In 2023, the Texas Rangers slugged their way to the inaugural team AL Silver Slugger award, as well as the first World Series title in franchise history. Just about every player had a career year, except for Josh Smith, who was still trying to find his footing in the majors.
Smith was acquired in a trade deadline deal alongside Ezequiel Duran, Glen Otto, and Trevor Hauver for Joey Gallo back in 2021.
At that point in the minors, the lowest OPS he had was .928 in 2019, thanks to his great approach and bat to ball skills. According to MLB Pipeline, Smith worked his way to the Rangers #7 prospect and eventually got to the majors that year. He notably collected his first hit in his first at-bat leading to a 3-hit game in his debut, and later in the year hit his first career home run with an inside the parker. Outside of those moments, it became very difficult to watch him, as he was just very overmatched and got relegated to late game defensive replacements.
Coming into 2024 with mostly the same roster as last year, it seemed like Smith was going to be stuck on the bench again. That was until Josh Jung got hurt very early in the season making Smith the ever day 3rd baseman, and he has not disappointed. He has produced an OPS+ of 126 and a 3.2 bWAR this year vs. 68 and 0.9 respectively the last 2 seasons combined. Obviously, these are drastic improvements, but how has he achieved them?
First off, a huge factor in this is the improvement in the power department. In ’22 and ’23 combined, Smith had only 22 extra-base hits in 408 AB’s, whereas up to this point in the season (August 8th) he already has 33 extra-base hits in only 361 at-bats, improving his ISO to by over 20 points from last season and over 100 points from 2022.
He is also putting the ball in play more this year, as hit K% and BB% are both down over 2%, and when he puts it in play, he is pulling the ball more than he ever has in his career. Combine the higher percentage of pulling ball, putting the ball in play, and him raising hit line drive rate over 5%, you will almost always get the result that Smith has gotten this season.
Among pitches he saw at least 100 times in a season, 4-seam fastballs gave him the most trouble by overall run value, and it seems that Smith knew this going into this year.
Before ’24, he would set up in the box with an open stance and a bit of a rocking motion, and this year he has a more squared up stance and seems stiller and more relaxed, helping him track the ball more, and now he is best against 4-seamers, according to run value.
This has also led him to be in the in the 88th percentile in the new baseball savant stat, swing length, which helps him get to the ball quicker since he only ranks in the 25th percentile in bat speed.
There are a few stats that show Smith may be due for some regression, but still be an above average player. For now though, Ranger fans will happily take what he has provided to the team since just about everyone else on the team is underperforming. Let’s hope he plays close to this level in the years to come and the Rangers have one of the best utility men in the league!
