With His Scorching Start, Bryan Reynolds Could Be Hitting His Manner Out of Pittsburgh

Oneil Cruz’s fractured fibula is the largest story surrounding the Pirates. On the constructive facet, the return of Andrew McCutchen to the fold is neat, and Tuesday night time’s walk-off dwelling run by Ji Hwan Bae was fairly cool. To these eyes, nonetheless, probably the most noteworthy factor about Pittsburgh to date — even past the truth that the staff’s 7–4 begin is its greatest since 2018 — has been the torrid play of Bryan Reynolds. The 28-year-old outfielder has been the one of many sport’s hottest hitters, and he’s achieved it as progress towards a contract extension has floor to a halt simply when it appeared {that a} deal to maintain him in black and gold was inside attain.

Reynolds ended final weekend as considered one of seven gamers who had collected hits in each sport this season (José Abreu, José Ramírez, Nolan Arenado, Randy Arozarena, Bryson Stott, and Jordan Walker had been the others). He and Abreu each went hitless in Monday night time’s Pirates-Astros contest, and by the shut of play Tuesday, solely the streaks of Stott and Walker remained intact. Still, season-opening hitting streaks come and go fairly shortly; of extra curiosity is that Reynolds has been placing up eye-opening numbers. Through Tuesday, he’s hitting .356/.367/.778, main the NL in slugging proportion and homers (5) and rating fifth in WAR (0.7) and wRC+ (184). Mind you, these numbers appeared much more spectacular earlier than his 1-for-8 on Monday and Tuesday nights, however the sudden itch to write down about Adam Duvall, an excellent hotter hitter on this younger season, happening with a wrist harm acquired in my means.

For Duvall, Reynolds, and everybody else, we’re nonetheless in Small Sample Theater territory, however as with the Red Sox slugger, some underlying numbers have me questioning if we’re seeing actual enhancements to his sport. For starters, like Duvall, he’s minimize his strikeout price dramatically: Last yr he struck out 23% of the time, and for his profession he’s at 21.5%, however this yr, that’s all the way down to 10.2%. Given that strikeout charges stabilize round 60 PA and that Reynolds is at 49, this might wind up being noteworthy, although in contrast to Duvall, his swinging-strike price hasn’t fallen fairly so dramatically, going from 12.9% final yr to 11.9% this yr. His 31.1% chase price is down 4.5 factors from final yr, when he tried to hack his means out of a gradual begin, and is simply half some extent decrease than his profession mark, besides, he’s strolling in simply 4.1% of his plate appearances, lower than half of his 9.7% profession mark.

All of this interprets to extra contact than standard for Reynolds, and he’s taking advantage of it. Seriously: He’s hitting the ball within the air far more than ever, and his common exit velocity, barrel price, and hard-hit price are past something within the Bryan Reynolds catalogue.

Again, we’re not but on the level of those stats stabilizing; by way of Baseball Prospectus’ Russell Carleton (whom I command you to learn), exit velocity stabilizes round 40 batted ball occasions and barrel price at 50 BBE, and groundball, fly ball, and hard-hit charges achieve this at 80 BBE. But even when Reynolds, who leads the majors with 12 barrels, didn’t add one other one over his subsequent eight batted balls, his 24% barrel price can be larger than each certified 2022 hitter aside from Aaron Judge. As it’s, his 28.6% barrel price is fifth amongst present qualifiers, and his .896 xSLG and .553 xwOBA each lead the majors:

Here’s the place Reynolds is by way of rolling xSLG:

The query underlying all of that is whether or not Reynolds’ scorching begin is an illustration that he can get again to approximating his 2021 type, when he hit .302/.390/.522 for a 141 wRC+ and was value 6.2 WAR, or whether or not final yr’s good-not-great .262/.345/.461 (125 wRC+) and a pair of.8 WAR is the brand new norm. That query clearly has ramifications in terms of his future, whether or not it’s in Pittsburgh or elsewhere.

Recall that in December, Reynolds, who has two remaining years of membership management after this season, requested a commerce after the Pirates reportedly provided him a six-year, $80 million extension, over $50 million in need of the eight-year, $134 million deal he was in search of. Dan Szymborski recapped all of that in February and supplied a six-year ZiPS projection for 2024–29: $95 million, a determine weighed down by Reynolds’ three remaining arbitration years (together with this one), the truth that he’ll be heading into his age-31 season as a free agent, and his subpar defensive metrics (he had -14 DRS, -6 RAA, and -2.7 UZR as a middle fielder final yr). Dan additionally famous that limiting the defensive enter to RAA as a middle fielder added one other $25 million to his projected worth over that span, pushing his valuation into the ballpark of what Reynolds sought.

Just earlier than the common season started, the 2 sides drew nearer to an eight-year, $106.75 million deal — that was together with his $6.75 million salaries for 2023 and ’24 — however hit a snag over Reynolds’ need for an opt-out clause after the fourth yr (2026), that means that the Pirates would acquire just one extra yr of management if he had been to train that choice. With the delicate deadline of Opening Day now having handed, that’s as far the dialog has gone. “Nothing to report… If there’s anything more to talk about, we’ll keep that between him and us.” mentioned basic supervisor Ben Cherington on Wednesday when requested if talks had progressed or damaged off.

Reynolds is tearing the duvet off the ball and in addition enjoying left area about twice as typically as middle (65 innings within the former, 32 within the latter up to now). His ZiPS rest-of-season projection for 3.5 WAR would put him at a complete of 4.2, just a little beneath the midway level between his final two seasons however nearer to All-Star caliber, that whereas enjoying for simply $6.75 million. Here’s a have a look at his preseason ZiPS percentile projection, based mostly on 622 PA:

Given the increase of his scorching begin, Reynolds may very well be headed towards one thing between his sixtieth and seventieth percentiles; my back-of-the-envelope math places him at a 137 wRC+ together with his rest-of-season ZiPS. Landing someplace in there would clearly make for a rosier long-term projection.

All of which is to say that each Reynolds’ inventory and his price ticket are at the moment on the rise because of this scorching begin, and whereas there are actually groups on the market keen to satisfy his long-term monetary needs, the Pirates’ willingness to get to his stage is in query; their observe file in such issues is actually worthy of skepticism even given how shut the 2 sides seem like. If this present alternative passes and not using a deal coming collectively, Reynolds could be hitting himself out of Pittsburgh, simply at a time the staff is displaying indicators of life.