Let’s Talk About Launch Angle “Tightness”

Yesterday, I finally followed up on a note written on my white board for months: “sd(LA) –> BABIP?” The results from my research: the tightness of a hitter’s launch angle is moderately positively correlated with his batting average on balls in play (BABIP). I measure “tightness” in terms of variance. The narrower the distribution of his launch angles, the tighter. The wider, the looser. There is also weak evidence to suggest a tighter launch angle correlates with more consistent exit velocity (EV).

random finding of the day:

r² = 0.24 between BABIP and stdev(LA)

that is, tighter avg launch angle ➡️ higher BABIP. bat control and all that.

also: tighter launch angle ➡️ more repeatable exit velo to a small extent (r² = 0.14)

— Alex "Oxlade" Chamberlain (@DolphHauldhagen) December 5, 2019

(Turns out Brock Hammit, who is part of the Brewers’ player development team, investigated this very idea in June. Small world! Great minds! All that good stuff.)

As noted in my Tweet, the crux of the finding hints at something previously quantifiable only by the eye test: bat control. In effect, it’s a quantification of the hit tool — to me, the most interesting possible application. Would it surprise you to learn that Joey Votto has the tightest launch angle in the Statcast Era^TM? Followed by hitting savants both current and former, such as Freddie Freeman, Miguel Cabrera, Joe Mauer, Mike Trout, Michael Brantley — and maybe less-expected and arguably underrated names (underrated exclusively in the greater “hit tool” discussion) like Justin Turner, Daniel Murphy, J.D. Martinez, and DJ LeMahieu?

These hitters all have or had outstanding contact skills, superb batted ball efficacy, or both. If you click through to any of their player pages, you’ll encounter routinely elevated BABIPs.

Is there more to this than meets the eye? I’m not sure. Obviously all of this here is but a small part of a much bigger puzzle and should be used in conjunction with, and not in place of, our existing knowledge about player performance. I wouldn’t consider this the be-all, end-all of BABIP analysis by any means, although I do think it’s significant.

That said, here are three potentially pertinent applications of this knowledge:

1) Circling back to the idea of the “hit tool,” I think launch angle tightness clarifies a hitter’s hit tool grade(s). Singling out Manuel Margot: his player page still displays scouting grades, which include a 50 PV/60 FV on his hit tool. Among 282 hitters who have seen at least 5,000 pitches since Statcast launched, Margot owns the 11th-loosest launch angle. By no small coincidence, he has continually drummed up below-average BABIPs despite 70-grade speed — no small feat for someone allegedly equipped with multiple ‘plus’ tools. With a career .289 BABIP, .146 isolated power (ISO), and 84 wRC+, Margot is the poster boy for a hit tool grade gone wrong. (Or maybe Byron Buxton is. More to come below.)

2) Unsavory trends in a hitter’s launch angle tightness could indicate decline (or perhaps injury). Some of the biggest increases in launch angle standard deviation from 2018 to 2019? Robinson Canó, Matt Carpenter, Manny Machado, Daniel Murphy, David Peralta, and Wil Myers, all of whom had proportionately unsavory 2019 seasons. Similarly, 2019’s biggest breakouts and improvements were among MLB’s biggest launch angle tighteners: Cody Bellinger, Rafael Devers, Ozzie Albies, Yoán Moncada, Tim Anderson, Josh Bell, even James McCann. Both sides of this coin make a ton of sense.

José Altuve owns 2019’s biggest decline in launch angle tightness. Is this the byproduct of his injury or true performance decline? Last year’s .303 BABIP, more than 30 points lower than his career mark, might be earned and not at all an aberration.

(It’s worth noting a downward trend could be a hitter selling out for power, although the examples are few and far between. Namely, Eugenio Suárez and Christian Yelich. Maybe Yuli Gurriel beneath the cutoff, if you squint.)

3) The act of combining the tightness of a hitter’s launch angle with his average exit velocity might denote a hitter’s overall quality. In theory, a tight launch angle and a high average exit velocity would indicate repeatably high-quality contact. (Indeed, Hammit’s finding suggests as much.) Below is a table of hitters with at least 180 batted ball events (BBEs) in 2019 with select commentary as curated by yours truly. In ascending order of tightness:

• Is there an argument to be made that J.D. Martinez is the best pure hitter (in terms of bat-to-ball outcomes) in the sport? It’s a loaded question, but there are no questions about his production. Since the start of 2016, his .312 average ranks 5th of 292 and his .288 ISO ranks 3rd. Only Mike Trout is comparable (.307 AVG, .303 ISO).
• Domingo Santana is a really interesting entry here. It’s a shame his launch angle is so shallow. It stands to reason if he simply tried to make more contact, even at the expense of power, good results would follow.
• Exhibit A, why I’ll take Aaron Judge before Giancarlo Stanton.
• If J.D. Martinez isn’t the best pure hitter in baseball, then “Michael Tauchman” is. For real, Mike Tauchman always possessed an above-average hit tool, long before he ever developed power. (He used to be a speedy high-average guy!) It’s reassuring, then, to see how well he graded out here. My love for him knows no bounds.
• I have alleged before that Cavan Biggio possesses an above-average hit tool; this seems to confirm it. His only deficiency is his extreme passivity. I recently compared him to Jeff McNeil, but at the polar opposite end of the passivity-aggression plate discipline spectrum. Even with a low average, he has high-floor talent with 20/20 potential.
• Yordan Alvarez. ‘Nuff said.
• I’m sorry, does J.D. Davis compare favorably to Trout? Even before seeing these results, I loved what I saw from Davis this year. He never got nearly enough love from fantasy owners, and his early National Fantasy Baseball Championship (NFBC) average draft position (ADP 173) suggests more of the same.
• Perhaps the most fascinating takeaway: among 127 hitters with 350+ BBEs in 2019, Moncada ranks 13th — and no one above him possesses a better average EV. If he becomes more aggressive — something I think will benefit him — he could become a monster.

Flipping the table over…

• If you’ve been holding out hope for Maikel Franco all these years… maybe stop?
• I’ll admit, I drank the Andrelton Simmons Kool-Aid — not to the point of it being detrimental, but as an incredibly cheap target for the last several years, I found myself targeting him in late rounds as a low-upside volume play. His launch angle tightness has steadily declined, though, and there might be a premature demise in productivity looming.
• Buxton. Woof, pal. At least the average exit velocity is good. However, this Baseball Prospectus write-up called Buxton’s hit tool “more advanced” with “a chance [to be] plus-plus.” (I’m not picking on BP. Everyone loved Buxton, obviously. I just needed a concrete scouting report to point to.) Like in the case of Margot, I think a lack of launch angle tightness explains a great deal of Buxton’s incredibly underwhelming production in nearly 400 MLB games. In fact, Buxton owns the “loosest” launch angle of anyone with 800+ BBEs in the Statcast Era. That’s really bad! That is simply not a plus, or even above-average, or even regular-average, hit tool.
• Is it any wonder why Rougned Odor can’t post a consistent BABIP to save his life?
• The most interesting names here, to me, are Gary Sánchez, Matt Chapman, and Mike Moustakas. In essence, the only thing preventing them from being Odor or Myers is contact skills — and that’s fine, because contact skills are really important. As long as they sustain their efficacious batted ball quality, they should continue to mash. They were all highly productive despite low BABIPs anyway — maybe that’s the full extent of it. That said, they could be skating on thinner ice than others from a long-term perspective.

Enjoy. (As always, click headers to sort!)