Have you ever had that one friend that you swear is really funny in private, and you go around and you tell all the other friends about how funny they are, and you can’t wait to get them together because you know that your guy is gonna deliver, and you’re gonna be proven correct? But then, when that friend gets around a group of people, he totally underperforms and remains completely silent, and you end up looking like a fool. That’s Parker Meadows.
I’ve been high on Parker for several years now. I see the ceiling. I see all the things that I feel like he’s capable of doing. There is somewhere in Parker Meadows, a five-tool player and a legit lead-off hitter at the vague level. We’ve seen it in spurts. This team doesn’t make the playoffs in 2024 without his contributions, and it felt like he was starting to turn a corner. Then he came into this season injured, missed the first chunk of the campaign, and by the time the year was over, he was an automatic out at the bottom of the order. By the postseason, AJ finally said, "Enough is enough," and just moved him down to the 8 or 9 spot.
I will cut Parker a little bit of slack for the fact that it didn’t seem like he was ever healthy this season. Early on in spring training, he had an injury, and while he still played a good amount of the season, it was pretty clear that he was not himself. Maybe I shouldn’t say that, maybe what we saw this year is just who Parker Meadows is. Maybe he’s a guy who’s going to play really good defense, show flashes of what we believe could be a good bat at the big league level, but ultimately just be a well below average major league player.
Parker Meadows finds himself in the position that Spencer Torkelson found himself in at the end of last year. Torkelson, to his credit, had a monster spring training, and it played his way into the opening day lineup. That continued in April, and he ultimately ended up having his best season as a big leaguer. The time is now for Parker Meadows.
I wish I could more accurately explain what the issue is. It feels like the tools are there, the makeup is there. He has remarkable speed and is a well-documented, tremendous centerfielder. We’ve seen moments where it feels like the bat is legit, but for every step forward, there are three steps back. Maybe what we’re seeing from Parker falls in line with the player he’s been, going back to the minor leagues. It’s always taken him quite a bit of time to figure it out, but the fact that we are now about to head into 2026 and he still hasn’t locked down the everyday centerfielder job is pretty damning.
Objects in the mirror are closer than they appear, and that object in this particular case is definitely Max Clark. Even if Clark continues to ascend rapidly, there is still a world in which Parker Meadows can be a functioning member of this ball club. There are a lot of intangibles that he has that this team simply lacks. But it’s hard for me to sell people on a player with speed and tremendous base running capabilities when they aren’t getting on base enough times to really show off their talents.
It probably seems like I’m going to stamp Parker Meadows with a giant "F" grade, and there’s still a part of me that’s debating whether or not I should. He does still play an elite center field, which is at least worth something. The biggest reason I can’t quite give him a full-on F is that I just don’t know how healthy he was this season. It’s tough for any player not to have a spring training and try to slowly work their way back to the big league level. I think that Parker was still given a pretty big landing strip. He had months to figure it out. Some struggles were to be expected once he came back, but the fact that we got into October and he was seemingly worse than he was to start the season just added to the frustration. Next year is going to be "prove it" year for Parker. I know that it’s in there. We’ve seen this guy contribute, but next year is the year that he has to put it together. This year, though, was a mess.
FINAL GRADE: D-