The Jac Caglianone Breakout Has Arrived

“Jactani.” That was the incredibly intimidating nickname bestowed upon Jac Caglianone by University of Florida fans and college baseball fans alike during his breakout sophomore season with the Gators.

A combination of blazing stuff on the mound and otherworldly power from the left side of the plate earned Caglianone the nickname, as he appeared to be the closest thing college baseball had to its own version of MLB phenom Shohei Ohtani.

As expected, the name came with expectations through the stratosphere. Caglianone had become one of the rare college baseball players recognizable even to casual Major League Baseball fans. However, Caglianone never seemed fazed by the weight that came with those expectations — in fact, he seemed to thrive off of it.

In both 2023 and 2024, Cags helped lead the Florida Gators to trips to Omaha as they competed for the College World Series in back-to-back seasons. Additionally, the flamethrower was named as one of the finalists for the Golden Spikes Award in both seasons, an honor given to the best collegiate player in the country.

Needless to say, when Caglianone became eligible for the MLB draft following Florida’s exit from the College World Series in 2024, there were fans across baseball clamoring for their franchise to be the lucky team to select the left-hander.

Despite the hype and consistent performance in the SEC, however, there were still a remarkable number of questions surrounding Cags as the 2024 draft approached.

Early Questions Surrounding Caglianone

To start, there was a great deal of skepticism regarding whether he would be able to follow in the footsteps of the aforementioned Ohtani and sustain being a two-way player in professional baseball as a Major League Baseball player. There seemed to be a consensus around the league that his pitching lagged behind the offensive side of his game, as he seemed to be far more polished at the plate.

Even with that being said, there were still alarming concerns about Cags at the plate. Some scouts seemed to believe that despite having immense power, Caglianone would have a hard time making enough contact to truly utilize it properly, as they forecasted a great deal of swing and miss once he faced more advanced pitching in professional baseball.

All in all, there were an enormous number of red flags raised by scouts and evaluators regarding how Caglianone’s stellar college game would translate after draft day.

These red flags wound up leading to a slight drop, as he was projected to be in the 3-4 range by most outlets and ended up falling to the Kansas City Royals with the sixth overall selection. Despite that, when Rob Manfred announced the pick, Caglianone was announced as a two-way player.

However, it did not take long for the front office and development team to determine that the wisest way to move forward with their first-round pick was to focus on him as a position player.

And a wise decision that was indeed.

Hitting the Ground Running in the Minor Leagues

Caglianone’s minor league career was incredibly short-lived, much like many of his counterparts from the early rounds of the loaded 2024 draft class.

After a brief stint in High-A to close out the 2024 season, the Royals opened his 2025 campaign in Double-A. It did not take long for Cags to make a mockery of the competition. Over 38 games, he posted just under a 1.000 OPS, making it increasingly clear that he needed a greater challenge to continue his development.

Kansas City answered that challenge by promoting him to Triple-A in May 2025. Rather than slowing down against the highest level of minor league competition, Caglianone somehow got even better. He posted a staggering 1.132 OPS with 11 home runs in just 28 games, making his case for a spot on the big league roster impossible for Kansas City to ignore.

An Underwhelming Rookie Campaign

The date of Jac Caglianone’s MLB debut with Kansas City was June 23, 2025. The Royals traveled to their in-state rival, the St. Louis Cardinals, for a three-game set and had the newly called-up Cags positioned in the six hole in the order as the team’s designated hitter.

Caglianone’s debut came with a great deal of fanfare and hype among Royals fans. Calling up a player of his ilk, armed with astonishing minor league numbers, seemed like an ideal remedy for a team laboring through the dog days of summer. The hope was that the youngster could become a lightning rod in the middle of Kansas City’s lineup, with his archetype as a power-hitting lefty providing the perfect complement to Bobby Witt Jr., a right-handed, contact-oriented bat.

Underwhelmingly, Caglianone went 0-for-5 in his professional debut against St. Louis. Unfortunately for both Kansas City and Caglianone, that performance would prove symbolic of how the rookie would perform for the remainder of the 2025 campaign.

Cags had finally met his match in the big leagues, as his contact concerns began to rear their ugly head. Veteran pitchers, in particular, were able to pick him apart, leading him to chase at a remarkably poor 38.5% rate.

That elevated chase rate not only contributed to a higher strikeout rate at the plate but also diminished Caglianone’s greatest strength: his power.

When Caglianone swings at pitches over the plate and squares them up, he is capable of producing outlier-level exit velocities, crushing baseballs at a level few big leaguers can match. When he chases, however, it becomes increasingly difficult to make quality contact on pitches outside the zone.

As a result, even when Caglianone managed to avoid striking out in Kansas City, he too often failed to capitalize on the very skill that made him such an intriguing prospect in the first place. All in all, the left-hander posted a measly 89.7 mph average exit velocity, placing him in the middle of the pack for major leaguers — a far cry from where he should be given his elite raw ability to impact the baseball.

When the year came to a close, Caglianone’s lack of discipline and failure to get to his power resulted in a disastrous slash line of .157/.237/.295, which provided him with an OPS that was less than half of his stellar Triple-A statline earlier in the season.

A Breakout in 2026