Scott Rovak / USA TODAY Sports
The baseball season just started and one of the most difficult tasks when analyzing the young season is determining what trends we notice from the first couple of weeks will continue on throughout the whole MLB season. One of these trends that caught my attention was Ender Inciarte’s newfound power. Inciarte’s power is unsustainable, especially for a player with his track record, but it is worth a closer look.
Ender Inciarte has played the majority of three seasons in the MLB, two in Arizona and one in Atlanta where he is now. In his first three season, the lefty was known as a high-average hitter with fantastic speed who was also a great outfielder.
In 2014, he hit .278/.318/.359 with four home runs, 27 RBIs, and 19 stolen bases in 447 plate appearance. According to Fangraphs, he had an isolated power (ISO), which measures the amount of raw power a hitter has and how often they get extra base hits, of .081. The league average for ISO is .140.
In 2015, Inciarte slashed .303/.338/.408 with six home runs and 45 RBIs in 561 plate appearances. He also added 21 stolen bases and 73 runs scored. Although his ISO increased a little from from .081 to .105, he was still well below league average.
2016 went just like the previous two for Ender Inciarte. He slashed .291/.351/.381 with three home runs and 29 RBIs in 578 plate appearances. He added 16 stolen bases and 85 runs. However, his ISO dropped closer to his 2014 number of .090, considerably below the league average.
However, in 2017, Ender Inciarte has played like a totally different player. He’s like Chance the Rapper. Chance’s first two mixtapes were pure rap music, but his third one was much different, incorporating a lot of gospel, creating a one-of-a-kind mixtape (which he won three Grammy Awards for).
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Inciarte is slashing .250/.280/.521 this season with four home runs and seven RBIs through fifty plate appearances. That is a home run every 12.5 plate appearances. In 2014, that number was 111.75. In 2015, that number was 93.5. And in 2016, that number was 192.67. This jump in how often he is hitting home runs is insane. He has already hit more home runs this season through 11 games than he did all of last season through 131 games.
So far this season, Inciarte has an ISO of .271. That is roughly three times his 2016 ISO and significantly above the league average of .140. Only the elite power hitters in the MLB have an ISO of .200 and above let alone .271. Last season, the only hitters with an ISO of .270 or higher were Nolan Arenado (.275), Chris Carter (.277), Mark Trumbo (.277), Khris Davis (.277), Brian Dozier (.278), and future Hall of Famer David Ortiz (.305). What do they all have in common? They all hit 38 or more home runs. How many did Inciarte hit last season? Three. Just three home runs and now he is slugging at an elite clip.
Although Ender Inciarte has made an amazing jump in power, it has come at the expense of his contact. In his first three complete MLB seasons, his contact percentage was 88.3, 89.6, and 90.3% respectively. This season, his contact percentage is 83.2%. Although it isn’t that significant of a decline, it is still a decent percentage lower than in his past seasons. He is also swinging at more pitches outside of the strike zone. In his first three seasons, he swung at 35.7, 34.1, and 32.8% of pitches outside of the strike zone respectively. This season, that number is 41.4% which is a significant increase. Not only is he swinging at more pitches out of the zone, he is making less contact on such pitches. His contact percentage on pitches out of the zone has declined from 83.3% last season to 66.7% this season.
Since the season just started, it is hard to predict whether or not these trends will continue the rest of the season. What we can conclude though, is that Ender Inciarte has made very impressive strides as a power hitter early in his career and is a great center fielder on a team friendly contract.