William Contreras Has Found the Wrong Way to Pull the Ball in the Air

Despite being one of the best offensive catchers in baseball for most of the current decade, William Contreras has not fully tapped into his talent at the plate. Contreras has flashed prodigious power over the years, hitting baseballs at elite exit velocities. Even while playing with a broken finger last season, he still posted an excellent 90th-percentile exit velocity of 107.4 mph.

The issue has been Contreras hitting more than half of his contact on the ground in most seasons, running one of baseball’s highest ground-ball rates. If he could find a way to launch those hard-hit balls in the air, he could also become one of the game’s best power hitters.

That change to his flight plan has technically happened this year. Contreras’s ground-ball rate has fallen to a career-low 43.5% in 2026. For the first time since a cup of coffee with Atlanta in 2021, his 17.2% pull air rate slightly exceeds the league average. And yet, Contreras is hitting for less power than he ever has as a full-time player, managing just a .118 isolated power and a modest .406 slugging average. His 107 wRC+ is the lowest of his Brewers career.

There’s a bit of misfortune here, as Contreras’s .340 xwOBA suggests he should have notched a few more extra-base hits. More importantly, though, his seemingly improved pull air rate is misleading. Not every batted ball pulled in the air is equally productive.

Contreras’s overall hard-hit rate is down to 43.5% this season. That’s still slightly above the league average, but it’s the worst mark of his career. When he is hitting the ball at power trajectories—a high enough angle for a fly ball to travel into a gap or over the fence—he’s often hitting it around 90 mph, which typically makes for a routine flyout. Contreras’s xwOBA on contact this year is .360, an improvement over last season, but still lower than his best years in 2023 and 2024.

Back in May, Matt Trueblood covered how this year’s changes to Contreras’s stance, stride, and swing path have pushed his contact point further out in front without an increase in power. Now, we’ve seen how those shifts have played out in the first half.

Contreras is still making great contact against fastballs, slugging .475 against them with a .499 xSLG. According to Statcast’s swing timing data, his bat is more lined up on hard stuff than ever before. However, by forcing his contact point further in front, he’s been unable to wait back as consistently on breaking and offspeed pitches.

With that slightly flatter bat path, Contreras doesn't roll over the ball as often when he’s early. He’s meeting soft stuff in a better spot vertically, but many of those early swings are producing harmless pop-ups.

Last season, Contreras slugged .367 against breaking pitches and .403 against offspeed pitches, hitting a combined eight of his 16 home runs against them. This year, he’s slugging .258 and .361, respectively, with just one homer. He's already popped out 15 times against non-fastballs this year. On 10 of them, he was well out in front, making contact at least 32 inches in front of his body.

For the fourth straight season, the Brewers have one of baseball’s lowest pull air rates as an offense. They’re not against pulling the ball in the air, but they want their hitters to get there in what they deem the right way, while still having a balanced approach. Contreras seems to have strayed from that a bit, and the ironic result has been less damage for a hitter who has long carried the potential to be even more than he already is, despite hitting balls in the general direction and on the general trajectory people have always cried out for.