90th Percentile Exit Velocity Investigation
Checking out the 90th-percentile exit velocity leaderboard to spot under-owned potential power hitters.
This post brought to you by the “Exit Velo Percentiles” tab of my Main MLB Dashboard. Here’s a preview of it, but you’ll have to be a paid subscriber to get the full dashboard and the daily updates on it. Here’s what it looks like:
So for all hitters you have their exit velocity distributions measured by all of those different marks
Max
Average
90th Percentile
75th Percentile
25th Percentile
And then we throw in average launch angle there too just in case you want to filter out the guys just pounding the ball into the ground.
I’m not going to sit here and write a paragraph about how Shohei Ohtani and Giancarlo Stanton have hit the ball really hard this year, you already know that, we’re going to focus in on some more surprising names that may be actionable for fantasy purposes, whether that means adding them off waivers or trying to trade for them from an unsuspecting sucker manager in your league.
So which metric should we be focused in on when comparing all of the different ways to look at exit velocity? Here’s a quick trio of scatter plots:
It’s hard to look at, but I’ll summarize it very quickly. Here, I compared all of these to Brl% using 2023 data:
90th Percentile EV
Average EV
Max EV
The R-Squared values:
90th: .66
Avg: .57
Max: .50
So 90th-percentile EV is the winner by a decent margin. What is the 90th percentile EV? You simply take a list of all exit velocities from each hitter, and find the mark where 89% of the values are less than it. Here is Ohtani’s 2023 90th percentile shown compared with the rest of his EV distribution:
We also know that you really only need a few weeks for this data to become useful. The league leaders right now are coming up on 150 balls in play, and we get pretty stable data after 75 balls in play or so. Let’s highlight some names.
Jake Burger
Balls In Play: 50
Max EV: 112.9
90th Percentile: 110.3
He has missed a couple of weeks to injury so he’s behind the league leaders in balls in play, but in his 50 balls in play so far he has continued to hit the ball really hard. Last year his max EV was 118.2, and he’s exceeded 116 multiple times in his career. Burger is a clear top-ten hitter in terms of swing speed, and we have yet to see him reach the heights he’s capable of yet this year.
In his 72 PAs so far this year he’s posted a strong 12% Brl% while keeping the K% down below 24%, a very impressive combination. He has just three homers so far, mostly because of that IL stint, but chances are the homers come in bunches from here on out. You can probably get Burger without paying much given the missed time and the team context and his somewhat unknown profile, and I would recommend it. He will also gain 1B eligibility soon as well in addition to 3B, and it’s also possible he gets traded to a much better team mid-season.
Jo Adell
Balls In Play: 58
Max EV: 113.3
90th Percentile: 110.1
That data is current as of May 7th, and he went ahead and hit another homer in the day game today. It’s been a very surprising early season for Adell, who has long just destroyed AAA pitching without any ability to hack it in the Majors. But the thinness of the Angels big league roster forced him back to the highest level, and he’s been rewarding the Angels and his fantasy teams.
86 PA, .247/.302/.468, 4 HR, 13.8% Brl%, 24.4% K%, 74% Contact%
These numbers are not updated after Wednesday’s game.
It’s no surprise that Adell is hitting homers, he’s always been able to do that, but what is striking is the K% drop from 40% last year to that 24% mark this year, and the Contact% has followed the same trend going from 62% to 74%. Great stuff for Adell, who steals bags as well. I would feel pretty good about betting on him to strikeout at a lot higher than a 24% rate moving forward, but it’s a good sign that he can keep it under control enough for the raw power to play here.
William Contreras
Balls In Play: 110
Max EV: 114.4
90th Percentile: 108.4
He was a top-two catcher off the board in drafts this year, so he’s certainly not available in any leagues - but just to make a point of it. Contreras has started every single game the Brewers have played this year. That alone brings a ton of value at the catcher position where most guys are playing 75% of the time at best.
But add on to that that he’s also hitting the ball extremely hard, and Contreras is up there with the most valuable fantasy players in the game.
160 PA, .331/.406/.511, 5 HR, 10.9% Brl%, 57% Hard%, 19% K%
There’s a good bit of luck going on here (.390 BABIP and a 67% Contact% that implies more strikeouts will come), but when you’re at the top of the lineup every day and hitting the ball that hard, great things will happen.
Ryan Mountcastle
Balls In Play: 95
Max EV: 112.6
90th Percentile: 107.9
It wasn’t all that long ago that Mountcastle was a top prospect for the Orioles.
His career hasn’t gone in the expected direction, but he’s been solid enough with a career 114 wRC+. He’s started the year off very well this year in the middle of that elite Orioles lineup [most days], and has become a worthwhile fantasy pickup at a first base position where there has been a lot of disappointment.
The funny thing is, he’s pretty much the same exact guy as last year:
2023: 12.1% Brl%, 23% K%, 7.5% BB%, .350 xwOBA
2024: 11.6% Brl%, 23% K%, 7.3% BB%, .351 xwOBA
The difference for him right now is that he’s in the lineup everyday. Last year he played just 115 games. Some of that had to do with an injury, but a lot had to do with him just sitting at times against right-handed pitching. This year he’s sat just three times and has the fourth-most PAs on teh team with 137.
He’s a very talented hitter who has done nothing but rack up barrels since joining the team. The fact that the left-center field is half mile away from home plate is tough for him, and it will continue to cap his home run ceiling, but Mountcastle has long been one of the game’s most underrated hitters in my book, and he’s looking awesome this year.
Ryan McMahon
Balls In Play: 87
Max EV: 112.2
90th Percentile: 107.9
Just another underrated hitter. He’s out here once again posting a strong OPS (.865) with a 13.8% Brl%, albeit a high 29% K%. This is all before the hitting conditions really get good in Coors Field as well. Incredible small splits-sample here, but McMahon has been just as good on the road as at home (.886 OPS with a homer away from Coors, and .839 with four homers in Coors).
You can always draft McMahon late, which I usually recommend, but if you just need a solid power and RBI bat, McMahon is a pretty nice target right now as we finally head for some warmer Colorado weather, and hopefully some improving young hitters around him as well (I expect better things in the future for Tovar, Jones, Beck, and others).
Jack Suwinski
Balls In Play: 91
Max EV: 111.0
90th Percentile: 107.7
It’s a pretty disappointing start to the season for Jack as he has homered just twice. Given the homers are most all of his fantasy appeal, he’s been pretty much a killer on fantasy teams this year.
However, better times should be ahead given the exit velocities still popping off the bat. The even more important point, which I’ve mentioned a few times this year, is the K% improvements he’s made. Last year he struck out 32% of the time with a 70% contact rate, this year he’s down to a 20% K% and an 81% Contact%. That contact-heavy approach has dropped his barrel rate to 6.2%, but given the fact that the exit velocities are still flowing, it’s just a matter of time before we start getting some long-balls from the young Suwinski (he’s still just 25 years old).
Brandon Nimmo
Balls In Play: 99
Max EV: 111.1
90th Percentile: 107.5
He’s re-invented himself a bit in the last two seasons, clearly concentrating on hitting for more power. And that’s worked. He has a 10.3% Brl% and 20.9% K% over these last two seasons, an impressive pairing, and that has turned into 29 homers, a homer every 29 PA’s, good for around a 23-homer pace.
He’s a strong asset for consistent playing time at the top of the lineup, and that turns into a good number of runs with a potentially good batting average, and he doesn’t kill your team anywhere. Just a solid fantasy bat ever since adding some homers to his game.
Brenton Doyle
Balls In Play: 84
Max EV: 109.8
90th Percentile: 106.9
This is the first name in this post I was truly surprised to see. Doyle hasn’t wow’d with any individual ball in play, but the consistency of being in the triple-digits has been nice.
If Doyle was drafted in your league, it was for the steals only. But so far he’s been pretty decent with a .262 batting average and three homers on a 6.9% Brl%. The strikeouts are a problem once again (30%), but he’s hit the ball hard regularly (41% hard%) and has kept it off the ground to a good enough extent (44% GB%).
Add to that four steals and a high 17% SB Attempt% and we could be looking at a guy who flirts with a 20-20 season, and he’s still widely available. I’m not sure I would add him in 10 or 12-teamers, but he’s doing a lot of good things early and will continue to play after taking home the Gold Glove award in center field last year.
Jordan Westburg
Balls In Play: 96
Max EV: 111.2
90th Percentile: 106.9
Westburg was in the Majors for a good portion of the 2023 season, but it wasn’t all that impressive of a debut:
228 PA, .258/.311/.402, .713 OPS, 3 HR, 6.5% Brl%, 24.6% K%, 7.0% BB%
But as should usually be expected, the young player has made improvements this year:
132 PA, .287/.333/.508, .842 OPS, 6 HR, 10.3% Brl%, 19.7% K%, 5.3% BB%
Doubling his homer output in fewer PAs, and raising the barrel rate while lowering the K% - but substantially. Westburg has arrived, and appears to be a good Major League hitter.
It’s been a bit streaky so far:
But the season-long numbers are very impressive and make me believe he’ll be a very useful fantasy hitter moving forward.
Widely Available Hitters Above 105
Jesus Sanchez 109.8
Brent Rooker 109.6
Matt Vierling 107.9
Hunter Renfroe 107.5
Patrick Bailey 106.9
Rowdy Tellez 106.7
James Outman 106.5
Elehuris Montero 106.2
Edward Olivares 106.1
Lars Nootbaar 106.0
Ty France 105.2
Brandon Drury 105.7
Javier Baez 105.6
Shea Langeliers 105.5
Kyle Isbel 105.5
Names at the Bottom of the List
Just a quick list of some surprisingly low 90th-percentile EVs early on
Gleyber Torres 100.2 (fourth-worst for hitters with at least 100 BIP)
Isaac Paredes 100.3
Jose Altuve 101.0
Xander Bogaerts 101.2
Alex Bregman 101.6
Ha-Seong Kim 101.7
Anthony Rizzo 102.1
Nolan Arenado 102.4
Jose Ramirez 102.8
Mookie Betts 102.8
Willy Adames 102.9
Francisco Lindor 103.3
That’s it for this post, check out the link to the dashboard at the top for the full data.
Nice work! Going into draft season I convinced myself that Gleybar would be a king stud at his ADP this year and tried to draft him as often as possible, wtf...