What’s A Good Exit Velocity?
Image credit: Aaron Judge (Photo by Ron Jenkins/Getty Images)
I’ve often asked myself what’s a good 90th Percentile Exit Velocity? If you are reading this article, there’s a very good chance you’ve seen this metric many times, and perhaps, you’ve asked yourself that very same question. Today, we’re going to answer this question, as well as benchmark several other exit velocity metrics.
Below, we explain what various exit velocity metrics mean and attempt to translate them into tool grades on the 20-80 scouting scale. Our goal is to help provide context to the metrics you’re seeing with increasing proliferation while also contextualizing performances across the majors.
EV90th – 90th Percentile Exit Velocity
90th percentile exit velocity represents what type of power a batter is capable of. It ranks all batted balls (excluding bunts) by exit velocity, and takes the one that is better than roughly 90% of that hitter’s batted ball events. If a hitter has 100 events, it will count either the 10th or 11th hardest hit event.
EV90th – 2023 MLB Hitters
The plurality of hitters sit in the 104 mph bucket, which we can interpret as the level that a median MLB player will typically achieve. We also see that the very best power hitters in baseball are seven to eight mph above 104, and the very worst power hitters are seven to eight mph below our benchmark, providing nice symmetry. We can translate EV90th to tool grades:
| EV90th | Grade | Example Players |
|---|---|---|
| 110+ MPH | 80 | Stanton, Judge, Acuna Jr. |
| 109 | 75 | Olson, Devers, Guerrero Jr. |
| 108 | 70 | Soto, Yelich, Harris II |
| 107 | 65 | Riley Greene, Machado, Longoria |
| 106 | 60 | Brandon Lowe, Realmuto, Yainer Diaz |
| 105 | 55 | 0’Hearn, O’Hoppe, d’Arnaud |
| 104 | 50 | Swanson, Verdugo, McCutchen |
| 103 | 45 | Volpe, Bogaerts, Albies |
| 102 | 40 | Keibert Ruiz, Semien, Rendon |
| 101 | 35 | Miguel Rojas, Josh Rojas, Wendle |
| 100 | 30 | Masyn Winn, Luis Urias, Curtis Mead |
| 99 | 25 | Arraez, Straw, Merrifield |
| 98 or Lower | 20 | Schanuel, Kwan, Rocchio |
EV90th to Tools – Rule of Thumb
Each MPH of EV90th translates to roughly a half grade on the 20-80 scouting scale. If a player has a 107 MPH EV90th, that means they are three mph above the MLB average, which translates to a 65-grade EV90th. Remember the midpoint (104 mph), then add or subtract five for every mph difference.
EV78th – 78th Percentile Exit Velocity = 100 MPH is Average
Is there an exit velocity percentile that’s better than the rest? That’s a rather complicated question to answer. Davy Andrews did a great job exploring this over at FanGraphs.
He concluded that anywhere between EV70 and EV90 was a good way to predict next season’s quality of contact. I wanted a percentile where the average batter would be around 100 mph. After some trial and error, EV78 did the trick.
We get a similar distribution to EV90, which is to be expected, except that we have the plurality of batters clustered in the 100 mph bucket, which is great for us humans, who like easy to remember benchmarks. Here’s how our one mph = 1/2 grade chart looks for EV78:
| EV78th | Grade | Example Players |
|---|---|---|
| 106+ MPH | 80 | Judge, Stanton, Acuna Jr. |
| 105 | 75 | Alvarez, Soto, Devers |
| 104 | 70 | Seager, Schwarber, Yelich |
| 103 | 65 | Kepler, Machado, Goldschmidt |
| 102 | 60 | Arozarena, Hayes, Muncy |
| 101 | 55 | Betts, Trea Turner, Bryan Reynolds |
| 100 | 50 | Verdugo, Volpe, Varsho |
| 99 | 45 | Bogaerts, Grandal, Justin Turner |
| 98 | 40 | Cronenworth, Stott, Hoerner |
| 97 | 35 | Paredes, Luis Urias, Turang |
| 96 | 30 | Arraez, Schanuel, Merrifield |
| 95 | 25 | Tony Kemp, Straw, Esteury Ruiz |
| 94 MPH or Lower | 20 | Kwan, Edwards, Fletcher |
Maximum Exit Velocity
Maximum Exit Velocity, aka Max EV or EVMax, takes a single data point for that batter. How hard did they hit their hardest ball? In many ways this is similar to how we look at pitchers, where we’ll describe a pitcher as 94-96 mph, with a top of 98. Despite it being a sample size of one, it tends to be quite a strong predictor. At the major league level, where measurements are more reliable, we can trust the readings more. If you see Max EV readings from the minors, keep in mind that there could be more measurement errors at those levels, so I would recommend looking for multiple samples, rather than just one.
We have a slightly wider distribution for Max EV, so we’ll need to tweak our EV to Tools chart a little by expanding the 50 bucket to include 109-111 mph.
| Max EV | Grade | example Players |
|---|---|---|
| 117+ MPH | 80 | Acuna Jr, Stanton, Ohtani, De La Cruz |
| 116 | 75 | Riley, Wallner, Harper, Alonso |
| 115 | 70 | Soto, Devers, Schwarber |
| 114 | 65 | Chapman, Seager, Trout |
| 113 | 60 | Gallo, Casas, Salvador Perez |
| 112 | 55 | Chisolm Jr, Verdugo, Nootbaar |
| 109-111 | 50 | Muncy, Longoria, Swanson |
| 108 | 45 | Bregman, Cronenworth, Stott, Kirk |
| 107 | 40 | Rendon, Wendle, Espinal |
| 106 | 35 | Merrifield, Luis Urias, Frelick |
| 105 | 30 | Kwan, Narvaez, Nick Gordon |
| 104 | 25 | Winn, Schanuel, Brujan |
| 103 MPH or Lower | 20 | Tony Kemp, Rocchio, Fletcher |
Average Exit Velocity
Average Exit Velocity is considered to be a noisy metric, which means that a player’s average EV from year to year will be less consistent than some of the other metrics. That doesn’t mean we should ignore it, as it does describe something very basic, how hard, on average does a batter hit the ball?
An average average EV looks to be around 89 mph. We have a tighter distribution, so we’re going to make the 80-grade cutoff 94+ mph and the 20-grade cutoff 84 mph or lower, and make the jump a full grade from the nearest mph.
| Average EV | Grade | Example players |
|---|---|---|
| 94+ MPH | 80 | Judge, Acuna Jr, Ohtani, Olson |
| 93 | 70 | Yandy Diaz, Soto, Devers, Yordan Alvarez |
| 92 | 65 | Vientos, Betts, Guerrero Jr. |
| 91 | 60 | William Contreras, Willson Contreras |
| 90 | 55 | Chisholm, Durran, Kyle Tucker |
| 89 | 50 | Swanson, Josh Lowe, Josh Naylor |
| 88 | 45 | Rutschman, Jansen, Stott |
| 87 | 40 | Abrams, Keibert Ruiz, Cronenworth |
| 86 | 35 | Blackmon, Grissom, Kwan |
| 85 | 30 | Schanuel, Gimenez, Rafaela |
| 84 MPH or Lower | 20 | Curtis Mead, Frelick, Dozier |
EVBest50 – Average of a Batters Top 50% Batted Balls
You’ll see this metric on Baseball Savant as EV50, but I find that slightly confusing since EV50 could mean Median EV (Tom Tango would argue that should be EV50th, and he would be correct). Personally, I think EVBest50 is more descriptive, so we’ll be using that here. Unlike the other metrics, we’re going to show you 2021 through 2023:
We’ve included three years, since it isn’t clear from 2023 where the midpoint is. Based on three years of data, it looks like it’s somewhere between 99 and 100.
Surplus Exit Velo – Exit Velo above 88 MPH
At around the 88 MPH mark, every extra mph starts to matter. Baseball Savant used to refer to this as Escape Velocity, and has now re-branded it as Adjusted EV, a term I really don’t like. Adjusted how?
We see that +6 mph is what an average batter will do. That means that for balls hit 88 mph or greater, they’ll average 94 mph on those batted balls. Baseball Savant’s metric will add 88 to each batted ball, which makes 100 MPH roughly the top end for 2023.
Putting It All Together
We covered a variety of Exit Velocity metrics today. Here’s a quick summary of how to translate them into rough grades on the 20-80 scale:
Average EV90th: 104 MPH
Average EV78th = 100 MPH
Average EVBest50 = 99 to 100 MPH
Average Average EV = 89 MPH
Average Max EV: 110 MPH
Surplus EV 88 = +6 MPH
Going up or down one mph is roughly equivalent to a half grade on the 20-80 scale, except for Surplus EV 88, where 1 mph is roughly a full grade.
