That is the time of yr when individuals begin telling me that my job should be so laborious now that there’s no baseball to write down about. It occurs each offseason. I all the time protest. Whereas it’s true that with out main league video games to observe, one notably enjoyable and fruitful supply of article concepts has dried up, I truly love writing in November. The reality about who was coping with an damage all yr begins trickling out. The free agent market is shaping up. Normal managers are hinting at their plans. Scott Boras is unveiling a recent batch of the worst puns conceivable. I get to dig into my notes app, the place I’ve been stashing bizarre concepts for a wet day. Extra importantly, it’s a good time to replicate on the season that was. The whole lot continues to be considerably recent in your thoughts, however you’re working with a full season’s value of numbers. You don’t have to fret {that a} participant’s going to dive into the world’s worst hunch the second after you write about their scorching streak. You’ll be able to write about gamers who maybe aren’t altering the course of the season, however are attention-grabbing in their very own method. It’s a good time to test the leaderboards for a shock.
In the present day’s shock appeared on the SEAGER leaderboard. That’s Robert Orr’s metric for SElective AGression, and gamers discover their option to the highest by swinging at hittable pitches and shedding dangerous ones. Corey Seager, endlessly on model, completed the season in second place (and first in an unpublished up to date model). Aaron Decide and Ronald Acuña Jr. completed first and fourth, respectively, which makes loads of sense since they completed first and fourth in stroll fee and likewise mashed the ball. It was third place that held the identify that stunned me: Joey Bart. The 6-foot-3, 235-pound Bart has seen his numbers flip round a bit prior to now two seasons. As a result of he’s a catcher who splits time, his numbers characterize a smaller pattern with extra room for fluctuation, but it surely was nonetheless eye-opening to see him in that type of firm.
As soon as a Johnny Bench Award winner at Georgia Tech, the second total decide within the 2018 draft, and the inheritor obvious to Buster Posey, Bart debuted in San Francisco in the course of the shortened 2020 season and struggled with accidents and underperformance from the get-go. Over 162 video games from 2020 to 2023, he batted .219 with simply 11 house runs. To that time in his profession, his wRC+ within the minors was 123, in comparison with 77 within the majors. In April 2024, after Bart had exhausted his minor league choices and Patrick Bailey had impressed in his personal 2023 debut, the Giants traded Bart to the Pirates. Our preseason projections noticed him placing up below-average numbers each on the plate and behind it. As a substitute, he had a profession yr. Splitting time with Yasmani Grandal and 2021 first total decide Henry Davis, Bart ran a 121 wRC+, the fourth-highest mark amongst catchers with a minimum of 200 plate appearances. He bested his profession complete with 13 house runs.
As a result of Bart solely obtained into 80 video games, and since his protection graded out under common, his 1.3 WAR ranked simply twenty ninth amongst catchers and twenty fourth on a per-plate look foundation. Nonetheless, after the way in which his profession began out, it was a real shock to see him producing like a top-25 catcher and hitting like a star. He pledged to work on his protection in the course of the offseason, and two of the three essential defensive metrics graded him as improved in 2025. As you would possibly anticipate, Bart’s offense got here again right down to Earth a bit this yr, although his 101 wRC+ was nonetheless much better than something he’d carried out earlier than the 2024 season. He posted a .330 xwOBA in 2024 and .326 xwOBA in 2025. You possibly can argue that the step again he took in 2025 was only a results of luck. Nonetheless, his BABIP truly rose 35 factors in 2025, DRC+ noticed him fall from 106 to 93, and he solely hit 4 house runs, dropping his 122 factors off his slugging proportion. Then there’s the acute leap in his SEAGER rating, which introduced him to my consideration within the first place. One thing else will need to have modified in 2025.
So what obtained into Bart during the last two seasons? And why didn’t he enhance much more in 2025 if he all of a sudden had among the finest approaches within the recreation? Let’s begin with plate self-discipline. In February, Alex Stumpf of MLB.com revealed that Bart had began working with a hitting coach earlier than the 2024 season. He made some mechanical adjustments and labored on his method. Earlier in his profession, Bart stated, he “simply went up there and swung.” Now that’s a quote. “Bart simply stopped swinging totally,” wrote Patrick Dubuque of Baseball Prospectus on the finish of the 2024 season, “displaying Decide-level persistence—besides with out the Decide-level intimidation.”
The Evolution of Joey Bart
| Yr | Chase% | Z-Swing% | Z-Contact% | F-Strike% | BB% | Ok% |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2020-23 | 32.2 | 63.0 | 76.5 | 67.2 | 6.4 | 35.4 |
| 2024 | 26.0 | 58.8 | 86.1 | 64.5 | 7.8 | 25.9 |
| 2025 | 22.8 | 58.5 | 85.2 | 54.5 | 12.0 | 28 |
The headline right here isn’t simply that Bart has gotten extra affected person. That is a completely new method, so totally different that it’s important to suppose he should be seeing the ball significantly better. He’s slashed his chase fee by almost 10 factors whereas dropping his swing fee on pitches within the zone a lot much less – and by no means in 2025. That’s how he ended up on the prime of the SEAGER leaderboard; he’s nonetheless method too passive on pitches within the zone, however he’s minimize his chase fee a lot that, a minimum of based on this explicit metric, it’s all value it.
On the similar time, Bart has added almost 9 factors to his contact fee on pitches within the zone. To be clear, his contact fee continues to be properly under common; he’s an enormous, sturdy man with plus bat pace and that’s by no means going to be his recreation. However this seems to be like a completely totally different participant. His first-strike fee is down greater than 12 proportion factors. Twelve! Simply from 2024 to 2025, he went from the fiftieth percentile in SEAGER to the a hundredth. He additionally noticed far fewer pitches within the zone within the first place. No marvel his stroll fee has almost doubled prior to now two seasons. It’s the type of turnaround you anticipate to see (however not often truly do) when a participant will get laser eye surgical procedure over the winter.
Put all this collectively – chasing much less, getting forward within the rely extra usually, and making extra contact within the zone – and also you’d anticipate Bart to be hitting for extra energy, as a result of the pitches he’s hitting are a lot juicier. To wit, in 2025, 53% of his balls in play got here on pitches over the center of the plate, in comparison with 48% in his earlier seasons. Wouldn’t you realize it, his hard-hit fee jumped by the identical quantity, going from slightly below 38% in 2024 to simply over 43% in 2025. That brings us to an apparent query: If Bart is strolling a lot extra, and he’s hitting the ball laborious extra usually, why have his energy numbers collapsed?
For starters, none of this occurred in a vacuum. Pitchers began attacking Bart a lot in another way this yr. Particularly, they threw him extra breaking stuff and didn’t pound him fairly to this point inside with fastballs:
For an enormous, sturdy man like Bart, you’d suppose that will be an excellent factor. He additionally began organising almost two inches farther off the plate in 2025. Suddenly, he’s nice at shedding offspeed pitches and breaking stuff off the plate. When he sees pitches on the outer half of the plate, he can get his arms prolonged and do harm on the market, proper? Not precisely. Right here’s his run worth on a per-pitch foundation. Truthfully, I’ve by no means seen something prefer it:
From one yr to the subsequent, Bart went from being nice on exterior pitches and horrible on inside pitches to the exact opposite. That helps clarify why pitchers began attacking him exterior a bit extra, as does a sprig warmth map to indicate the place he truly hit the ball:
His pull fee dropped dramatically. He began going with the pitch, hitting it the opposite method and particularly to the massive a part of the sector. So regardless that his hard-hit fee went up dramatically, his pull fee on hard-hit balls dropped all the way in which from 49% to 35%. Unsurprisingly, his common exit velocity on these hard-hit balls dropped too. It’s so much more durable to hit house runs to middle discipline. In 2024, Bart pulled 10 of his 13 homers, however in 2025, he pulled simply considered one of 4. One other factor occurs whenever you meet the ball additional away out of your physique: You additionally have a tendency to fulfill the ball deeper within the zone, when your bat path isn’t as steep. Meaning groundballs, and Bart’s groundball fee has additionally jumped dramatically prior to now two years. It’s truly risen in every of the previous 4 years, however in 2025, it was all the way in which up at 52%. That’s one option to just be sure you don’t hit for energy no matter your hard-hit fee.
In some methods, this can be a acquainted story: A participant’s method will get too passive, and it results in swings which might be too passive too. They’re now not going out and attacking the ball, and their contact high quality and energy numbers undergo. That’s my greatest guess right here. Bart goes with the ball and attempting to make extra contact reasonably than leveraging his plus bat pace – his greatest software – in an effort to hit it laborious. However even when Bart’s numbers going ahead look extra like they did in 2025 than they did in 2024, that is nonetheless an actual win. Bart has now put up two seasons in a row as a minimum of a roughly common hitter, and he’s improved his protection too. The early projections see him as a roughly common catcher going ahead, and that’s an enormous accomplishment after the way in which his profession began out.
That’s an entire lot of research, and I nonetheless have extra questions than solutions. I’ve solely given you a guess as to why Bart all of a sudden obtained a lot worse on pitches out over the plate. I’m actually interested by why he determined to arrange additional away from the plate, but it surely’s a distinction of fewer than two inches. Perhaps it wasn’t even intentional. And what precisely did that hitting coach inform him to alter about his method that precipitated such a dramatic shift? He’s shedding changeups, making extra contact, and specializing in the strike zone, all as a result of he’s now not simply going up there and swinging? I might like to know whether or not all of that may proceed in 2026.
The largest query for subsequent season is how a lot Bart will get to play in any respect. The Pirates have 4 catchers who noticed time within the majors final yr, and Bart’s contract is out of choices. They acquired Rafael Flores for David Bednar on the deadline. His protection is tough, however Flores has raked within the low minors and held his personal in Triple-A, launching greater than 20 house runs in every of the previous two seasons. The Pirates had been excessive sufficient on him to name him up for the final couple weeks of the season. And though he hasn’t hit on the big-league degree for 3 years now, Davis has nice defensive numbers and his peripherals ticked up in 2025. Lastly, they’ve Endy Rodriguez, whom we ranked second within the group in 2023. Rodriguez began the 2025 season with the membership, obtained despatched down as soon as, after which noticed his season finish early after ulnar nerve transposition surgical procedure. It’s laborious to know the place the Pirates worth Bart in that group. At this level although, amazingly, Bart has arguably the very best monitor document of the bunch.