Ryan O'Hearn Leveled Up ... Once more

It’s been simply shy of a 12 months since MLBTR’s Darragh McDonald wrote, “The Orioles could have discovered the lefty bat they needed” when writing about Ryan O’Hearn’s then-nascent breakout in Baltimore. Acquired from the Royals in alternate for money on the heels of a DFA, O’Hearn was subsequently designated for task by the Orioles as properly earlier than being handed by waivers unclaimed and despatched outright to Triple-A Norfolk.

It was the type of ostensible unremarkable commerce that’s made a whole bunch of instances over the course of a calendar 12 months and rapidly forgotten — till it wasn’t. As most are conscious — actually each Orioles fan — O’Hearn certainly emerged because the left-handed bat Baltimore had sought. On the time of Darragh’s piece final 12 months, O’Hearn was slashing .308/.348/.542 with six house runs in 115 plate appearances. It wasn’t an enormous pattern and he wasn’t strolling a lot (5.2%), however O’Hearn’s batted-ball information supported a lot of that early flurry. He completed the 12 months in robust trend, seeing common enjoying time in opposition to right-handed pitching and ending the 12 months with a stout .289/.322/.480 slash — 18% higher than league-average, by measure of wRC+.

For a participant who’d hit .211/.282/.351 with a 27% strikeout fee over the 4 prior seasons in Kansas Metropolis (2019-22) earlier than being designated for task, final season was a shocking breakout. The Orioles would’ve been thrilled simply to have that one 12 months, however O’Hearn got here to Baltimore with four-plus years of enjoying time, making him controllable by the 2024 season. It was a no brainer to tender him a contract and undergo the arbitration course of with him, and even when he reverted again to his 2019-22 type or regressed some on the plate, the complete gambit of buying him would’ve been properly price it primarily based on 2023 alone.

O’Hearn, nevertheless, hasn’t reverted to his 2019-22 type. He hasn’t regressed nearer to league-average. He hasn’t maintained the established order and and even taken only a small step ahead. Reasonably, he’s taken his recreation to a wholly new degree, not simply by way of his uncooked run-production but in addition his strategy on the plate.

In 189 plate appearances this season — all however 11 coming in opposition to right-handed pitching, it ought to be famous — O’Hearn is batting .287/.384/.489. He’s been 38% higher than league-average, per wRC+. He’s already belted 9 homers, six doubles and a triple.

He’s additionally struck out 19 instances. In 189 plate appearances. Lest you assume that was a typo, let’s write it out: nineteen instances.

O’Hearn, who entered the 2024 season with a lifetime 25.6% strikeout fee within the huge leagues, has at 30 years outdated merely grow to be allergic to strikeouts. He’s additionally almost doubled his stroll fee from final 12 months’s 4.1% to 7.9%. That feat isn’t as eye-popping by itself, given O’Hearn’s penchant for drawing free passes earlier in his profession (11.5% from 2018-20), however it does serve to additional underscore the evolution of his strategy on the plate.

By measure of Statcast, O’Hearn chased 32% of pitches off the plate in 2023. This 12 months, that quantity is all the way down to 26.5%. He’s making contact on balls out of the strike zone at a career-best 64.4% clip, and his capability to attach on pitches throughout the strike zone has additionally ticked up. This 12 months’s 90.6% mark is a career-best and sits greater than 5 proportion factors north of the 85.3% league common.

The uptick in quantity of contact has come on the expense of a few of his high quality of contact, however that’s to not say O’Hearn is getting by with a sequence of well-placed bloops and weak grounders. His 90.4 mph common exit velocity and 41.9% hard-hit fee are each robust — they’re simply down from final 12 months’s respective marks of 91.9 mph and 51.5%. He’s within the 72nd and seventy fifth percentile of MLB gamers by way of exit velo and hard-hit fee, plus the eighty fifth percentile of hitters by way of whiff fee. Even with much less life on his common batted ball, the elevated frequency of contact leads Statcast to venture O’Hearn within the 94th percentile or higher by way of his anticipated batting common, slugging proportion and wOBA.

It bears repeating that a number of the reasoning for each his high quality of contact and his gaudy anticipated stats is that O’Hearn is shielded almost fully from left-on-left matchups. His profession efficiency in such conditions (.168/.236/.286) moderately emphatically exhibits that he’s benefited from Baltimore’s aggressive platooning. That considerably specialised function doesn’t detract from his usefulness nevertheless, and when coupled with the nonexistent price of acquisition, O’Hearn continues to cement himself as one of many present entrance workplace regime’s savviest acquisitions.

Talking of savvy, any dialogue of O’Hearn’s manufacturing must also contact on the slugger’s contract standing. As famous earlier than, O’Hearn got here to Baltimore with two seasons of membership management remaining. Nevertheless, the 2 events weren’t in a position to agree on a center floor in arbitration previous to exchanging figures. O’Hearn filed for a $3.8MM wage to the Orioles’ $3.2MM determine. The 2 events finally prevented a listening to on the eleventh hour, agreeing to a $3.5MM wage for the 2024 season — the midpoint between their submitted figures — in addition to a membership possibility for the 2025 marketing campaign.

That may’ve been O’Hearn’s first free-agent season, however the O’s now have management over subsequent 12 months at a $7.5MM worth level. O’Hearn would enhance that possibility worth by $500K upon showing in 120 and 150 video games. The latter of these two numbers received’t occur. O’Hearn has already been absent from 14 Orioles video games. He’s on tempo to look in 127 video games, nevertheless, making the primary of these $500K escalators nonetheless not solely attainable however possible.

The membership possibility was notable on the time however hardly a lock to be exercised and even emerge as a borderline resolution. However, as MLBTR’s Anthony Franco quipped to me when chatting about O’Hearn’s newfound contact expertise, few realized he was going to “flip into Luis Arraez with energy.” That’s a little bit of an overstatement after all — Arraez has fanned at a ridiculous 5.7% clip since Opening Day 2023 — however O’Hearn presently possesses the seventh-lowest strikeout fee of the 248 hitters with no less than 150 plate appearances this season. Of the 30 gamers in that set who’ve a strikeout fee of 15% or decrease, the one one hitting for extra energy than O’Hearn (by measure of ISO) is Cleveland’s Jose Ramirez. Securing what now appears to be a wildly reasonably priced membership possibility for a 3rd season with a view to keep away from a listening to over a $600K distinction in figures appears like a raucous cut price for the Orioles.

O’Hearn could also be a restricted participant by advantage of his platoon splits and lackluster defensive scores each within the outfield corners and at first base, however he’s developed probably the most distinctive talent units within the recreation and made himself an important member of one in all MLB’s high offenses. On two completely different events within the 2022-23 offseason, any membership may’ve acquired O’Hearn for nothing greater than money or a waiver declare.

The Orioles clearly didn’t count on this degree of end result — they wouldn’t have designated him for task in the event that they did — however they deserve credit score for seeing worth the place others didn’t. A lot of the deal with Baltimore’s success is rightly positioned on younger core of gamers both drafted by the O’s (Adley Rutschman, Gunnar Henderson, and so forth.) or acquired by way of commerce (Corbin Burnes, Kyle Bradish, Cade Povich), however hitting the jackpot on a small-scale pickup like O’Hearn is the type of transfer that may be a separator, offering a high-end complementary participant to assist take a formidable core to the following degree.