Meet Alan Roden: The Blue Jays OF With A Physics Degree & Opportunity For An MLB Breakthrough In 2025

Image credit: Alan Roden (Photo by Mark Blinch/Getty Images)

Things aren’t always as they appear in baseball or in life.

We’re taught at an early age not to judge a book by its cover, but in a line of work where you’re ranking and evaluating young players, doing so is often an unavoidable consequence. It’s easy to be dismissive of those that fall outside the ideal prospect frame, age or mechanics.

In this way, a player like Blue Jays outfielder Alan Roden can slip under the radar for large swaths of baseball fans. 

Roden was a third-round draft pick in 2022 out of Creighton, where he spent four seasons. He redshirted his true freshman year in 2019 before covid wiped out his redshirt freshman campaign. Over the next two seasons, Roden was among the best hitters in the Big East, earning first-team all-conference honors in 2021 and a co-player of the year award in 2022. Despite technically being a draft-eligible sophomore, Roden was in fact a four-year player with a physics degree. 

That’s the fun twist in Roden’s story: his scientific background and immense intellect. His parents are both scientists themselves—a microbiologist and a soil scientist, respectively. As such, Roden made time to commit himself to his major despite a growing baseball career, so much so that he received a NASA Nebraska space grant for his research on black holes.

On the field, Roden is a similar case of being more than meets the eye. His boxy build and unassuming physicality looks more the part of a positionless player destined for first base than an above-average athlete. Despite this look, Roden was a strong athletic tester as an amateur and will show sneaky speed on the base paths and range in the outfield. 

Roden’s batting stance is also unusual, evoking comparisons to other unique stances in baseball history as he’ll start each at-bat with his bat high above his back shoulder. The look has been toned down in recent years, however, and hasn’t seemed to have any impact on his ability to load up and get on time.

It’s just another odd quirk for a player full of them. 

Despite not fitting into the industry’s standard for look, age or background, Roden has found success in the minor leagues. His discerning eye at the plate has led to high walk rates and low strikeouts rates throughout his professional career. His bat-to-ball skills are plus, as he shows the ability to hit a variety of pitches. While he lacks elite top-end exit velocities, he does show the ability to spray hard line drives. He’s made adjustments to get more into his pullside power in recent years, something that began to bubble to the surface late in 2024 and helped him earn Baseball America’s minor league player of the year team honors for the Blue Jays.

Now, Roden has an opportunity to continue his off-the-beaten path story at the major league level, as he recently broke camp with the Blue Jays and is hitting .313 with just one strikeout in 16 at-bats to open the 2025 season. He will fill in at corner outfield spots for now and could stick around as a fourth outfielder upon Dalton Varsho’s return from the IL.

With polished plate skills and the ability to play all over the outfield, Roden might break through as an everyday regular for the Blue Jays in 2025 and continue to be a lesson on not judging a book—or baseball player—by its cover.