Another day, another at-bat, another home run for Fernando Tatis Jr. The San Diego Padres star went deep in his first at-bat Sunday afternoon, giving him six home runs in his last 12 at-bats with the Triple-A El Paso Chihuahuas. Tatis is playing minor-league rehab games in advance of rejoining the Padres this coming Thursday.
Here is Sunday's blast. Tatis hit three homers Thursday and two homers Saturday. He did not play Friday.
Entering Sunday's game Tatis owned a .536/.618/1.250 slash line with six homers, six walks, and two strikeouts in seven Triple-A games. They are the first seven Triple-A games of his career, it should be noted. Tatis skipped right over Triple-A and made the jump from Double-A to MLB when the made the Padres out of spring training in 2019.
The results have obviously been fantastic. Tatis is vaporizing the ball in Triple-A. What about the underlying numbers? Here's what Statcast says about the quality of Tatis' contact during his dominant Triple-A stint:
| 2021 in MLB | 2023 in Triple-A | 2023 MLB average | |
|---|---|---|---|
Average exit velocity | 93.9 mph | 94.9 mph | 89.0 mph |
Hard-hit rate | 55.6% | 61.5% | 39.0% |
Barrel rate | 21.3% | 26.9% | 8.0% |
Hard-hit rate is the percentage of batted balls over 95 mph and a barrel is a batted ball similar to other batted balls that produced a .500 batting average and a 1.500 slugging percentage. Barrels are the best possible contact, basically. Tatis has always been an exit velocity monster. Truly elite, top-of-the league numbers. That has continued to be true in Triple-A.
Of course, we're talking about a tiny sample and Triple-A competition, so you'd expect Tatis to dominate. It is worth nothing that, in addition to the 80-game performance-enhancing drug suspension, Tatis is also returning from two left wrist surgeries and a left shoulder surgery. That he's hitting the ball this hard suggests the wrist and shoulder are feeling good.
Players nearing a return from a PED suspension are allowed to play in minor league games to prepare for their return. Tatis is eligible to rejoin the Padres this coming Thursday, April 20. That will be the first game of a four-game series with the Arizona Diamondbacks at Chase Field.
Tatis, 23, authored a .282/.364/.611 batting line with 25 stolen bases and a National League leading 42 home runs in 130 games in 2021. He has not played in an MLB game since the final day of the 2021 season.
