Heading into the season, despite having played just 35 professional games, Bryce Rainer was getting buzz as a potential top 10 overall prospect.
The Tigers' 2024 first-rounder displayed rare power from the left side last season as a slick-fielding shortstop, up until his debut campaign ended in June with right shoulder surgery.
If there was any concern whether Rainer's thump might return now that he's fully healthy, he silenced those doubts with one swing on Friday as he crushed a 477-foot homer at 116.2 mph in Single-A Lakeland's 2-1 win over Daytona at Joker Marchant Stadium.
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Up to bat in the fourth inning, MLB's No. 32 prospect jumped on a first-pitch sinker over the middle from Reds right-hander Edgar Colon and mashed it over everything. Over the center-field wall, marked 420 feet away, over the towering batter's eye. And from Colon's facial expression, he knew it was gone off the bat.
Rainer's roundtripper, his first of the year, was truly historic. Since the start of the Statcast era (in 2015), it's both the longest measured homer by a Tigers Major or Minor Leaguer (surpassing Colt Keith's 473-footer for Triple-A Toledo on June 30, 2023) and the hardest hit (surpassing Chris Meyers' 115.7 mph for Lakeland on April 8, 2022).
The Tigers' No. 3 prospect has gotten off to a bit of a slow start, with just three hits and nine strikeouts across 18 at-bats in his first five games. But part of that has been bad batted ball luck. All of Rainer's contact has come at 91 mph or harder, with most coming at 104 mph or harder.
To wit -- and we're dealing with tiny sample sizes here -- Rainer's expected slash line of .224/.397/.430 is much more in line with expectations than his actual slash line of .143/.333/.214.
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The California native similarly got off to a slow start in 2025 -- 2-for-18 in his first six games -- before roaring to an .831 OPS. The signs are there for Rainer to become the next great power-hitting shortstop prospect, and he gave a taste of why on Friday.