MLB
Who Were the Luckiest and Unluckiest MLB Hitters in April?
Some fast starts at the plate aren't built to last, and neither are some slow starts.

Hitters With an Inflated BABIP

The league averaged a .291 BABIP with a 31.5% hard-hit rate in April. Each of the following 12 hitters surpassed that BABIP rather easily without the corresponding hard-hit rate that one would imagine was needed.

Player BABIP LD% GB% FB% Hard%
Cesar Hernandez .409 25.4% 49.3% 25.4% 25.7%
Brandon Drury .394 25.4% 47.8% 26.9% 26.9%
Starlin Castro .386 14.7% 49.3% 36.0% 32.0%
Brandon Phillips .385 17.9% 52.2% 29.9% 29.9%
Xander Bogaerts .365 22.2% 54.0% 23.8% 22.2%
Chase Headley .361 30.2% 36.5% 33.3% 23.4%
J.T. Realmuto .358 20.3% 46.4% 33.3% 27.5%
Tyler Saladino .341 20.5% 47.7% 31.8% 28.3%
Lorenzo Cain .339 22.2% 47.6% 30.2% 22.2%
Odubel Herrera .317 20.6% 55.6% 23.8% 27.0%
Jacoby Ellsbury .313 18.5% 43.1% 38.5% 26.5%
Eddie Rosario .313 13.8% 60.0% 26.2% 22.4%


A lot has been made about Cesar Hernandez's power binge to start 2017 (23.5% homer-to-fly-ball rate in April), but it appears he enjoyed quite a bit of good fortune -- especially since his hard-hit rate was actually slightly below what is was last season (26.0%).

Xander Bogaerts is potentially the most concerning hitter in this group -- yes, the line drives are up, but it doesn't help that his hard-hit rate was down nearly eight percentage points, while his ground-ball rate has increased by nearly nine percentage points. After seemingly finding his power stroke in 2016 with a career-high 21 homers and an Isolated Power (ISO) of .154, he entered May with no dingers and a .054 ISO.

Lorenzo Cain is probably the perfect case study for this kind of exercise, though.

Through his first 56 plate appearances, he was slashing .356/.482/.400 with a .457 BABIP despite a 17.1% hard-hit rate. He's improved on that last metric a bit, but his BABIP has come tumbling down and his triple slash settled in at .272/.385/.358 to finish the month.

While it's important to see how a hitter is performing in the categories that matter for fantasy baseball, it's helpful to investigate how they landed there to see exactly how sustainable it is -- and to prevent you from overpaying in any potential trade.

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