5 players who could run away with stolen base title

Do you feel the need? The need for speed?

The Marlins' Jon Berti led the big leagues last year with 41 steals. A fine total, but also one of the lowest by a Major League leader over the past 60 years. It's fair to assume that number will be topped this season.

The introduction of bigger bases has reduced the distance between each by small yet significant margins. Add in the new limits on pickoffs, and the game’s fastest players should be positively licking their chops once they reach safely.

Who will pace MLB in stolen bases in 2023? Here are five likely candidates.

Ronald Acuña Jr., OF, Braves
2022 total: 29

Acuña’s 2022 debut was delayed until April 28, more than nine months after he suffered a season-ending right-knee injury versus the Marlins. While it was great to see one of the game’s most dynamic, charismatic, talented players back in action, no one was really sure how much Acuña's ACL reconstruction would impact his base-stealing ways.

He then went out and stole two bases in that first game back.

Acuña nabbed 29 bags on the year, the seventh most in MLB, in just 119 games. However, it was clear that he wasn’t his normal self. His sprint speed, which ranked in the 95th percentile or higher each year from 2018-21, dipped into the 82nd percentile. His stolen base success rate fell from 78.8% to 72.5%. Conversely, Acuña’s effort on the basepaths wasn’t lacking. He attempted 40 steals, the fifth most in the Majors and only six fewer than the league leader.

Acuña’s knee shouldn’t be an issue in 2023. He is fully healthy and experiencing no pain, neither of which he could say throughout last season. Combine his physical state with his aggressiveness and age – he is still only 25 years old! – and it’s very possible that Acuña will exceed his career-high 37 steals from 2019. A 40-40 season isn’t out of the question either.

-- Brian Murphy

Esteury Ruiz, OF, OAK
2022 total: 1 (17 MLB games)

In 2022, Ruiz swiped an eye-popping 85 bags on 99 tries over 114 games in the Minors. It’s safe to say he won’t receive the green light as often in MLB, which hasn’t seen an 80-steal season since the days of Rickey Henderson and Vince Coleman, but Ruiz’s chances to run could still be plentiful this season.

After acquiring Ruiz from the Brewers in the three-team trade that sent catcher Sean Murphy to the Braves, the rebuilding A’s have every incentive to find out what they have in the 24-year-old outfielder. It remains to be seen what type of hitter he’ll be, but we already have some Statcast data on his wheels: He recorded an average sprint speed of 29.8 ft/sec -- tied for the 13th-fastest mark among qualifiers -- over 17 games in the Majors last year.

-- Thomas Harrigan

Bobby Witt Jr., SS, Royals
2022 total: 30

Swiping 30 bags as a rookie – the sixth-highest total in the Majors – certainly speaks to Witt’s potential here. But there is also plenty of reason to think that his ceiling is much higher, even setting aside any rule changes.

Most importantly, you have to get on base in order to steal bases, and Witt struggled to do that consistently in his debut, posting a .294 OBP. So despite playing a full season, he had only 197 stolen base opportunities, which Baseball-Reference defines as plate appearances through which a runner was on first or second with the next base open. Contrast that with Guardians rookie Steven Kwan, who turned roughly the same number of plate appearances into a whopping 304 steal opportunities, thanks in part to a .373 OBP.

While Witt might not ever be a high-OBP hitter, he also is a supremely gifted player who is still just 22 years old and played a total of 161 Minor League games before reaching Kansas City. It’s not unreasonable to think that an adjustment or two will help him get aboard more often in 2023, setting him up to unleash his top-five sprint speed on opposing defenses.

-- Andrew Simon

Trea Turner, SS, Phillies
2022 total: 27

Given his all-around talent, sometimes we focus in on Turner’s ability to hit -- he was second in MLB to now-former teammate Freddie Freeman with 194 hits last year, and led the Majors with 195 hits the season before that -- at the expense of all the other tools he brings to the baseball diamond. One of those, of course, is his speed. Turner’s 30.3 feet per second average sprint speed is fifth in baseball, and he has a career stolen base success rate of 85 percent.

Since 2016, when Turner retained rookie status after appearing in only 27 games the prior season, nobody has swiped more bases than his 228. He’s been consistent in both frequency and efficiency of steal attempts, and there’s no reason to think that will change as he plays his first season with the Phillies in ’23.

-- Manny Randhawa

Corbin Carroll, OF, D-backs
2022 total: 2 (32 MLB games)

So Carroll had only two steals after he got called up last season. Who cares? He's the fastest man in baseball. The 22-year-old led all Major Leaguers with a 30.7 ft/sec sprint speed last season -- anything 30 ft/sec or faster is elite, and Carroll reached that threshold on over 60% of his runs. He’s faster than Turner. He’s faster than Witt. He’s faster than Acuña. Carroll’s elite speed is a big reason why he's the No. 2 prospect in baseball -- he has 52 stolen bases in 142 Minor League games -- and that elite speed should be magnified even more with the shorter distance between bases in 2023 thanks to the new, bigger bags. If he wants to, he’ll win the stolen base title. All he has to do is run.

-- David Adler