Mariners' Julio Rodríguez has new hidden flaw exposed by ESPN center field rankings

Julio Rodríguez is a man of many talents. He's one of the rare bona fide five-tool players in today's game and it's a big reason he's the face of the Mariners franchise. Yet like even the greatest players in baseball, he's not perfect. He's a notorious slow-starter who takes a few months to get warm and we've gotten a chance to see glimpses of what he can do when he's at full strength.

When he does finally get into a groove, there aren't many players that are better at the plate. Over the course of his four-year career, he has a .902 OPS in the second-half and typically does his best work in August and September. However, a closer look shows that while he may reach new heights later in the season, he doesn't find the same pattern of success over the course of a single game.

Last season, Julio Rodríguez was consistently less productive when hitting against relief pitchers

Buster Olney of ESPN is just one of many who rightfully believe that Rodríguez is the best at what he does, ranking him as the best center fielder in baseball heading into 2026. Along with all the praise was a comment that while facing opposing bullpens, he was limited to just a .701 OPS across 277 plate appearances. This was just below the league-average OPS of .711 last year.

There are a few possible reasons for this.

First, it's common for relievers to be tougher assignments for hitters. Because they only pitch an inning at a time and often bring strange deliveries and unique pitch shapes to the table, it's difficult to get a feel for them once they enter the game. Second, relievers are often brought in with a platoon advantage. For Julio in 2025, 64.5 percent of pitches he faced from starting pitchers were from the right side, whereas the proportion was 80.4 percent when facing relievers.

It's such a minor thing that it may not even be on the team's radar. After all, the randomness around which reliever gets the call in which inning almost makes this flaw in his game negligible. One could argue that difficulties against relievers could suggest the lack of a "clutch" gene but he has an OPS of .796 in high-leverage situations, which is significantly better.

This will hopefully be another big year for Julio. Despite the frustration of falling short on the cusp of the World Series, he's moving forward with a productive mindset and seems ready for a fresh start. In fact, there are already plenty of encouraging signs that he's only going to continue to get better.

Signing Julio Rodríguez to a massive extension during his rookie year will go down as one of the best decisions ever made by the Mariners organization. Given all of his accomplishments, it's easy to forget that he just turned 25 years old a few months ago. Furthermore, you may have missed that last year was the best season of his career and he accumulated more rWAR (6.8) than Juan Soto (6.2). He may never be perfect but you can safely bet that he'll continue to be excellent.