Ketel Marte, 20 Homer Man
If you had told me during spring training that Ketel Marte would enjoy a fantasy breakout during his age 25 season, I would have guessed it would include something like 15 dingers and 30 steals. Fast forward two and a half months, and Marte is indeed enjoying that fantasy breakout, but the shape of that breakout is rather shocking. As I type this, Marte ranks tied for seventh in baseball in homers with 20. TWENTY! He’s now on pace for about 44 homers. Heading into the season, he had only hit 22 throughout his entire career, and that came over 1,402 at-bats! His HR/FB rate stood at a measly 6.7%. Measly no longer describes Marte’s power.
Obviously, the knee-jerk reaction is always to doubt this newfound ability. Perhaps this is just an extended hot streak, or he’s been the beneficiary of some errant gusts of wind that have pushed previous fly outs over the fence. But man, whether you think these underlying skills are sustainable or not, check out these trends.
| Season | FB% | FB Pull% | FB Oppo% |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2015 | 26.2% | 8.9% | 44.4% |
| 2016 | 26.2% | 23.3% | 38.9% |
| 2017 | 34.2% | 27.0% | 44.4% |
| 2018 | 29.0% | 19.5% | 41.4% |
| 2019 | 38.2% | 37.4% | 28.6% |
Outside of hitting an inside-the-park home run on a ground ball, a hitter must lift a fly ball for a shot at a dinger. So naturally, with all else being equal, more fly balls results in more homers. Like we have seen frequently over the last two seasons, it appears that Marte has enthusiastically joined the Fly Ball Revolution. Having posted below league average FB% marks every season of his career, including three seasons below 30%, Marte has seen his fly ball rate surge to a new career high and the first time it’s been above the league average. This is unlikely an accident, and most likely a conscious change in plate approach to tap into power we had no idea he had.
Another driver of hitting home runs is pulling your fly balls. While Marte had hovered around the FB Pull% league average of around 23% to 24% since 2016, he has now taken his pulled fly ball skills to an entirely new level. In fact, he now ranks 27th among 285 qualified hitters in fly ball pull rate. That’s quite the accomplishment given where he was coming from, as his current mark is nearly double last year’s.
Relatedly, you see that as his FB Pull% has spiked, his FB Oppo% has collapsed. That might not be great for his BABIP, but we’re only evaluating his power here, and this is another validation for his breakout.
| Season | FB Hard% | FB+LD EV (MPH) | FB+LD Avg Dist (ft) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2015 | 22.2% | 88.7 | 260 |
| 2016 | 25.6% | 87.2 | 264 |
| 2017 | 33.3% | 90.2 | 276 |
| 2018 | 38.3% | 92.0 | 287 |
| 2019 | 52.8% | 94.0 | 302 |
This table displays the FanGraphs Hard% for just fly balls, and data from Statcast, including exit velocity of Marte’s fly balls and line drives, plus the average distance of his fly balls and line drives. His fly ball Hard% has increased each season, but has skyrocketed this year. Similar to his fly ball pull rate, he ranks 28th in fly ball Hard%. Who woulda thunk?!
Aside from the drop from 2015 to 2016, Marte’s exit velocity has also risen each year, and he has finally pushed it above the league average, currently sitting at 92.8 MPH.
Finally, his average distance has taken its biggest step up yet, continuing its annual ascent. While his mark was just barely above the league average last year, it’s now firmly above it this year.
| Season | HR/FB |
|---|---|
| 2015 | 4.4% |
| 2016 | 1.1% |
| 2017 | 7.9% |
| 2018 | 10.9% |
| 2019 | 20.9% |
And of course, Marte’s HR/FB rate has doubled from last season. He’s simply hitting more of his fly balls over the wall than he had been, driven by the improvements discussed earlier.
So to summarize how Marte is now tied for seventh in homers:
- He’s hitting more fly balls than ever before
- He’s pulling more of those fly balls than ever before
- He’s going the opposite way with those fly balls less frequently than ever before
- He’s hitting his fly balls harder than ever before
- He’s hitting his fly balls further than ever before
- He’s hitting more of his fly balls over the fence than ever before
While I can’t possibly tell you whether the above bullet points will continue over the rest of the season and whether Marte comes anywhere close to the 44 dingers he’s currently on pace for, what I can tell you is that his 20 homers is the result of 100% skill and not extraordinary good fortune. His xHR/FB rate of 23.5% is right in line with his actual mark. All the trends point to a completely new hitter, rather than one merely on a hot streak.
I wouldn’t fault you for at least attempting to sell high. However, I don’t think owners should feel pressure to rush out and try to do so before an extended cold streak that never comes.
Mike Podhorzer is the founder of ProjectingX IQ, an advanced fantasy baseball analytics platform that transforms projection data and in-season performance signals into actionable intelligence. He is the 2015 Fantasy Sports Writers Association Baseball Writer of the Year and three-time Tout Wars champion. He is the author of the eBook Projecting X 2.0: How to Forecast Baseball Player Performance, which teaches you how to project players yourself. Follow Mike on X@MikePodhorzer and contact him via email.
I turned down an offer of Marte for Leclerc in my 16 team mixed keep 12 league (OBP) the first week of April: fml.
I would have done the same! I loved Leclerc, own him in multiple leagues.
Would you try and sell JRam to land Ketel in a 16-team OPS keeper?
I own JRam in my local league and am blindly going to hold him all season. I just don’t know what to say about him. I don’t know if you’re suggesting offering him and others for Marte or a straight up deal though.
YES
Is there a way to generate a leaderboard for hard hit fly ball percentage? I know I can look at player splits individually, but it would be great to see them as a group.
Yup, the Splits leaderboard, then filter for just fly balls.
Thanks for the article, Mike. Funny, I just posted this question of Mysterious Marte in one of Brad Johnson’s daily grind articles. Explains a bit, but this explosion is quite out of nowhere. I think he’s also taking more pitches, just by watching his games naked eye test/tv etc.? Any dBacks fans out there let me know, thanks.
Still a long season, and he should theoretically regress…but heck whom knows? Sometimes baseball players find their mojo.
3.75 pitches per plate appearance in 2018.
3.78 pitches per plate appearance in 2019.
So sort of?
Is there a way to make these stats relative to the league? Becuase shoot, about 100 players are going to hit 40HR this year
Obviously he has had a marked increase in skill level and specifically, the skills that lead to HR. However, I would point out the following – Marte has always generated excellent max exit velo:
2015: 109.3 mph 243rd out of 480 (min 50 BBE)
2016: 113.5 68 of 471
2017: 112.8 78 of 466
2018: 115.1 28 of 480
2019: 115.8 11 of 360
You can luck your way into hits, HR, etc, But you can’t luck your way into 115 mph exit velo.
That’s interesting, would not have guessed who looked pretty good by max exit velo. However, are you looking at just fly balls or all batted ball types? Because if the max exit velo is achieved from grounders, it’s meaningless.
That’s just from Baseball Savant’s main chart so I would assume it’s from all batted balls. As to the last point, I guess I disagree – if a guy can hit it 115 on the ground, there is no reason he can’t hit it 115 in the air. But just like not every pitcher can throw 98, not every hitter can generate the kind of bat speed to generate EV north of 110 or so no matter how hard they swing. Just as an example – Jonathan Lucroy has never topped 110.9 mph since Statcast started in 2015. Now, that misses his prime years from 2012-2014 but it does include a very nice 2016 when he put up an .855 OPS with 24 HR. Moreover, that’s north of 2,000 PA since 2015 and never once did Lucroy manage an exit velo over 110.9. Another one – Lorenzo Cain has never topped 112.4. Again, a quality hitter who even has some HR pop who has amassed north of 2,500 PA since 2015 and never once put up a number that Marte has exceeded 4 years in a row (generally by quite a bit). Some guys can hit the ball harder than others.
Of course, for Marte it’s not just about max exit velo. To go with the bump in FB%, his avg EV has increased almost every year from 85.6 to 83.6 to 86.6 to 88.5 to 90.8 so it’s also about improving the frequency and quality of contact. But he’s always had a pretty high ceiling on his exit velocity.
Here’s the link to 2018’s 115 MPH contact from Marte: https://baseballsavant.mlb.com/sporty-videos?playId=88fd6cca-a676-482b-9576-a8679f15feb2
Will you elaborate on max EV being achieved from grounders is meaningless? Top of the head, I would think if you smoke it you smoke it. Is there something regarding bat path or something that may allow grounder EV to not translate to FB EV?
Us Diamondbacks fans have been aware of this for well over a year. His raw power has been there every since AZ acquired him in 2017. It was mostly right-handed power in 2017 and 2018; what’s REALLY changed in 2019 is not the increase in power (which he already had), it was that Marte learned how to hit for power from both sides of the plate, not just the right-handed side:
2018 article: https://www.azsnakepit.com/2018/8/1/17641090/ketel-marte-is-having-a-breakout-but-hes-not-fully-there-yet-diamondbacks-goldschmidt-altuve
2019: https://www.azsnakepit.com/2019/5/7/18535496/ketel-martes-power-breakout-part-2
Furthermore, as many people have noted, Marte’s power is very much tied to his ability to hit flyballs. He really struggled to hit flyballs as a lefty prior to this season. But this is something we’ve been seeing for a while now.
I’m not saying this as a “haha I told you so”, but as more validation that what you’re seeing is real.
Said he would be the offensive leader for the Dbacks coming into the season and bought all the shares in this guy. It has paid off for him and myself. My only concern was the defensive position and if bouncing him back and forth from the outfield to the infield would hurt him, it has not.
He’s 4th in the MLB in DRS and 2nd in UZR among all centerfielders. And this is with not enough innings to be qualified (309 innings for Marte vs 500+ for the 3 guys ahead of him).
And watching him, he’s been really good. He’s just so fast and athletic and makes play after play. Has a good arm, too.
I already liked him as a “younger, warm body with upside… maybe” play as a utility player, but this really made me perk up: https://baseballsavant.mlb.com/sporty-videos?playId=999c57f0-cf47-4c94-a1c1-2f776e677990
And this was my “all in” moment: https://baseballsavant.mlb.com/sporty-videos?playId=cda0822d-db3e-4c7d-91d5-a06ab07b0bc6
First D-backs homer: https://youtu.be/Qks8mQArq3w
Second D-backs homer: https://youtu.be/KMk73EH4s0A
And to think, coming into this year I was only going to use him in Daily leagues vs LHP. Iirc he has hit one of the longest HRs every single year for the last 3 years, so the power has always been there, just now he is finally getting to it.