DataBaseball
2026
Donovan Walton headshot

2B · 2026

Donovan Walton

Age
32
B/T
L/R
Height
5' 9"
Weight
190 lb
Number
#29
Born
May 25, 1994 in Dallas, TX, USA
MLB debut
September 10, 2019
Drafted
2015, round 23
College
Oklahoma State
High school
Bishop Kelley
dbWAR
.8
4 season(s)
PA
140
AVG
.285
OBP
.362
SLG
.455
wRC+
136
100 = avg

Donovan Walton is a second baseman for the Los Angeles Angels. In 2026 he hit 3 home runs and knocked in 16 RBIs, notching 35 hits across 140 plate appearances in 46 games. His batting average was .285, 16.8% higher than the league average of .244. He reached base at a .362 clip and slugged .455, for an OPS of .818, 13.7% higher than the league mark of .719 — the third best on his team, and 57th of 417 among MLB batters with 100+ plate appearances. He averaged 84.9 mph off the bat, hit 34.0% of balls in play at 95 mph or better, barrelled 4.0% of them and made contact on 75.7% of his swings. Adjusted for his ballpark and league, his 136 wRC+ puts his offence 36% above average. That comes to 0.9 dbWAR — +5.0 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, 2026.

wRC+136
wOBA.362
ISO.171
BB%10.0%
WAR.9

How the WAR is built

Runs above replacement, 2026. These four terms sum to +9.2 runs, divided by runs-per-win to give WAR.

Batting+5.0Baserunning-0.4Position-0.1Replacement+4.7
BattingBaserunningPositionReplacement

WAR by season

0.90.4-0.1242526

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 LHP15132102.154.154.385.22413.3%
vs RHP1251103321423.300.384.464.37618.4%

Spray chart

Where every ball he put in play landed, 2026.

Loading 100 batted balls…

Contact quality

How hard and at what angle he hits it, over 100 tracked batted balls in 2026. Percentiles are against qualified batters.

Barrel rate
4.0%
4 barrels
Exit velocity
84.9
mph average
Max exit velo
105.6
mph, hardest hit
Hard hit
34.0%
95 mph or better
Sweet spot
44.0%
8–32° launch
Launch angle
9.8°
average
Barrel rate4.0%
Exit velocity84.9 mph
Hard hit rate34.0%
Contact rate75.7%

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.

.250.1675 AB.50010 AB5 AB.21119 AB.47117 AB.40010 AB.31316 AB.2229 AB5 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 Donovan Walton 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 situations140.285.362.455.362
Bases empty81752122615.280.333.467.349
Runner on first · thin221950214.263.333.368.317
Runners on594814114810.292.404.438.379
RISP3729911276.310.444.483.415

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, 2026.

Batting

Standard and advanced, by season.

Trend
2026461403531611425.285.362.455.171.33710.0%17.9%.362+5.01360.9
202529101001.125.125.125.000.1430.0%11.1%.111-1.5-41-0.1
2024825312027.136.240.273.136.1438.0%28.0%.239-1.550-0.1

Pitching

Standard and advanced, by season.

Trend
2024101.000020000.003.172.000.00.00780.0

Head to head

Put Donovan Walton beside up to three others.

Compare — add up to 3 more players
Donovan Walton

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.