How Fast Is Byron Buxton?

Byron Buxton is the second fastest in baseball. Sorry to disappoint the speed enthusiasts.

When it comes to the fastest man in the game, the Reds’ Billy Hamilton has the bragging rights, covering a 30.1 feet per second, while Buxton checks in right behind him at 29.9 feet per second. On the complete opposite end of the spectrum is someone Twins fans might recall seeing move at a snail’s pace in a recent series: Albert Pujols. Pujols’ running abilities are obviously hampered by injuries but nevertheless at 23.3 feet per second, he is the slowest man in baseball. In case you wanted to know who the slowest man in a Twins uniform is, that honor is shared by two men: Jason Castro and Kennys Vargas.

If you are wondering how the sausage is made, MLB’s Mike Petriello explains how it all works:

As we discussed in April, we're measuring speed in terms of "feet per second in a player's fastest one-second window," because feet and seconds make a lot more sense in the context of baseball than miles and hours. While three feet per second may not sound like much, if you were to maintain that speed for four or five seconds, suddenly you're talking 12-15 feet. It can be the difference between being safe or out or not even trying. While Hamilton averages about 30 feet per second, Olympian Usain Bolt, by comparison, has reached up to 37 feet per second in his first 40 meters.

The sausage-makers also did you a favor by removing the instances when a runner was jogging to first or pulled up to trot home on an uncontested play. Sprint Speed is only interested in maximum effort plays.

Considering that when I first started writing about baseball before the advent of Pitch FX and I had to chart my own swing-and-misses and pitch types during games, this is a substantial innovation. It is novel, to be sure, but I still am left thinking about the applicable use of this specific metric. It will help settle some bar bets and I certainly can see this number splayed on a broadcast after someone like Buxton covers a ton of territory in the outfield or rips a triple, but in terms of the analysis of the game? Part of me just wants StatCast to release a generic baseball skill leaderboard. I want to sort through the rankings of guys’ home-to-first times, catcher’s POP times and a pitcher’s delivery time -- things of that nature so I won’t have to bring a stopwatch to a game (note: I do not bring a stopwatch to a game). MLB probably won’t do this because sites like Fangraphs or Baseball Prospectus could use that data to create their own metrics, so we have to be satisfied with the morsels that MLBAM provides us.

While this data may be a surface-scratcher, there are some things of interest when you parse the list. Take note of the fastball Minnesota Twins:

Eduardo Escobar happens to be the fourth-fastest member of the Twins with an above average speed of 28 feet per second. That would be considered swift. Yet over his seven year career, he is just 8-for-17 in stole base attempts, averaging just five attempts per year. How is it that he is such a bad base-stealer? Are his leads inferior? Does his jumps suck? What is it about Escobar that makes a fleet-footed individual below-average at stealing bases? StatCast’s data leads to more questions which, unfortunately, have to be addressed through more StatCast data that isn’t available.

Oh well.

At least we now know Byron Buxton is very fast.

*Not a real thing but you bought it for a brief second which just goes to show how little you pay attention to StatCast.