HR/FB Rate Surgers Through the Lens of Batted Ball Distance

We’re not a month into the season, so it’s finally time to start putting the hitter batted ball distance leaderboard to work. Back in late January, I unveiled my xHR/FB rate equation, which included three components, batted ball distance being one of them. Unfortunately, I don’t have the data for angle and standard deviation, so I cannot calculate xHR/FB rate marks yet and share the biggest discrepancies. However, simply looking at batted ball distance could do a reasonably decent job at identifying those who might be in for a HR/FB rate surge or decline. We’ll start with the potential surgers. These are the hitters whose distance is top notch, but for whatever reason, have posted mediocre or poor HR/FB rates.

Last year, Freddie Freeman ranked 28th in baseball in batted ball distance with a 297 foot mark, but saw his HR/FB rate fall to just 11.9%. As a result, he was one of my surge candidates that I shared during this year’s Baseball HQ First Pitch Forum. This year, his distance is up another tick, but his HR/FB rate has barely budged. Even better new for his power moving forward is that he’s traded in some grounders and line drives for fly balls. After sitting in the low-to-mid 30% range his entire career, his fly ball rate has jumped into the mid-40% range for the first time. It’s not good for his batting average, even if his BABIP currently stands at .381, but it’s great news for his power. I could foresee a career high home run total.

Michael Morse has endured an extremely slow start, posting just a .254 wOBA and his highest SwStk% and K% since becoming a full-timer. Oddly, he’s also hitting grounders over 60% of the time, which obviously won’t do any favors to his home run total. But the good news is those rare flies are still going far. Morse has posted HR/FB rate marks in the low-20% range, so a 300+ distance mark isn’t out of the ordinary. I’m not sure he makes for a very good buy low candidate, but his power should improve. One can only guess what’s going on with his batted ball distribution though.

I liked Mark Trumbo as a rebound candidate this season, at least in the power department. His batted ball distance remained strong last year and suggested better than a 14.3% HR/FB rate. He’s now pushed that distance back over the 300 hump, and yet his HR/FB rate sits at a career low. He’s striking out at a career low clip, which would be encouraging if he wasn’t posting plate discipline metrics that were fairly similar to his historical norms, including a 13%+ SwStk%. So I don’t think that’s actually sustainable. But the power looks good and he’s already matched a career high in triples with three. I haven’t actually seen those triples, but it’s possible those were just missed homers. Even if not, don’t fret over his relatively slow start in the home run department. But don’t expect his batting average to remain this high.

After teasing us in 2011 during his first taste of the bigs, Brett Lawrie was a perennial sleeper who found himself on the DL far too often and disappointed us at the plate. His move from hitter friendly Toronto to pitcher friendly Oakland didn’t seem to be the recipe that leads to that breakout year finally. And so far, it hasn’t. But his batted ball distance is exciting. Last year, he posted just a 277 foot mark, so he’s up a whopping 23 feet. But his HR/FB rate sits at a career low and well below the league average. Unfortunately, his speed has disappeared and he is suddenly having major issues making contact. His SwStk% has nearly doubled and his strikeout rate has as well! He has needed a .361 BABIP just to hit .261. He remains an enigma and although his power outlook looks bright, I’m not very optimistic about his overall fantasy value going forward.

Buster Posey’s distance is up 20 feet from last year, but his HR/FB rate is basically league average. A terrible supporting cast that has scored the third fewest runs in baseball has resulted in disappointing runs scored and batted in totals. All this is leading to a slow start in terms of fantasy value earned. Because many fantasy owners don’t believe in how much qualifying at catcher boosts a hitter’s fantasy value in two-catcher leagues, Posey’s slow start could make him a great acquisition target.

I was a fan of Ike Davis heading into the season as he was supposedly over his Valley Fever symptoms that sapped him of his power and was coming as cheap as ever. So far, Davis looks like a completely different hitter, trading fly balls for grounders and line drives, walking less frequently and swinging and missing at a career low clip, leading to a career best strikeout rate. The power output has been right in line with his previous two seasons, which remains far below what he produced back in 2012. But check out that distance! In 2012, his distance was 300 feet, so he’s only about three and a half feet below that mark. Yet, his HR/FB sits at half what he posted then. The Oakland Coliseum is certainly going to take a bit out of his home run potential and that he’s a strict platoon player means it’s going to be tough for him to earn much more than replacement level value in 12-team mixers. But in deeper leagues, he should earn some decent value and provide better power the rest of the way.

Wow, what has happened to Robinson Cano?! We figured that the move from Yankee Stadium to Safeco Field would hurt his power numbers, but not by this much. And last season, he actually posted a HR/FB rate at home that was double his away mark! So can we really blame Safeco for his power outage? This year, he’s striking out and swinging and miss more than ever before, but there’s absolutely no reason that his HR/FB rate should be so low. With 11 doubles, it seems clear that this is a simple case of a redistribution of extra-base hits. I would bet that some of those doubles become homers in the months ahead and he quickly gets his HR/FB rate back into the teens.

Andrew McCutchen is an interesting case given the knee issue he has dealt with since spring training. His distance has remained stable from last year, but his power output has declined dramatically. A .242 BABIP is also leading to his slow start. We still don’t know a lot about the Soft% / Med% / Hard%, but it’s worth noting that his Hard% is at its lowest mark since his rookie year back in 2009. But since his distance is fine, I’m not sure if his knee is or has been affecting his performance at the plate. However, it seems obvious that it’s affecting his desire to run, as he’s attempted just two steals. We will never know exactly how he’s feeling and if that knee is suddenly feeling good enough again to get back to a normal stolen base pace. So it’s hard to advise targeting him in a trade, as he could just be a bust all year with a known injury holding him back. I’d be happy to acquire him, but only at a discount to give me some downside protection.