DH · 2023

Ji Man Choi

Pittsburgh Pirates National League CentralDH

Age: 32
B/T: L/R
Height: 6' 0"
Weight: 260 lb
Number: #26

Born: May 19, 1991 in Incheon, Republic of Korea
MLB debut: April 5, 2016

dbWAR: 3.9
PA: 117
AVG: .163
OBP: .239
SLG: .385
wRC+: 64

Ji Man Choi is a designated hitter for the Pittsburgh Pirates. In 2023 he hit 6 home runs and knocked in 13 RBIs, notching 17 hits across 117 plate appearances in 38 games. His batting average was .163, 34.2% lower than the league average of .248. He reached base at a .239 clip and slugged .385, for an OPS of .624, 15.0% lower than the league mark of .734 — 14th of 20 on his team, and 376th of 461 among MLB batters with 100+ plate appearances. He averaged 93.4 mph off the bat, hit 59.2% of balls in play at 95 mph or better, barrelled 16.9% of them and made contact on 69.2% of his swings. Adjusted for his ballpark and league, his 64 wRC+ puts his offence 36% below average. That comes to -0.4 dbWAR — -5.1 runs with the bat, -0.1 on the bases, -3.0 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+64

wOBA.268

ISO.221

BB%8.5%

WAR-.4

How the WAR is built

Runs above replacement, 2023. These four terms sum to -4.3 runs, divided by runs-per-win to give WAR.

BattingBaserunningPositionReplacement

WAR by season

Batting

Standard and advanced, by season.


2023	38	117	17	6	13	0	10	35	.163	.239	.385	.221	.169	8.5%	29.9%	.268	-5.1	64	-0.4
2022	113	419	83	11	52	0	58	123	.233	.341	.388	.154	.320	13.8%	29.4%	.325	+4.7	112	1.0
2021	82	305	59	11	45	0	45	87	.229	.348	.411	.182	.300	14.8%	28.5%	.339	+5.5	123	0.9
2020	42	145	28	3	16	0	20	36	.230	.331	.410	.180	.291	13.8%	24.8%	.319	-0.4	98	0.1
2019	126	487	107	19	63	2	64	108	.261	.363	.459	.198	.303	13.1%	22.2%	.352	+12.1	123	1.5
2018	61	221	50	10	32	2	26	55	.263	.357	.505	.242	.315	11.8%	24.9%	.372	+9.6	140	1.1
2017	6	18	4	2	5	0	2	5	.267	.333	.733	.467	.222	11.1%	27.8%	.420	+1.4	164	0.2
2016	48	129	19	5	12	2	16	27	.170	.271	.339	.170	.173	12.4%	20.9%	.271	-5.2	67	-0.5

Platoon splits

How he hits left- and right-handed pitching.

Season

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.
Split	PA	AB	H	HR	BB	SO	AVG	OBP	SLG	wOBA	K%
vs LHP	22	19	2	1	2	12	.105	.182	.263	.195	54.5%
vs RHP	95	85	15	5	8	23	.176	.253	.412	.285	24.2%

Spray chart

Where every ball he put in play landed, 2023.

Loading 71 batted balls…

Contact quality

How hard and at what angle he hits it, over 71 tracked batted balls in 2023. Percentiles are against qualified batters.

Barrel rate: 16.9%
Exit velocity: 93.4
Max exit velo: 110.0
Hard hit: 59.2%
Sweet spot: 33.8%
Launch angle: 11.9°

Barrel rate16.9%

Exit velocity93.4 mph

Hard hit rate59.2%

Contact rate69.2%

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.

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 Ji Man Choi 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.
Situation	PA	AB	H	HR	RBI	BB	SO	AVG	OBP	SLG	wOBA
All situations	117	—	—	—	—	—	—	.163	.239	.385	.268
Bases empty	66	61	12	5	5	4	16	.197	.258	.492	.315
Runner on first · thin	24	20	2	1	2	4	9	.100	.250	.250	.238
Runners on	51	43	5	1	8	6	19	.116	.216	.233	.206
RISP	27	23	3	0	6	2	10	.130	.185	.217	.179

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, 2023.

Head to head

Put Ji Man Choi beside up to three others.

Compare — add up to 3 more players

Ji Man Choi

Similar players

Nearest 2023 seasons by discipline, contact, power and speed, on rate statistics rather than totals.

Giancarlo StantonNYY

wRC+: 85
HR: 24
AVG: .191
WAR: -0.4

Comparable

David VillarSF

wRC+: 51
HR: 5
AVG: .145
WAR: -0.5

Comparable

Shea LangeliersOAK

wRC+: 83
HR: 22
AVG: .205
WAR: 1.2

Comparable

Josh DonaldsonNYY

wRC+: 76
HR: 13
AVG: .152
WAR: 0.0

Comparable

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.