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

AJ Smith-Shawver

2026
Braves· RHP · throws R· 21.0 IP· 7.71 ERA· 1.81 WHIP· 103 BF
Compare

Grade

How good he's been, and at what
Fbetter than 18% of pitchers at limiting bases
StarterStill Searching

Below league average across the board.

Smith-Shawver is getting hit harder than most pitchers

The simulator expects 0.477 bases allowed per batter faced against him — better than 18th percentile of qualified pitchers. The soft spot is Command (16th percentile).

103 batters faced · data through 2026-09-11.

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. The middle ring marks the league median and the outer ring the league best. Percentiles vs. 494 qualified pitchers — 100+ batters faced, starters and relievers pooled.

Plays like…

Same archetype, nearest by rate — pick one to see him side by side with AJ Smith-Shawver.

Yoendrys GómezTwinsKyle FinneganTigersPierce JohnsonRedsDavid SandlinWhite Sox

Pitcher type

What kind of pitcher he is, next to the league

Pitcher type

Where he sits among qualified pitchers on the two skills that separate styles.

League best:K% − BB% Jacob Misiorowski (26.7%)Hard-hit% against Blake Snell (29.8%)

How to read this chart
Two skills separate pitching styles: finishing hitters without free passes (strikeout rate minus walk rate) and keeping the contact they do allow soft (hard-hit rate against). Every dot is a qualified pitcher this season; dot size tracks batters faced. Click any dot to open that pitcher's page.
 AJ Smith-ShawverLeague medianPercentile
Bases per ball in play(lower = better).557.52718th
Walk rate(lower = better)12%9%16th
Strikeout rate(higher = better)20%22%32nd

100th percentile = best in MLB.

Arsenal

What he throws, and what it does

AJ Smith-Shawver mixes his four-seam fastball (39%) and splitter (38%). No pitch has beaten league-average results yet — the splitter has come closest.

Pitch mix & swing-and-miss

+4 bases better than a replacement arm this season

allowed 52 bases vs a replacement arm's 56 over the same batters faced

Replacement level is per-batter and can't be split by pitch type, so the bars below use league average.

All pitches

1.7 bases cost vs league average, across 308 pitches — 0.6 per 100.

Four-Seam Fastball
39%
95.9 mph · RHP median 95.1
10% whiffs · Lg median 21%
cost 0.8 per 1001.2 total
Splitter
38%
82.7 mph · RHP median 86.9
35% whiffs · Lg median 34%
cost 0.3 per 1000.5 total
Curveball
not charted
8%
75.2 mph · RHP median 81.2
—
—
Sinker
not charted
8%
94.9 mph · RHP median 94.7
—
—
Slider
not charted
7%
84.5 mph · RHP median 86.9
—
—

Only his four-seam fastball and splitter are in the charts below — the rest were tracked too rarely to plot.

Rarely used: cutter (0%)

How to read this chart
What they throw, how hard, and what misses bats — from pitch tracking, regular season only.

Mix by batter side

Four-Seam Fastball
44% vs LHH · RHP median 40%
31% vs RHH · RHP median 33%
Splitter
39% vs LHH · RHP median 31%
37% vs RHH · RHP median 16%
How to read this chart
How the mix shifts against lefty and righty bats. Medians are among right-handed pitchers who throw that pitch at least 3% of the time — between 42 and 371 of them, depending on the pitch. Overall results by batter side are under Platoon splits.

By appearance

How the stuff has held up outing to outing

One point per outing — how his velocity, movement, and pitch mix have moved across the season, with league context for scale. Each pitch keeps the same color in every chart. Only his four-seam fastball and splitter are in these charts — the rest were tracked too rarely to plot.

Platoon splits

How he fares against lefties and righties

Platoon splits (EB/PA allowed)

Better vs RHB than vs LHB by 0.042 EB/PA allowed (modeled).

50% probable range: +0.034 to +0.050

vs LHB61 PA0.501

vs LHB: shrunk estimate 0.501 EB/PA, 50% probable range 0.479 to 0.523, based on 61 plate appearances. Raw (unshrunk) rate: 0.463 EB/PA. League median vs LHB: 0.455 EB/PA.

vs RHB43 PA0.460

vs RHB: shrunk estimate 0.460 EB/PA, 50% probable range 0.437 to 0.481, based on 43 plate appearances. Raw (unshrunk) rate: 0.589 EB/PA. League median vs RHB: 0.438 EB/PA.

Raw vs RHB rate (0.589) is off this scale — small samples like this are exactly why the shrunk estimate (the dot) is the trustworthy number, not the raw one.

0.4270.4540.4800.5060.533
← betterworse →
Below league medianAbove50% probable rangeHis raw rateMiddle half of the league

About the typical split for a righty arm (median 0.043). He allows more than the league median against both sides.

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 side — small samples make it noisy, which is why the simulator pulls his estimate toward a more trustworthy value.
  • “Middle half of the league” is the 25th–75th percentile of all pitchers against that side.
  • These are bases allowed, so lower is better. Weighted by how often he faces each side, the two splits average back to his modeled overall EB/PA allowed — not the xEB/PA headline at the top of the page, which folds in strikeouts and walks differently.
  • Shrunk splits beat raw splits on held-out seasons, most decisively at low batters-faced counts (relievers especially), and converge with the raw numbers as exposure builds.

Contact allowed

What hitters do when they connect

Batters go up the middle off him most often, but the hardest contact goes to the pull side.

Pull and oppo are relative to each batter's stance, so this pools all the hitters he faced.

Batted balls allowed

Where every ball hit off AJ Smith-Shawver landed this season.
hit · out
EBlowhigh
vs Junior CamineroHome run
EV 110 mph · LA 25° · EB 3.9
09/08 vs Rays
vs Liam HicksHome run
EV 101 mph · LA 31° · EB 3.5
09/08 vs Rays
vs Yohandy MoralesHome run
EV 101 mph · LA 26° · EB 3.2
09/01 vs Nationals
vs Tommy EdmanHome run
EV 104 mph · LA 22° · EB 2.8
08/26 vs Dodgers
vs Freddie FreemanDouble
EV 102 mph · LA 18° · EB 1.9
08/26 vs Dodgers

Luck check

Burned 2 times — balls with a hit probability under 20% that found grass anyway.

vs Luke KeaschallSingleCheap hit
EV 71 mph · LA 44° · EB 0.1 · xBA .124
08/19 vs Twins
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 his defense ran down. Tap or hover a dot or a row to link the two, and use the ▶ links to watch a play on Baseball Savant.

Earned vs. actual

Results have matched the contact quality — batters have been credited about what they earned off AJ Smith-Shawver.

Earned off his contact allowed40
Actually credited to batters43

over 71 balls in play · walks and strikeouts excluded on both sides

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

ERA 7.71 · WHIP 1.81 · BABIP against 0.313 (Lg median 0.287)

Times through order

What happens the third time they see him

Best games

His biggest outings this year

Best games

His best outings this season by bases saved vs a replacement arm.

Multi-season trends · AJ Smith-Shawver

HR allowed% up, BB% up, K% down, Barrel% against down, Hard-hit% against down vs last season

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