Stat Leader Focus: Average Exit Velocity — Elly De La Cruz Crushes the Field
Elly De La Cruz leads MLB in average exit velocity over the last 30 days at 98.8 mph, a full 1.8 mph ahead of second-place James Wood.
Numbers through 2026-10-04 (rolling 30 days).
Elly De La Cruz is hitting the ball harder than anyone in baseball right now, and it isn't close. Over the rolling 30-day window ending 2026-10-04, the Cincinnati Reds shortstop leads MLB in average exit velocity at 98.8 mph across 47 batted balls — a full 1.8 mph ahead of second-place James Wood of the Washington Nationals, who sits at 97.0 mph on 44 batted balls. De La Cruz pairs that top-end velocity with a 70.2% hard-hit rate, the best mark on this leaderboard, meaning more than seven of every ten balls he puts in play leave the bat at 95 mph or harder.
The Leaderboard
| Player | Team | Avg Exit Velo (mph) | BBE | Avg EV (mph) | HH% |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Elly De La Cruz | Cincinnati Reds | 98.8 | 47 | 98.8 | 70.2 |
| James Wood | Washington Nationals | 97.0 | 44 | 97.0 | 65.9 |
| Jared Young | New York Mets | 95.0 | 32 | 95.0 | 59.4 |
| Jackson Merrill | San Diego Padres | 94.4 | 70 | 94.4 | 57.1 |
| Munetaka Murakami | Chicago White Sox | 94.4 | 40 | 94.4 | 57.5 |
| Yordan Alvarez | Houston Astros | 94.4 | 55 | 94.4 | 60.0 |
| Francisco Alvarez | New York Mets | 93.9 | 35 | 93.9 | 62.9 |
| Agustín Ramírez | Miami Marlins | 93.6 | 31 | 93.6 | 54.8 |
| Thomas Saggese | St. Louis Cardinals | 93.6 | 49 | 93.6 | 53.1 |
| Brett Baty | New York Mets | 93.5 | 36 | 93.5 | 44.4 |
Three Mets — Jared Young, Francisco Alvarez, and Brett Baty — occupy spots in the top ten, and Jackson Merrill's 70 batted balls give him the largest sample on the board while still holding a 94.4 mph average.
What Average Exit Velocity Measures
Average exit velocity is the mean speed of the ball off the bat across all of a player's batted-ball events, as captured by Statcast. Every groundout, line drive, and home run counts equally, which makes it a pure measure of how consistently hard a hitter strikes the ball — no outcomes, no luck, just contact quality. This leaderboard requires a minimum of 30 batted balls in the window to qualify.
League average exit velocity sits around 88-89 mph. Anything above 90 mph is above average, 92 mph or better marks a genuine power threat, and 95 mph-plus over a full month is elite territory. De La Cruz's 98.8 mph is nearly ten full ticks above league average — a gap that translates directly into harder line drives, more extra-base hits, and more mistakes punished.
Why It Matters
Front offices use average exit velocity to separate sustainable power from hot streaks. A hitter can run a lucky batting average for weeks, but consistently producing 94-plus mph contact — as Merrill, Murakami, and Yordan Alvarez all did at exactly 94.4 mph — reflects a repeatable skill that projects forward. When a player's EV jumps, his contract-year valuation and trade value jump with it.
Fantasy and DFS players use the same signal. Exit velocity surges show up in the data days before they show up in the box score, making this leaderboard an early-warning system for breakouts and a confirmation tool before paying up for a bat.
In Legends Deck
In Legends Deck, average exit velocity feeds directly into card power ratings. A 98.8 mph month like De La Cruz's pushes his card's contact-quality attributes toward the top of the scale, which means his simulated at-bats generate harder contact, more barrels, and more extra-base outcomes against any pitching card you line him up against. Hard-hit rate matters too — that 70.2% mark means his card's floor stays high even when the simulation dice don't roll his way. Francisco Alvarez's 62.9% hard-hit rate on a 35-batted-ball sample is exactly the kind of profile that makes a card outperform its overall rating in-game.
Want to put this leaderboard to work? Browse the Legends Deck marketplace and find the cards whose real-world Statcast form is peaking right now.