Aaron Judge Shohei Ohtani Credit: MLB.com

Aaron Judge and Shohei Ohtani are two of the best that Major League Baseball has to offer. The two superstars will soon convene against each other next weekend for an epic showdown. But before we get there, the two became intertwined on Sunday without them even realizing it.

Judge and Ohtani are two of MLB’s best hitters. They’ve also been two of the absolute best at barreling the ball. A ‘barrel’ in baseball is when a hitter’s exit velocity exceeds 98 miles per hour.

As one X user pointed out, both Judge and Ohtani are so far ahead of the pace in MLB this year in this category that it’s absurd. Seriously.

X user Sretcher (@Sretcher7) said, “The MLB average barrel rate this season is 7.2%. Shohei Ohtani sports a 19.1% barrel rate, 100th percentile on Statcast. That’s insane. Aaron Judge has a 29.3% barrel rate. That’s over 10% higher than the guy listed as 100th percentile in that category.”

That is just ridiculous. It’s clear why these two are two of the best players in MLB, and while you don’t just need one stat to prove that, that’s fine. There’s several others that show that too. The MLB world had much to say over this eye-popping statistic.

[Sretcher7]

About Chris Novak

Chris Novak has been talking and writing about sports ever since he can remember. Previously, Novak wrote for and managed sites in the SB Nation network for nearly a decade from 2013-2022