The Rockaway Wave
Originally Published August 7, 2026
Exactly eight years ago on Monday, Texas Rangers first baseman Ronald Guzmán hit three home runs as a visiting player at Yankee Stadium. He’s one of 14 visiting players to accomplish that feat at any Yankee Stadium—new or old—putting him in the company of players like J.D. Martinez, Vladimir Guerrero Jr., Bo Jackson, and just this past week, Alec Burleson.
In the stands was a 13-year-old Randy Guzmán, his brother. “It was the greatest day of my life,” Randy said.
Ronald is 10 and 1/2 years older than his younger brother, and was a 23-year-old rookie playing in his 87th career MLB game at the time of his three-home-run showing.
The Guzmán family would go on vacation from the Dominican Republic to the United States to watch Ronald play. As Randy remembers it, every member of his family—parents, cousins and friends—was in the stands to watch Ronald’s offensive explosion.
About four years after this game, Randy signed with the New York Mets as an international free agent. His journey following in his older brother’s footsteps had begun. Randy has learned a lot from Ronald. He’s helped him with his swing and his approach in the box, and has been a go-to support system while he learns to play the game at this level.
“I learned a lot about the lifestyle of a baseball player, and he talks to me a lot about it too,” Randy said. “He gives me a lot of advice. It’s like having a father that already went through that path, and he talks to me a lot. We have great communication.”
Randy played 67 games in the Dominican Summer League over his two seasons of professional baseball, and he really didn’t hit much. He wasn’t necessarily worried that a promotion to the United States wasn’t going to come, but he knew he wasn’t playing well.
“You just want to be the best,” he said. “I was new in this, in professional baseball, and I thought that I had to do more than I was doing, so I was putting pressure on myself.”
The promotion did come, as the Mets assigned him to the Florida Complex League to begin 2025, and he said it felt like a great relief. He made some adjustments, both to his routine and, most importantly, to his mentality.
“I knew myself, I knew my swing, I knew my game, and I started doing good, and I had no pressure,” he said. “And then I started knowing that the more fun I have in-game, I play better.
So, I learned that part. Now I have no pressure. I just go out there, I don’t care about the result, I just go have fun, and whatever happens, happens.”
From there on, he took off. Randy hit .282/.371/.474/.845 with seven homers in 49 games in the Florida Complex League before earning a promotion to Single-A near the end of July. He was even better there, hitting .333/.381/.604/.985 with three more homers in 26 games.
Like his brother, Randy’s best trait is his power. He’s a big guy, listed at 6-foot-4, 215 lbs, and he looks bigger than that in person. His exit velocity numbers are staggering. This season at Single- A, he hit a ball 117.6 mph.
“He’s got all of the power,” Brooklyn Cyclones Hitting Coach Devin DeYoung, who was also Randy’s hitting coach last year in Single-A, said. “He’s just an impressive body. Really good mover, really good athlete for his size. He thinks he runs a little faster than he does. But the bat’s real.”
Where minor league exit velocity data is publicly available—which, as of right now, is only Triple-A and the Florida State League—there have only been two balls hit harder. One was by Minnesota Twins prospect Emmanuel Rodriguez at Triple-A, a consensus top 100 prospect, who is 23. The other was by Washington Nationals prospect Andrew Pinckney at Triple-A, who is 25. Randy is 21, and he’s the only player at the level to clear 117 mph. Only two MLB hitters have even hit balls harder in 2026: Yordan Alvarez and Oneil Cruz
It’s not a one-off thing, either. He’s hit two other balls over 115 mph, the most among anyone in the Florida State League. In fact, he leads the league in balls hit over 107, 108, 110, 112, 113, 114, 115, 116 and 117 mph. His average exit velocity sits in the 84th percentile, and his 90th- percentile exit velocity sits in the 97th percentile.
He also maximizes his already plus power by pulling the ball in the air at a well-above-average clip, even though he does not seek out pulled fly balls. He’s made an approach change from his first few years in pro ball, and the results have followed.
“I used to want to hit a homer every at-bat,” he said. “Now it’s different. I try to not hit homers. Just low line drives, keep it simple. Not too hard swings, and that actually helps me to hit bombs because in the game with the adrenaline, you swing hard normally. So in practice, I just go to the other way—line drives—and in the game it just comes.”
Also like his brother, Randy sees a lot of his time at first base. Ronald saw all but 1.2 of his defensive innings in the big leagues at first base, with the other five outs coming in left field. That’s where he and his brother differ.
Even throughout his minor league career, Ronald barely played anywhere other than first. Randy’s spent a lot of time at first base too, but he already has 709.1 innings in the outfield. It’s split evenly between both left and right field, and the two add up to actually beat out the time he’s spent at first base by about 60 innings.
Randy loves it.
“I can show them a lot more stuff,” he said. “At first, everything’s short, just throws and groundballs. You know in the outfield, you’ve got to move to the sides, you’ve got to make throws. If a runner is going second to home, you can show your arm. It’s more fun, more activities there.”
He likes first base. He’s confident in his defense there and joked that he can do a split, but he wants to show that he can play the outfield. He’s also very confident in his arm. He will keep playing all three positions, Cyclones Manager Eduardo Núñez said.
Randy only spent about a month in Single-A last season, so he returned to the level to begin 2026. In the first week of June, he strained his quad trying to beat out a double play.
“I was out for a month, but I wasn’t out mentally,” he said. “I was always trying to watch my videos, watch the game, keep being in the game, and I made some adjustments.”
And that wasn’t all.
“It might sound crazy, but I play a lot of MLB The Show,” he said. “It has helped me a lot, to be honest, to know the zone better.”
He plays Diamond Dynasty, the card-collecting, team-building mode. He doesn’t care if he wins or loses. He’s trying to have good at-bats. It’s a way for him to work on swinging at strikes and practice predicting pitch sequencing while playing out unique game-like situations.
In that mode, he can also use his Real 99 card, a special item only given to major and minor league players. It’s a card of themselves with close to maxed-out stats, each one unique to the player. They are the only ones in the game that get that card.
“It feels so amazing,” Randy said. “Every time I hit a homer, I just feel great. It’s like me being in the actual game. It’s amazing. It’s the same stance, same power—it’s obviously me. It feels great.”
After he returned to Single-A from his rehab assignment, he went on a tear. Randy hit .379 with three homers, a double and a triple in nine games before earning a promotion to Brooklyn. With the incoming players from the 2026 MLB Draft, there was roster shuffling across the different levels of the minor leagues. He was expecting that a promotion might be coming, but he said it was exciting news to get nonetheless.
So far for the Cyclones, he’s done nothing but hit. In his first seven games at the level, Randy’s hit .393/.438/.536/.974 with one homer and one double. The home run was 107.8 mph off the bat and went 395 feet to left-center field at Maimonides Park, not an easy feat.
“He does some of the most impressive things I’ve ever seen,” DeYoung said. “He can reach in the other batter’s box and hit a double off the wall. He can take a changeup off the plate and drive it 110 [mph] off the wall. He does some pretty cool things, and he comes from some pedigree. His brother’s a big leaguer. He’s an unbelievable leader. He has some nuance to the game, like he can pick up little details that’ll give him an edge. He’s just all around the package.”
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