What's behind Tommy Edman's power surge? How Dodgers star has added a new aspect to his well-rounded game

A new baseball season means, among other things, ample opportunities to ask, “What the heck is going on here?” Consider Los Angeles Dodgers second baseman Tommy Edman. 

Edman launched his fifth home run of the year on Friday night against the Philadelphia Phillies, putting him in a tie with Arizona Diamondbacks third baseman Eugenio Suárez for the most in the National League. (Aaron Judge, the New York Yankees star and reigning American League MVP Award winner, leads the majors with six.) This is a most unexpected development for Edman, who is already 38% of the way to his single-season high (13) after making something like 6% of his likely appearances on the year.

If you didn’t see Tommy Edman, the home run hitter, coming … well, who did? Here’s part of what we wrote last July, while praising the Dodgers for obtaining him in a three-team trade with the Chicago White Sox and the St. Louis Cardinals:  “The Dodgers aren’t acquiring Edman for his switch-hitting bat (though he is more of an asset against left-handed pitching); they’re acquiring him for his secondary skills.” That may have been true at the time. Now, though? Edman has the chance to render the extension he signed over the winter (five years, $74 million) a laughable bargain for L.A.

Of course, a hot streak to open the season doesn’t necessarily mean a player has leveled up. There is, nevertheless, reason to think this is a different version of Edman than the one who entered 2025 with a career 100 OPS+.

For starters, the switch-hitting Edman has altered his swings. Compare one of his first hacks with the Dodgers to his current lefty swing, and you’ll notice that he’s altered his hand placement (raising them) and his bat angle at the height of his stride. But we don’t have to rely on the eye test anymore. Thanks to Statcast’s limb-tracking measurements, we can compare a number of markers and illustrate that this isn’t the same old Edman:

It’s not just cosmetic differences, either. Edman is demonstrably making more authoritative contact in 2025. His average exit velocity is up, from 87.6 mph to 91.5 mph, and he’s clearing 95 mph every 2.3 batted balls to date. For reference, he did that every 3.9 batted balls last year, and every 3.4 in 2023.

Power is generally a function of bat speed and point of contact. Both dynamics are pointing in the right direction for Edman. Nearly 7% of his lefty swings have cleared 75 mph this season; the sum of his previous two years — not the average, but the sum — was 6%. Edman is also making contact more than five inches in front of the plate as a lefty and righty swinger; he’d not cleared two inches previously. 

In accordance, Edman has pulled more than 22% of his balls in the air after pulling around 14% in 2023 and less than 17% in his career. That doesn’t put him at Isaac Paredes’ levels (30% plus, usually), but it’s another piece of the puzzle when it comes to explaining his power gains.

So, yes, this does seem to be a different Edman — and the Dodgers might have one of their three former MVPs to thank. At minimum, Edman’s hot start shines a new light on comments he made last fall during a post-World Series edition of Mookie Betts’ podcast. “Obviously it sucked that you were injured too, but since we were both kind of going through the same thing, we were able to work on our swings together,” Edman said. “I know you showed me a few really good things about my swing early on that kind of helped me out and helped drive me through the season.”

It should go without saying that Edman is unlikely to maintain this level of home-run output — even Aaron Judge isn’t going to sustain an 81-homer pace. The beauty of Edman’s game is that he doesn’t need to in order to remain a highly valuable player: he’s still making a ton of contact and he continues to grade as a well-above-average baserunner and fielder. 

Whatever slugging gains do prove legitimate for Edman — and there’s enough going on here to think that some will stick — will simply enhance his profile rather than establishing it whole. That’s a good place to be, all things considered.