We often define BABIP as luck. A week ago I broke down why it’s not so simple, and BABIP can be controlled to an extent. I looked at a few players who might post a high BABIP in the majors and find success as a result. This week we’ll look at the inverse, players who project for a low BABIP. We’ll then look at if that BABIP can be improved and what that could mean for their future potential. Last time we looked at players with high sweet-spot%, low pop-up rates, and high hard-hit rates that carry more mediocre tools or defensive profiles to relevancy. This time we’ll be looking for players who can do everything but produce a high BABIP.
Cooper Bowman, 2B OAK
To most people, Cooper Bowman is the last-minute throw-in to last month’s Frankie Montas trade. That is a perfectly logical conclusion to draw when you consider the fact that Bowman has an 86 wRC+ in A+ this year. Except the reason for Bowman’s struggles isn’t a lack of tools, or even a whiff concern. His lack of production is wholly a byproduct of horrendous launch angle optimization.
If Bowman can clean up his launch angles, he might have stardom written in his future. There are four players in the minors this year who are under 25 with a chase rate below 15%, an in-zone contact rate above 82%, and a 90th EV above 104 MPH. These four players excel in laying off of bad pitches out of the zone, making contact on driveable pitches, and have impact raw power. Three of those four players are Bowman, Adley Rutschman, and Lars Nootbaar. Two of those players have already become mainstays in the majors. (There is a fourth as well who will make an appearance later on in this article). If Cooper Bowman can figure out his launch angles, then the upside is truly incredible, but that is a pretty big if.
However, the launch angles are atrocious right now. He has a 17.5% sweet-spot rate this year which is in the bottom 5th percentile of minor leaguers. As a refresher, that is batted balls hit between 8-32°. Those batted balls have a .533 BABIP on average. Bowman avoiding ideally hit balls is obviously a problem, but it is far from his biggest one.
That title goes to the 14.6% popup rate which is in the bottom 3rd percentile of minor leaguers. Popups are essentially automatic outs. Additionally, he hits the ball on the ground over 48% of the time which is in the 23rd percentile, and happens to be pull heavy which doesn’t help at all. The lack of outfield flyballs stops the above-average raw power from playing in games, and the abundance of popups and dearth of line-drives leads to him not getting on base very often either despite the contact and approach skills. It is an ugly combination that has lead to ugly results.
Here is the catch and why I find Bowman so intriguing; prior to this year, Bowman’s BABIP profile was arguably his best skill. In a 72 BBE sample in Low-A last year after getting drafted he posted a 44.3% sweet-spot rate. That is in the 99th percentile of minors leaguers. He also had just a 6.3% popup rate. That is a smaller sample so take it with a grain of salt but 72 BBE isn’t insignificant. So what changed?
I don’t have the data to fully verify this, but based on film study, the issue appears to be mechanical. Coming out of the draft, Bowman had poor spinal posture due to an ineffective hip hinge that left him somewhat hunch-backed at foot strike. The Yankees recognized the problem and adjusted his hinge to fix the posture and as a result, the power has taken off this year. The problem is that his steep VBA was a direct result of his poor posture. With a more normal spinal angle, he now has a much flatter swing that he isn’t comfortable with yet. That flatter swing has not only led to worse contact quality because of a worse bat angle but it has also caused attack angle regressions because the bat shape is different and squaring up balls now requires a different angle.
Cooper Bowman still has bat to ball skills and is hitting the ball harder but he squares up a lot less contact. I think with deliberate adjustments to his bat angle, you can get Bowman back to what he was, but while also maintaining the raw power. If the Athletics can do that then he should soar up prospects lists as he already has elite swing decisions and good contact skills. Bowman is a long shot at this point but the upside is significant and there is reason to believe that he will find the correct path soon.
Jacob Amaya, SS LAD
Jacob Amaya is one of the most fascinating prospects in the minors. Amaya deservedly had top 100 hype heading into both 2020 and 2021, but a 75 wRC+ in 2021 followed by a 91 wRC+ this year has knocked him down the ranks considerably. I am still a believer in Amaya’s upside, however. He is a slick fielding shortstop who offers both above-average raw power and speed. That power is consistent too as it’s not just above-average top-end EVs but a 80th percentile hard-hit rates as well. He is running both plus contact and plus chase rates this year. All the ingredients are there for success except for one- BABIP.
Jacob Amaya’s BABIP problems are harder to put a pulse on then Bowman’s as he actually grades our fine in all out fine in all three of the key statistics we highlighted last week. So why are the BABIPs so low? It’s not just bad luck, his expected BABIP based on contact quality is .267 according to a source. That also eliminates reasons like batted ball spin and spray direction from consideration as those aren’t factored into expected stats.
The actual problem is suboptimal distributions of his hard contact. All his hard contact comes on the ground and all of his weak contact comes in the air. Exit velocity doesn’t actually matter much on groundballs. A little known secret about groundballs is that exit velocity does not have anywhere near as much on them as it does on aerial contact. Amaya can pound the ball into the dirt but it doesn’t do him any real favors and it greatly skews his power metrics to make it look like the power is more real in games than it is.
Like with Bowman, I think Amaya’s issue is mechanical. Dylan Moore has a similar issue in the majors. He has above-average sweet-spot and hard-hit rates. He makes good swing decisions. Yet, he fails to hit for any impactful power and has a .270 career BABIP. This is because all his hard contact comes on the ground just as it does with Amaya. The likely culprit as to why remains the same as well. They have very little shoulder abduction in their swing and that makes them reliant on topping the ball from a late connection point in order to produce top-end EVs. If you can increase shoulder mobility, both the raw power, and moreover, the effective in-game wOBAcons could improve.
Is that doable? Dansby Swanson is a living testimony to the idea that it is. The evolution of his shoulder movements since his debut has been incredible to watch. Is it likely Amaya makes the needed adjustments? Maybe not, however, the upside of the tools guarantees at least a bench role and hints at star upside with some adjustments.
Justin Farmer, OF SD
Justin Farmer is that other player I mentioned earlier in Cooper Bowman’s section. Farmer was an undrafted free agent by the Padres in 2021 out of Florida International. So far, on the surface, he has not looked like anything special as the 23 year old has hit .224/.382/.364 between Low A and High-A+. The correct assumption is that he probably will not amount to much in the majors. However, there are reasons to believe that Farmer has hidden upside that a clever team can tap into and find a useful player within.
Justin Farmer makes contact at a high rate, he does so 82% of the time within the strike zone. Farmer also makes elite swing decisions with a 14% chase rate. That is in part due to him being a passive hitter but it is also an actual skill to lay off tough pitches he can’t do damage on. To top it off, Farmer has a 104.7 MPH 90th percentile EV. That is in the 90th percentile of minor leaguers. I’m not convinced his power is actually that good but it’s likely at least above-average raw power. So why does Farmer only have a 104 wRC+ this year?
The answer is simply that his wOBAcon profile is completely awful. For starters, he is hitting popups 14.6% of the time. Secondly, Farmer is hitting balls in the sweet-spot just 19% of the time this year. To top it off, Farmer isn’t even posting decent HR/FB rates because he has cluster issues like Amaya does. The skills are clearly there to succeed but his current swing mechanics are hindering the impact of any skills Farmer actually possesses from playing in games.
Once again, I think swing mechanics explain a lot of his struggles. Farmer has two major issues that tank the wOBAcon profile. The first is an issue with pitches away from him. He struggles to fully extend and get the barrel over the outer regions because he has a long hand path that pulls the hands in prematurely.
The second problem is the more impactful one as Farmer doesn’t have much of a hip hinge in his swing. The lack of hip hinge leads to issues pulling hard contact in the air and a lot of hard hit groundballs that depress his power production. It completely kills his ability to do damage on aerial contact, and Farmer has a flyball rate over 50% (counting popups). This leads to very poor wOBAcons and mediocre productions despite great K/BB ratios.
I have no clue how fixable these issues are but there is almost no risk in trying. He cost nothing for the Padres to acquire and has the skills to make an impact if you completely rework the swing. Farmer is not a likely major leaguer, but he is someone worth keeping tabs on over the next year.