The Boston Red Sox offense is back to being one of the best offenses in Major League Baseball. J.D. Martinez, Rafael Devers and Xander Bogaerts now have help behind them. It’s not a coincidence. But one meaningful name has yet to contribute much for the Red Sox through 51 games in 2022: Alex Verdugo. Though, that may be starting to change.
Red Sox’ Alex Verdugo’s 2022 Season Is Better Than It Looks
On the surface, Red Sox left fielder Alex Verdugo’s 2022 season has been terrible. Verdugo is hitting .235/.273/.352/.625 with a 71 wRC+ through 47 games. However, below the surface, Verdugo is doing just as well as he did in 2021. He has a .287 expected batting average, a .521 expected slugging percentage, and a .345 xwOBA this season; he hit .289/.351/.426/.777 with a .334 wOBA and 107 wRC+ last season.
And almost every advanced metric is identical to 2021. Verdugo has an 8.6 percent barrel rate (7.3 percent last season), 7.2 barrels per plate appearance (5.5 in ’21), an 89.4 mph average exit velocity (90 mph in ’21), a 7.6-degree launch angle (7.7 degrees last season), a 34.6 percent sweet spot rate (34.9 percent in ’21), a 41.4 percent hard-hit rate (43.3 percent last season), a 27.4 percent chase rate (26.5 percent chase in ’21), and a 14.1 percent whiff rate (17 percent whiff in ’21). His flyball rate is up to 26.5 percent from 21 percent last season, his line-drive rate is down to 19.8 percent from 24.3 percent, his zone swing rate is up to 69.3 percent from 62.2 percent, his zone contact is up to 92.6 percent from 88.7 percent, and his first pitch swing is up to 27.6 percent from 19.4 percent.
Alex Verdugo ground ball outs 95+ mph https://t.co/6vE9tPixVP #MLBFilmRoom via @MLB
— Cody Bondeson (@cody_bondeson) June 3, 2022
Alex Verdugo Has Been Extremely Unlucky
Alex Verdugo has the largest negative gap between his actual slugging percentage and his xSLG and the second-largest negative gap between his wOBA and xwOBA of 265 qualified MLB hitters; He’s 15th in hard-hit per swing rate and 60th in barrels per PA. Verdugo is also 35th among 164 qualified hitters in xBA, 34th in xSLG, 73rd in xwOBA, 77th in average exit velocity, 67th in sweet spot percentage, and 72nd in barrel rate. In six of these categories, the only Red Sox hitters ahead of Alex Verdugo are J.D., Devers, Trevor Story, and Christian Vasquez. They’re having great seasons for the Red Sox in 2022. Verdugo’s also tied with Devers in sweet spot percentage and hard hits per swing rate.
The Red Sox left fielder also ranks in the top half of the league or better in all Statcast percentile categories except Outs Above Average, sprint speed, and walk rate. Verdugo is in the 58th percentile in hard-hit rate (67th percentile in 2021), 61st percentile in xwOBA (65th percentile last season), 80th percentile in xBA (90th percentile in ’21), 83rd percentile in xSLG (60th percentile in ’21), 58th percentile in barrels (38th percentile in ’21), 95th percentile in strikeout rate (81st percentile last season), 17th percentile in walk rate (42nd percentile in ’21), 96th percentile in whiff rate (88th percentile in ’21) and the 58th percentile in chase rate (56th percentile last season).
Alex Verdugo fly ball outs 95+ mph https://t.co/4z6VaxYvaL #MLBFilmRoom via @MLB
— Cody Bondeson (@cody_bondeson) June 3, 2022
Alex Verdugo began the 2022 season for the Red Sox batting .291/.349/.491/.840 with 11 RBI and a 129 wRC+ in his first 16 games. He then did almost nothing in his next 22 games (.165/.189/.212/.401 with five RBI, a six wRC+, and a .179 wOBA). During that seemingly abysmal stretch, Verdugo had a .260 xBA, .457 xSLG, and a .307 wOBA. Nonetheless, Alex Verdugo seems to be turning a corner. Over his last nine games, he is hitting .308/.342/.462/.803 with a 128 wRC+, .301 wOBA, and 10 RBI.
When Alex Verdugo’s bad luck turns around, watch out.
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