Article: The March of Michael Busch Continues

[matto1233]

No single development so far this season should make Chicago Cubs fans more excited than the fact that they might have found their long-term first baseman. In fact, they might even have found a star.

Image courtesy of © Patrick Gorski-USA TODAY Sports

I’m still waiting for Michael Busch to come back to Earth. I don’t think that even the biggest Busch optimist, coming into the 2024 season, could claim to have predicted the level of production that he has given the Chicago Cubs to this point. He has a glowing .309/.385/.618 batting line, good for a 172 wRC+.

Admittedly, I am not sure what coming back to Earth would mean for Busch, at this point. According to Baseball Savant, his results are right where they should be. His batting average is a little above his expected one, but his slugging percentage is below his expected slugging of .702. He has a .431 wOBA and a .450 xwOBA, where an average hitter has a wOBA of about .320. What has he been doing so well, and can we really expect it to continue at this level?

We can get the potentially obvious statistic out of the way early: Busch is performing well because he is hitting the ball hard consistently. His average exit velocity of 93.7 mph was 12th in all of baseball, through Saturday’s games. He is ahead of exit velocity kings Kyle Schwarber, Yordan Alvarez, and Vladimir Guerrero Jr. That’s great! But it also isn’t everything. Ahead of him on the average exit velocity leaderboard are the likes of Jesús Sánchez and Lawrence Butler, and nobody is writing articles about those guys. Admittedly, I didn’t even know who Butler was until looking at that leaderboard.

The first thing that strikes me about Busch on this list is his maximum exit velocity. His hardest-hit ball so far was hit 109 miles per hour. That is fine, but not great. As a matter of fact, that puts him outside of the top 100 in MLB, and everyone ahead of him on the average exit velocity leaderboard has a much higher maximum exit velocity. This would suggest to me that, while Busch might lack the upper-level power of sluggers like Aaron Judge, he is hitting the ball so hard so consistently that he still manages to have an elite average exit velocity.

After all, someone can hit the ball 100 mph twice, or hit it 115 mph once and 85 mph after that. They both come away with an average exit velocity of 100 mph, however, the player who hit the ball 100 mph twice gave himself a better chance at two hits. That's what Busch is doing, and there are other numbers to back this up. According to FanGraphs, he has recorded soft contact just 6.8 percent of the time, which is the sixth-lowest number in baseball. 

The other thing that strikes me about Busch is where he is hitting the ball. This is most likely Baseball 101 to anyone who reads this site at this point, but just in case: not all hard contact is created equal. If you hit the ball hard, but on the ground, the best-case scenario for someone with Busch’s speed is likely a double, if you manage to place it down the line. You want to hit your hard contact in the air, so it can find its way into the bleachers. According to FanGraphs, MLB as a whole is batting .465 with a 184 wRC+ on hard-hit ground balls this year. Hitters are batting an equally good .472 on hard-hit fly balls this year, but with a 455 wRC+. The difference? Some 31.5 percent of hard-hit fly balls have resulted in home runs, and of course, zero hard-hit ground balls have.

Returning to the Cubs’ rookie first baseman, his average launch angle this year of 22.5 degrees is 18th in all of baseball, per Baseball Savant. His ground ball rate of 23.3 percent is eighth-lowest in baseball, according to FanGraphs. Thus far, Busch has been the perfect balance of consistently hitting the ball hard and hitting it in the air. Both he and the Cubs are profiting from it.

Our own Matthew Trueblood just did a bit of work in this vein with regard to Rhys Hoskins, at our sister site, Brewer Fanatic. He created three stats that help us capture the idea of clustering hard-hit balls in launch angle bands where they have the greatest value, and of hitting it hard when you do lift the ball. Here's how Busch rates:

• Sweet Spot Exit Velocity (SSEV): 98.1 MPH, 91st percentile
• Hard-Hit Launch Angle (HHLA): 22.6 degrees, 94th percentile
• Weighted SSEV: 95.3, 97th percentile

The last of those is the one that best correlates with overall production, as it blends the ability to hit line drives and non-pop-up fly balls with the ability to hit them hard. Busch excels most in it, which is a great sign.

The next logical question, of course, is can this continue? For one, this is a new trend from Busch. His average launch angle in his 81-plate appearance debut with the Dodgers last year was 4.7 degrees. His ground-ball rate in Triple-A last year was low, at 37.6 percent, but still not nearly as low as the 23.3 percent he has in the big leagues this year. Busch either has a new approach, or is executing his old one better than he ever has before. 

While Busch has had success so far, both in his raw numbers and his peripherals, pitchers will surely adjust their approach to him as they get more data points on what exactly he is trying to accomplish at the plate. The good news on that end is that he has been able to elevate the ball almost anywhere it has been thrown, and has covered the whole strike zone pretty well, save for the corners:

 

To put a bow on this, it’s time to get excited about Michael Busch. We knew about his eye at the plate and good swing decisions coming into the year. The concern was the strikeout rate, and given that it is currently near 30 percent, that is still going to be an issue. Let that serve as a reminder that it’s not reasonable, yet, to expect him to be one of the best hitters in baseball for the full season. However, given the quality of contact and new approach, it’s safe to say that this stretch to start the season hasn’t been lucky. We’re seeing what this guy can do when everything clicks.

Before the year, ZiPS pegged Busch at a good but only slightly above-average wOBA of .337. Now, ZiPS has seen enough to project a .347 wOBA for him for the rest of the year. Last season, that would have been a top-50 hitter in baseball, in line with the likes of Julio Rodriguez, Randy Arozarena, José Ramírez, Gunnar Henderson, and Pete Alonso. If he can continue elevating the ball like he has been, the Cubs just might have stumbled upon a hitter who can be listed with some of the elites of the game.

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[Bertz]

It's kind of wild how unimpeachable Busch's start has been.  There are the obvious caveats about pitchers potentially figuring some things out as he gets more exposure around the league, and it seems pretty clear his numbers will take a hit when he is shielded from lefties less aggressively.  But that's it.  Contact, power, and approach all look great.  He's not getting bullied by a particular pitch or a particular zone or primo velocity...he's just doing it all.

[Old Time Cub Fan]

Great article, well researched!. I don't completely understand the advanced statistics, but I know enough to see they are impressive. Have to hand it to the Cubs staff for pulling this off. Looks like they might have gotten a real jewel. Wonder why other teams weren't in on him. May they were, but Ferris was a big prize for the Dodgers.