RF · 2024
Ben Gamel
- Age
- 32
- B/T
- L/L
- Height
- 5' 10"
- Weight
- 180 lb
- Number
- #39
- Born
- May 17, 1992 in Neptune Beach, FL, USA
- MLB debut
- May 6, 2016
- Drafted
- 2010, round 10
- High school
- Bishop Kenny
- dbWAR
- .4 1 season(s)
- PA
- 99
- AVG
- .247
- OBP
- .384
- SLG
- .333
- wRC+
- 112 100 = avg
Ben Gamel is a right fielder for the Houston Astros. In 2024 he hit 1 home run and knocked in 4 RBIs, notching 20 hits across 99 plate appearances in 35 games. His batting average was .247, 1.5% higher than the league average of .243. He reached base at a .384 clip and slugged .333, for an OPS of .717, 0.8% higher than the league mark of .711. He averaged 88.2 mph off the bat, hit 36.8% of balls in play at 95 mph or better, barrelled 7.0% of them and made contact on 65.8% of his swings. Adjusted for his ballpark and league, his 112 wRC+ puts his offence 12% above average. That comes to 0.4 dbWAR — +1.5 runs with the bat, -0.1 on the bases, -1.3 for the position he plays, against replacement level. It includes no fielding: defensive runs are proprietary and are not estimated here, so the figure credits playing a demanding position but not playing it well.
League context
Percentile among qualified batters, 2024.
How the WAR is built
Runs above replacement, 2024. These four terms sum to +3.5 runs, divided by runs-per-win to give WAR.
Platoon splits
How he hits left- and right-handed pitching.
| Split | PA | AB | H | HR | BB | SO | AVG | OBP | SLG | wOBA | K% |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| vs LHP | 18 | 15 | 4 | 0 | 3 | 5 | .267 | .389 | .333 | .336 | 27.8% |
| vs RHP | 81 | 66 | 16 | 1 | 15 | 19 | .242 | .383 | .333 | .330 | 23.5% |
Spray chart
Where every ball he put in play landed, 2024.
Loading 56 batted balls…
Contact quality
How hard and at what angle he hits it, over 57 tracked batted balls in 2024. Percentiles are against qualified batters.
- Barrel rate
- 7.0% 4 barrels
- Exit velocity
- 88.2 mph average
- Max exit velo
- 110.5 mph, hardest hit
- Hard hit
- 36.8% 95 mph or better
- Sweet spot
- 47.4% 8–32° launch
- Launch angle
- 11.9° average
A barrel is a batted ball whose exit velocity and launch angle have historically produced at least a .500 average and 1.500 slugging — 98 mph within 26–30°, widening to 8–50° by 116 mph. Reconstructed from Statcast's published anchor points, which reproduces them exactly; the interior is within a degree. Sweet spot (8–32°) is an exact definition.
Hot and cold zones
Batting average by pitch location, 2024.
Situational hitting
How Ben Gamel hits by base state, outs, score and late-game pressure — each read against his own season line.
| Situation | PA | AB | H | HR | RBI | BB | SO | AVG | OBP | SLG | wOBA |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| All situations | 99 | — | — | — | — | — | — | .247 | .384 | .333 | .331 |
| Bases empty | 56 | 48 | 11 | 1 | 1 | 8 | 13 | .229 | .339 | .333 | .309 |
| Runner on first · thin | 21 | 18 | 5 | 0 | 0 | 3 | 7 | .278 | .381 | .389 | .347 |
| Runners on | 43 | 33 | 9 | 0 | 3 | 10 | 11 | .273 | .442 | .333 | .360 |
| RISP · thin | 22 | 15 | 4 | 0 | 3 | 7 | 4 | .267 | .500 | .267 | .373 |
Runners on includes runners in scoring position, which is the convention every reference uses. Rows under 25 plate appearances are marked thin — at that size a rate moves several dozen points on one hit. Counted from play-by-play, 2024.
Batting
Standard and advanced, by season.
| Trend | ||||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2024 | 35 | 99 | 20 | 1 | 4 | 1 | 18 | 24 | .247 | .384 | .333 | .086 | .339 | 18.2% | 24.2% | .331 | +1.5 | 112 | 0.4 | — |
Head to head
Put Ben Gamel beside up to three others.
wOBA uses linear weights measured from this season's own play-by-play rather than published constants, and wRC+ is park-adjusted against that same league. dbWAR is our own open implementation — not fWAR or bWAR — and the full derivation, including its simplifications, is on the methodology page.