What is Pull Rate? Definition and Examples

What Pull Rate Measures

Pull rate is the percentage of a hitter's batted balls hit to the side of the field they swing toward — left field for right-handed batters, right field for left-handed batters. It's one of three directional categories Statcast tracks (pull / center / opposite field), and it captures swing geometry and approach better than batting average alone. A pull-heavy hitter is rotating early through the zone and using the air on the pull side for power; an opposite-field hitter keeps the bat in the zone longer and uses the whole field.

How Pull Rate Is Measured

Statcast classifies every batted ball event (BBE) by the field section where it lands or is fielded. The fair-territory diamond is divided into three 30-degree wedges from home plate:

Pull Rate = (Batted Balls to Pull Field) / (Total Batted Balls in Play)

Strikeouts, walks, and HBPs are excluded — only balls put in play count. Baseball Savant and FanGraphs publish pull rate splits broken down further by batted-ball type (pull-ground, pull-fly, pull-line drive), which matters because pulled fly balls have dramatically higher slugging value than pulled grounders.

Worked Example

Isaac Paredes is the modern poster child for extreme pull-side power. In 2024, Paredes pulled roughly 53% of his batted balls — well above the MLB average near 40% — and the large majority of his home runs went to the pull-side gap and corner. His swing is engineered to put the ball in the air to the pull side, and he capitalizes on short porches like the Trop's left-field wall. Compare with Luis Arraez, whose pull rate sits near 30% — among the lowest in baseball for a regular. Arraez uses the whole field, generating contact and batting average over slug. Same plate appearance count, completely different batted-ball footprint.

Why Pull Rate Matters

Pull rate plus launch angle plus exit velocity gives you a home run profile. Pulled, elevated, hard-hit balls are the highest-slugging batted-ball category in baseball — slugging well over 2.000 leaguewide on pulled fly balls hit 95+ mph. Front offices target pull-side flyball hitters in stadium-specific contexts (Yankee Stadium, Great American Ball Park, Citizens Bank Park). After the 2023 shift restrictions, pull-heavy left-handed hitters with ground-ball tendencies (think Joey Gallo in earlier seasons) recovered some batting-average value because defenses can no longer stack the pull side. For DFS, pulled-flyball hitters in hitter-friendly pull-side parks are core stacking targets.

Limitations and Common Misconceptions

Pull rate alone tells you nothing about contact quality. A hitter who pulls 50% of their grounders into a shifted infield is very different from one pulling 50% of fly balls over the fence. Always combine pull rate with launch angle, hard-hit rate, and barrel rate. Pull rate also varies by pitch location — most hitters pull inside pitches and go opposite-field on outside pitches, so a high pull rate may signal a hitter who only sees (or only handles) inside pitches. Finally, pull rate is sometimes confused with "pull air rate" or "pull-fly rate," which are stricter and more predictive of power output.

Related Terms

• Launch Angle
• Hard-Hit Rate
• Barrel Rate
• Ground Ball Rate
• The Shift

In Legends Deck

Every hitter card carries a directional profile derived from Statcast pull/center/oppo splits. When you simulate an at-bat, the engine pulls from a hitter's actual spray distribution to determine where contact goes — and pulled fly balls check the park-factor table for that stadium's pull-side dimensions. A Paredes card in a short-porch park hits more homers than the same card in Petco. Real data, real outcomes.