Last Updated on September 6, 2025 by Matt Musico
We now have less than a month of MLB’s 2025 regular season left. Outside of the Tampa Bay Rays trying to grab an American League Wild Card spot, there’s still plenty to watch for.
And I’m mainly talking about Junior Caminero because I want to see how he finishes out his first big-league campaign.
He’s been around for a couple of seasons since he made his MLB debut in September 2023 as a 20-year-old, but he was far from a proven commodity at the highest level entering 2025. After all, Caminero had appeared in just 50 games for Tampa Bay.
It’s safe to say the former top prospect has officially arrived.
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A Glimpse at Junior Caminero’s Breakout Season
In those 50 games between 2023 and 2024, Caminero accumulated 213 plate appearances. He slashed .246/.296/.412 with seven home runs, 10 doubles, one triple, 25 RBI, and 19 runs scored.
Solid stats for a young rookie trying to get a foothold in the big leagues, especially since his OPS improved from .631 in 2023 to .724 in 2024 (the sample sizes were quite different, but you get the idea).
Taking yet another step forward while playing every day is not a surprise, especially for someone who arrived in the majors with a top prospect pedigree. But it’s probably difficult to find someone who predicted the kind of power surge he’d go on throughout the year for Tampa Bay.
Through 573 trips to the plate, Caminero is slashing .263/.304/.541 with 41 home runs, 103 RBI, and 85 runs scored. His OPS is on track to take another significant jump this year (.631 to .724 to .845).
Making any legitimate comparisons to his 2023 season in the big leagues isn’t fair because he only registered 36 plate appearances. But then again, the positive trend in his batted-ball profile is there.
Caminero’s ground-ball rate is on track to improve for the second straight year (61.5% to 48.0% to 46.2%), as is his soft-hit rate (26.9% to 22.0% to 13.8%). The infielder’s hard-hit rate has taken a dramatic jump, too — it’s currently sitting at 39.2% after settling in at 29.1% last season.
Only Looking Up at Carlos Peña Now
And all of these improvements have Caminero on the doorstep of Rays franchise history. Tampa Bay has only been around since the 1998 season, so there haven’t been a ton of opportunities for the organization to accumulate huge individual power seasons.
Carlos Peña was the only Rays hitter to record a 40-homer campaign before Caminero recently joined. Peña’s 46 taters in 2007 are a franchise record — for now, at least.
Caminero still has time left to slug six more homers and pass Peña on the Rays’ single-season home run leaderboard.
He at least appears to be in a great position to make it happen. The right-handed slugger has hit at least six homers in each month this season.
Did The Home Run Derby Get Him Going?
The 2025 Home Run Derby was filled with plenty of first-time participants, with Caminero being one of them. The first-time All-Star probably took many by surprise since he slugged 44 taters and reached the finals before Cal Raleigh eventually won the crown.
If you take a look at Caminero’s first- and second-half splits, it’s clear to see his power has reached another level after the midsummer classic. He hit 23 homers with a .790 OPS before the All-Star Game, following 18 homers and a .957 OPS so far after it.
So, that begs the question… did the Home Run Derby get him going? My first inclination would be to say yes, but if that did happen, it certainly wasn’t a straight line.
When looking at his triple slash, July was actually Caminero’s worst month of the season. His .232 average, .262 on-base percentage, .444 slugging percentage, and .706 OPS were all his lowest through the first four months of the regular season. But August is when he reached a level we hadn’t seen yet, which has also put him in a spot to break Peña’s franchise record.
Caminero slashed .262/.313/.631 with 12 homers and 23 RBI through 112 plate appearances in August.
So, while some might point to the Home Run Derby as a turning point when looking at his first- and second-half splits, that’s probably not the case. Either way, he’s on the cusp of some fun franchise history.
Do you think Caminero can surpass Peña on Tampa’s single-season home run leaderboard? How many homers do you think he’ll finish the year with?
Stats via FanGraphs and Baseball-Reference, unless otherwise noted.
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