Which MLB Teams Have the Best Plate Discipline?

Good eye! Good eye!

If you have been to a Little League or even high school baseball game, you have definitely heard these words shouted by teammates and fans after the batter lays off and watches a ball outside the strike zone go by.

You have also inevitably heard the classic “leave those up there” when the hitter chases a high heater or “recognize the spin” when the hitter goes golfing in the dirt after a curveball.

From a young age, plate discipline is stressed by coaches and is seen as one of the marks of a good hitter. Some superhumans like Vladimir Guerrero or Javy Baez can make a career out of chasing bad pitches, but nearly every good hitter possesses above average plate discipline.

Some big league teams seem to stress discipline at the plate more than others. You will often hear MLB commentators mention that certain teams love to “grind out at-bats”. This simply means that this team takes more pitches than your average club and will not chase outside the zone.

On the flip side, some teams have a free-swinging lineup full of all-or-nothing guys who will strike out more than the grind-it-out teams but will hit for more power.

Knowing which teams tend to have better discipline at the plate can yield major profits down the road.

Deciding which SP to add to your team on Draftkings? You are going to want to choose a guy facing a lineup that strikes out a lot. Can’t decide whether to take the over or under on a game? Knowing which teams are more explosive and which play it safe at the plate can make the decision easy.

First Look at Strikeouts and Walks

Strikeouts and walks are the best place to start when exploring plate discipline. High walk rates indicate good discipline while high strikeout rates indicate that discipline is lacking.

Here is a quick rundown of the top-4 teams in walk rate and the 4 teams with the best strikeout rates (the fewest Ks) in the majors.

There are not many strikeouts occurring in the AL West. The Angels, Astros, and A’s are the three toughest teams to strike out in all of baseball.

Of the 8 teams on this list, 7 of them have winning records (sorry Mariners). If you didn’t already realize, striking out less and walking more is beneficial to an offense.

Ks and BBs are symptoms of problems at the plate, but they do not reveal the source of the problem. Looking at pitch data can help pinpoint where the issues are in a hitter’s approach.

Next Look at O-Swing% and O-Contact%

I want to focus on two very telling statistics: O-Swing% and O-Contact%. I have talked about O-Swing% before. It is a very simple concept. O-Swing% is the percentage of pitches outside of the strike zone that a batter swings at. O-Contact% is the percentage of these swings in which the batter makes contact.

Typically, a lower O-Swing% is better. Constantly chasing pitches outside the zone is a one-way ticket to Slump City for most hitters (see above). A high O-Contact% is better than a low one, but just because a hitter makes contact on a bad pitch does not necessarily mean it is hard contact.

I gathered the data and put together a simple bubble chart of the teams with the lowest O-Swing% and the highest O-Contact%. Check it out.

As you can see, O-Swing% is on the x-axis while O-Contact% is on the y-axis. This means the teams with the best plate discipline will be on the top-left.

I really want to highlight the Angels here. If you remember back to that previous chart, the Angels have the lowest K rate in baseball. They just don’t strike out. Here is why.

Of all 30 MLB teams, the Angels chase the fewest pitches outside of the zone. LA offers on between 26% and 27% of bad pitches while average teams chase way more often.

Not only do the Angels chase the least, but when they do chase, they hit the ball! With an O-Contact% just under 70%, the Angels seldom get themselves out.

This is where an analytical mind can draw some conclusions. If a team has good O-Swing and O-Contact rates but still strikes out a lot, that means they are getting out on pitches in the strike zone.

If a team is terrible in O-Swing and O-Contact but still manages to fend off strikeouts, they are probably getting lucky.

Put this knowledge to use, find hidden value, and make yourself some money today!