It's a story we've heard time and time again at this point; the Cleveland Guardians needed power and slugging so they went out and signed Josh Bell in free agency to fill that void.
Bell hasn't lived up to those expectations this season while not looking comfortable at the plate.
But the full story is much more complicated than that.
At face value, Bell's numbers don't look great. He currently owns a slash line of .240/.330/.403 with an OPS of .773 which is comparable to his 2020 season. There's no denying that fans and Bell were hoping that'd he be able to contribute more at the plate. At this point, he has 11 home runs and 47 RBI.
However, the advanced statistics suggest that Bell hasn't been as bad as it may appear.
Bell's expected stats from Baseball Savant are comparable to a hitter who's been getting on base at a high rate this season. He currently sits in the 81st percentile in xwOBA, 76th percentile in xBA, and 75th percentile in xSLG.
The former Silver Slugger currently has an xBA of .271 which is tied with Nick Castellanos (.271), better than All-Star J.D. Martinez (.270), Juan Soto (.262), Corbin Carroll (.258), and Francisco Lindor (.246) just to name a few.
Bell's xSLG of .457 is also similar to Yandy Diaz (.457), Adley Rutschman (.455), and Julio Rodriguez (.433).
So, when we're taking into account factors such as exit velocity, launch angle, sprint speed, contact, and the other components that go into advanced stats, it gives us a clearer picture of where Bell could and should be at this point of the season.
This is a similar story to what happened to Josh Naylor at the beginning of the season. Another slugger was hitting the ball just as hard as anyone in the Big Legues but just couldn't get hits to fall.
Naylor had a batting average of .250 in March and .208 in April. But he didn't let himself get too deep into the numbers since he knew he was making hard contact.
Since then, Naylor has become the Guardians' best hitter this season and one of the most consistent batters in all of baseball. He holds an OPS of 1.059 and a true (not expected) batting average of .378 over the last 10 weeks.
The same turnaround that Naylor had at the beginning of June may be on the horizon for Bell too. In Bell's last 15 games, he's hit three home runs, has more RBI (10) than strikeouts (9), and is slugging .481 with a batting average of .278.
The results have not been there for Bell this season which of course is frusterating. However, if Josh can take the lessons of another first baseman/DH named Josh, it's that if he keeps hitting the ball hard and making contact, he'll come around to be an important piece in the Middle of Cleveland's lineup.
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Somehow Josh Naylor Wasn't An All-Star
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