A statistical look at D1 hitters to determine who stood out.
A little gift for stats lovers during the holiday season… BBTV France had some fun identifying the best hitter of the 2024 season, considering 10 offensive statistics. Why 10? Why not… In any case, we chose the 10 stats that seem most telling, most interesting, and most comprehensive. That’s why you won’t find slugging, OPS, or OBP here, as we provide more complete versions of those. The same goes for stolen bases, with SecA being more precise. We could have used other stats just as interesting, like BABIP, wRC+, Linear Weight, and others, but choices had to be made, and they probably wouldn’t have drastically changed the final standings.
Another note: to establish the list, we went beyond the usual 3.1 or 2.8 at-bats per game, which typically means 87 or 77 at-bats. We wanted to widen the pool a bit and included hitters with at least 70 at-bats, which gives us exactly 52 eligible players.
Batting Average.
We used the good old batting average, which, despite its shortcomings, still gives a solid look at hitters’ performance.
1- Rodriguez, 2. Smith, 3. Defries, 4. Blondel, 5. Ruiz, 6. Jiminian, 7. Ogawa, 8. Velazquez, 9. Navarro, 10. M. Esteban.
wOBA
There are several weighted statistics, meaning they assign coefficients to actions and consider more than just hits, but also walks, sacrifices, etc. They provide a very precise look at overall performance. We chose wOBA, or weighted on-base average, which is probably the most common.
1. Smith, 2. Defries, 3. Rodriguez, 4. Ruiz, 5. Blondel, 6. Acuna, 7. Antonac, 8. Partington, 9. Jiminian, 10. A. Soriano.
ISO
Isolated Power expresses a hitter’s pure power. This is where the big hitters shine.
1. Antonac, 2. Ruiz, 3. Acuna, 4. Smith, 5. Defries, 6. Jiminian, 7. A. Soriano, 8. Masson, 9. Briones, 10. Hrytishvili.
Secondary Average
A statistic that combines speed on the bases and patience at the plate with the number of hits. It provides a broader view of offensive production.
1. Partington, 2. Defries, 3. Acuna, 4. Jiminian, 5. Antonac, 6. A. Soriano, 7. Masson, 8. Ruiz, 9. M. Esteban, 10. Briones.
Runs Created
An estimate of a player’s individual contributions to their team’s offense, converting their performances into an intuitive value: the number of runs they helped generate, based on all their offensive statistics.
1. Smith, 2. Defries, 3. Ruiz, 4. Jiminian, 5. Rodriguez, 6. Acuna, 7. Spring, 8. Partington, 9. M. Esteban, 10. Blondel.
GPA
Gross Production Average refines the extremely important OPS statistic, particularly by slightly valuing OBP more.
1. Smith, 2. Ruiz, 3. Defries, 4. Acuna, 5. Antonac, 6. Jiminian, 7. Rodriguez, 8. Partington, 9. Briones, 10. A. Soriano.
K/BB %
This is about bat discipline, the ratio between strikeout percentage and walk percentage.
1. Smith, 2. Mendoza, 3. A. Soriano, 4. Acuna, 5. M. Esteban, 6. Gonzalez, 7. Ruiz, 8. Spring, 9. Gleeson, 10. Jiminian.
Win Probability Added
WPA measures the impact of hits on the probability of winning a game. At any moment in a game, there’s an estimated probability that each team will win, based on the game situation (e.g., the score, runners on base, number of outs, etc.). WPA measures the change in probability before and after a hit. For example, a 2-run HR in the 8th inning of a game with a 10-run lead will have little impact on the probability of a team winning. On the other hand, a single that scores a run in the 6th inning with the score tied has a greater impact. This measures a player’s impact on their team’s successes.
1. Ruiz, 2. Navarro, 3. Kovacs, 4. Hrytishvili, 5. Acuna, 6. Nakamura, 7. Defries, 8. Briones, 9. Rodriguez, 10. Masson.
Leverage Index
Not all at-bats have the same value depending on the inning, the score, the number of outs, the number of runners on base. The LI is a way to quantify the importance of moments in a game, and it allows evaluating players’ performance in high-pressure situations. It’s certainly very close to WPA, but even more precise and even more aware of specific situations.
1. Ruiz, 2. Smith, 3. Defries, 4. Partington, 5. Jiminian, 6. Hrytishvili, 7. Spring, 8. Acuna, 9. Masson, 10. Briones.
Situational Hitting
An improved version of the average with runners in scoring position, measuring the ability to produce and be effective with runners on base.
1. M. Esteban, 2. Hrytishvili, 3. Rodriguez, 4. Y. Lopez, 5. Brito, 6. Defries, 7. A. Soriano, 8. Surjus, 9. Kovacs, 10. Algeni.
Overall Ranking
We simply added up the rankings in each category to establish the 2024 championship hitter rankings:
1. Defries, 2. Smith, 3. Acuna, 4. Jiminian, 5. Ruiz, 6. M. Esteban, 7. A. Soriano, 8. Partington, 9. Hrytishvili, 10. Spring, 11. Masson, 12. Rodriguez, 13. Briones, 14. Kovacs, 15. Brossier, 16. Ogawa, 17. Navarro, 18. Antonac, 19. Blondel, 20. Harrison, 21. Saumande, 22. Algeni, 23. Bouniol, 24. Brown, 25. Mendoza, 26. Brainville, 27. Baisse-Depontieu, 28. Y. Lopez, 29. Gleeson, 30. Cegielski, 31. Gonzalez, 32. A. Amoros, 33. Lassaline, 34. Pierre, 35. Viger, 36. Nakamura, 37. Roze, 38. Velazquez, 39. Launay, 40. Rosell, 41. Perdomo, 42. Tissera, 43. Brito, 44. Rioux, 45. Do Carmo, 46. Khoury, 47. Crawford, 48. Surjus, 49. D. Mayeux, 50. Gras, 51. Cailteux, 52. Laufenbuchler.
F. Colombier
