DataBaseball
2026
Rafael Ortega headshot

CF · 2024

Rafael Ortega

Age
33
B/T
L/R
Height
6' 0"
Weight
200 lb
Number
#0
Born
May 15, 1991 in El Tigre, Venezuela
MLB debut
September 30, 2012
dbWAR
-.2
1 season(s)
PA
17
AVG
.071
OBP
.176
SLG
.071
wRC+
-24
100 = avg

Rafael Ortega is a center fielder for the Chicago White Sox. In 2024 he hit 0 home runs and knocked in 1 RBI, notching 1 hit across 17 plate appearances in 8 games. His batting average was .071, 70.6% lower than the league average of .243. He reached base at a .176 clip and slugged .071, for an OPS of .248, 65.1% lower than the league mark of .711. He averaged 79.8 mph off the bat, hit 45.5% of balls in play at 95 mph or better and made contact on 70.4% of his swings. Adjusted for his ballpark and league, his -24 wRC+ puts his offence 124% below average. That comes to -0.2 dbWAR — -2.5 runs with the bat, +0.4 on the bases, +0.1 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, 2024.

wRC+-24
wOBA.136
ISO.000
BB%11.8%
WAR-.2

How the WAR is built

Runs above replacement, 2024. These four terms sum to -1.5 runs, divided by runs-per-win to give WAR.

Batting-2.5Baserunning+0.4Position+0.1Replacement+0.6
BattingBaserunningPositionReplacement

Platoon splits

How he hits left- and right-handed pitching.

Batting by the hand the pitcher throws with, 2024. Counted from play-by-play, so totals can differ from the box-score season line by a plate appearance or two.
SplitPAABHHRBBSOAVGOBPSLGwOBAK%
vs LHP551002.200.200.200.17840.0%
vs RHP1290022.000.167.000.11916.7%

Spray chart

Where every ball he put in play landed, 2024.

Loading 11 batted balls…

Contact quality

How hard and at what angle he hits it, over 11 tracked batted balls in 2024. Percentiles are against qualified batters.

Barrel rate
0.0%
0 barrels
Exit velocity
79.8
mph average
Max exit velo
104.1
mph, hardest hit
Hard hit
45.5%
95 mph or better
Sweet spot
18.2%
8–32° launch
Launch angle
11.1°
average
Barrel rate0.0%
Exit velocity79.8 mph
Hard hit rate45.5%
Contact rate70.4%

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, 2024.

1 AB1 AB2 AB2 AB2 AB0 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 Rafael Ortega 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 situations17.071.176.071.136
Bases empty · thin9710022.143.333.143.257
Runner on first · thin4400000.000.000.000.000
Runners on · thin8700102.000.000.000.000
RISP · thin4300102.000.000.000.000

Runners on includes runners in scoring position, which is the convention every reference uses. Rows under 25 plate appearances are marked thin — at that size a rate moves several dozen points on one hit. Counted from play-by-play, 2024.

Batting

Standard and advanced, by season.

Trend
2024817101224.071.176.071.000.09111.8%23.5%.136-2.5-24-0.2

Head to head

Put Rafael Ortega beside up to three others.

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Rafael Ortega
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.