SS · 2023
Yu Chang
- Age
- 28
- B/T
- R/R
- Height
- 6' 1"
- Weight
- 209 lb
- Born
- August 18, 1995 in Taitung, Taiwan
- MLB debut
- June 28, 2019
- dbWAR
- -.4 6 season(s)
- PA
- 112
- AVG
- .162
- OBP
- .200
- SLG
- .352
- wRC+
- 41 100 = avg
Yu Chang is a shortstop for the Boston Red Sox. In 2023 he hit 6 home runs and knocked in 18 RBIs, notching 17 hits across 112 plate appearances in 36 games. His batting average was .162, 34.8% lower than the league average of .248. He reached base at a .200 clip and slugged .352, for an OPS of .552, 24.8% lower than the league mark of .734 — the worst on his team, and 434th of 461 among MLB batters with 100+ plate appearances. He averaged 86.4 mph off the bat, hit 38.9% of balls in play at 95 mph or better, barrelled 5.6% of them and made contact on 65.2% of his swings. Adjusted for his ballpark and league, his 41 wRC+ puts his offence 59% below average. That comes to -0.2 dbWAR — -7.9 runs with the bat, +0.7 on the bases, +1.1 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.
How the WAR is built
Runs above replacement, 2023. These four terms sum to -2.3 runs, divided by runs-per-win to give WAR.
WAR by season
Batting
Standard and advanced, by season.
| Trend | ||||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2023 | 36 | 112 | 17 | 6 | 18 | 4 | 3 | 34 | .162 | .200 | .352 | .190 | .169 | 2.7% | 30.4% | .236 | -7.9 | 41 | -0.2 | |
| 2022 | 65 | 190 | 35 | 4 | 15 | 0 | 16 | 59 | .208 | .289 | .315 | .107 | .290 | 8.4% | 31.1% | .275 | -5.6 | 76 | 0.0 | |
| 2021 | 83 | 251 | 54 | 9 | 39 | 1 | 11 | 69 | .228 | .267 | .426 | .198 | .281 | 4.4% | 27.5% | .296 | -4.5 | 87 | 0.1 | |
| 2020 | 6 | 13 | 2 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 2 | 4 | .182 | .308 | .182 | .000 | .286 | 15.4% | 30.8% | .247 | -0.8 | 48 | -0.0 | |
| 2019 | 27 | 84 | 13 | 1 | 6 | 0 | 11 | 22 | .178 | .286 | .274 | .096 | .240 | 13.1% | 26.2% | .257 | -4.7 | 56 | -0.1 |
Pitching
Standard and advanced, by season.
| Trend | |||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2022 | 2 | 0 | 2.0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 6 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 13.50 | 9.61 | 3.00 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 340 | 242 | -0.1 | — |
Platoon splits
How he hits left- and right-handed pitching.
| Split | PA | AB | H | HR | BB | SO | AVG | OBP | SLG | wOBA | K% |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| vs LHP | 24 | 23 | 4 | 2 | 0 | 7 | .174 | .208 | .478 | .285 | 29.2% |
| vs RHP | 87 | 81 | 13 | 4 | 3 | 26 | .160 | .200 | .321 | .225 | 29.9% |
Spray chart
Where every ball he put in play landed, 2023.
Loading 72 batted balls…
Contact quality
How hard and at what angle he hits it, over 72 tracked batted balls in 2023. Percentiles are against qualified batters.
- Barrel rate
- 5.6% 4 barrels
- Exit velocity
- 86.4 mph average
- Max exit velo
- 109.7 mph, hardest hit
- Hard hit
- 38.9% 95 mph or better
- Sweet spot
- 34.7% 8–32° launch
- Launch angle
- 8.7° average
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.
Situational hitting
How Yu Chang hits by base state, outs, score and late-game pressure — each read against his own season line.
| Situation | PA | AB | H | HR | RBI | BB | SO | AVG | OBP | SLG | wOBA |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| All situations | 112 | — | — | — | — | — | — | .162 | .200 | .352 | .236 |
| Bases empty | 54 | 52 | 6 | 3 | 3 | 2 | 20 | .115 | .148 | .308 | .193 |
| Runner on first | 26 | 23 | 2 | 2 | 4 | 0 | 7 | .087 | .125 | .348 | .196 |
| Runners on | 57 | 52 | 11 | 3 | 15 | 1 | 13 | .212 | .255 | .404 | .283 |
| RISP | 31 | 29 | 9 | 1 | 11 | 1 | 6 | .310 | .355 | .448 | .351 |
Runners on includes runners in scoring position, which is the convention every reference uses. Counted from play-by-play, 2023.
Head to head
Put Yu Chang beside up to three others.
Similar players
Nearest 2023 seasons by discipline, contact, power and speed, on rate statistics rather than totals.
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.