Who is Steven Kwan?

Who is Steven Kwan?

He’s become baseball’s internet darling in under a week. Why is that? For starters, we all love an “out of nowhere” story. Kwan entered 2022 as the Guardian’s No. 27 ranked prospect according to Baseball America. As a 24-year-old that’s pretty uninspiring.

However, he has a particular skill set, which is another reason folks have fallen in love with his story.

The Good

Kwan is elite at making contact and getting on base. Those are two fundamental skills of being a hitter, so this seems good.

Entering Tuesday, Kwan has totaled 53 plate appearances since the starting of spring training. He has yet to strike out. That is amazing.

It is far too early to draw meaningful takeaways from most of his Statcast numbers, but his 100th percentile expected batting average seems promising.

One stat that we can draw conclusions from earlier than most is reach rate (O-swing%). By this metric, Kwan has also been impressive, ranking 13th in the majors with a 15.2% rate. Kwan and Eloy Jimenez are the only two batters who have yet to swing and miss this season.

The Questionable

We’ve established that Kwan is likely to hit for a good average while getting on base at a productive clip, so what isn’t to like?

The answer is power. Currently, Kwan is in the 40th percentile in Statcast’s max exit velocity. The issue is it has been just 5-6 days of baseball. Many hitters will surpass Kwan’s hardest hit ball of 103 mph, but will he be able to keep up?

In 2021 the lowest max exit velo among qualified hitters was 104.6 mph by Josh Rojas.

Just like everyone else, Kwan has plenty of time to record a harder hit batted ball event. Unlike everyone else, there are real questions as to whether or not he can.

If he can’t, would that be a huge issue? Depends. Max exit velocity isn’t overly predictive, but it is descriptive. It likely means Kwan’s ultimate power ceiling is 10-12 homers.

He combined for 12 long balls between Double-A and Triple-A last year, so it’s possible, but that’s on the high end.

Conclusion

Could Kwan ultimately become a .300 hitter with a .365 OBP, 10 homers, 10 steals, and a healthy amount of runs hitting atop the Guardians’ lineup? Definitely.

How much value that stat line has for fantasy likely depends on how deep your league is, the scoring format, etc. That is what I project right now, though I’ll admit the homer total could be a bit optimistic.

What I know is that Kwan is one of the most fun baseball players to come along in quite some time. That, in and of itself, is worth celebrating.