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

Nelson Velázquez

2026
Astros· LF · bats R · throws R· 88 PA
Compare

Grade

How good he's been, and at what
Bbetter than 61% of hitters at creating bases

His season is in line with his established level.

Aggressive Power

Big pop, rarely takes a walk.

Makes some of the hardest contact around

Nelson Velázquez squares the ball up — harder contact than 97% of qualified hitters. The strikeouts pile up, though — only 18% of qualified hitters whiff more often. Early-season read — only 88 plate appearances so far.

88 plate appearances · data through 2026-08-22.

How to read this chart
Each spoke is a skill estimate adjusted for sample size — not raw season stats — so farther out = better. Spokes are the metric itself; ↓ marks a rate where a LOWER number is better. Percentiles vs. 499 qualified hitters — 50+ plate appearances.

Plays like…

Same archetype, nearest by rate — pick one to see him side by side with Nelson Velázquez.

Kazuma OkamotoBlue JaysBlaze AlexanderOriolesJarren DuranRed SoxChristian Encarnacion-StrandOrioles

Hitter type

What kind of hitter he is, next to the league

Hitter type

Elite contact quality; strikes out more than most.

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 when he does put it in play (hard-hit rate). Every dot is a qualified hitter this season; dot size tracks plate appearances. Click any dot to open that hitter's page.
 Nelson VelázquezLeague medianPercentile
Bases per ball in play(higher = better).648.50861st
Walk rate(higher = better)8%8%52nd
Strikeout rate(lower = better)30%23%18th

100th percentile = best in MLB.

Platoon splits

How he fares against lefties and righties

Platoon splits (EB/PA)

Better vs LHP than vs RHP by 0.041 EB/PA (modeled).

50% probable range: +0.021 to +0.060

vs LHP67 PA0.469

vs LHP: shrunk estimate 0.469 EB/PA, 50% probable range 0.442 to 0.496, based on 67 plate appearances. Raw (unshrunk) rate: 0.518 EB/PA. League median vs LHP: 0.425 EB/PA.

Raw vs LHP rate (0.518) is off this scale — small samples like this are exactly why the shrunk estimate (the dot) is the trustworthy number, not the raw one.

vs RHP21 PA0.428

vs RHP: shrunk estimate 0.428 EB/PA, 50% probable range 0.402 to 0.454, based on 21 plate appearances. Raw (unshrunk) rate: 0.396 EB/PA. League median vs RHP: 0.436 EB/PA.

0.3910.4200.4490.4780.507
← worsebetter →
Above league medianBelow50% probable rangeHis raw rateMiddle half of the league

About the typical split for a righty bat (median 0.034). Against righties he sits below the league median — a genuine platoon vulnerability.

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

How to read this chart
  • Tap or hover any mark for its number, or tab to a row for all of them.
  • His raw rate is the unshrunk number against that hand — small samples make it noisy, which is why the model pulls his estimate toward a more trustworthy value.
  • “Middle half of the league” is the 25th–75th percentile of all hitters against that hand.
  • Shrunk splits beat raw splits decisively at low PA counts and converge with them as playing time builds — individual platoon gaps need roughly 1,000+ PA vs a hand before the raw number alone can be trusted.

How he hits

What happens when he puts a ball in play

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

Best batted balls

Where every ball Nelson Velázquez put in play landed this season.
hit · out
EBlowhigh
vs Shota ImanagaHome run
EV 105 mph · LA 27° · EB 3.8
05/29 vs Cubs
vs Martín PérezHome run
EV 108 mph · LA 28° · EB 3.8
06/30 vs Braves
vs David PetersonHome run
EV 103 mph · LA 31° · EB 3.8
06/10 vs Mets
vs Robert GasserHome run
EV 110 mph · LA 24° · EB 3.7
07/07 vs Brewers
vs Shane DrohanDouble
EV 102 mph · LA 13° · EB 2.2
07/06 vs Brewers
How to read this chart
Dot color is estimated bases (EB) — what the contact was worth, regardless of what the defense did with it. 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 · 349 pitches

Bases he adds per 100 pitches of each type, against the league.

← below leagueabove league →
Four-Seam Fastball (116 pitches)
+1.3
Lg median −0.4Lg best +12.9
Changeup (59 pitches)
−5.8
Lg median −0.3Lg best +17.9
Other (174 pitches)

+2.9 bases per 100 · no single-type league comparison

Above league medianBelowMiddle half of the leagueLg medianLg best
How to read this chart
Bases added per 100 pitches of each type — the same scale as the pitcher pages’ “saved/cost per 100”, 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 the count’s expectation. Values are bases vs the league count-average: +3.5 means his results against that pitch have been worth about 3.5 extra bases per 100 seen. Types with fewer than 50 pitches seen pool into “Other”.

Earned vs. actual

Results have matched his contact quality — Nelson Velázquez has been credited about what his contact has earned so far.

Earned off his own contact35
Actually credited to him32

over 54 balls in play · walks and strikeouts excluded on both sides

How to read this chart
Every ball he puts in play is worth the bases its exit velocity and direction usually earn. Comparing those earned bases with the bases he was actually credited shows whether his results have been lucky, unlucky, or fair.

Swing

How fast he swings, and what he changes with two strikes. League tracking starts in 2024.

Swing at a glance

2026 · data through 2026-08-22
Bat speed · 168 swings
74.1 mph
Lg median 71.1 mph
Slowest: S. Kwan (61.9 mph)Fastest: J. Caminero (78.7 mph)
Lg median

Swings faster than most hitters. His swing length is typical, but his attack angle is steeper than most. Changes his swing less than most hitters with two strikes. His bat travels on a steeper path than most.

Attack angle
14.8°
Lg median 9.4°
Swing length
7.4 ft
Lg median 7.3 ft
Swing path tilt
34.5°
Lg median 31.6°
Middle half of the league
How to read this chart
  • Competitive swings: bunts and checked-type swings under 50 mph are excluded, so these numbers sit a touch below the bat speeds Savant publishes, which use a different cut.
  • League tracking starts in 2024, and early 2024 has small gaps — about 93% of swings that season have a reading.
  • Swing length — how far the sweet spot of the bat travels during the swing.
  • Attack angle — the bat’s upward or downward tilt through the zone.
  • Swing path tilt — how steep the bat’s path is.
  • None of these is better or worse on its own — swing style trades power against contact (the fastest and slowest swings in the league both belong to stars).

How he sets up

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

How he sets up

A typical setup — close to league average in depth, off-plate distance, width, and angle.

Top-down batting stance vs league averagePitcher ↑

Month by month this season, from his setup about a second before each pitch.

Middle half of the leagueLg median
His feetLg avg
How to read this chart
  • Overhead view of the batter’s box. The dots are his feet, reconstructed from Statcast’s stance measurements — hip position, foot separation, and stance angle — about one second before the pitch. It’s an approximation of his setup, not his stride or swing.
  • Open means his front foot is pulled off the line to the plate; closed means it steps toward it. The average hitter sets up slightly open.
  • The change line above only appears for a sustained month-over-month move that clears normal Statcast noise by a wide margin.
  • The chart is his month-by-month average for whichever measure you pick, this season only. A month needs 25 tracked swings to appear, so an injured or platooned month can be missing. The shaded band and dashed line are where the middle half of hitters, and the median hitter, sat over their whole season.
  • On the angle chart, below zero is an open stance and above zero is a closed one — hover a point (or drag on a phone) and it says which in words.
  • Data through 2026-08-22.

Best games

His biggest games this year

Best games

His best games this season by bases above replacement.

Multi-season trends · Nelson Velázquez

HR% up, K% up, Barrel% up, Hard-hit% up, FB% down vs his previous season

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