Ronald Acuña Jr.’s Bat Is Almost All of the Manner Again, however the Remainder of His Sport Lags

When the Braves gained the World Series in 2021, Ronald Acuña Jr. was a bystander, as a torn anterior cruciate ligament in his proper knee knocked him out for the second half of the season and the complete postseason. He returned to motion close to the tip of April final 12 months, however whereas he was the Braves’ second-most priceless outfielder — which wasn’t saying a lot as a result of slumps and calamities that befell the group’s different fly chasers — his efficiency was far in need of the excessive commonplace he’d set since debuting in 2018. With a robust begin to his 2023 season, Acuña is displaying indicators of recovering his pre-injury kind, although his efficiency in a few areas does elevate issues.

After hitting a scorching .283/.394/.596 (157 wRC+) in 82 video games earlier than tearing his ACL in 2021, Acuna dipped to .266/.351/.413 (114 wRC+) in 119 video games final 12 months. It wasn’t a foul efficiency; his wRC+ ranked among the many high 30 of all outfielders, and his 2.1 WAR prorates to about 2.6 per 650 PA. On a group the place all the different outfielders apart from rookie Michael Harris II — specifically Travis Demeritte, Adam Duvall, Robbie Grossman, Guillermo Heredia, and Eddie Rosario — netted -1.1 WAR, Acuña’s contribution wasn’t an unwelcome one, serving to the group win 101 video games. Yet his season was properly shy of the elite degree that he set for himself pre-injury, with a 140 profession wRC+ and 6.0 WAR per 650 PA. After all, this can be a participant whom Dan Szymborski had as soon as projected because the probably to supplant Mike Trout as the sport’s finest by way of WAR.

Acuña missed his probability for that, however he’s nonetheless simply 25 years previous, and thru the primary two weeks of the season, he’s hitting .370/.452/.537 by means of 62 plate appearances. Already he has three three-hit video games and 4 two-hit video games underneath his belt, and he’s helped the Braves bounce out to a 9-4 document even whereas coping with quite a few accidents to their rotation and lineup.

While he solely has two homers, Acuña is hitting the ball about as exhausting as he was simply earlier than getting injured:

The pattern sizes are essential to notice right here and all through this piece — a chorus we’ll be singing for awhile, however an essential one. With 44 batted ball occasions, we’re simply previous the 40 at which exit velocity stabilizes, and approaching the 50 at which barrel price does so, so it’s reassuring to see that Acuña is roughly in between the place he was in 2020 and ’21 on the latter entrance, and properly forward of final 12 months.

More out of character are Acuña’s excessive groundball price, groundball-to-fly ball ratio and common launch angle. He set profession highs within the first two of these classes final 12 months, and a profession low within the third, and through his early efficiency, he’s on monitor to surpass these. However, groundball and fly ball charges don’t attain the purpose of stabilization till 80 batted ball occasions, so these measures are noisier at this juncture than exit velo and barrel price; hard-hit price doesn’t stabilize till 80 BBE both.

Even with that prime (however maybe extra transient) groundball price, it’s fascinating to notice that to date, Acuña’s anticipated slugging share is even forward of his 2021 numbers:

In taking a look at this, it’s price noting that Acuña fell 73 factors in need of his xSLG final 12 months, the second-largest shortfall of any qualifier; notably, he was 4 residence runs in need of his Statcast anticipated complete, the Twelfth-largest shortfall.

A take a look at his rolling xSLG exhibits that Acuña had stretches final 12 months the place he was hitting the ball as exhausting and even tougher than now however couldn’t maintain that clip for very lengthy, and even slumped to the purpose of being properly beneath common. One of these valleys from final 12 months matches up together with his July, throughout which he hit simply .219/318/.281 and had a 5.4% barrel price; from July 10 to August 3, he went almost 17 full video games (48 BBE) with out barreling a single ball.

Batting isn’t the one dimension of Acuña’s sport, in fact; this can be a participant who stole 37 bases to go together with his 41 homers in 2019, the one season during which he’s performed greater than 119 video games. While final 12 months’s 29 steals (in 40 makes an attempt) represented his highest complete since then, he solely performed 46 video games in 2020 and 82 video games in ’21. He does lead the NL with six steals, placing him on tempo for 75 over a 162-game season — wouldn’t that be a factor to see? — however his Statcast metrics present that he’s not solely notably slower than earlier than his damage, however barely slower than final season:

On an age and percentile foundation, Acuña’s relative standing has improved in comparison with 2022, and he’s nonetheless properly above common, however his uncooked numbers are down a hair, which doesn’t precisely make the case that he’s all the best way again.

If Acuña stays quick sufficient to be a pressure on the basepaths, the place he’s actually misplaced floor is on protection. Not solely is he not a middle fielder — he performed simply 13 innings there pre-injury in 2021, and only one inning since — however his proper area metrics are a bit ominous. He made simply 88 begins in proper final 12 months in addition to 27 at DH, and whereas his 0 DRA and -0.7 UZR make the case that he was common, his -5 RAA paints a distinct image. His jumps have been poor (nineteenth percentile), his catch share was 4 factors beneath anticipated (87% vs. 91%) and whereas his arm remained elite (one hundredth percentile), his -7 OAA was within the sixth percentile, outranking solely Nick Castellanos and Juan Soto amongst proper fielders. Yikes. His greatest weak point was that he was 4 outs beneath common in transferring laterally in direction of the primary base facet. The Braves did have Acuña taking part in deeper than earlier than (a median of 298 ft vs. 290 in ’21), which could have been a problem, and he was taking part in with a brand new middle area neighbor in Harris, who was above common (6 RAA) and powerful in each instructions laterally — however then his 2021 middle fielders (often Cristian Pache and Heredia) have been above common as properly.

Still, don’t attempt to run on him:

For all of that, even together with his defensive decline Acuña projected to provide 5.5 WAR through our Depth Charts, with greater than a 60% probability of being a four-win participant in line with ZiPS; right here’s his percentile projection, courtesy of Dan:

That’s fairly spectacular, sufficient that he ranked twentieth amongst all gamers by way of his preseason ZiPS. Still, in noting that his performance-to-date prorates to 75 steals and 25 residence runs over the course of a full season, I couldn’t assist however be reminded of the legend of Eric Davis, the oft-injured outfielder whose peak continues to be spoken about in hushed tones by males of a sure age; in 1986, his age-24 season, he paired 27 homers and 80 steals, after which the following 12 months 37 homers and 50 steals. Though he had a number of different excellent seasons, the tantalizing promise of that speed-power mixture eroded together with his frequent accidents; in 17 seasons, he by no means topped 135 video games performed. Manny Machado just lately in contrast Acuña to Ken Griffey Jr., however I’m wondering if Acuña will wind up being nearer to this technology’s Davis. Griffey missed numerous time as a result of accidents, albeit totally on the again half of his profession after increase Hall of Fame credentials, whereas Davis is a first-ballot Hall of What Might Have Been man.

That’s a heavy thought, maybe too heavy to position on the shoulders of a 25-year-old star two weeks into what is meant to be his rebound season. For now, it ought to rely as excellent news that Acuña has resumed being an offensive pressure. We’ll simply have to attend and see as as to if his all-around sport returns.