Signs Acuña's power numbers are on the way
Over his career, Acuña has a 43.3% groundball rate and a 14.8% barrel rate. This season, his groundball rate is at 53.2% and his barrel rate is just 7.8%. He has never finished a season with a barrel rate below 12.8% (power-sapped 2022). Unless Acuna has an injury we don't know about, I see a huge correction coming for both of these numbers.
So, he's not quite barreling balls up. He's hitting more grounders than ever. He's slugging .250 on fastballs this season after he smashed them for a .575 SLG in 2023.
Acuña is hitting the ball hard
Through April 15th, Acuña had just one barreled ball. He had three in the next week and has had five barrels since then. Despite just one barreled ball in the first half of April, he has corrected to the 56th percentile in barrel percentage on the season.
Acuña still has the Braves' fourth-highest max exit velocity this season. He is sandwiched right between Austin Riley and Matt Olson. Acuña's maximum exit velocity of 113.2 mph is in the 91st percentile in all of baseball.
Since April 15th, Ronald Acuña Jr. is fourth on the team in hard-hit percentage at 48.6% behind Matt Olson, Travis d'Arnaud, and Marcell Ozuna. We talked about his ultra-low barrel percentage earlier, stuck in the mud at 7.8% on the year. Since April 16th, it's back to a more normal rate at 14.3%.
Continue to the next page for more signs Acuña's power is coming to life.