DataBaseball
2026
Byron Buxton headshot

Players · B · CF · 2026

Byron Buxton

Age
33
B/T
R/R
Height
6' 1"
Weight
190 lb
Number
#25
Born
December 18, 1993 in Baxley, GA, United States
MLB debut
June 14, 2015
Drafted
2012, round 1
High school
Appling County
Salary, 2026
$15.1M
dbWAR
22.9
12 season(s)
PA
408
AVG
.254
OBP
.319
SLG
.511
wRC+
128
100 = avg

Byron Buxton is a center fielder for the Minnesota Twins. So far in 2026 he has hit 25 home runs and knocked in 46 RBIs, notching 94 hits across 408 plate appearances in 93 games. His batting average is .254, 4.2% higher than the league average of .244. He reached base at a .319 clip and slugged .511, for an OPS of .829, 15.4% higher than the league mark of .719 — the best on his team, and 42nd of 462 among MLB batters with 100+ plate appearances. He averaged 90.2 mph off the bat, hit 46.9% of balls in play at 95 mph or better, barrelled 14.4% of them and made contact on 68.7% of his swings. Adjusted for his ballpark and league, his 128 wRC+ puts his offence 28% above average. That comes to 2.9 dbWAR — +12.5 runs with the bat, +0.4 for the ballpark, +0.5 on the bases, +1.5 on double plays, +0.5 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, 2026.

wRC+128
wOBA.355
ISO.257
BB%7.4%
WAR2.9

How the WAR is built

Runs above replacement, 2026. These terms sum to +27.9 runs, divided by runs-per-win to give WAR. There is no fielding term.

Batting+12.5Ballpark+0.4Baserunning+0.5Double plays+1.5Position+0.5Replacement+12.6
BattingBallparkBaserunningDouble playsPositionReplacement

WAR by season

5.02.2-0.7151617181920212223242526

Batting

Standard and advanced, by season.

Trend
2026MIN93408942546730100.254.319.511.257.2797.4%24.5%.355+12.51282.9
2025MIN12654212935832441148.264.327.551.287.3027.6%27.3%.366+23.01315.0
2024MIN9938899185672099.279.335.524.245.3385.2%25.5%.367+17.41363.4
2023MIN85347631742935109.207.294.438.230.25310.1%31.4%.313-2.2940.4
2022MIN91382762851634116.224.306.526.303.2448.9%30.4%.358+14.21363.0
2021MIN6125472193291362.306.358.647.340.3445.1%24.4%.420+22.01733.5
2020MIN371353313272236.254.267.577.323.2411.5%26.7%.344+2.51160.8
2019MIN79295711046141968.262.314.513.251.3146.4%23.1%.343+5.01141.7
2018MIN279414045328.156.183.200.044.2263.2%29.8%.172-11.1-1-0.7
2017MIN13551111716512938150.253.314.413.160.3397.4%29.4%.315-4.1912.1
2016MIN893316710381023118.225.284.430.205.3296.9%35.6%.308-3.5901.1
2015MIN3713827262644.209.250.326.116.3014.3%31.9%.255-6.757-0.3

Platoon splits

How he hits left- and right-handed pitching.

Batting by the hand the pitcher throws with, 2026. Counted from play-by-play, so totals can differ from the box-score season line by a plate appearance or two.
SplitPAABHHRBBSOAVGOBPSLGwOBAK%
vs LHP115105274929.257.322.419.32525.2%
vs RHP29326567212171.253.317.547.36824.2%

Spray chart

Where every ball he put in play landed, 2026.

Loading 270 batted balls…

Contact quality

How hard and at what angle he hits it, over 271 tracked batted balls in 2026. Percentiles are against qualified batters.

Barrel rate
14.4%
39 barrels
Exit velocity
90.2
mph average
Max exit velo
111.9
mph, hardest hit
Hard hit
46.9%
95 mph or better
Sweet spot
33.9%
8–32° launch
Launch angle
20.4°
average
Barrel rate14.4%
Exit velocity90.2 mph
Hard hit rate46.9%
Contact rate68.7%

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, 2026.

.143.269.200.094.21414 AB.36025 AB.40015 AB.26730 AB.31435 AB.30243 AB.21414 AB.20040 AB.40035 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 Byron Buxton 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 situations408——————.254.319.511.355
Bases empty2322166217171360.287.336.593.395
Runner on first887619511917.250.352.487.369
Runners on176154328291740.208.295.396.302
RISP887813318823.167.239.308.234

Runners on includes runners in scoring position, which is the convention every reference uses. Counted from play-by-play, 2026.

Head to head

Put Byron Buxton beside up to three others.

Compare — add up to 3 more players
Byron Buxton

Similar players

Nearest 2026 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.