DataBaseball
2026
Ryan Zimmerman headshot

1B · 2021

Ryan Zimmerman

Age
37
B/T
R/R
Height
6' 3"
Weight
215 lb
Number
#11
Born
September 28, 1984 in Washington, NC, USA
MLB debut
September 1, 2005
dbWAR
5.7
6 season(s)
PA
273
AVG
.243
OBP
.286
SLG
.471
wRC+
104
100 = avg

Ryan Zimmerman is a first baseman for the Washington Nationals. In 2021 he hit 14 home runs and knocked in 46 RBIs, notching 62 hits across 273 plate appearances in 110 games. His batting average was .243, level with the league average of .244. He reached base at a .286 clip and slugged .471, for an OPS of .756, 3.9% higher than the league mark of .728 — 6th of 20 on his team, and 162nd of 463 among MLB batters with 100+ plate appearances. He averaged 91.3 mph off the bat, hit 47.8% of balls in play at 95 mph or better, barrelled 10.6% of them and made contact on 71.0% of his swings. Adjusted for his ballpark and league, his 104 wRC+ puts his offence 4% above average. That comes to 0.3 dbWAR — +0.8 runs with the bat, -0.2 on the bases, -6.2 for the position he plays, against replacement level. It includes no fielding: defensive runs are proprietary and are not estimated here, so the figure credits playing a demanding position but not playing it well.

League context

Percentile among qualified batters, 2021.

wRC+104
wOBA.320
ISO.227
BB%5.9%
WAR.3

How the WAR is built

Runs above replacement, 2021. These four terms sum to +3.5 runs, divided by runs-per-win to give WAR.

Batting+0.8Baserunning-0.2Position-6.2Replacement+9.1
BattingBaserunningPositionReplacement

WAR by season

3.81.4-1.0151617181921

Batting

Standard and advanced, by season.

Trend
202111027362144601677.243.286.471.227.2895.9%28.2%.320+0.81040.3
2019521904462701739.257.321.415.158.2978.9%20.5%.316-1.1930.1
20188532376135113055.264.337.486.222.2849.3%17.0%.356+9.81211.4
201714257615936108144126.303.358.573.269.3357.6%21.9%.391+32.21433.8
2016115467931546429104.218.272.370.152.2486.2%22.3%.280-15.573-1.0
20159539086167313379.249.308.465.217.2688.5%20.3%.333+5.01111.1

Platoon splits

How he hits left- and right-handed pitching.

Batting by the hand the pitcher throws with, 2021. Counted from play-by-play, so totals can differ from the box-score season line by a plate appearance or two.
SplitPAABHHRBBSOAVGOBPSLGwOBAK%
vs LHP116110327535.291.319.582.37630.2%
vs RHP1571453071142.207.261.386.28026.8%

Spray chart

Where every ball he put in play landed, 2021.

Loading 179 batted balls…

Contact quality

How hard and at what angle he hits it, over 180 tracked batted balls in 2021. Percentiles are against qualified batters.

Barrel rate
10.6%
19 barrels
Exit velocity
91.3
mph average
Max exit velo
111.5
mph, hardest hit
Hard hit
47.8%
95 mph or better
Sweet spot
33.9%
8–32° launch
Launch angle
7.4°
average
Barrel rate10.6%
Exit velocity91.3 mph
Hard hit rate47.8%
Contact rate71.0%

A barrel is a batted ball whose exit velocity and launch angle have historically produced at least a .500 average and 1.500 slugging — 98 mph within 26–30°, widening to 8–50° by 116 mph. Reconstructed from Statcast's published anchor points, which reproduces them exactly; the interior is within a degree. Sweet spot (8–32°) is an exact definition.

Hot and cold zones

Batting average by pitch location, 2021.

.231.143.188.135.00010 AB.30813 AB.5008 AB.21723 AB.26926 AB.38918 AB.36422 AB.36025 AB.12516 AB
Below averageLeague averageAbove average
Batting average by location of the pitch that ended each plate appearance, catcher's view. The bordered square is the strike zone; the outer band is chase territory. Cells with fewer than 8 at-bats are left grey rather than shown as signal. League average on the same attribution is .243.

Situational hitting

How Ryan Zimmerman hits by base state, outs, score and late-game pressure — each read against his own season line.

Split by
By who is on base when he comes up. The season line is repeated as the baseline.
SituationPAABHHRRBIBBSOAVGOBPSLGwOBA
All situations273.243.286.471.320
Bases empty1221153045731.261.303.452.324
Runner on first666419412220.297.318.547.364
Runners on151140321041946.229.272.486.317
RISP857613629726.171.235.434.281

Runners on includes runners in scoring position, which is the convention every reference uses. Counted from play-by-play, 2021.

Head to head

Put Ryan Zimmerman beside up to three others.

Compare — add up to 3 more players
Ryan Zimmerman

Similar players

Nearest 2021 seasons by discipline, contact, power and speed, on rate statistics rather than totals.

How these are computed

wOBA uses linear weights measured from this season's own play-by-play rather than published constants, and wRC+ is park-adjusted against that same league. dbWAR is our own open implementation — not fWAR or bWAR — and the full derivation, including its simplifications, is on the methodology page.