In the Lab: Astros Center Field Violation

As we pass through the diamond, I should note that I played a bit loosely and fancifully with the outfield distinctions. In fact, almost every outfielder besides Yordan Alvarez is capable of playing all three positions and most of them will likely play multiple positions. So who I choose to place largely depends on where we can expect them to play, but also as a way to space things out so we have the same number of guys in each lab.

For our purposes here, we’re looking at Jake Meyers and Zach Cole, but we have to acknowledge that Joey Loperfido and Cam Smith could also see time at center. As we have done, I will include a player who is not on the Astros (or currently in MLB) as a frame of reference for Zach Cole. We’re not necessarily predicting he’ll have this player’s career, but I’m sure we’d be in if he did.

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• Chase Rate: This is the percentage of balls a player throws outside the zone. The league average is normally around 30 percent, but we’ll be looking at three-year intervals and we should notice trends more than just where a player is compared to the league average.

• Hard Hit Percentage: This is simply the percentage of balls a player hits hard. Hard hit balls become hits and extra base hits more often than softer contact. Generally, 35 percent is around the league average in this category.

• BABIP: That’s the batting average on balls in play. Home runs are obviously excluded since they’re not in play. The league average tends to hover around .300, but it will largely depend on hitting percentages and the split between ground balls, flyballs and line drives.

• Contact Percentage: This is the percentage of swings that turn into contact. Generally, 75 percent is around the league average.

• HR/FB Percentage: This is the percentage of flyballs that result in home runs. Ten percent is generally around the league average.

Jake Meyers

There were a number of people (myself included) who were critical of the Astros’ coaches in recent years, but it should be noted that not everyone got worse under these guys. Meyers made real gains in chase rate, hard hit rate and contact rate last season. It’s likely that at least some of that will continue this season. So, in all likelihood, Meyers is a better offensive player in 2026 than he was in 2023 and 2024. However, he may not be as good as he was last season.

This is largely due to BABIP out of context. Even with gains in hard contact, this kind of jump is not sustainable. At best, he could live between .310 and .320 in this category and that assumes a return to career standards in terms of home runs per flyball. If you give him a positive regression in this category, then he could be around the same level as last season overall.

However, it’s likely that a hitter lives around .250 or .260 with decent velocity numbers and decent power numbers. So it could be around 0.250/0.300/0.380. Add in some very good defensive metrics and you get a consistently above-average total, but in all likelihood you won’t see 2025 Meyers again.

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Zach Cole

These are all minor league numbers for Cole. Cole has four of the five tools in spades. If we add home plate discipline as a tool, then he has five of the six tools in spades. Unfortunately, this sixth tool might be the most important. Like Matthews and Dezenzo before him, there’s just a ton of swing and miss to his game. Players have found success at the big league level while missing the hit tool, but there are fewer and fewer of them. The question will be whether he can make enough contact gains to give those other tools enough room to breathe.

As we noted above, there is one player that Cole has been compared to that we can feature here. Joey Gallo no longer plays in the big leagues, but he had big seasons with the Rangers before disappearing. In short, the lack of contact eventually caught up with him, but he could be the pinnacle of what Cole can accomplish at the big league level. Between 2017 and 2019, Gallo hit over 100 home runs. Cole has more speed than Gallo, so he could be even more so. Just look at the numbers and see what you notice.

His career numbers showed that he declined a bit in terms of hard hits and pure power after those first three seasons. Simply put, you cannot survive for long with such a contact rate. I don’t have a minor league to major league decoder ring, but most players don’t make more contact at the major league level initially. So, Gallo seems like a reasonable lineup for Cole.

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Gallo had a career-high 4.4 FWAR in 2021, so I think most people would be pleasantly surprised if the Astros got that from Cole. Keep in mind that he adds an element of speed that Gallo didn’t. Unfortunately, he doesn’t have quite the power rate or hard hit rate that Gallo had. Maybe he makes a few more contacts and ends up getting closer to the numbers above overall. The question will be whether Astros fans want to endure the swing and miss in order to take advantage of the impressive power and speed. What do you think?