Juan Soto Isn’t Having a Juan Soto Year

Juan Soto was acquired from the Nationals in an eight-player blockbuster on August 2. He debuted with the Padres on 3 August and hit .246/.408/.485. On August 23, he was scratched with back tightness. Since then, Sato has hit just 3-for-42 with 6 hits in 15 games. His on-base percentage is below .400. Sata was hit by a pitch and left a game with a shoulder contusion. He didn't collect an RBI until Tuesday night. The Padres are trying to hold onto the third NL Wild Card spot.

Juan Soto is in a slump. He's had 64 plate appearances since his return. Since his debut in 2018, he's one of four players with a slugging percentage above .500 and an average launch angle below 10 degrees. Petco Park is 322 feet down the right field line thanks to a small section that cuts a notch in the corner. The park has a park home run factor for left-handers of 95. Eloy Jiménez, Vladimir Guerrero Jr., and Christian Yelich have SLGs in .507–.510 range with angles in 5.9–8.3 degrees range.

Juan Soto is having a bad season. His slash line is .237/.402/.448 and his wRC+ is 142. He's producing his lowest average exit velocity, barrel rate, hard-hit rate and xWOBA since his 2018 rookie season and highest average launch angle since '19.

Juan Soto is making poor contact this year. He has just one bunting this season. His stats for 2021 and 22 are available via the Visuals & Statcast Pitch Highlighter path.

Juan Soto has been having a bad season this year. He makes poor contact more than half the time. This year he has a lot of pop-ups and routine fly outs. The table shows his season rates for each type and aggregations of the first three (“Poor%”) and the last three “Good%".

Juan Soto is having a bad year. He's underperforming his worst contact when connecting with fastballs and breaking balls. His performance against both classes has been worse than expected. Sato is hitting better than Josh Bell and Brandon Drury. The Padres are playing well and have a good chance of making the playoffs. They have 78-64 record and a two-game lead over the Brewers for the third Wild Card spot. They also have an 83%–24% edge in terms of their chances of winning the game.