Discussing the HR/FB Rate Surprises – The Leaders

Let’s continue our perusal through the various leaderboards, returning back to power and HR/FB rate. We’ll go through the HR/FB leaders, include their xHR/FB rate marks (not adjusted for home park) and marvel of their awesomeness.

Man, the plan was just to write about a handful of guys, but I guess with power and HR/FB rate sitting at its highest mark since we have stats available (going back to 2002), it figures that surprises litter the leaderboards. It’s not as if Dee Gordon is suddenly on pace to jack 30, but guys we expected to hit the low-to-mid teens are sitting pretty with 20%+ marks. And this is the case for a lot of hitters. It’s pretty crazy. So I decided to list a lot of them, but I won’t be touching on all.

We’re all aware of Aaron Judge’s epic season so far and I love how even his xHR/FB rate is at 35.9%. And of course, he still leads baseball in Brls/BBE. Having already watched more of the Yankees in the first two and a half months than I’ve watched in my entire life previously (I own nearly the entire lineup across my leagues), it’s been a joy to watch Judge hit, especially when you’re an owner :-).

Justin Bour is a good example of what this leaguewide power explosion has done. His first two partial seasons brought HR/FB rates around 20%, yet now he sits second behind Judge with a mark above 30%. But xHR/FB rate tells us this is the same Bour that he has always been. I should clarify — his Brls/BBE is actually up from the last two seasons, but he has outperformed his previous xHR/FB marks so now his current mark simply validates what he had done previously. Perhaps he’s doing something not captured by the equation since this would make it three seasons of xHR/FB rate outperformance.

Wow, Cody Bellinger! While his power was always good in the minors, he really broke out at Triple-A this year over a small sample of at-bats, posting a 31.3% HR/FB rate mark. And he hasn’t missed a beat after being promoted, as his HR/FB rate is actually a tick higher in the Majors. The near 50% fly ball rate also helps boosts his home run total, and he’s both barreling the ball often, as well as pulling his flies frequently. You have to assume pitchers adjust and he’ll slump at some point, but I would figure at least a 20% HR/FB rate the rest of the way.

Marcell Ozuna has enjoyed the ultimate breakout, as his walk rate is up, his BABIP has skyrocketed, and his HR/FB rate has doubled off last year’s mark. He’s accomplishing all this without swinging and missing more often, and amazingly, his fly ball rate is at a career low. That’s really the only thing missing here or he’d be at 20 homers already.

Seriously, who has taken over Alex Avila’s body? He has always walked a ton, and now he’s pairing it with monster power. Do you see that Brls/BBE?! You might think this HR/FB surge actually began last year when he posted a 33.3% mark, but his Brls/BBE was in the single digits and xHR/FB rate only 13.9%. At age 30, he’s younger than I assumed, so maybe this is just an example of a late-blooming catcher. With Victor Martinez out indefinitely, he’s going to play nearly every day and needs to be owned in all formats.

Marwin Gonzalez?!?!?!? He is perhaps the most surprising hitter above 20% on the HR/FB rate leaderboard. But with a Brls/BBE of just 6.3% and 11.6% xHR/FB rate, he’s seemingly been the luckiest. His Brls/BBE is almost identical to his last two years, and his xHR/FB rate matches his actual mark from last year. So this looks like a complete fluke. He has made legit strides by nearly tripling his walk rate, but this kind of power is going to disappear sooner or later.

Between Taylor Motter, Chad Pinder, and Chris Taylor, middle infielders are coming out of every corner going bonkers with the power. Taylor only posted a double digit HR/FB rate once in his entire minor league career, and that was back at High-A in 2013. But he’s been very Marwin-like in that this appears to be a complete fluke, so says xHR/FB rate. And since his FB% is sub-30%, a significant decline in HR/FB rate means he’s going to return to being the limited home run contributor we all expected to begin with.