Skip to main content
MLB Deserve-to-Win
← All hitters·All pitchers

Buddy Kennedy

2026
Giants· 3B · bats R · throws R· 49 plate appearances

Grade

His grade shows how good he has been, and at what.
Fbetter than 9% of hitters at creating bases

He's running below his established level this season, so he has room to rebound.

Patient Contact

Works counts and puts the ball in play; modest slug.

Still searching for results at the plate

Buddy Kennedy walks at a better-than-most clip. He walks more often than 68% of qualified hitters. The overall production lags, though. Only 9% of qualified hitters create fewer estimated bases per plate appearance. This is an early read, on only 49 plate appearances so far.

49 plate appearances · data through 2026-09-27.

How to read this chart
Each spoke is a skill estimate adjusted for sample size, not a raw season stat, and farther out is better. A ↓ marks a stat where a lower number is better, and its spoke is flipped so farther out still means better. The middle ring marks the league median and the outer ring the league best. EB/PA is estimated bases, HR% home runs, BB% walks and K% strikeouts, each per plate appearance, and Hard-hit% is balls hit 95 mph or harder. Percentiles compare him with 534 qualified hitters, the ones with 50 or more plate appearances. He hasn't reached that bar himself, so he is measured against them rather than counted among them.

Plays like…

Each of these hitters shares his archetype and sits closest to him in EB/PA.

Anthony VolpeYankeesZack ShortMetsHunter FeducciaDodgersAlex FreelandDodgers

Hitter type

See what kind of hitter he is, next to the rest of the league.

Hitter type

He gives away more at-bats than most, and he hits the ball hard less often than most.

League best:BB% − K% Josue De Paula (14.3%)Hard-hit% Yohandy Morales (62.5%)

How to read this chart
Two skills separate hitting styles: not giving away at-bats (walk rate minus strikeout rate) and squaring the ball up (hard-hit rate). Up and to the right is better on both. Every dot is a hitter with at least 40 plate appearances this season, and dot size tracks plate appearances. Click any dot to open that hitter's page.
 Buddy KennedyLeague medianPercentile
Bases per ball in play(higher = better).315.511—
Walk rate(higher = better)10%8%68th
Strikeout rate(lower = better)31%23%22nd

A higher percentile is better, and the 99th is the top of the league.

Platoon splits

See how he hits left-handed and right-handed pitchers.

Platoon splits (EB/PA)

He hits lefties better than righties, by 0.028 EB/PA.

50% probable range: +0.003 to +0.052

vs LHP30 PA0.400

vs LHP: shrunk estimate 0.400 EB/PA, 50% probable range 0.371 to 0.430, based on 30 plate appearances. Raw (unshrunk) rate: 0.274 EB/PA. League median vs LHP: 0.424 EB/PA.

His raw rate vs LHP (0.274) is off this scale. Small samples can push a raw rate this far, which is why the dot, the shrunk estimate, is the number to trust.

vs RHP20 PA0.372

vs RHP: shrunk estimate 0.372 EB/PA, 50% probable range 0.345 to 0.399, based on 20 plate appearances. Raw (unshrunk) rate: 0.330 EB/PA. League median vs RHP: 0.433 EB/PA.

His raw rate vs RHP (0.330) is off this scale. Small samples can push a raw rate this far, which is why the dot, the shrunk estimate, is the number to trust.

0.3350.3620.3890.4170.444
← worsebetter →
Above league medianBelow50% probable rangeHis raw rateMiddle half of the league

His split is about typical for a righty bat (median 0.035). He sits below the league median against both hands.

He sits in the league's middle half vs lefties and the league's bottom quarter vs righties.

How to read this chart
  • Each dot is his estimate against that hand, with its 50% probable range as the bar. Higher is better.
  • The diamond is his raw rate, which small samples make noisy, so the simulator pulls the dot toward a more trustworthy value.
  • The dashed tick is the league median, and the shaded strip is the middle half of hitters with 50 or more plate appearances.
  • Tap or hover a mark for its number. LHP and RHP are left- and right-handed pitchers. More on the About page

How he hits

See what his contact is worth and what pitchers throw him.

He hits the ball up the middle most often, but does his most damage to the pull side.

Best batted balls

Every ball Buddy Kennedy put in play this season is drawn where it landed.
hit · out
EBlowhigh
vs Foster GriffinSingle
60 mph · 34° · worth 1.3 bases
08/18 vs Guardians
vs Craig KimbrelDouble
100 mph · 4° · worth 1.2 bases
07/12 vs Rays
vs Tanner GordonSingle
106 mph · 11° · worth 1.1 bases
08/15 vs Rockies
vs Cody BradfordOut
96 mph · 36° · worth 0.8 bases
08/05 vs Rangers
vs Gabriel HughesSingle
94 mph · 9° · worth 0.7 bases
08/16 vs Rockies

Luck check

How to read this chart
Dot color is estimated bases (EB), what the contact was worth no matter what the defense did with it. Darker means more bases, so a dark hollow ring in the outfield is a crushed ball that got caught. Tap or hover a dot or a row to link the two, and use the ▶ links to watch a play on Baseball Savant.

Performance by pitch type

2026 · 217 pitches

Each row shows the bases he adds per 100 pitches of one type, against the league.

← below league medianabove league median →
Four-Seam Fastball (71 pitches)
−1.9
Lg median −0.4Lg best +8.7
Other (146 pitches)

−4.1 bases per 100 · no single-type league comparison

Above league medianBelowMiddle half of the leagueLg medianLg best
How to read this chart
Each row is the bases he adds per 100 pitches of that type, on the same scale as the pitcher pages’ “saved/cost per 100” but from the hitter’s side. Every pitch counts. Taking a ball adds value, whiffing loses it, and the pitch that ends the plate appearance scores its outcome against what that count usually produces. A value of +3.5 means his results against that pitch have been worth about 3.5 extra bases per 100 seen. Higher is better. Types with fewer than 50 pitches seen pool into “Other”.

Swing

See how fast he swings and what he changes with two strikes. League tracking starts in 2024.

Swing at a glance

2026 · data through 2026-09-27
Bat speed · 95 swings
71.6 mph
Lg median 71.1 mph
Slowest: S. Kwan (61.8 mph)Fastest: J. Caminero (78.4 mph)
Lg median

He swings about as fast as most hitters. His swing is shorter than most hitters', with a typical attack angle. With two strikes, he changes his bat speed less than most hitters. His bat travels on a steeper path than most.

Attack angle
8.7°
Lg median 9.6°
Swing length
6.7 ft
Lg median 7.3 ft
Swing path tilt
34.4°
Lg median 31.4°
Middle half of the league
How to read this chart
  • Bat speed counts competitive swings only, so bunts and check swings under 50 mph are left out.
  • Swing length is how far the sweet spot of the bat travels during the swing. Attack angle is the bat’s upward or downward tilt through the zone.
  • Swing path tilt is how steep the bat’s path is.
  • None of these is better or worse on its own. Swing style trades power against contact, and the fastest and slowest swings in the league both belong to stars. More on the About page

How he sets up

See where he stands in the box and how his feet are set, next to the league-average setup.

How he sets up

He sets up 31″ deep in the box, deeper than 89% of hitters (league average 28″).

Top-down batting stance vs league averagePitcher ↑
His feetLg avg
How to read this chart
  • This is an overhead view of the batter’s box. The dots are his feet about one second before the pitch, and the rings are the league-average setup.
  • Open means his front foot is pulled off the line to the plate, and closed means it steps toward it. Neither is better or worse.
  • The chart is his monthly average this season. The band and dashed line are the middle half and the median of hitters over the whole season.
  • On the angle chart, below zero is open and above zero is closed.
  • Data through 2026-09-27. More on the About page

Best games

These are his biggest games this season.

Best games

These are his best games this season, ranked by bases above replacement.

Multi-season trends · Buddy Kennedy

Compared with last season, his BB% is up and his K% is up.

Actual rates show what happened on the field, season by season.