Juan Soto is a tricky player for me to write about, because the numbers speak for themselves — no literary flourish needed. Trying to get cute while writing about a guy performing miracles isn’t baseball blogging, it’s the Gospel of John. Nevertheless, Soto is operating on such a level (he’s hitting .316/.421/.559 through the weekend — all stats are current through Sunday’s games) that it begs examination. Soto has the best batting eye of his generation; therefore, for him, every year is a walk year. But this season, specifically, is his final one before he hits the open market in search of a record long-term contract.
It’s been a complicated couple years for us Soto zealots. How can this player demand more money than the (deferral-adjusted) Shohei Ohtani deal? He’s never won an MVP and only finished in the top three once. He’s never recorded a 7-WAR season, never hit 40 home runs. He’s a bad defender, and in the past two seasons, he hit .242 and .275 respectively. If he’s such a uniquely valuable player, how come two teams gave up on him before he turned 25? Soto suffers slightly in the public estimation because his greatest skill is invisible.
Soto has posted a .400 OBP in every season of his career; since he debuted in 2018, nobody else has done that more than twice in a full 162-game season. He is the active leader in walk rate by 3.3 percentage points and the active career OBP leader by 27 points, both over Aaron Judge. Soto is still one of the most selective hitters in the majors — out of 171 qualified batters, he has the fifth-lowest overall swing rate and chase rate — but by his standards, he’s been quite aggressive this season.
Soto is currently running, albeit by a tenth of a percentage point, the lowest walk rate of his career. That’s accompanied his lowest-ever strikeout rate. And when he makes contact, he’s doing more damage; Soto currently has the highest wOBA and xwOBA of his career, with the exception of his 47-game 2020 season.
This past winter, it was fashionable to suggest that Soto would adapt his game to playing in the Bronx. After all, this is a very strong left-handed hitter who’d just come from San Diego and its famous pitcher-friendly ballpark. Now, Soto would be playing his home games at Yankee Stadium, an edifice whose dimensions were built to suit 100 years’ worth of pull-happy lefty power hitters.
Soto might not be as big as Judge or as thirsty for home runs as Babe Ruth, but he can count to 314 — the distance, in feet, from home plate to the right field foul pole at Yankee Stadium. That’s not very far. I was skeptical; when Soto puts a charge into the ball, he can hit it out.
