Over the past week, we've taken a look at some of the standout hitters in the game. We first recognized the hitting "technicians," who repeat positive processes and behaviors more consistently than their peers, and then tipped a cap to the "mashers," who do incomparable damage to the baseball. Today, we look at the best hitters in the game: the ones who best combine those two disparate aspects of hitting.
Throughout this analysis, I will refer to hitters' Adjusted Contact Scores. This is their expected level of production (on a scale where 100 equals average, the higher the better) on all batted balls, assuming league average results for each exit speed/launch angle bucket.
First, let's mention some players who barely missed the cut. Don't sleep on the Nationals' Juan Soto. His age-19 rookie season was truly phenomenal. His K/BB ratio was exceptional, he crushes his fly balls, and his fly ball frequency rate has plenty of room to grow. Scary upside.
The last two cuts were Bryce Harper and Paul Goldschmidt. Harper's overall average exit speed was limited by average range grounder authority. His excessive pull tendency on the ground is another limiting factor. Goldschmidt is still really, really good, but he doesn't quite control his launch angle well enough to be an elite technician and doesn't hit it quite hard enough to be an elite masher. I still could have slid him in as my fifth choice but decided to go in a slightly more controversial direction, as you will see.
Here they are, MLB's foremost technical mashers, or mashing technicians, or whatever you wish to call them, in alphabetical order:
Mookie Betts (Red Sox) - The 2018 AL MVP possesses a unique, lethal mix of offensive skills that has taken him to the top of the game. He strikes out way less than any of the others on this list; his K rate has never been above the 19th percentile in his five-year career. His fly ball rate is very high and on the rise (92nd percentile in 2018) while his pop up rate is on the decline (54th). The biggest factor in his MVP breakthrough season was a stark increase in fly ball authority - his average fly ball exit speed rose from 88.5 MPH in 2017 to 96.0 MPH in 2018. Hitting a ton of flies in Fenway with a 179 Adjusted Fly Ball Contact Score is how you win hardware. Limitations? Believe it or not, Betts has never compiled a league average liner rate. Also, he developed an excessive grounder-pulling tendency last season. Despite that, he hit ,344 AVG-.391 SLG on the ground, way, way above the league average. He has plenty of downside batting-average wise.
J.D. Martinez (Red Sox) - The Sox' World Series triumph starting to make more sense to you? Where does one begin with Martinez? His overall average exit speed of 93.0 MPH is best among this illustrious group. He could have been one of our "technicians"; his launch angle standard deviation of 23.9 (a measure of launch angle consistency) is at an elite level. He never pops up; his pop up rate was in the 2nd percentile in 2018. His liner rate has been above league average in three of the last four years, and reached a career-best 68th percentile last season. His K and BB rates are both trending positively, reaching career bests relative to the league in 2018. Plus, he hits all batted-ball types exceedingly hard; he could have been one of our "mashers". His Adjusted Fly Ball Contact Score of 256 is third highest among this group. He is at the absolute peak of his offensive game, with no real limitations to speak of.
Shohei Ohtani (Angels) - OK, I'll brace myself for the backlash here. Hear me out. First, on the "technician" side, his launch angle STD of 24.3 is near elite level consistency. His liner rate was in the 76th percentile in his rookie season. On the "masher" side, he absolutely crushes both his fly balls (275 Adjusted Fly Ball Contact Score) and his liners (average exit speed of 99.1 MPH, tied for fourth highest in the AL). He didn't hit a ton of fly balls (35th percentile), so imagine the power output with an increase. Still, he wouldn't be on this list if not for his singular uniqueness. The only remote comp to him is Babe Ruth, circa 1918. For him to do what he did with the bat while also excelling on the mound (and then getting hurt) in a new country, in the best league on earth, is astounding. Limitations? His K rate was in the 88th percentile, and he did show an extreme pull tendency on the ground.
Mike Trout (Angels) - The game's best, bar none. He's actually more technician than masher at this point. His 23.9 launch angle STD is at the elite level, and his liner rate has been in the 68th percentile or higher in all but one of his MLB seasons. He has increased his fly ball rate to the 91st and 93rd percentile the last two seasons. Trout's elite level BB rate gives him a huge margin for error that he doesn't even need. While his batted ball authority is impressive, it kind of pales in this company; his overall 91.2 MPH average exit speed is the lowest of these five players by over one full MPH. Still, his average fly ball and liner exit speeds climbed to three-year highs of 94.1 and 96.6 MPH, respectively, in 2018. His 200 Adjusted Fly Ball Contact Score is quite good for someone who hits the ball in the air so often. Limitations? He doesn't hit his grounders very hard, but hit .320 AVG-.340 SLG on them anyway because of his speed, which won't be there forever.
Christian Yelich (Brewers) - The only National Leaguer on this list. Yelich is an outlier in many ways; his average launch angle of 4.6 degrees is by far the lowest on this list. His launch angle consistency (24.2 STD) is quite good. His liner rate has been in the 68th percentile or higher in four of his five MLB seasons, and reached a career-best 79th in 2018. Only 19.8% of his fly balls were hit between 35-50 degrees, the lowest percentage among MLB regulars last season. Why is that important? Flies hit at those launch angles resulted in .095 AVG-.240 SLG in 2018, while flies hit between 20-35 degrees resulted in massive .439 AVG-1.185 SLG production. On the "masher" side of the equation, Yelich's 304 Adjusted Fly Ball and 150 Ground Ball Contact Scores are truly exceptional. Of course, his fly ball rate is notoriously low, in the 7th percentile in 2018. He almost led the NL in homers with so few fly balls; take a moment to step back and consider how staggering that is, and appreciate the almost incomprehensible homer upside if he were to post even a league average fly ball rate.
