Juan Soto Switches Boroughs

You have probably read by now that Juan Soto has agreed to a 15-year, $765 million contract with the New York Mets. This isn’t some bizarro world where the Mets are actually bidding gargantuan money for the top free agent, even outbidding the typical teams competing for these names. Instead, this is the new Mets, armed with an owner who ranks as one of the richest people in the world, and is actually willing to spend the money to put a contending team on the field. Luckily for Soto, he doesn’t have to travel very far, or at all, to join his new team. After posting his highest wOBA over a full season, how might the home park switch affect the 26 year-old’s results? Let’s consult the Statcast left-handed park factors.

Yeahhhhh, this doesn’t look so great. It’s nearly a clean sweep for Yankee Stadium, but let’s dive into each of the individual factors.

First we’ll start off with the hit type factors. Citi Field’s single and triple factors are meaningfully higher than Yankee Stadium’s, while it’s doubles factor is below Yankee Stadium’s. We’ll get to home runs next, but once you include those factors, you find that both parks actually suppress hits rather significantly. In fact, Citi is tied for the worst park in baseball for left-handed hits over the last three seasons, while Yankee Stadium ranks third worst. Who knew?!

The good news is that because he’s coming from a poor park for BABIP, he shouldn’t see much of a difference moving to the worst park for BABIP. If you exclude home runs, the two parks might actually have identical hit factors, meaning little to no effect on hits on balls in play. Still, for a hitter that sports a .305 career BABIP, just a bit above the league average, who hasn’t posted one above .300 since 2021, landing in a more hit friendly park would have been nice.

Now let’s talk home run factors. We see a massive difference here, with Citi Field suppressing left-handed dingers, while Yankee Stadium dramatically inflates them. Citi ranks 20th, while Yankee ranks in a tie for third in left-handed home run factor. Normally, it would be a big negative for a left-handed hitter’s home run power moving from Yankee Stadium to Citi Field. However, Soto actually posted a higher HR/FB rate on the road this season than at home! One reason for this is because he’s not your typical pull-side power hitter. He actually hits a ton of his flies straightaway or to the opposite field. Still, Yankee Stadium’s right-handed park factor is actually one point higher than for left-handers! So I’m not sure how he ended up posting a higher HR/FB rate on the road, outside of just one season randomness.

Clearly though, no matter how you slice it, the move to Citi is a negative for Soto’s home run power. That doesn’t necessarily mean he can’t or won’t post another mid-20% HR/FB rate or higher though. He’s just 26 years old and theoretically first entering his peak power years. Furthermore, his Statcast metrics (HardHit%, maxEV, and Barrel%) are elite and support even higher HR/FB rates than he has posted, save for his small sample 2020 season. But again, his home run projection with the Mets should definitely come in lower than if he had resigned with the Yankees.

Next, we move along to walk factors. Incredibly, the parks sport identical 109 factors, which is tied for the highest factor among all parks. It’s quite interesting to see that both parks have low hit factors, but high walk factors. As you should know, Soto is a walk machine. After three straight seasons posting a walk rate over 20%, he’s settled into the 18% range, and the park switch surely won’t hamper his patience. What’s crazy is that walk rate tends to improve with age. I have a feeling that’s not going to happen here, as there’s only so much higher his walk rate could possibly get! That said, it’s possible that his walk rate actually does increase this season as he won’t have Aaron Judge batting behind him. Opposing pitchers will be able to pitch him a little more carefully now without worrying about the best hitter in baseball coming to the plate next with a runner on base.

Ultimately, the hit and walk factors combine to only marginally suppress OBP, as seen by their 98 OBP factors. That’s actually tied for 20th, so the sting of the low hit rate is almost entirely offset by the inflated walk rate factor.

The two parks sport similar strikeout factors, with both inflating them, Citi doing so slightly more than Yankee. Part of what makes Soto such a special hitter is that he makes exceptional contact, and yet is still able to hit for as much power as he does. He hasn’t posted a strikeout rate over 18.2% since 2019, and outside of that season, has never posted a SwStk% higher than 7.7%. It’s rare to find such a combination of contact ability and power, but when you do, you’ve found yourself a future Hall of Famer.

Lastly, we end on the runs scored factor and overall Park Factor. Thanks to the gap in home run factor, Citi is more pitcher friendly than Yankee, but it might actually be a surprise to learn that overall, Yankee Stadium is slightly pitcher friendly.

So based solely on the switch in park, the factors suggest that Soto might enjoy a slightly higher BABIP, but a similar hit total as his home run count is cut. That means a similar batting average, but less power, both from doubles and home runs. He’ll also join a weaker lineup that would hinder all his counting stats, but you never know who else the team might sign or trade for heading into next season. All of these effects result in a drop in projected fantasy value as a member of the Mets instead of the Yankees. He’s obviously still a fantasy star, and absolutely monstrous in OBP formats, but a star that’s ever so slightly dimmed.