If Tarik Skubal positioned the fastball in the area, the opponent’s batsman might be cooked. They were swaying nearly halfway, and they were empty. If they manage to make a difference, they are unlikely to do much damage – five of them were singles in the six hits he allowed. That only extra hit rate? Absolute tank! A 429-foot home run, a perfectly executed 98 mph heater appeared on the first court of the game, courtesy of a Zach Neto who is currently defending the low-level star.
After a tough rookie campaign in 2023, Neto broke out in his sophomore effort, posting the 3.5 War (23) by playing a competent short factory and enough home runs (23) to cover up his mediocre base abilities. Even after missing the tramp in the first few weeks of the season, the 24-year-old took another step in 2025: His 139 WRC+ is second among all shortstops, with at least 150 sets.
This improved line is surging by power. In just 37 games, he played 9 home runs and 10 doubles. The barrel rate has actually doubled, jumping to 16.8% from 8.4% last year. As a result, his .589 Expected Playing (XSLG) ranked eighth in baseball, down from big Sluggers like Aaron Judge, Shohei Ohtani and Kyle Schwarber.
These three guys are tough romantics and have long been the bat speed rankings. But Neto is not suitable for this profile. He stood beside 5-foot-11 slim. Even with a slight increase in year-on-year batting speed, his average swing of 71.7 mph is still below the major league average. Angel Shortstop didn’t post elite power as he tried hard to wield the bat. This is because he maximized his aggressiveness, sold out his power, and was mostly successful.
To understand Neto’s approach, it requires a visit to the beneficiaries of the STATCAST factory to delete new statistics. The first launches around the batting posture data, measuring the vertical and horizontal positions of the batsmen in the batsmen’s box and the average “intercept point”, or the batsmen’s contact with the ball relative to the board and its mass center. The second launch has statistics on the bat path, most notably the swing path tilt – swing angle and attack angle for the first 40 milliseconds of contact, which is the angle of the bat relative to the ball when it comes into contact.
The batting posture indicator shows that Neto is approaching the pitcher every year. In his position, his body center is 19 inches in the box, closer to the pitcher than he stood in 2024, and overall the ninth best setting for 252 qualified batsmen. You can see his forefoot as close to the front of the box as possible:
Judging from that video frame, he also packed the plates. He is only 22 inches from the center of the plate and is fourth among 252 batsmen. The tendency to stand on the edge of the box is nothing new. His distance from the plate has been barely changed throughout his career and has likely caused 16 gradual attacks in 2023 and 2024. (Surprisingly, he was hit only twice this year.)
By the simplest measure of aggressiveness of postures – adding up the depth in the box and the distance from the plate – Neto is second in all baseballs, behind Xavier Edwards.
This combination of scoch feet in the box and crowded plates allows players such as Eugenio Suárez, Anthony Santander, Xander Bogaerts and Neto to attack various courts in front, making it easier for them to hit their pull-side. (There are also benefits of congestion in the sector due to fear of putting it on the basis of HBP.
Another factor in Netto’s power surge is his swing inclination, which has increased from 33 degrees in 2024 to 37 degrees this season – only Spencer Torkelson added more inclination in 2025 – and the result is more balls in the air. Neto is currently ranked 93rd percentile in Statcast’s “pull air” percentage thanks to his positive stance and sublime swing. Pulling the balloon is the most valuable of all of them, and Neto rolls them into a pile.
He didn’t do it like Isaac Paredes, he was farther from the plate to better punish the inner court. Instead, because Neto stands on a plate that is too close, his favorite attack balls tend to be in the middle or outside. The image above shows all of Neto’s 2025 barrels – as you can see, there are fewer barrels inside (can beat him) and more places to reach out and raise your arms. Watch him smash the 3-1 slider from the outer edge to the left center field:
This is the last part of Neto’s breakthrough: He makes flush contacts as he sways. His contact speed (defined by baseball Savant as a firm squared hard shake) is in the 92nd percentile, higher than the 2024 league average. This barrel accuracy, at least until the season, allowed him to gain the maximum power of nature.
Interestingly, Neto’s aggression did not extend to his swing decision. His overall swing rate is the lowest in the league, especially on the field within the area. Even his meatball swing ratio (over 60%) ranks 211th, with at least 40 meatballs. But if Neto has a place on the hunting court, then it gets up.
When Esteban Rivera wrote about Neto’s swing last June, Neto made adjustments to better attack these high fastballs, hiking, hiking to make the ball shorter. But in my opinion, this adjustment has disappeared. Neto is now holding the elbow close to his body. Check out his setup at the pitcher factory in 2024…
In 2025…
Maybe I looked too hard at me, but it seems to me that Neto has put down his hand, stuffed his elbows in, and tilted his shoulders inward, thus increasing the increase in Swing Path Tilt, thus allowing him to participate in launch mode. Remember Homer in the introduction outside Skubal? Neto can flip the barrel and raise it, even at advanced speeds at the top of the area.
These adjustments come with some very clear tradeoffs. All of these method-based aggressive flip side combined with passivity on the pitch of the region is relatively high strikeout efficiency. Neto plays more time almost 30% of the time and walks even fewer than last season. The crowded plates brought him into the inner court, and he had less reaction time when perching in the box. Although the pitcher has not reliably exploited this weakness, he is particularly vulnerable to rising and fastballs. It is indeed difficult to fine targets because the margin for error is small and the potential negative consequences are huge. If the pitcher misses inside, they risk Neto paying and grant him first base. If their pitch leaks on the plate, Neto can take advantage of this error. So far, he is doing this.
Neto’s new approach puts a lot of pressure on him to continue hitting to maintain the power of value, but I don’t think the extra base hit rate is a phantom of some kind of small sample. He made sense to play because he made a major mechanical change to it, and the increased power output was reflected in the hitting data. He doesn’t look like he’s part of Slugger in a 5-foot-11 sting. But thanks to these new statistics from baseball Savant, we can understand that slipping doesn’t just mean spinning the bat as quickly as possible.
