In case you haven’t been paying attention to the Cleveland Indians this season, infielder Jose Ramirez has been putting up ridiculous numbers. Like, super-ridiculous numbers.
Entering Tuesday’s series opener against the Chicago White Sox, Ramirez owns a .282/.396/.578 triple slash with 38 home runs, 101 RBI, 101 runs scored, and 32 stolen bases. That susses out to a healthy 155 wRC+ and 8.0 fWAR through 642 plate appearances, both of which are among the best in baseball when looking at qualified hitters.
One glance at the above stats tells us the American League MVP candidate has already joined the 30-30 club for the first time in his career. It’s the first time someone has punched their ticket for this group since 2012, when both Mike Trout and Ryan Braun accomplished the feat. What neither one of them could do, though, was also draw more walks than strikeouts at the same time.
That’s exactly what Ramirez is on pace to accomplish — he’s struck out just 72 times so far this season, compared to collecting 111 walks. This is rather rare, especially considering it’s Ramirez’s age-25 season.
José Ramírez turns 26 today, but 2018 is still his age 25 season.
Players with 30+ HR & 30+ SB with more walks than strikeouts in age 25 or younger season:
2018 José Ramírez (age 25)
1990 Barry Bonds (age 25)
1956 Willie Mays (age 25)— Christopher Kamka (@ckamka) September 17, 2018
What’s hilarious is that Ramirez’s strikeout rate is actually on pace to increase for the third consecutive season (10.0% to 10.7% to 11.2%). His walk rate has gone in the same direction, but in greater increments (7.1% to 8.1% to 15.0%).
Another cool trend appears when peeking at his hard-hit rate. Since making his big-league debut with the Indians in 2013, his ability to make hard contact has improved every single season. While there was a huge jump from 2016 (26.8%) to 2017 (34.0%), he’s still on track to keep that streak alive this year (37.4%).
Ramirez’s ability to crush four-seam fastballs at an increasingly better rate doesn’t hurt, either. Check out the following three-year progression he’s currently on:
Phew.
You’d imagine that Ramirez would be a MVP frontrunner based off the numbers he’s produced this year, but that’s not even the case with Mookie Betts also doing ridiculous things on the field. It wouldn’t be outrageous to think he’ll at least be a finalist for the second consecutive year, though.
About Matt Musico
Matt currently manages Chin Music Baseball and contributes to The Sports Daily. His past work has been featured at numberFire, Yahoo! Sports and Bleacher Report. He’s also written a book about how to become a sports blogger. You can sign up for his email newsletter here.
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