Major League Baseball

MLB Home Run Derby 2022: Pete Alonso vs. the field. Who wins?

Updated Jul. 18, 2022 8:45 p.m. ET

By Jake Mintz
FOX Sports MLB Writer

LOS ANGELES — It's Derby Day, one of the best days of the year.

Since MLB moved to the current bracket-based, time-oriented format, the Home Run Derby has been phenomenal. Last year in Denver was Ohtani-mania, but it was Pete Alonso taking the title again. In ‘19 in Cleveland, it was the Vladdy show and Pete's first title. In '18 in D.C., Bryce Harper won at home. And in '17 in Miami, Aaron Judge dominated.

Like I said, it has been sweet lately. And this year's Home Run Derby is shaping up to be magnificent yet again.

Home Run Derby: Dodgers Stadium tour & the best place to catch a home run

Jordan Shusterman and Jake Mintz take a tour of Dodger Stadium and discuss the best places to catch a home run during the Home Run Derby.

Part of that is because Dodger Stadium is not a yard that sees a great deal of lengthy long balls. In the Statcast tracking era (since 2015), Dodger Stadium has the second-fewest home runs 440 feet or farther (35) in baseball. The only park with fewer is Globe Life Field in Texas, which has existed only since 2020.

Combine that massive dinger dearth with the fact that this is the first Derby at Dodger Stadium, and you've got yourself a rare opportunity to see MLB's most powerful gents blast baseballs deep into the L.A. hills.

Now, only six homers have ever completely left Dodger Stadium. Willie Stargell did it twice, in 1965 and ‘73. Mike Piazza, the only Dodger to do it, cleared the left-field grandstand in ‘97. Mark McGwire hit a parking-lot bomb in ‘99. Giancarlo Stanton sent it flying as a Marlin back in ‘15. And the sore and sorely missed Fernando Tatis Jr. accomplished the feat just last season.

Will anybody leave the yard on Monday? Yes. Absolutely yes. The parking lot is very much in play, as are the scoreboards atop the outfield bleachers. Expect to see things you've never seen before.

To get you prepped for a night of obliterated baseballs, Gatorade breaks and sports joy, here's a rundown of the eight contestants participating in the festivities.

As always, the entrants are seeded in order of how many homers they've hit so far this season. The winners of the first-round matchups move on to the semifinals; the winners of that round move on to the finals. You're a baseball fan — you know how it works.

Who'll win the Home Run Derby?

Ben Verlander gives his round-by-round predictions for the 2022 Home Run Derby at Dodger Stadium.

Anyway, here are the matchups.

No. 1 Kyle Schwarber (29 homers) vs. No. 8 Albert Pujols (six homers)

The Derby at Nats Park in 2018 is remembered as Harper's last hurrah as a member of the Nationals. At the time, it felt like a galvanizing moment that could jump-start what had been a lackluster Nats club. Alas, baseball clubhouses don't care about Home Run Derby wins, and seven months later, Harper was in Philly.

But all the Harper hoopla overshadowed just how good Schwarber was that night. In total, the former Cub hit 10 more big flies than Harper, but Schwarber lost the final matchup. Cubs fans are probably still irked that Harper wasn't penalized for getting his pitches before the previous batted ball touched down.

Schwarber's 55 homers in 2018 still stand as the seventh-most ever hit in a single Derby (to be fair, that tally is skewed by the recent shift in format). And considering how scalding he has been at times for the Phillies this season — his 29 homers lead the NL — Schwarber is probably the second-favorite to take home the crown, after Alonso.

And whereas Schwarber has to be considered a front-runner, Pujols might be the longest shot in Derby history. A win by the 42-year-old future Hall of Famer in his final All-Star Game would be downright shocking, considering that Albert has just six homers this season as a part-time bench bat who predominantly faces left-handed pitchers.

The Derby requires physical stamina as much as raw juice. Pujols is a nice story and a legend, and it's cool that they let him participate, but there's no way he wins. Right?

No. 2 Pete Alonso (24 homers) vs. No. 7 Ronald Acuña Jr. (eight homers)

As the two-time defending champion, Mets slugger Alonso is seeking to be the event's first back-to-back-to-back winner. Only Junior Griffey has ever won it thrice. Last year in Denver, Alonso picked up his second straight title belt with a spectacular performance and solidified himself as the new "Home Run Derby Guy."

Although many other power guys rely on pre-pitch movement and a high-effort swing to drive the baseball, Alonso has so much raw juice that he doesn't need to swing that hard in a Derby. His short, compact and repeatable stroke has propelled his two previous wins and will make him extremely tough to beat yet again.

When he gets into a rhythm like he did last year, Pete is a machine, blasting tater after tater deep over the left-center-field fence. What's more, he loves the show.

Some sluggers are reluctant or refuse to participate in the Derby, afraid that it could mess up their swing for the second half. Alonso cares not for such rubbish. The Derby is his stage where he feels most comfortable. If he takes home the belt for a third straight time, he'll get to call himself the greatest Derby hitter ever.

Acuña has participated in the Derby only once, in the 2019 edition at Progressive Field in Cleveland. That night, he was electric in his first round, besting Josh Bell 25-18, and he took Alonso to the brink by whopping 19 homers in their second-round matchup.

The Derby is an exhibition, yes, but that loss to Alonso will definitely be on Acuña's mind come Monday night.

Compared to Alonso's raw polar bear strength, Acuña's power is much more dependent on his elite bat speed and full-effort hack. That means, at least in theory, that he'll tire out at a faster rate than his competitors, but he should prove a real challenge to Alonso in the first round.

A major takeaway from Acuña's 2019 performance was how easily and often he drove the ball to the opposite field. Other Derby hitters might have to let an errant batting practice toss on the outer half go by, but Acuña can just smack it to right field.

It's somewhat surprising that the Braves allowed Acuña to participate, considering he's just over a year removed from his ACL injury, so you have to imagine that he genuinely cares about participating. In 2019, he put on a show and lost to Alonso by a hair. In 2020, there was no Derby, and he missed last year's festivities after suffering the ACL injury a week before the break.

I think Acuña is being overlooked a bit and is a dark horse to win the whole thing.

No. 3 Corey Seager (22 homers) vs. No. 6 Julio Rodríguez (16 homers)

For the first time since 2012, there's no hometown hitter participating in the Derby. But Rangers shortstop Seager, who spent the first six years of his career in Dodger blue, should play the role of crowd favorite. His departure from L.A. felt like a foregone conclusion after the Dodgers traded for Trea Turner last July, and it doesn't seem like there's any resentment toward Seager from the fan base.

His only previous participation was at Petco Park in 2016, halfway through his rookie season. He lost to Mark Trumbo in the first round. Until I looked it up, I had completely forgotten Seager was in that Derby. (Don't hate on me; a lot has happened the past six years.)

Similar to Acuña, Seager's opposite-field prowess should play to his advantage, as should his familiarity with Dodger Stadium. Little things, such as knowing how the ball comes out of the center-field batter's eye and how flies carry to different parts of the park, could make a real difference, especially when you consider that Rodríguez has never played at Dodger Stadium.

Like Seager six years ago, Rodríguez is Derby-ing midway through a sensational rookie season. Two other rookies, Judge in 2017 and Alonso in 2019, have won this event in the past four editions, so perhaps youthful exuberance is a plus.

You can imagine a scenario in which J-Rod's eagerness gets the best of him and he overswings his way to an early exit. But you can just as easily picture him catching absolute fire, winning over the crowd while knocking off the former Dodger and storming his way to a rousing Derby title.

All with a smile on his face.

No. 4 Juan Soto (20 homers) vs. No. 5 José Ramírez (19 homers)

There were so many Derby storylines last year — Alonso's dominance, Trey Mancini's comeback story, the fanfare around Shohei Ohtani's Derby debut — that it's easy to forget how awesome Soto was in his first try.

The Nats' 23-year-old maestro went toe-to-toe with Ohtani in a Derby battle for the ages, with the two superstars tying in regulation and again in a tie-breaker. Soto edged Ohtani in the three-pitch swing-off before running out of gas and hitting "just" 15 in the semifinals against eventual champion Alonso.

The hot gossip this week about Soto declining a $440 million contract offer from Washington will have absolutely zero bearing on the Derby. He'll probably get asked about it at media day and at the pre-Derby presser, but when Soto is in the box at Dodger Stadium, his cranium won't be lingering on trade destinations. He'll have homers to hit.

What's next for Juan Soto?

Ben Verlander discusses Juan Soto reportedly rejecting the Nationals' mega-contract proposal and what this means moving forward.

J-Ram, who put all the trade rumors to bed by signing an extension with Cleveland earlier this year, is the only other first-time Derby participant besides Rodríguez. It'll be interesting to see which side of the plate the switch-hitting Ramírez opts for, considering that Dodger Stadium's fences are perfectly even for righties and lefties.

I have no idea how repeatable Ramírez's powerful hack will be over the course of an entire Derby, but he's sure to hit a couple of laser beams that might send a Dodger Dog or two flying into the night.

The pick

I'm going out on a limb and picking Schwarber, the slugger with the most home runs so far this season, to win. I think his swing is perfect for the Derby, and he'll be able to take it pretty easy and save his energy in the first round against Pujols.

For an even bolder prediction, I'll say Acuña beats Alonso in the first round. Alonso is a formidable Derby force, and a big part of me hopes I'm wrong and he makes history with his third straight title.

But Acuña's 2019 performance is so overlooked yet was so impressive that I think he shocks the world by sending Pete packing prematurely.

Jake Mintz is the louder half of @CespedesBBQ and a baseball writer for FOX Sports. He’s an Orioles fan living in New York City, and thus, he leads a lonely existence most Octobers. If he’s not watching baseball, he’s almost certainly riding his bike. You can follow him on Twitter @Jake_Mintz.