No matter how many thousands of simulations are run in the preseason, Major League Baseball always manages to deliver players and teams who exceed even our wildest dreams.

From the Cleveland Guardians leading the American League in winning percentage to the likes of Ronel Blanco and Luis Gil going from injury replacements to indispensable aces, the first half of the 2024 campaign has delivered all sorts of surprises.

And let's be sure to note right away: This will be a space of purely good vibrations.

If you're looking for the players and teams that have been surprisingly awful, our Brandon Scott ranked the 10 biggest disasters of the first half earlier this week.

We'll be focusing on the positive surprises; the teams that have unexpectedly become contenders and the players who could be three months away from a trophy that no one could have projected them for three months ago.

These 10 surprises are ranked in ascending order of how tightly you would have furrowed your eyebrows if we had suggested in March that it was plausible.

Honorable Mentions

Reynaldo López, RHP, Atlanta Braves

In 2019, López allowed more earned runs (110) than any other pitcher in the majors. Two years later, he didn't even make Chicago's Opening Day roster and returned to the big leagues in July as a reliever—remaining primarily a reliever through the end of last season. And now, back in a starting role, he has the lowest ERA among pitchers who have logged at least 50 innings. Even with fellow converted relievers Ranger Suárez, Tanner Houck, Trevor Williams and Seth Lugo right there with him atop the ERA leaderboard, that's pretty wild.

Joey Ortiz, 3B, Milwaukee Brewers

We'll get into the Brewers as a whole later on in our top five, but Ortiz deserves his own bit of recognition here. He'd still be stuck in Triple-A right now if he hadn't been traded from Baltimore to Milwaukee in February, but he has become a budding star at the hot corner, leaving Oliver Dunn in the dust in what was a platoon situation at third base to start the season.

Paul Skenes, RHP, Pittsburgh Pirates

Can't exactly be surprised that the No. 1 pick from last year's draft is good, but we can definitely be surprised that Skenes has been this damn good, this damn fast. Despite not getting called up until mid-May, he has become the clear favorite for NL Rookie of the Year, deserves to be recognized as an All-Star in a few weeks and might even legitimately surge into the NL Cy Young conversation if the Pirates don't put any sort of cap on his innings.

Jordan Westburg, 3B/2B, Baltimore Orioles

Westburg was Baltimore's first-round pick in 2020 and a respectable contributor in his 68 games played last season. But while Jackson Holliday's first foray into the majors was a great big dud, Westburg has become the star second fiddle to Gunnar Henderson that Holliday was supposed to be this year, swatting 13 home runs en route to an .848 OPS.

Washington Nationals

The Nats were projected to finish roughly 30 games below .500. Yet, as recently as Monday morning, they were 38-39 and knocking on the door of the NL's No. 6 seed. Jake Irvin, Mitchell Parker and Jacob Young have all been unexpectedly key contributors for a team that might not be sellers at the trade deadline after all.

10. Kansas City Royals

2023 Record: 56-106

Preseason Win Total: 73.5

Current Trajectory: 87 wins

Two months into the season, the Royals were sitting atop the list of biggest surprises.

In late May, the club that had the second-worst record in baseball just one season ago was 15 games above .500 with the third-best run differential, sitting prettier than even the Los Angeles Dodgers.

However, a brutal month-long 'gift' from MLB's schedule makers—consecutive series against the Twins, Padres, Guardians, Mariners, Yankees and Dodgers—has brought the Royals back to the pack; still exceeding expectation, though not to anywhere near the same degree as they were before.

Star shortstop Bobby Witt Jr. is still putting up MVP-caliber numbers, on pace for roughly 25 home runs, 40 stolen bases and a batting average north of .300. The two most recent players to hit each of those thresholds in a season were 2023 NL MVP Ronald Acuña Jr. and 2012 AL ROY and MVP first runner-up Mike Trout.

Witt isn't the surprise, though. He had 30 dingers and 49 swipes just last season and signed a nearly $300 million contract this past winter. He was already the undisputed MVP of the team.

The surprises have been Seth Lugo (2.29 ERA, 1.04 WHIP) becoming a co-ace to Cole Ragans, and Brady Singer (3.12 ERA, 1.18WHIP) rallying from a terrible 2023 season (5.52 ERA, 1.45 WHIP) to become a strong third arm in the rotation.

Lugo did make an impressive return to the starting rotation last season for the Padres, recording a quality start in 17 of 26 appearances after half a decade spent mostly in a middle-relief role. But who could have guessed he'd be flirting with an ERA title as a virtual lock to make the All Star Game roster?

9. Tyler Anderson, LHP, Los Angeles Angels

Pre-2024 Career (2016-23): 943.1 IP, 4.35 ERA, 1.28 WHIP, 7.6 K/9, 11.8 bWAR

2024 Stats: 99.1 IP, 2.63 ERA, 1.22 WHIP, 5.9 K/9, 4.0 bWAR

At least with Tyler Anderson, it's not the first time he has pitched well. The 34-year-old southpaw had an incredible run with the Los Angeles Dodgers in 2022, posting a 2.57 ERA that went underappreciated in a rotation where Tony Gonsolin (2.14), Julio Urias (2.16) and Clayton Kershaw (2.28) were somehow each even better.

Prior to this season, though, that was the exception to the rule with Anderson.

He had a 4.69 ERA in his four seasons with the Rockies. Leaving Coors Field did little to help his effectiveness, putting up marks of 4.37, 4.53 and 5.43 in 2020, 2021 and 2023, respectively.

One season into his three-year, $39M deal with the Angels, he sure felt like a sunk cost for the Halos, performing at almost exactly replacement level in 2023.

In year No. 2, though, he's leading all pitchers in wins above replacement and has become quite the hot commodity ahead of the trade deadline.

Anderson has made six starts this season in which he went at least seven innings, allowing either zero or one earned run. That matches his total from that All-Star season two years ago.

8. Philadelphia Phillies

2023 Record: 90-72

Preseason Win Total: 89.5

Current Trajectory: 107 wins

To be clear, it's not a surprise that the Phillies have been good. They made the playoffs (and performed well in October) in each of the past two years and did not lose anyone more noteworthy than Craig Kimbrel from last year's roster. (Phillies fans pretty unanimously agreed that was addition by subtraction, too.)

The surprise is that they have become the best team in baseball, anchored by a few unexpected sources.

In the lineup, Alec Bohm has been rock solid all season long. He was a replacement-level player over the past three seasons combined, but he is flirting with a batting title, leading the majors in doubles (28) and tied for the NL lead in RBI (64).

And Edmundo Sosa was quite the hero for the six weeks Trea Turner was recovering from his hamstring injury. From May 3 through June 16, Sosa posted an .851 OPS, after entering 2024 with a career mark of .707. The Phillies were 21-11 (.656 winning percentage) when Turner got hurt and went 25-13 (.658) for the 38 games he was out. Sosa was a big part of that.

The biggest surprise, though, has been Ranger Suárez (2.01 ERA, 2.64 FIP) and Cristopher Sánchez (2.67 ERA, 2.50 FIP) turning this into the best rotation in baseball.

Both southpaws had been reasonably valuable in the past. Suárez was sensational in 2021, posting a 1.36 ERA in 106 innings spread between the rotation and the bullpen, and he entered 2024 with a career ERA of 3.41 in six big league seasons. Sánchez gave them a 3.44 ERA in 19 appearances last season.

However, they were supposed to be the fourth-best and fifth-best starters for the Phillies, well behind both Aaron Nola and Zack Wheeler, and a bit behind Taijuan Walker once he got healthy.

Instead, the Phillies have had four aces, plus Spencer Turnbull (2.65 ERA) thriving in the spot-starter/long-reliever role that Suárez filled three years ago.

7. Luis Gil, RHP, New York Yankees

Pre-2024 Career (2021-22): 33.1 IP, 3.78 ERA, 1.38 WHIP, 11.6 K/9, 0.6 bWAR

2024 Stats: 85.2 IP, 3.15 ERA, 1.12 WHIP, 10.4 K/9, 2.1 bWAR

Heading into spring training, Luis Gil was an afterthought for the New York Yankees.

He had an impressive first three starts in the majors back in 2021, but he had made just nine total appearances (one in the majors) between the 2022 and 2023 seasons, allowing 28 earned runs in 29.2 innings of work bookending Tommy John surgery.

Even after Gerrit Cole was shut down in mid-March with elbow inflammation, Gil was hardly a lock for the starting rotation. MLB.com's Bryan Hoch made a projection of New York's Opening Day roster on Feb. 1, and neither Gil nor rookie Clayton Beeter was on it. Spring training became a "two men, one spot" battle between those two, with Gil emerging victorious.

After five OK-not-great starts (4.01 ERA, no quality starts, 19 walks in 24.2 IP), it was unclear if the Yankees had made the right choice, and Cole could not return soon enough.

From May 1 through mid-June, though, Gil went from 'Should he really be in the majors?' to 'Is he unanimously going to win AL ROY?' in a hurry.

In those nine starts (all Yankees wins), he compiled a 1.14 ERA, 0.79 WHIP and 9.9 K/9. The only team that hit him even a little bit well during that stretch was the Dodgers, and even in that start he carried a shutout into the fifth inning against one of the most potent offenses.

Gil has yet to pitch more than 96 innings in a season, so we'll see how well he holds up into the second half of the year. He has already been roughed up for 12 earned runs in his two most recent starts.

Even so, he has been a massive piece of New York's AL East-leading puzzle.

6. Josh Smith, 3B, Texas Rangers

Pre-2024 Career (2022-23): .191/.306/.287, 8 HR, 31 RBI, 5 SB, 1.1 bWAR

2024 Stats: .294/.389/.462, 7 HR, 32 RBI, 4 SB, 3.5 bWAR

During Texas' 2023 World Series run, Josh Smith was a mostly anonymous utilityman.

He filled in at shortstop when Corey Seager was hurt early in the year, and played a fair amount of third base while Josh Jung was on the shelf in the second half. However, he posted a sub-.200 batting average for the second consecutive season. And though he did make the Rangers' roster in each round of the postseason, he only appeared in three games as a pinch runner who made no plate appearances.

Smith proceeded to barely crack Texas' 2024 Opening Day roster, not appearing in the season opener before serving as a ninth inning replacement in each of the next three games.

So, naturally, he is presently leading the Rangers in wins above replacement.

Wait...what?

With Jung landing on the IL just four games into the season with a broken wrist, Smith once again became the 'break in case of emergency' solution for the Rangers.

Except this time, he rose to the occasion, replacing his .287 career slugging percentage with a near .300 batting average and blossoming into an indispensable asset who might/should continue to play on a near-everyday basis even if/when this lineup gets back to full strength.

Texas still faces quite the uphill climb to get back to the postseason, but at least the reigning champs are still in the conversation.

Without Smith's emergence in year No. 3, that probably isn't the case.

5. Milwaukee Brewers

2023 Record: 92-70

Preseason Win Total: 76.5

Current Trajectory: 96 wins

Despite competing in five of the previous six postseasons, the Milwaukee Brewers were not supposed to be good this season.

They all but admitted defeat themselves, trading away Mark Canha in November, trading away Adrian Houser and Tyrone Taylor in December and trading away Corbin Burnes in February, getting four prospects in return for those expiring assets.

By the time we found out in mid-March that elite closer Devin Williams was going to miss at least the first half of the season with stress fractures in his back, the Brewers already felt like a lost cause anyway.

They entered the year with +9000 World Series odds—same as the Marlins; worse than the Tigers—and with an initial starting rotation of:

• No. 1: Freddy Peralta (a good pitcher, but hardly a bona fide ace)
• No. 2: DL Hall (one of the two chips received for Burnes, he had 33 career innings of MLB experience, mostly as a reliever)
• No. 3: Colin Rea (a 4.55 ERA in 2023 after spending the previous year in Japan)
• No. 4: Jakob Junis (spent most of last season as a middle reliever and sports a 4.64 career ERA)
• No. 5: Joe Ross (missed all of 2020, all of 2022 and all of 2023)

Lo and behold, they have been in sole possession of first place in the NL Central for basically the entire season.

Joey Ortiz (the other chip they got in the Burnes trade) has been a godsend at third base, quickly cementing himself as an everyday player. Christian Yelich has bounced back to being the hitter (albeit not quite the slugger) that he was half a decade ago. And Brice Turang has made quite the sophomore year leap at second base, blossoming into Milwaukee's MVP.

The real surprise, however, is how much better than adequate the pitching has been.

Rookie Tobias Myers has been a wholly unexpected revelation in the rotation after struggling through Double-A ball for most of last season. Trevor Megill had zero career saves a little over two months ago, but he has thrived at closer, converting 16 saves while only blowing one. And goodness has rookie Bryan Hudson ever been valuable in a setup role, boasting an 0.84 ERA, 0.63 WHIP and 10.3 K/9 in 43 innings of work.

4. Ronel Blanco, RHP, Houston Astros

Pre-2024 Career (2022-23): 58.1 IP, 4.78 ERA, 1.53 WHIP, 9.1 K/9, 0.0 bWAR

2024 Stats: 84.2 IP, 2.34 ERA, 0.97 WHIP, 8.4 K/9, 3.2 bWAR

When Ronel Blanco no-hit the Toronto Blue Jays in his first start of the season, it felt like that was going to be a fun little bit of bar trivia one day—an "oh yeah, I remember when that 30-year-old came out of nowhere for one magical appearance, on April Fools' Day, in an opportunity as the fifth starter that he only got because the Astros had so many established starting pitchers on the IL."

Even though he continued to dominate every fifth or sixth game for a rotation that has otherwise resembled a hospital ward this season, when Blanco was ejected from a start in mid-May for failing a sticky stuff check between innings, it felt like that was going to be the end of his surprising run; that the sticky stuff explained how these Cy Young caliber numbers were coming from a pitcher that at least 95 percent of baseball fans had never heard of prior to his no-hitter.

But he came back from that 10-game suspension and just keeps pitching at an incredibly high level.

Blanco has yet to allow more than five hits in any of his 14 starts, going at least 5.2 innings in 12 of them. And in addition to the no-hitter against the Blue Jays, Blanco also tossed seven hitless innings against the Tigers just two weeks ago.

He carries a 2.34 ERA into Friday's start against the Mets, good for the sixth-lowest mark among pitchers who have logged at least 60 innings of work.

Blanco is just about the only thing keeping the Astros afloat, as they have gone 11-3 in his starts and 29-37 in all other contests.

3. Chicago White Sox's Co-Aces

Erick Fedde Pre-2024 Career (2017-22): 454.1 IP, 5.41 ERA, 1.52 WHIP, 7.0 K/9, negative-0.3 bWAR (spent 2023 in KBO)

Erick Fedde 2024 Stats: 100.1 IP, 3.23 ERA, 1.14 WHIP, 8.2 K/9, 3.8 bWAR

Garrett Crochet Pre-2024 Career (2020-23): 73.0 IP, 2.71 ERA, 1.33 WHIP, 10.5 K/9, 1.8 bWAR

Garrett Crochet 2024 Stats: 94.1 IP, 3.05 ERA, 0.94 WHIP, 12.4 K/9, 3.8 bWAR

The Los Angeles Angels playing 68 games below .500 in their six seasons with both Shohei Ohtani and Mike Trout on the roster is the all-time, most evident example that it takes 20+ players—not just two great ones—to put together a successful season.

But the Chicago White Sox are presently providing a remarkable reminder of that, on pace for one of the worst seasons in MLB history despite what has been arguably the best one-two pitching punch this season.

Garrett Crochet pitching well isn't a big surprise. He was Chicago's first-round pick in 2020 and a force out of the bullpen in 2021 prior to undergoing Tommy John surgery and missing all of 2022 and most of 2023. What is a surprise, though, is how durable he has been, leading the AL in both games started and strikeouts after not starting a single game since before they drafted him.

Erick Fedde's dominance, on the other hand, is a bit stunning.

Yes, he was incredible in Korea last season, winning the pitching Triple Crown. However, he ended up in Korea because no one in the majors wanted him when he hit free agency two offseasons ago. He was simply an inexpensive innings eater for a bad Washington Nationals team in 2021 and 2022, and it was reasonable to assume the same this year in Chicago.

Nevertheless, his 93 MPH sinker and 83 MPH sweeper have been deadly, as both he and Crochet have become two of the most coveted names on the trade block.

2. San Diego Padres Outfield

Jurickson Profar 2023 Stats: .242/.321/.368, 9 HR, 46 RBI, negative-1.3 bWAR

Jurickson Profar 2024 Stats: .316/.408/.484, 11 HR, 55 RBI, 2.0 bWAR

Jackson Merrill 2023 Stats: .277/.326/.444, 15 HR, 64 RBI, 15 SB (between high-A/double-A ball, almost exclusively as a shortstop)

Jackson Merrill 2024 Stats: .284/.320/.433, 10 HR, 37 RBI, 9 SB, 2.1 bWAR (in the majors, exclusively as a center fielder)

When the Padres traded away both Juan Soto and Trent Grisham for four pitchers and a catcher, they got pretty decent value for one year of a superstar and two years of a Gold Glove center fielder who was a black hole in the lineup (.647 OPS between 2022-23).

What they also got in the trade was an entire industry of MLB writers asking what exactly they planned to do in the outfield in 2024.

Soto played 154 games in left for the Padres in 2023. Grisham played 153 in center. And after the trade went through, the only players left on the roster who had appeared in at least five games in the outfield last season were two-time Silver Slugger Fernando Tatis Jr. and light-hitting, replacement-level José Azocar.

Considering financial constraints were a big part of the motivation for trading away Soto, no one expected them to go out and get a guy like Jung Hoo Lee, Cody Bellinger or Teoscar Hernández in free agency. In fact, all they added were Óscar Mercado and Bryce Johnson on minor-league deals, and Jurickson Profar on a one-year, $1M deal, with him fresh off a horrific 2023 campaign.

As such, converting top prospect Jackson Merrill—who had yet to even play in Triple-A, let alone the majors—from a shortstop to an outfielder and playing him basically every single day was Plan A, and goodness only knows what Plan B was.

By some miracle, though, the Padres have had arguably the second-best outfield in the majors, behind only the Yankees juggernaut that San Diego helped assemble.

Profar is leading the NL in OBP and may well be the league's 2024 Comeback Player of the Year, while Merrill would likely be the favorite for NL Rookie of the Year were it not for Paul Skenes.

1. Cleveland Guardians

2023 Record: 76-86

Preseason Win Total: 79.5

Current Trajectory: 106 wins

Small-market team during an offseason of financial unknown at a leaguewide level or not, we were all a bit baffled by Cleveland's approach of doing a whole lot of nothing this winter.

Over the course of the full five months, the Guardians' two most newsworthy moves were subtractions. They designated starting pitcher Cal Quantrill for assignment in mid-November before trading him to the Rockies for a low-level prospect (Kody Huff), and then waived center fielder Myles Straw a week before Opening Day.

Between those moves, losing Shane Bieber to Tommy John Surgery one week into the season and not yet getting a single inning of work out of Gavin Williams, you'd think that a team which finished 10 games below .500 last season would be, at best, on pace for the same this year.

Instead, the Guardians have their sights set on possible home-field advantage through the World Series.

With an honorable mention to Ben Lively as the acquisition that ended up being way more valuable than anyone realized, the three biggest catalysts for Cleveland's success have been Steven Kwan, David Fry and an impenetrable bullpen.

Not only is Kwan flirting with a .400 batting average, but he has found some pop, too. After hitting five home runs in 718 plate appearances last season, he's already at seven in 235 trips to the plate. As a result, his OPS has skyrocketed from .710 to .988.

Fry's OPS has been absurd, too, and out of nowhere. The 28-year-old utilityman had a sub-.800 OPS in the minors in each of 2021 and 2022, and didn't do much in his 58 games in the majors last year. Yet, at the beginning of June, he had the highest OPS in all of MLB—yes, even higher than Aaron Judge and Shohei Ohtani.

The bullpen is the big one, though.

They'll blow a lead every once in a while, but it doesn't feel like it. Cleveland's relievers have a cumulative year-to-date ERA of 2.37 with 30 saves and 69 holds. Their only reliever with at least 30 innings of work and an ERA north of 2.25 is Scott Barlow (3.58), and even he still struck out three straight Orioles for a save Monday night—with regular closer Emmanuel Clase unavailable after flawlessly saving three of the previous four games.

In February/March, you could've gotten Cleveland at close to +7000 to win the World Series. But the Guardians now have the sixth-best odds at +1100. And shrinking.