Can Royce Lewis Maintain His Elite Contact High quality?

Royce Lewis is likely one of the most intriguing hitters within the sport proper now. Regardless of how implausible he has been on a charge foundation, it’s laborious to completely consider his general worth as a hitter due to how little he has performed. He has amassed 4.1 WAR and a 159 wRC+ throughout 93 profession video games, however as is well-known, he’s been restricted because of a sequence of accidents that features two ACL tears, quadricep and hamstring points, and an indirect pressure.

This season, his explosive efficiency has added some confidence in what he might be as a hitter. Regardless of struggling a quad damage on Opening Day that saved him out of the lineup for 2 months, he’s clobbered 10 house runs in 23 video games, exhibiting that he doesn’t want a bunch of plate appearances to shake the rust off his swing earlier than catching fireplace. His uncooked expertise has by no means been in query, however there’s one a part of his sport all through his energy surge that appears to defy logic and is value keeping track of shifting ahead: His xwOBACON sat at .473 getting into play Sunday. If he have been a professional hitter, that may rank within the prime decile. Given what we’ve seen from Lewis, that isn’t all too stunning – he can actually put a cost into the ball. However when zooming in a bit on a specific element of his swing, it turns into a bit shocking. Listed here are the leaders in xwOBACON so far in 2024:

I’ve included Vertical Bat Angle (VBA) right here as a result of, apart from Juan Soto, Lewis has the bottom common VBA of all hitters on this checklist. After Lewis, the hitter with the next-lowest VBA is Giancarlo Stanton, who generates a lot energy and bat velocity that it will be practically unattainable for him to not have a top-of-the-line xwOBACON, even with such an unorthodox swing. How Soto can affect the baseball with ferocity regardless of having one of many flattest swings in all the sport is a little more complicated. The only rationalization is he has unbelievable higher physique athleticism, which permits him to let the ball get extraordinarily deep within the hitting zone and nonetheless alter his bat path to get on airplane with the pitch.

In any other case, although, hitters infrequently generate this stage of contact high quality with most of these VBAs. So it’s outstanding that Lewis is among the many exceptions. For the remainder of this piece, let’s ignore Stanton as a result of he’s, within the phrases of Yankees supervisor Aaron Boone, a “weirdo” and what he does along with his violent, uneven swing is nearly definitely unattainable to copy. Soto can be a singular hitter; the distinction is that what he does — utilizing his flatter bat path to make extra constant contact whereas nonetheless having the energy to do harm, and pairing that hit device with 80-grade swing selections — could be value emulating if anybody have been gifted sufficient to do it. At a look, it appears Lewis might need the talents to comply with a considerably related recipe. Up to now this season, Lewis has a 98th percentile SEAGER, a metric from Robert Orr that weighs how selective hitter are and the speed at which they assault hittable pitches. It’s particularly encouraging that Lewis lets solely 28.2% of hittable pitches go him by, that means that when he will get a pitch he can crush, he’s assaults it. That’s an amazing basis to have.

To raised perceive his swing, I’ll refer you all to the third hitting installment from Tess Taruskin’s invaluable video scouting sequence, particularly the half the place she compares grooved and adjustable swings. As a result of Lewis is a hitter with such a flat swing, my preliminary hunch was that almost all of his harm comes in opposition to pitches down the center or in prime half of the zone, leaving a gap for pitchers to focus on on the backside of the zone. This could point out that Lewis would have a grooved swing, one which repeats a selected swing path again and again, resulting in a restricted house for barrels. Though Lewis’ pattern dimension continues to be hardly vital this yr, it’s value the place his greatest swings when it comes to contact high quality have been situated. Listed here are his 10 house runs this season:

Attention-grabbing. All of Lewis’ homers have come from the center of the zone. That’s not essentially a nasty factor – one of the best hitters in baseball are those who crush errors probably the most typically. And as we noticed from his SEAGER, he’s nice at attacking pitches in hittable zones. Mainly, we are able to’t simply knock him just because his homers come from meatballs. Nonetheless, it’s related context to the dialog round distinguishing whether or not his swing is grooved or adjustable. To go a bit additional than simply his pitch chart on house runs, we are able to have a look at his efficiency by zone to see if he’s had a gap beneath the zone.

Lewis has truly been fairly profitable within the backside of third of the zone, with a .380 wOBA and .355 xwOBA on pitches on this location. (I included each 2023 and 2024 to extend the pattern dimension a bit.) That’s fairly spectacular for a hitter with such a flat swing. Soto’s wOBA/xwOBA line in that span is .264/.260, although his pattern is way bigger. Lewis’ contact high quality on lower-third pitches can be fairly robust.

video, it turns into clear how Lewis is succeeding in opposition to lower-third pitches, and that is the place he’s completely different from Soto. Bear in mind, it’s Soto’s higher physique flexibility that propels him to affect pitches that get deep within the zone in opposition to him. Lewis, then again, makes use of his decrease physique to get down within the zone and do harm on pitches within the backside third:

If you happen to concentrate on the place Lewis’ head begins on these swings versus the place it finishes, you’ll be able to see the angles he can create along with his decrease physique to get his barrel to the decrease third regardless of his flat swing. It’s harking back to Fernando Tatis Jr. The fingers begin excessive and keep excessive, however the decrease physique creates house for the barrel to nonetheless preserve a constructive assault angle – the angle of the bat path at contact relative to the bottom – on the backside of the zone. It’s a tough transfer to make, however when your swing is that this adjustable, you’ll be able to depend on it infrequently if you establish pitches accurately.

The distinction between Lewis and Soto is a superb reminder of how completely different hitters might be, even when a key trait of their swings is comparable. Lewis’ superpower lies in his decrease physique. Whether or not the pitch is inside, exterior, or in the midst of the zone, he makes use of his legs and hips to go down and get pitches.

Now, if I have been an opposing pitcher, I’d problem Lewis to make these strikes again and again and show he can nonetheless elevate pitches down within the zone. Like I’ve mentioned, we’re coping with a restricted pattern. Nonetheless, based mostly on what we’ve seen to date, there may be motive to imagine Lewis has the talents wanted to proceed producing elite contact along with his flat swing.