Quick thoughts on Jordan Walker's winning the Home Run Derby (!)

That, friends, was fun

I really hope you got to see that.

Sure, it’s the Home Run Derby. It doesn’t count in the standings. None of those 31 home runs that Jordan Walker hit at Citizens Bank Park on Monday night are going to show up on his baseball card or his Baseball-Reference page. It doesn’t really, truly change anything about the Cardinals’ 2026 season. But it was pure, unleavened baseball fun. It was also yet another memorable accomplishment for a player who’s walked through baseball hell and back before age 24. It’s another upward bend on the arc that’s taken him from bust to one of the best power hitters in baseball.

In case you missed it – and I really, really hope you didn’t – Jordan Walker is the 2026 Home Run Derby champion. He claimed the belt and the title (and the $1 million prize) with a dominating performance in the first two rounds and then with a miracle comeback in the finals, in defiance of Kyle Schwarber’s lofty finals tally and a thoroughly hostile Philly crowd.

For the uninitiated, the Derby is back to a “number of swings” format instead of a timed format. There’s always a risk of it becoming a Taking Pitches Derby under that structure, but Monday night’s wasn’t too bad in that regard. Walker cracked 13 homers on his 20 swings in the first round, which tied him with old friend Willson Contreras for the highest total (Contreras earned top honors via distance tiebreaker). In the second round, Walker blasted Junior Caminero out of the water, as he passed him and eliminated him with seven swings still left on the board. In the finals, Walker punched his way out of the Derby grave by homering six straight times with scant margin for error to stun Schwarber and the throngs of Philly rooters.

Please enjoy:

In the Birdy Work Slack for paid subscribers, some of us were watching “together,” and, well, you’re invited to appreciate the enthusiasm upon the instance of Walker’s walk-off:

Almost more striking than all of Walker’s clouts was just how easy it seemed to come to him. With his hat turned around in homage to Ken Griffey Jr. and some casual gum-chewing, Walker almost never seemed to register the weight of the moment or physical rigors of hitting that many balls that hard. It wasn’t so much nonchalance as it was a sense of calm that permitted Walker to maintain a certain grace while his competitive peers were huffing and puffing and popping veins from effort. “Easy gas” is a pitching term, but Walker on Monday wielded that concept as a hitter. Those uncommon vibes plus the white-knuckled finish made it, to paraphrase the onlooking Barry Bonds, the best Derby ever. And maybe it was.

And to repeat, no, don’t worry about Walker’s participation in the Derby derailing his swing. There’s just no evidence that participating in the Derby is bad for a hitter’s swing or future production. I compared his Derby swing on the home run that sent Caminero to the showers to his final homer of the first half. He was set up with a bit more of a closed stance for the Derby, and he locked out his front leg a bit more firmly on contact Monday night. But the finish was the same, the shoulders had a similar tilt at contact, and the back elbow was slotted tight to the ribs on the swing just as it usually is. And so on.

Furthermore, have a look at Walker on July 9 at heel plant just before he homers against the Brewers:

And here is on Monday night at heel plant just before walking off Caminero

There’s just not much there at that very vital checkpoint in the swing – at least not adjust for camera angle and pitch location.

If anything, the mission objective to hit the ball in the air to the pull side over and over again might be of use to Walker, who still wrestles with his old ground-ball proclivities from time to time. He’s a pro hitter, and he takes hundreds of swings every week. A mere fifty or so swings for the downs on an isolated night in the middle of July isn’t going to come back on him in any meaningful way.

So appreciate Monday night for the great show that it was and appreciate what it plainly meant to Walker and his family, who was blessedly in attendance.

What better way to celebrate it than by inking Walker to, oh, an eight-year extension or thereabouts. Right?

Back soon with more.