Kris Bryant
Bryant's career arc tells the story of a player who peaked early and couldn't sustain elite production. His 2016 MVP season—39 homers, .939 OPS, and a World Series title with the Cubs—represents the ceiling of what looked like a generational talent. That 127 OPS+ was the best mark of his career, and he's never come close to replicating it.
The decline has been steady and concerning. Bryant's career 106 OPS+ suggests he's been merely above-average over his 11 seasons, a far cry from the superstar trajectory many expected after he captured Rookie of the Year honors. At 34, his .273 average and 184 career home runs are respectable but underwhelming for a former third overall pick.
The Cubs' decision to trade him in 2021 looks prescient now. Bryant became a cautionary tale about early peaks—sometimes the best version of a player comes right at the start, and everything after is just managing expectations.
Career · Batting
13 seasons| Year | Team | G | AB | HR | RBI | AVG | OPS | OPS+ |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2015 | — | 151 | 559 | 26 | 99 | — | — | — |
| 2016 | — | 155 | 603 | 39 | 102 | — | — | — |
| 2017 | — | 151 | 549 | 29 | 73 | — | — | — |
| 2018 | — | 102 | 389 | 13 | 52 | — | — | — |
| 2019 | — | 147 | 543 | 31 | 77 | — | — | — |
| 2020 | — | 34 | 131 | 4 | 11 | — | — | — |
| 2021 | — | 93 | 326 | 18 | 51 | — | — | — |
| 2021 | — | 51 | 187 | 7 | 22 | — | — | — |
| 2021 | — | 144 | 513 | 25 | 73 | — | — | — |
| 2022 | — | 42 | 160 | 5 | 14 | — | — | — |
| 2023 | — | 80 | 300 | 10 | 31 | — | — | — |
| 2024 | — | 37 | 133 | 2 | 15 | — | — | — |
| 2025 | — | 11 | 39 | 0 | 1 | — | — | — |
| Career | 1198 | 4432 | 209 | 621 | — | — | — | |
Every ball this hitter has put in play — how hard it left the bat, and at what angle. The red field behind the dots shows how much damage that kind of contact does, league-wide: the darker the red, the better things go for the hitter.
The field — league-average xwOBA (what a batted ball is typically worth: 0.0 is a sure out, ~2.0 a sure home run) for every exit-velocity × launch-angle combination, measured from 1.3 million regular-season balls in play since 2015. The dark ridge — balls hit 105+ mph at 25–30° — is the barrel zone, where contact becomes near-automatic extra bases.
The dots — this hitter’s career regular-season balls in play, grouped to a fine grid; a bigger dot means more batted balls at that exact combination. Dots piled onto the red ridge are damage; dots low on the pale field are weak or mishit contact. Spring training and the postseason are excluded.
Matchups, projections, comps — grounded in Lahman, Retrosheet, and Statcast.