Javier Baez (Topps Fire 2019)
“El Mago” Javier Baez is a 2-time all-star of the Chicago Cubs. In 2018, he hit .290/.326/.554 with 34 Home Runs and 111 RBIs and finished 2nd in the NL MVP voting. Meanwhile, his OPS was .881 and it was Baez’s first time to finish at least .800 in OPS. He became the core of the Cubs offense along with Kris Bryant and Anthony Rizzo.
2018 was definitely a great season for Javier Baez, how did “El Mago” have a breakout season? Is there any magic from the magician?
Launch Angle
Look at the launch angle first. Javy’s launch angle was stable in 2015 and 2016 and his average launch in these two years was 11.4 degrees. However, his launch angle went down gradually, particularly against fastballs, his launch angle dropped to only 4 degrees in 2019.
What’s the result of a lower launch angle? No doubt, Javy hit more baseballs on the ground. Last season, Javy’s GB% went up to 55% against fastballs and offspeed pitches.
Javy’s line drive rate remains between 18% and 28% constantly from 2016 to 2019.
His FB% has been up and down, but in the 2018 and 2019 season, Javy hit more fly balls against breaking balls than against fastballs.
Javy only had 80 PAs in 2015. So we might not go deep in that season. His hard hit rate increased from 2016 to 2018. Against fastballs, Javy’s hard hit% was more than 45% in 2018 and 2019. His hard hit rate was 43.1% and 43.6% in 2018 and 2019 each.
Baez keeps barreling baseball from 2016 to 2019. However, his Barrel % against breaking balls and offspeed pitches went down in 2019. Overall, his barrel% ranked 23rd in the league in 2018 and ranked 30th in 2019.
In 2019, there’s no huge difference against all pitches in Javy’s xwOBA. Thus, there are no big problems for him to hit any kinds of pitches. He had some troubles against offspeed pitches in 2017, but it seemed that he figured out the solutions in 2018.
Nowadays, launch angle has been talking frequently. Lots of players changed their hitting approaches and hit baseballs in the air. Javier Baez seems to be the opposite, but he still hits pretty well. How could this happen? Look at Baez’s xwOBA by zone. No doubt, if you throw in the middle, you are done. Meanwhile, it’s obvious that Javier Baez is much better at hitting “high strikes”. Launch angle is part of the story, the more important is about the zone. Javier Baez chose the right pitches in the right zone so that he can do damage. Even though his launch angle was lower than the league average, Javy still can hit well. However, as he already hit more baseballs on the ground, he has to be more disciplined with the zone since pitchers may already know and he will probably see less pitches at the top of the strike zone.
xwOBA (Zone, 2018)
xwOBA (Zone, 2019)
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