San Diego's Tatis, Miller Named To All-MLB Team

If you didn't know any better and took a look at the counting numbers of the San Diego Padres' Fernando Tatis Jr. on May 29 you might have thought you were perusing the line of a fourth outfielder or utility infielder:

• .268 average, .652 OPS, six doubles, zero home runs, 17 RBIs and 51 strikeouts in 205 at-bats for a 24.9% strikeout rate

And, yes, that's right, zero home runs.

At that point, and considering Tatis' reputation and past performance, you wouldn't be wrong to think he might be headed for an All-MIA season rather than an All-MLB one.

But if you looked farther beneath the surface you would have seen that Tatis' advanced batting metrics like exit velocity and launch angle were still elite, lending hope that those line drives being hit right at somebody or the flyballs being caught at the wall would soon start finding grass or clearing the fence.

The turnaround began on May 30 when he hit his first HR against the Washington Nationals, and he pretty much didn't stop hitting after that, which helped spark the Padres' run to the NL's top wild-card seed.

When the dust settled on Sept. 27, Tatis was hitting .289 (just seven hits short of a .300 season) with a robust .828 OPS, 25 doubles, 25 HRs, 83 RBIs and a K rate that had shrunk to 20.8%.

On Tuesday, those numbers, along with his usual stellar defense in right - and 50 unexpected starts at second base - earned Tatis one of three outfield spots on Bleacher Report's All-MLB Team, which "highlight[s] the best and brightest across Major League Baseball during the 2026 season...."

Tatis has some familiar company on B/R's All-MLB Team as he is joined by Padres' closer Mason Miller.

Miller's inclusion on the team confirms his status as baseball's most unhittable relief pitcher. Of the 272 batters he faced in 70.0 innings pitched this season, he struck out 129, for an astronomical strikeout rate of 47.4% and corresponding 16.6 strikeouts per nine innings pitched.

That allowed him to record an NL-best 38 saves this season, including 28 straight to open the campaign.

Digging deeper, Miller averaged 101.4 mph with his fastball and generated an otherworldly 56.3% whiff rate when he threw his slider, making those two offerings ones in which hitters' bats more often than not went MIA.

And he did all of that while living as a Type 1 diabetic who must wear a glucose monitor to ensure that his blood-sugar levels are within the proper range.