The breakout star driving MLB's surprise team

By Cole Jacobson | April 28, 2024

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After entering the 2024 season projected to miss the playoffs, the Guardians have almost inarguably been MLB’s biggest surprise thus far. Entering Monday, the Guardians lead the AL with a 19-9 record and +46 run differential -- both of which rank second in MLB behind Atlanta this year, and both of which are Cleveland's best through 28 games since 2011.

Of course, there’s not just one reason for the Guardians’ hot start. One could point to Steven Kwan refusing to swing and miss, or Emmanuel Clase continuing to set the standard for relief pitchers, or Carlos Carrasco finding the fountain of youth in his return to Cleveland, or the impact of first-year manager Stephen Vogt, and so on. But at or near the top of anyone’s list has to be the breakout season of first baseman Josh Naylor.

Naylor was already a strong player in 2023, his second season as a full-time starter. He finished 22nd in AL MVP voting, and had career highs in just about every offensive stat, including but not limited to batting average, OBP, slugging percentage and Baseball Reference’s WAR. But thus far in the admittedly small sample size of 2024, he’s taken his game to a new level. He has an .895 OPS thus far, one of numerous metrics in which he’s currently setting a new career best.

Josh Naylor conventional stats, career

(All four are career bests for Naylor)

The simultaneous increase in home runs and decrease in strikeout rate makes Naylor a rarity among even MLB’s best hitters: a power hitter who rarely strikes out. In fact, among MLB’s 280 qualified hitters entering Sunday, Naylor is one of only seven to rank in the 90th percentile or better in both strikeout rate and expected slugging percentage, joining Mookie Betts, Marcus Semien, Ryan O’Hearn, Salvador Perez, Juan Soto and Yordan Alvarez. Only Naylor and O'Hearn rank in the 95th percentile or better in both.

All of this leads to a natural question surrounding Naylor. Is his hot start to 2024 merely fool’s gold coming from a small sample size, or is he here to stay as one of the elite young hitters in a sport full of them? We dive into Naylor’s approach and his advanced stats to gauge what’s sustainable about his impressive season.

NOTE: All individual stats are entering Sunday unless otherwise noted.

Stronger selectivity

The first step to hitting the ball better is seeing the ball better. And for the 26-year-old Naylor, who was the 12th pick in an absolutely stacked first round of the 2015 MLB Draft, this has been a major component of his extremely successful start to his sixth MLB season.

In four of his prior five seasons, his chase rate (i.e., percentage of out-of-zone pitches swung at) was at least 31%, most recently including a career-worst chase rate of 39.5% in 2023. (For frame of reference, this season’s MLB average is 28.4%.) This season, though, that’s taken a sharp turn, as Naylor has gotten his chase rate all the way down to 27.7%.

One might think this just means he’s being more passive in general, but that’s far from the truth. In fact, for pitches that have been inside the strike zone, Naylor has swung 80.6% of the time, which is by far a career high, and also ranks second in MLB this season. Much of this has been due to his increased willingness to be aggressive on the first pitch, swinging at a career-high 49.5% of such pitches.

Highest in-zone swing percentage, 2024
Among 249 players to see 125-plus such pitches

If this dichotomy of being more aggressive in the strike zone and less aggressive outside of it sounds difficult to achieve, you’re on to something. Via Statcast, there are 194 hitters who have been qualified in both 2023 and 2024. Among that group, only three have seen their in-zone swing rate increase by at least three percent, and their chase rate decrease by at least five percent, from year to year: Naylor, DeJong and Josh Rojas.

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On a similar note, Naylor’s in-zone swing rate (80.6%) is 52.9 percentage points higher than his chase rate (27.7%). That gap is the fourth-largest among 237 hitters to see at least 125 pitches in each category this season, trailing only George Springer, Semien and Abreu.

“You can’t say enough about the quality of at-bat that ‘Nayls’ puts together,” Vogt told MLB.com’s Mandy Bell. “That’s why I say he’s not a power hitter, he’s a hitter with power. He doesn’t punch out at an enormous rate. He’ll take his walks. He takes what the pitchers give him. He hits to the situation with the threat of, ‘if you make a mistake, you’re not getting the ball back.’ Those are the most dangerous hitters you can have.”

Not more contact, but better contact

Plate discipline only gets you so far, though. Gaudy offensive stats don’t come without putting the bat on the ball -- and Naylor has done plenty of that as well.

Interestingly, despite the improved selectivity, Naylor is actually making contact slightly less often than he did last year. As a matter of fact, his 21.6% whiff rate is his highest since having a 22.1% mark in his rookie season five years ago.

But when Naylor has put the ball in play, it’s gone better for him than ever before. His average exit velocity hovered in the upper 80s in each of his first five seasons (the 2024 MLB average is 88.4 mph, for context), but it has skyrocketed to a career-best 90.7 mph this season.

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Indeed, no matter what metric one looks at to evaluate the quality of contact, the Canada native has broken out this season. Beyond the exit velocity, Naylor is also currently setting career highs in barrel rate (11.8%), barrels per plate appearance (9.1%), sweet-spot rate (36.5%) and hard-hit rate (43.5%).

Add all of that together, and it’s clear that Naylor’s success isn’t simply a result of getting bailed out by poor defense or bloop hits falling in convenient areas. But in case that wasn’t already evident, the Statcast “expected” metrics firmly hammer the point home.

Josh Naylor advanced stats, career

(All four are career bests for Naylor)

“He’s a great hitter with power,” Vogt told Bell earlier in April. “He shortens up and gets that big single for us in that moment, he takes walks when he needs to and then if you make a mistake, he can drive you out of the ballpark. That’s what well-rounded hitters do and 'Naylz' is one of them.”

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Adjusting to the breaking stuff

We can see that Naylor’s having a breakout season. Both the conventional and the advanced metrics back that up. But what specifically has been a source of improvement?

One core aspect has been the aforementioned plate discipline. Another has been his improved approach against left-handed pitchers, as Bell touched on here. But a third one worth pointing out is Naylor’s stark improvement against breaking pitches.

By no means was the first baseman bad against such pitches a year ago, but this season, he’s taken off. He ranks second in MLB (behind Alec Bohm) with a .534 wOBA against breaking balls in 2024, a sizable increase from where he was at before.

Josh Naylor against breaking pitches, career

(All four are career bests for Naylor)

Furthermore, his “putaway %” (percentage of two-strike pitches resulting in a strikeout) on breaking pitches is a career-low 14.8%, a testament to his ability not to overthink those ostensibly stressful situations.

“A lot of coaches talk about two-strike approaches and if you miss a few swings, spread out and put the ball in play,” Naylor told MLB.com. “But I think I’m a believer in just getting your A-swing off whether you miss it or you don’t. Always take your best shot.”

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Impact on the team

For a Cleveland squad seeking to continue blowing past expectations, Naylor will play a major role. Despite the Guardians’ strong start to the season, their offense has lagged behind their elite pitching performance. Among the team’s qualified hitters, only Naylor and Kwan have an OPS of at least .750. And with ace Shane Bieber out for the season, Naylor and the offense will have to pick up extra slack for the Guardians to continue pacing the AL Central.

But beyond any sheer stats, Naylor’s impact on the team’s culture has been, and will surely continue to be, tremendous. Even if it scares his teammates and coaches in the moment.

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“That’s Josh Naylor, man,” Vogt said after a memorable Naylor home run celebration on April 20 when he hit his own helmet with the bat on the way to first base. “He’s obviously emotional and charismatic. As long as he didn’t concuss himself, I’m all right.”

“I think that’s the inner competitor that comes out,” Kwan added on the same day. “I think it gets to the point that he just blacks out and it’s just pure baseball passion. It’s definitely special. But yeah, that’s Josh Naylor right there.”

Making the leadership aspect even more relevant is that the Guardians aren’t just Naylor’s family in a metaphorical sense. Catcher and Naylor’s younger brother, Bo, makes the phrase apply in a literal sense as well. After the two brothers homered in the same inning earlier this season -- on “National Siblings Day,” no less -- the younger Naylor reflected on the importance of having his brother in the dugout.

“Every time I am in the locker room, I get to be able to hang out with my brother, it's a new special moment,” said Bo, who was drafted by Cleveland in 2020, before Josh was even a part of the organization. “Every time I'm out there on the field, every end-of-inning I get to throw a ball over to him, it's special. So for me, it's a new part of the journey every day, and I'm super grateful to be able to share these experiences with him.”

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Two years ago, when Bo was a rookie and Josh was in his first season as a full-time starter, the Guardians won the AL Central as one of the youngest teams in MLB postseason history. According to the Elias Sports Bureau, Cleveland became the second playoff team ever with each of their top 10 hitters (in plate appearances) and top five pitchers (in innings) being in their age-29 season or younger, joining the 1970 Reds led by Pete Rose and Johnny Bench.

Now, the whole team, including both Naylors, is a little bit more mature. And if the Guardians are to make the playoffs for the first time since then, both Josh Naylor’s hitting prowess and his fiery attitude are going to be needed all year long.

“I think [Naylor’s antics] fire us up,” Kwan said. “He does that when he feels like things are getting stale on the field and he tries to fire us up. I think, in a roundabout way, that’s his team leadership and how he kind of guides the ship. We couldn’t do this thing without him.”

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