DataBaseball
2026
Nicky Lopez headshot

Players · L · 2B · 2026

Nicky Lopez

Age
31
B/T
L/R
Height
5' 10"
Weight
186 lb
Number
#33
Born
March 13, 1995 in Naperville, IL, United States
MLB debut
May 14, 2019
Drafted
2016, round 5
College
Creighton
High school
Naperville Central
dbWAR
3.4
12 season(s)
PA
266
AVG
.266
OBP
.319
SLG
.305
wRC+
78
100 = avg

Nicky Lopez is a second baseman for the Texas Rangers. So far in 2026 he has hit 1 home run and knocked in 24 RBIs, notching 62 hits across 266 plate appearances in 93 games. His batting average is .266, 9.1% higher than the league average of .244. He reached base at a .319 clip and slugged .305, for an OPS of .624, 13.2% lower than the league mark of .719 — 13th of 15 on his team, and 367th of 462 among MLB batters with 100+ plate appearances. He averaged 80.7 mph off the bat, hit 22.3% of balls in play at 95 mph or better and made contact on 81.7% of his swings. Adjusted for his ballpark and league, his 78 wRC+ puts his offence 22% below average. That comes to 0.3 dbWAR — -7.5 runs with the bat, +0.5 for the ballpark, -0.7 on the bases, +0.1 on double plays, +2.1 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+78
wOBA.284
ISO.039
BB%4.5%
WAR.3

How the WAR is built

Runs above replacement, 2026. These terms sum to +2.5 runs, divided by runs-per-win to give WAR. There is no fielding term.

Batting-7.5Ballpark+0.5Baserunning-0.7Double plays+0.1Position+2.1Replacement+8.1
BattingBallparkBaserunningDouble playsPositionReplacement

WAR by season

3.61.6-0.41920212223242526

Batting

Standard and advanced, by season.

Trend
2026TEX/CHC932666212451244.266.319.305.039.3214.5%16.5%.284-7.5780.3
2025CHC/LAA1328101044.042.179.042.000.05014.3%14.3%.135-4.2-27-0.3
2024CWS1214459612153767.241.312.294.053.2888.3%15.1%.278-12.5780.5
2023KC/ATL812625212562640.231.326.307.076.2769.9%15.3%.291-6.4770.6
2022KC13648099020132963.227.281.273.046.2656.0%13.1%.252-23.2570.0
2021KC147565149243224974.300.365.378.078.3478.7%13.1%.332+7.11053.6
2020KC551923411301841.201.286.266.065.2609.4%21.4%.256-10.755-0.4
2019KC1034029123011851.240.276.325.084.2734.5%12.7%.261-21.157-0.4

Pitching

Standard and advanced, by season.

Trend
2026TEX101.000041109.001.104.009.00.0215260.0
2025LAA100.100000010.0012.143.000.027.00292-0.0
2023ATL202.100042027.7111.402.570.07.7178263-0.2
2022KC101.0000320018.0029.113.000.00.0454734-0.3

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 LHP585112019.235.259.235.22615.5%
vs RHP2091835011135.273.333.322.29916.7%
Opponent batting by the side the hitter bats from, 2026. Counted from play-by-play, so totals can differ from the box-score season line by a plate appearance or two.
SplitPAABHHRBBSOAVGOBPSLGwOBAK%
vs LHB221000.500.500.500.4470.0%
vs RHB553001.600.600.600.53620.0%

Spray chart

Where every ball he put in play landed, 2026.

Loading 203 batted balls…

Contact quality

How hard and at what angle he hits it, over 202 tracked batted balls in 2026. Percentiles are against qualified batters.

Barrel rate
0.0%
0 barrels
Exit velocity
80.7
mph average
Max exit velo
104.7
mph, hardest hit
Hard hit
22.3%
95 mph or better
Sweet spot
28.6%
8–32° launch
Launch angle
-0.2°
average
Barrel rate0.0%
Exit velocity80.7 mph
Hard hit rate22.3%
Contact rate81.7%

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.

—.200.379.138—6 AB.18211 AB.40010 AB.13622 AB.35728 AB.34626 AB.14314 AB.30030 AB.23113 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 Nicky Lopez 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 situations266——————.266.319.305.284
Bases empty1341282900422.227.261.242.232
Runner on first5543151336.349.417.488.402
Runners on13310633124822.311.380.377.341
RISP786318021516.286.356.302.300

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

Pitch sequencing

What Nicky Lopez throws in each count, and what he follows each pitch with. Select any cell for the breakdown.

ShowBatter
FastballEephus

Select a count to see exactly what Nicky Lopez throws in it.

Pitch arsenal

What he throws, how hard, how often it misses, and what hitters do with it.

Fastball79.2%1962.81,53547.4%12.5%5——
Nicky Lopez's arsenal by usage. Velocity is average release speed in mph, spin in rpm, and whiff rate is misses per swing — the cleanest single measure of whether a pitch beats hitters. BAA and OPS are what hitters did against each pitch, credited to the one that ended the plate appearance, and are left blank under 15 at-bats.

Head to head

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Nicky Lopez

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.