DataBaseball
2026
C.J. Cron headshot

1B · 2023

C.J. Cron

Age
33
B/T
R/R
Height
6' 4"
Weight
235 lb
Born
January 5, 1990 in Fullerton, CA, USA
MLB debut
May 3, 2014
dbWAR
10.6
9 season(s)
PA
278
AVG
.248
OBP
.295
SLG
.434
wRC+
87
100 = avg

C.J. Cron is a first baseman for the Colorado Rockies. In 2023 he hit 12 home runs and knocked in 37 RBIs, notching 64 hits across 278 plate appearances in 70 games. His batting average was .248, level with the league average of .248. He reached base at a .295 clip and slugged .434, for an OPS of .729, 0.7% lower than the league mark of .734 — 5th of 16 on his team, and 205th of 461 among MLB batters with 100+ plate appearances. He averaged 87.7 mph off the bat, hit 40.0% of balls in play at 95 mph or better, barrelled 12.3% of them and made contact on 71.7% of his swings. Adjusted for his ballpark and league, his 87 wRC+ puts his offence 13% below average. That comes to 0.1 dbWAR — -1.6 runs with the bat, -0.4 on the bases, -6.1 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, 2023.

wRC+87
wOBA.313
ISO.186
BB%6.1%
WAR.1

How the WAR is built

Runs above replacement, 2023. These four terms sum to +1.1 runs, divided by runs-per-win to give WAR.

Batting-1.6Baserunning-0.4Position-6.1Replacement+9.3
BattingBaserunningPositionReplacement

WAR by season

3.81.90.0151617181920212223

Batting

Standard and advanced, by season.

Trend
20237027864123701765.248.295.434.186.2846.1%23.4%.313-1.6870.1
202215063214829102043164.257.315.468.210.3076.8%25.9%.336+12.51042.0
20211425471322892160117.281.375.530.249.31611.0%21.4%.386+31.91373.8
202013528480916.190.346.548.357.18217.3%30.8%.378+2.51400.3
20191224991162578029107.253.311.469.216.2775.8%21.4%.327+1.91040.7
20181405601273074137145.253.323.493.240.2936.6%25.9%.350+14.51251.8
20179937384165632296.248.305.437.189.2965.9%25.7%.319-1.7980.2
2016114445113166922475.278.325.467.189.3025.4%16.9%.341+6.81161.1
201511240499165131782.262.300.439.177.2934.2%20.3%.321+1.31070.5

Platoon splits

How he hits left- and right-handed pitching.

Batting by the hand the pitcher throws with, 2023. Counted from play-by-play, so totals can differ from the box-score season line by a plate appearance or two.
SplitPAABHHRBBSOAVGOBPSLGwOBAK%
vs LHP6963162617.254.319.429.32624.6%
vs RHP20919548101148.246.287.436.30923.0%

Spray chart

Where every ball he put in play landed, 2023.

Loading 194 batted balls…

Contact quality

How hard and at what angle he hits it, over 195 tracked batted balls in 2023. Percentiles are against qualified batters.

Barrel rate
12.3%
24 barrels
Exit velocity
87.7
mph average
Max exit velo
114.5
mph, hardest hit
Hard hit
40.0%
95 mph or better
Sweet spot
33.8%
8–32° launch
Launch angle
12.9°
average
Barrel rate12.3%
Exit velocity87.7 mph
Hard hit rate40.0%
Contact rate71.7%

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, 2023.

.000.300.125.189.5008 AB.23517 AB2 AB.31822 AB.44829 AB.33318 AB.20015 AB.27322 AB.14328 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 .248.

Situational hitting

How C.J. Cron 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 situations278.248.295.434.313
Bases empty1401313566834.267.314.458.333
Runner on first67621113511.177.239.274.231
Runners on13812729631931.228.275.409.294
RISP716518528420.277.310.538.352

Runners on includes runners in scoring position, which is the convention every reference uses. Counted from play-by-play, 2023.

Head to head

Put C.J. Cron beside up to three others.

Compare — add up to 3 more players
C.J. Cron

Similar players

Nearest 2023 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.