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Michael Helman

2026
Rangers· CF · bats R · throws R· 35 PA

Grade

How good he's been, and at what
Fbetter than 27% of hitters at creating bases

He's running below his established level this season — there's room to rebound.

Free-Swinging Contact

Bat-to-ball first, seldom walks, light power.

Soft contact is the story so far

Michael Helman keeps the strikeouts in check — strikes out less often than 68% of qualified hitters. The contact is soft, though — only 1% of qualified hitters hit the ball with less authority. Early-season read — only 35 plate appearances so far.

35 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. He hasn't reached that bar himself, so he is measured against them rather than counted among them.

Plays like…

Same archetype, nearest by rate — the hitters whose profile looks most like this one.

Nick GonzalesPiratesRikuu NishidaWhite SoxChuckie RobinsonDodgersRonny SimonPirates

Hitter type

What kind of hitter he is, next to the league

Platoon splits

How he fares against lefties and righties

Platoon splits (EB/PA)

Better vs LHP than vs RHP by 0.033 EB/PA (modeled).

50% probable range: +0.014 to +0.053

vs LHP16 PA0.428

vs LHP: shrunk estimate 0.428 EB/PA, 50% probable range 0.399 to 0.457, based on 16 plate appearances. Raw (unshrunk) rate: 0.313 EB/PA. League median vs LHP: 0.425 EB/PA.

Raw vs LHP rate (0.313) 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 RHP19 PA0.395

vs RHP: shrunk estimate 0.395 EB/PA, 50% probable range 0.368 to 0.423, based on 19 plate appearances. Raw (unshrunk) rate: 0.306 EB/PA. League median vs RHP: 0.436 EB/PA.

Raw vs RHP rate (0.306) is off this scale — small samples like this are exactly why the shrunk estimate (the dot) is the trustworthy number, not the raw one.

0.3570.3850.4120.4400.468
← 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 middle half vs lefties and the league's bottom quarter 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 to the pull side most often, and that's where his hardest contact goes.

Best batted balls

Where every ball Michael Helman put in play landed this season.
hit · out
EBlowhigh
vs Will DionHome run
EV 96 mph · LA 31° · EB 2.3
06/07 vs Guardians
vs Tayler SaucedoDouble
EV 82 mph · LA 30° · EB 1.0
05/23 vs Angels
vs Jose QuintanaSingle
EV 88 mph · LA 12° · EB 0.8
05/18 vs Rockies
vs Antonio SenzatelaOut
EV 68 mph · LA 42° · EB 0.6
05/20 vs Rockies
vs Justin SlatenOut
EV 85 mph · LA 32° · EB 0.5
06/13 vs Red Sox

Luck check

1 lucky hit — a ball with a hit probability under 20% that found grass.

vs Seth LugoSingleLucky
EV 75 mph · LA 1° · EB 0.1 · xBA .082
05/30 vs Royals
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.

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 · 58 swings
69.6 mph
Lg median 71.1 mph
Slowest: S. Kwan (61.9 mph)Fastest: J. Caminero (78.7 mph)
Lg median

Swings about as fast as most hitters. His swing is longer than most hitters', with a steeper attack angle than most. Cuts his swing down about as much as most hitters with two strikes. His bat travels on a fairly typical path.

Attack angle
12.7°
Lg median 9.4°
Swing length
7.8 ft
Lg median 7.3 ft
Swing path tilt
29.4°
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).

Best games

His biggest games this year

Best games

His best games this season by bases above replacement.

Multi-season trends · Michael Helman

HR% down, BB% down, K% down vs last season

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