Yainer Diaz teased us in 2023. It feels like he was too good to be true. I kept expecting him to regress. He never did.
I mean, why would a guy who had a 127 wRC+ only get 377 plate appearances? That was 40th in the league out of 245 players with 350+ PA’s. And on the rare occasions he got to play his natural position, catcher, his wRC+ was 170, the highest among catchers with at least 150 PA’s.
And this performance does not appear to be a fluke. Here’s a look at his Statcast expected numbers and barrel statistics.