It would have been understandable if the Guardians had phoned it in at the trade deadline. They were 40-48 on July 6th and had just lost their 10th game in a row. Starting pitcher Luis L. Ortiz was facing an MLB suspension for illegal gambling activity. Just a few weeks later, star closer Emmanuel Clase would join him on administrative leave for the same potential infraction. It seemed like a given that fellow veterans Carlos Santana, Steven Kwan, and others might be traded at the deadline, with the team turning the page to 2026.
Instead, the Guardians came out of the gates hot after the All-Star break, held firm at the trade deadline, and then doubled down and promoted one of their top prospects, C.J. Kayfus, at the start of August.
Kayfus was the Guardians’ third-round pick in the 2023 MLB Draft out of Miami. At the time of his promotion, he was the team's 4th-ranked prospect and the 66th-ranked prospect overall, according to MLB Pipeline. The 23-year-old began this season at Double-A, quickly shot up to Triple-A after 18 games, and already finds himself in the big leagues. That would be a whirlwind of a season that could be hard for anybody to process, but Kayfus is keeping his composure by sticking to a simple process.
"Just sticking to my plan and getting a pitch over the middle of the plate," he told me before a game against the Mets last week. "I've had success throughout my career. That's what got me here, so I'm trying not to change anything."
That plan has certainly led Kayfus to success in all stages of his career. He was a .350 hitter in three seasons at Miami with a 1.001 career OPS in college. He holds a .293 career minor league batting average in 211 games with a .920 OPS. In 68 games with Triple-A Columbus this season, Kayfus slashed .283/.367/.526 with 13 home runs and 43 RBIs. He played well enough that he was selected to represent the Guardians in the 2025 All-Star Futures Game during the All-Star Break.
During his time at Triple-A, he made strong swing decisions and was aggressive in the zone with a 68% zone swing rate that led to a 73% contact rate overall, which is solid for a player with 20 home run power. However, hunting his pitch in the zone has been a bit harder to do since he's been up in the big leagues.
"Honestly, the only big difference [between Triple-A pitching and MLB pitching] is the consistency with hitting spots," he admitted. "Whether it's a hitter advantage count or not, they're still gonna paint around the zone instead of giving you a pitch to do damage with, is what I've noticed so far."
The stats support what Kayfus is seeing. So far, the rookie has seen a pitch in the strike zone 43.8% of the time, which is below the league average of 47.2%, and his first pitch strike rate, which measures swings and called strikes in 0-0 counts, is just 48.3%, which is well below the 62.2% league average. As you can also see in the Statcast graphic below, the majority of the pitches Kayfus is seeing are in the shadow area, which encompasses the corners that are partially on the strike zone and partially off.
Kayfus is swinging at those pitches 12% more than league average, which has led to a -2 Run Value on pitches that he sees on the shadow. He's doing a good job of laying off pitches that are well off the plate, but he could also afford to be more aggressive when he does get a pitch over the middle of the plate, since they seem to come less often than they did for him in the minor leagues.
Still, Kayfus is adjusting just fine. He has hits in six of his eight starts and in five of his last six. His chase rate is only marginally higher than it was in the minors, and his contact rate is still 72.2%, which is pretty solid for a rookie in his first MLB action. It's also more impressive considering Kayfus has also made four big league starts in right field, which is a position he just learned to play in the minor leagues this season.
"There really wasn't any conversation at all [about the position change]," he recalled. "Honestly, it was just get back after the game and see that I'm playing left or right field again."
The move made sense from an organizational standpoint. The Guardians already have Kyle Manzardo and Carlos Santana at first base on the MLB roster, and even if Santana were to leave in free agency, Manzardo would be the favorite to be the regular first baseman in 2026. The team has also been using Jhonkensy Noel at first base in the minor leagues, and he would fill a logical platoon with Manzardo, so the Guardians needed another way to ensure that Kayfus could get regular at-bats and find an easier path to the big league team this year. The outfield was the best way forward.
Even though Kayfus played 36 games at first base for Triple-A Columbus, he also mixed in as a right fielder for 22 games, a left fielder for 12 games, and a designated hitter for one. There weren't many major hiccups either. Kayfus only made three errors while he was in Triple-A, but two of them came at first base, so the Guardians kept writing him into the lineup in the outfield.
"I think that's exactly what I needed," he stated, "just more time out there." Kayfus got that time during practices, but he also makes sure to get as much work in the outfield as he can pre-game as well. "I like to, regardless of if I'm playing first or outfield, go get some live reads during batting practice...I'm feeling really comfortable out there now."
It's no small feat that Kayfus has transitioned to a new position so quickly and has been able to play it comfortably at the big league level. You hear plenty of stories about players who spend so much time focusing on improving their defense or learning a new position that they have less time in the day to hit in the cage or work on their swing. So while their defensive performance or versatility improves, their offensive production begins to taper off. That hasn't been the case with Kayfus.
"I don't think [learning a new position] had any correlation with my offensive production," Kayfus said. "I think that the coaches here have done a really good job of helping me with the extra work of playing multiple positions."
While Kayfus is happy with his coaches, his primary concern now is making sure that his coaches are happy with him.
"Just, pretty much prove myself to my teammates and coaches who are here at the big league level," he replied when I asked what his goals were for the remainder of the season. "Really just staying true to myself and playing my game of baseball, you know, situational hitting, whether it's moving a guy over or getting a clutch two-out RBI."
He's beginning to show off that situational hitting more over the last few games. On Saturday, he drew an impressive nine-pitch walk in his second at-bat of the game against the White Sox and scored on a Brayan Rocchio double. In his next at-bat, he pounced on a 2-0 fastball and hit it out of the park for his first MLB home run. It was a pitch that Kayfus originally thought was going to be an “auto-take”in a 2-0 count: "Honestly, I think I told myself it was an auto-take. Let me just get on base, see some more pitches. And then I end up swinging. I'm sure glad I did."
That adaptability has been a hallmark of Kayfus' season so far in Cleveland and could be the calling card of his emergence as an everyday asset in this Guardians lineup.
