Atlanta Braves star performers first week of MLB 2018

Freddie Freeman is incredibly good at baseball, and the Atlanta Braves are fortunate to have him.

Going into today’s games, Freddie Freeman of the Atlanta Braves is tied with Carlos Correa as the most valuable player in baseball. Amassing 0.7 fWAR in six games is no small feat. Freeman has a walk rate of 34.5% and a K rate of 10.3%. Walking three times more than you strike out is A) probably unsustainable and B) outlandishly good. This is what small samples get you.

Freddie isn’t seeing many pitches inside the zone, as you might infer from the above. On the young season, only 32.3% of pitches to Freeman have been strikes. The rare strikes Freeman does see are getting destroyed at a 1.333 slugging percentage. The aforementioned statistics are covered in more detail in Mark Bowman’s recent Braves blog post.

Freeman’s first home run was off Hoby Milner, a low arm slot lefty specialist. He was brought into the game for the sole purpose of getting Freeman out. That didn’t happen. When Max Scherzer took the mound yesterday, Freddie hit two doubles off of him.

Here are some additional odds and ends. Freeman carries a 43.8% hard-hit rate on the year. Freddie Freeman has seen the fewest strikes of any MLB batter as of this writing. Freddie Freeman also generates positive values on every pitch type regarding runs above average. Fastballs: 4.9 runs above average. Sliders: 0.5 runs above average. Cutters: 0.5 runs above average. Curveballs: 0.9 runs above average. Changeups: 0.5 runs above average.

Freddie Freeman is a monster when he is healthy. Also, Freddie Freeman is healthy.