Examining the Pittsburgh Pirates’ Fly Ball Mediocrity

The 2018 Pittsburgh Pirates rank towards the bottom of the pack in ‘big flies,’ but the rest of their fly balls are also uninspiring.

Despite some encouraging individual performances, the 2018 Pittsburgh Pirates are a power-starved bunch.

With a current ranking of 25th in baseball in home runs (146 as of this writing) and 23rd in ISO (.153), the club lacks the ability to change games quickly. While the Pirates hit their share of doubles (255, good for 11th in MLB), their overall power game is sorely lacking. Their team wOBA on fly balls of .428 (15th in MLB) backs this up.

This became even more readily apparent when I was looking at which Pittsburgh Pirates hitters have the most productive fly…