? Did the player make adjustments and come back to the majors a better player? It’s a very challenging data question, and that’s the reason this is an analysis “done by hand”. I went to RosterResource and downloaded the workbook that shows all transactions where a player was “Optioned to minors” in 2025. I then downloaded this season’s stats from our leaderboard page here on FanGraphs and kept the group wide open, requiring only one big-league PA in 2025 to qualify for analysis. From there, I isolated the MLB dataset to those players who went through a demotion, sorted it by major league PAs, and went to each player’s FanGraphs page to make sure they:

1. opened the season on the big league roster
2. were demoted to the minors sometime thereafter
3. were called back up to the majors this season

From there, I took the top five players and used their game logs to gather their stats. Below is a summary of the five players I analyzed, and it works best if you focus on one row at a time. From left to right, you can see the player’s major league plate appearances, the date they were sent down to AAA, the minor league plate appearances they accumulated during their demotion, and the date they were called back up to the bigs:

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Jordan Beck, COL, OF

At the age of 24, Beck is in his second big-league stint in 2025. Last season, 2024, he earned 184 plate appearances at the major league level. He may not have stood out in the big leagues, but he showcased real power in the minor leagues: .540 SLG and 8 HR across two levels. Yet, a monstrous 35.3% 2024 MLB K% showed he wasn’t ready to be an everyday big leaguer. He returned to spring training as an everyday player and hit four home runs, stole six bases, and slashed .231/.306/.446, earning him a spot on the 2025 opening day roster.

What transpired was more strikeouts and less power. He did not hit a home run in his first 23 big league plate appearances and was moved down to AAA to figure things out. In those AAA plate appearances, he lowered his K% but still struggled to hit. Still, he was promoted back up to the big leagues fairly quickly and is now showing clear signs of development. Since being called up, he’s hit eight home runs, stolen four bases, and is walking more often, though his K% is still too high. Around this time last year, Eric Longenhagen wrote the following:

Beck should get to enough of his power to be a useful big league role player, and he’ll probably have a peak year or two where he plays more or less every day and hits 30 bombs, maybe more with help from Denver. But same as I wrote last year when he was crushing it at Spokane, I am apprehensive about projecting him to do it consistently and for an extended period of time because of the nature of his swing-and-miss.

A year later, that analysis is still playing out.

Did-it-work!? – Yes

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Jake Burger, TEX, 1B/3B

Burger’s introduction to Texas did not come with much success, but it wasn’t as if he was producing at career lows:

At the time of his demotion (marked in the screenshot), Burger was striking out at a very high rate and producing very little because of it. You have to think someone in the Rangers’ organization said something like, “Hey Jake, we want you to spend some time in AAA just working on not striking out.” Down he went and strike out less he did. He chipped in an insane slash line just to put “I don’t belong here” in bold ink:

But minor league pitching isn’t big league pitching, and Burger couldn’t carry that plate discipline into his promotion. Still, his K% came way down, relatively so, and his wOBA is trending in the right direction. In many leagues, Burger was dropped to the waiver wire upon his demotion, and it went unnoticed when he was quickly called back up. It’s yet to be seen if dropping Burger was the right move or not, but his AAA reset seems to have placed him back on pace to hit 20 home runs.

Did-it-work!? – Yes

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Brett Baty, NYM, 3B

Baty’s short 2025 stint in the major league included time at 2B and 3B as the Mets attempted to find an infield that sticks. He showcased stronger defensive ability than Mark Vientos and Luisangel Acuña, but he couldn’t fight off the K monster and was demoted for a short 11 games in the minors. There, he crushed the ball and slashed like the lead guitar player in Guns N’ Roses, while lowering his K%, though it remained high. Now back in the majors, Baty’s been on a hot streak and has lowered his K% even further to a much more acceptable level. When looking at his overall 2025 MLB stat line, Baty appears to be underperforming his expectations…

• BA: .242, xBA: .260
• SLG: .452, xSLG: .481
• wOBA: .318, xwOBA: .334

…and he’s producing incredible batted ball statistics including a 13.6% Barrel%, a 113.9 maxEV, and a 44.3% HardHit%. He’s doing most of his damage on breaking balls, according to his pVals, and he’s still chasing over the average, but development works one step at a time, and Baty is on his way to putting it all together at the major league level.

Did-it-work!? – Yes

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Matt Shaw, CHC, 3B

Matt Shaw was an exciting prospect at the start of the regular season and opened with the Cubs in Japan. With no MLB track record, it was difficult to asses his major league viability during fantasy draft season, but most of his projections were promising. He crashed and burned out of the gates and simply didn’t hit. You could use the graph below to tell a story in which Shaw attempted not to strike out by not swinging the bat…

…but who knows if that’s true. What seems likely is his minor league reset reminded him that he’s a good hitter and that strikeouts are going to come. He proved to the Cubs, who desperately need an everyday third baseman, that he has outgrown the minor leagues. In his return, Shaw has been hitting at the bottom of the order, but that may change. He’s certainly improved his slash line, but his batted ball metrics don’t necessarily jump off the page; his HardHit% (23.1%) is almost half the league average. Still, he’s making solid zone contact, putting the ball in play, and has showcased power potential in the minor leagues.

Did-it-work!? – Yes

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Alan Roden, TOR, OF

It’s understandable that Roden made the big league club out of spring training, as he slashed .407/.541/.704 in 37 plate appearances. As impressive was his 10.8% K%. But once the big league lights turned on and the season began, Roden didn’t hit. Though his K% was relatively low compared to some of his peers, he did not make quality contact with a 1.8% barrel rate and a 31.6% HardHit. Those contact skills check out when reading the prospect report Eric Longenhagen and James Fegan co-authored in April:

The [swing] changes have helped Roden, who turned 25 in December, to access more power without trading off much contact. He slashed .293/.391/.475 split between Double- and Triple-A in 2024, running a 93% in-zone contact rate and an 83% contact rate overall. His measureable power (37% hard-hit rate, 103 mph EV90) was a shade south of the overall big league average, but comfortably below what is typical for a corner outfielder…he’s a good, big league-ready hitter with plus contact and plate skills.

No, he hasn’t showcased that power at the major league level yet, but he has it in his profile. Like everyone else on this list, he was given a chance, didn’t perform, and was then sent to AAA to prove he is better than that level of play. RosterResource has him as a strong-side platoon starting right fielder, and Roden will need to make some noise to stick on the roster. He’s competing with many others, including Nathan Lukes, Davis Schneider, and Myles Straw, for playing time.

Did-it-work!? – Yet to be seen

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Someone with solid database access and a little gumption could surely automate this type of report. The benefit would be early signals of improvement from players who were forgotten about, dropped to the waiver, or painted into a corner by fantasy managers. For now, I may continue the old-school research approach of aggregating portions of game-log data because, well, it could end up being quite useful.

Note: all stats listed are through games played 6/1/25.