MLB Draft Prospects: Power, Contact & Chase Rates For Top 2025 College Hitters


Image credit: Jace LaViolette (Photo by Eddie Kelly / ProLook Photos)
Today we’re diving into the data for top college hitters in the upcoming draft class, something that’s become a bit of a tradition over the last few seasons.
Below, we’re comparing the top 32 college hitters who currently rank on our top 100 draft list, and comparing each hitter’s power, bat-to-ball skills and swing decisions using 90th percentile exit velocity, contact rate and chase rate with 2024 TrackMan data.
In the chart below, you can see each player and get full data by hovering over each respective dot on the graph. On the X axis, you will find contact rate, while 90th percentile exit velocity can be found on the Y axis. Chase rate is visualized by dot shading, with darker blue being more selective and darker red being more aggressive.
For a bit more context on the data below, here are the averages in each category within this 32-player sample:
- 90th percentile EV: 105.9 mph
- Contact%: 76.85%
- Chase%: 26.29%
At the moment, the 2025 college hitting class includes precious few hitters with an entirely well-rounded offensive profile. In fact, just four players are above-average at all three categories based on their 2024 datasets: Aiva Arquette, Dean Curley, Ike Irish and Devin Taylor.
Top Well-Rounded Hitters
Dean Curley, SS, Tennessee
- 90th percentile EV: 107 mph
- Contact%: 80.4%
- Chase%: 19.3%
In this graph, Curley’s offensive profile stands out for the most positives. There are only 10 players with a contact rate greater than 80%, and of that group, Curley’s 107 mph 90th percentile exit velocity is far and away the best of the field, with RJ Austin’s 105.1 mph mark a distant second place. He’s one of only six players with a chase rate lower than 20%, and of that six-man group, only Jace Laviolette and Nolan Schubart hit the ball harder, while only Marek Houston made more contact. Curley is a draft-eligible sophomore in the 2025 class. He hit .285/.386/.502 with 12 home runs and 10 doubles as a freshman in 2024 with a 17.5% strikeout rate and 11.6% walk rate.
Ike Irish, C, Auburn
- 90th percentile EV: 106.3 mph
- Contact%: 79.3%
- Chase%: 23.3%
Irish was a standout catcher coming out of high school in the 2022 class—he caught Rangers righthander Brock Porter at St. Mary’s Prep in Michigan—and is now a bat-first college catcher and one of the top backstops in the class. Irish had a power-over-hit reputation in high school, but he hit well over .300 in back-to-back seasons with Auburn, upped his home run total from six to 14 and has maintained solid plate discipline numbers in both seasons. In total, he’s a .343/.417/.582 hitter with a 15.1% strikeout rate and 10% walk rate. Irish doesn’t have the sort of contact skills that Coastal Carolina’s Caden Bodine boasts (88.8% contact rate, first in this group), but he does have nearly 3 mph more in 90th percentile exit velocity, which creates a well-rounded offensive skill set at the catcher position.
Devin Taylor, OF, Indiana
- 90th percentile EV: 106.1 mph
- Contact%: 78.8%
- Chase%: 23.40%
There are a number of scouts who view Taylor as the best pure hitter in the 2025 college class, so it’s unsurprising to see him rate well in these offensive metrics. Taylor doesn’t rank top 10 among this group in any individual category, but he’s above-average in all three and has layered strong college and summer league production on top of his metrics, as well. He’s a career .338/.441/.655 hitter with Indiana who has homered 36 times in two seasons. He crushed the New England Collegiate League in 2023 and hit well both in the Cape Cod League and with Team USA during the 2024 summer. While Taylor’s exit velocity data doesn’t jump off the page, he seems to create a lot of his hard contact at good angles that gets the ball in the air, and he’s shown a great ability to homer to all fields in his college career.
Aiva Arquette, SS, Oregon State
- 90th percentile EV: 107.2 mph
- Contact%: 79.7%
- Chase%: 25.7%
Arquette made a significant jump as a sophomore with Washington and is coming off a spring season in which he slashed .325/.384/.574 with 12 home runs and 14 doubles. He’s likely a bit more aggressive than his 2024 TrackMan data suggests—his Synergy chase rate was 29%—but he did cut his strikeout rate significantly from 30.4% to 17.5% from his freshman year to sophomore year. The shortstop position at the major league level has become increasingly more physical and power-oriented, and Arquette fits that changing profile with a 6-foot-5, 220-pound frame, exciting pullside power and remaining physical projection.
More Players To Know
Now let’s explore a few other interesting offensive profiles or key players to know in the class, starting with the No. 1 player on the draft board.
Jace Laviolette, OF, Texas A&M
- 90th percentile EV: 108.8 mph
- Contact%: 73.5%
- Chase%: 17.2%
Of this 32-player group, LaViolette’s 108.8 mph 90th percentile exit velocity is fifth-best, and his 17.2% chase rate is the best in the group. We probably could have just looked at his 50 home runs and 18.2% walk rate over two seasons with Texas A&M to conclude he was one of the most impressive power-and-patience hitters in the country, but the data backing it up is always nice.
What separates LaViolette from top-of-the-class college hitters from a year ago is his relatively poor contact rate. Here’s where LaViolette’s 2024 contact rate stacks up with the 2024 rates of every top-10 college hitter from last year’s class:
- Travis Bazzana: 85.1%
- JJ Wetherholt: 84.7%
- Charlie Condon: 80.9%
- Nick Kurtz: 80.2%
- Jac Caglianone: 79.9%
- Seaver King: 79.1%
- Christian Moore: 77.0%
- Jace LaViolette: 73.5%
LaViolette is a different sort of athlete with better physical tools than many of the other hitters on this list, but college hitters go at the top of the draft for their hitting ability first and foremost. Improving his overall contact rate—much in the same way that Moore did in his draft year—will be key for LaViolette to maintain his No. 1 status throughout the spring.
Henry Godbout, 2B, Virginia
- 90th percentile EV: 101.0 mph
- Contact%: 87.5%
- Chase%: 21.0%
Godbout’s reputation as a pure hitter is about as strong as anyone’s in the 2025 class, and he’s continued to get plenty of positive chatter throughout the scouting industry this fall and winter. His 87.5% contact rate is second in this group behind only Caden Bodine, but his 90th percentile exit velocity of 101 mph is better than just one other player (Wake Forest SS Marek Houston). Adding more strength, showing more impact and displaying over-the-fence pop this spring will go a long way in pushing him further up the board. He homered three times in 56 games with Virginia in 2023 as a freshman, then upped that to nine home runs in 51 games in 2024 as a sophomore. All those home runs went to the pull side, but Godbout might be the sort of hitter who needs to pull the ball to do damage and also has the ability to get the ball in the air to the pull side consistently.
Nolan Schubart, OF, Oklahoma State
- 90th percentile EV: 111.6 mph
- Contact%: 63.3%
- Chase%: 18.7%
On the exact opposite side of the chart from Godbout we find Schubart, who has one of the more extreme offensive profiles in the class. He’s a “three true outcome” hitter who has ended 54.9% of his 490 plate appearances with Oklahoma State with either a walk (92), strikeout (137) or home run (40).
No one in this sample hits the ball harder than Schubart, and his 111.6 mph 90th percentile exit velocity stacks up with the top sluggers from the 2024 draft class like Charlie Condon (112), Christian Moore (111.8) and Jac Caglianone (111.7). Unfortunately for Schubart, he also makes less contact than any player in this 32-player sample at just a 63.3% clip.
There will surely be teams intrigued with this sort of Emmanuel Rodriguez starter kick profile, but for Schubart to improve his stock this spring, finding the barrel more frequently and cutting his 28% strikeout rate is the obvious answer.
Max Williams, OF, Florida State
- 90th percentile EV: 109.0 mph
- Contact%: 72.9%
- Chase%: 35.8%
Landing side by side with Jace LaViolette on a chart like this is probably a good thing, generally, but while Williams matches—and even slightly beats—LaViolette in contact rate and 90th percentile exit velocity, the big separator comes down to swing decisions. While LaViolette is one of the most selective hitters of this group of players, Williams is tied with Gavin Kilen for the most aggressive hitter in the group with a 35.8% chase rate.
Unsurprisingly, Williams swung the bat a ton in the 2024 season, with an ultra-aggressive 57.3% swing rate. He performed well in his first season with Florida State after transferring from Alabama, slashing .311/.384/.582 with 14 home runs, a 20.8% strikeout rate and a paltry 7.3% walk rate. There seemed to be a clear shift in approach for Williams in his time with FSU, because in 2023 in 16 games with Alabama he swung at just a 48% clip and walked at an impressive 16.1% rate. Finding a happy medium between those two approaches might allow Williams to have an even better 2025 season.