3 most insane stats from Shohei Ohtani’s MVP campaign
Shohei Ohtani home runs aren’t the only impressive thing about his hitting
As mentioned, when Ohtani hits home runs he usually doesn’t get cheated. His power looks greater when you dive deep into the advanced metrics as well.
Per Baseball Savant, Ohtani is tied for the hardest-hit ball in the majors this season, a 119 MPH rocket on April 12.
Shohei Ohtani is just the 5th player in the Statcast era to have a batted ball of 119+ MPH (Stanton, Judge, Cruz, Sánchez).
— MLB Stats (@MLBStats) April 13, 2021
(MLB x @googlecloud) pic.twitter.com/h9Sp85oKb8
When he’s making contact, he’s squaring up baseballs more often than not. His traditional box score statistics will show this, but the analytical data also provides more evidence to this as he ranks Top-5 in the majors for most categories for putting balls in play.
Ohtani 2021 MLB Statcast Rankings:
- Barrels/PA% (15.2%-1st)
- Barrels/BBE% (25.4%-1st)
- Hard-Hit % (56.9%-1st)
- Avg. Distance (206 feet-3rd)
- Avg. Exit Velo. (93.9 MPH-5th)
In the Era of the “Three-True Outcomes” approach, Ohtani has continued to deliver productive offense with his slugging mentality. It says something given how often players are willing to strikeout because they’re swinging for the fences.
Ohtani does have a 28.7 strikeout percentage this season, but he still draws his fair share of walks. His 10.6 base-on-balls percentage is nearly two ticks higher than the MLB average of 8.7 percent.
He’s turned himself into a complete hitter. Throw in his nasty stuff on the mound and manager Joe Maddon has baseball’s best weapon.