Twins Tidbit: Luis Arraez is a Unicorn

[TwinsData]

Hitters face a tradeoff between swinging for power in order to drive the ball and protecting the plate with swings that are sure to make contact. The best hitters are the ones who effectively balance their swing-and-miss propensity with their aim to hit the ball hard. In his ability to do that, Luis Arraez is unique in all of baseball.

The above graph plots the whiff rate (fraction of swings that are swings-and-misses) with average exit velocity for all MLB hitters in the top 10 percentile for whiff rate. A few takeaways:

• Among hitters with sufficient plate appearances, Arraez leads the league in whiff rate. Less than 7 percent of his swings result in misses. Only four hitters are even below 10 percent. (note that the plate appearance cutoff is not really driving this result ... the only hitters with lower whiff rates than Arraez have seen less than 40 pitches this season).
• Arraez's exit velocity is uniquely high for hitters with such low whiff rates. You have to get all the way to Michael Brantley to find a hitter who hits the ball harder than Arraez, and Brantley whiffs almost twice as often to accomplish that.
• Does exit velocity even matter? Of course. The league leaders in exit velocity are Yordan Alvarez, Aaron Judge, and Giancarlo Stanton. A real who's who. And the hitters who most closely resemble Arraez in whiff rate while sacrificing exit velocity (Steven Kwan, Luis Guillorme, and Nick Madrigal) own OPS values of 0.771, 0.712, and 0.581 compared to 0.841 for Arraez.

No other hitter in the big leagues combines plate control and exit velocity like Arraez does. Imagine a Brantley or DJ LeMahieu who whiffed at pitches half as often without losing any of the power. And was only 25 years old. That's Arraez. Pretty good!

 

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[Old Twins Cap]

Now that's a metric that is easy to understand.

Thank you!

[SportsGuyDalton]

Arraez' bat control is next level.

Even when he swings at a pitch outside the zone, he makes contact 90.2% of the time. Best in MLB by a 5% margin. What a joy to watch.

[Trov]

Just think he is still not in his prime.  What is amazing for me is how quickly he adjusts to how teams have adjusted to him.  He will go on a short skid and then boom I will start hitting the ball somewhere else.  He will foul pitches off until he gets his he wants.  This is not something most can do. He is a joy to watch.

[awmonahan]

Awesome graphic representation. I underrated the guy, thinking he couldn't stay healthy and had no position. He's having  a ridiculous season, though.

 

[Scott51104]

Arraez is a pleasure to watch. I would find it interesting to see the same chart with his teammates also included.

[umterp23]

An above average power but high average/contact and once in awhile HR capable hitter.  Old School Baseball Player vs todays swing and miss or hit bombs players.  He is mastering the hitting craft which is beautiful to watch vs guys swinging out the shoes to pull everything over a fence.  Give me more of Arraez hitting style on a team and that will be enjoyable baseball.

[TwinsData]

30 minutes ago, Scott51104 said:

Arraez is a pleasure to watch. I would find it interesting to see the same chart with his teammates also included.

You are in luck: 

 

[Rosterman]

Arraez is such a gem to watch battin. I hope his knees hold up. And first base seems to be a good place for him.

Home runs are nice. But what is nicer is someone else hitting a home run with a runner on base. Construct the lineup correctly and you can make use of Arraez's run-scoring abilities.

Inetresting. I often wonder what the Twins would be like with Isiah Kiner-Falefa. I was excited when the Twins obtained him for shortstop. But glad the Twins were able to get out of the Donaldson contract and more than happy with Urshela at third base for the moment. 

[RpR]

Luis was swinging for the fence a good bit more early in the season, his batting average took a tumble, now he is making sure he hits the ball, his average is at least stable.

Some other Twins should take note.

[USAFChief]

 

[GNess]

Nice info on a vital member of the Twins and as others have said a Joy to watch.

[bean5302]

Love to watch Arraez's plate appearances. Something's always going to happen, and often, it's something good or great.

Looking at that chart, Larnach's whiff rate is scary considering his EV, but Larnach has drawn a fair number of walks, too. I'm hoping Larnach's early year successes against the slider and sinker weren't just SSS mirage, but when I isolate his performance against the slider, he crushed it in April and then started struggling after that.