C · 2026

César Salazar

Age: 30
B/T: L/R
Height: 5' 8"
Weight: 198 lb
Number: #18

Born: March 15, 1996 in Hermosillo, SO, Mexico
MLB debut: April 2, 2023
Drafted: 2018, round 7
College: Arizona
High school: Sahuaro

dbWAR: -.0
PA: 22
AVG: .056
OBP: .227
SLG: .056
wRC+: -2

César Salazar is a catcher for the Houston Astros. In 2026 he hit 0 home runs and knocked in 1 RBI, notching 1 hit across 22 plate appearances in 7 games. His batting average was .056, 77.2% lower than the league average of .244. He reached base at a .227 clip and slugged .056, for an OPS of .283, 60.7% lower than the league mark of .719. He averaged 86.2 mph off the bat, hit 33.3% of balls in play at 95 mph or better and made contact on 85.7% of his swings. Adjusted for his ballpark and league, his -2 wRC+ puts his offence 102% below average. That comes to -0.2 dbWAR — -2.6 runs with the bat, -0.0 on the bases, +0.4 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, 2026.

wRC+-2

wOBA.173

ISO.000

BB%13.6%

WAR-.2

How the WAR is built

Runs above replacement, 2026. These four terms sum to -1.5 runs, divided by runs-per-win to give WAR.

BattingBaserunningPositionReplacement

WAR by season

Platoon splits

How he hits left- and right-handed pitching.

Batting by the hand the pitcher throws with, 2026. Counted from play-by-play, so totals can differ from the box-score season line by a plate appearance or two.
Split	PA	AB	H	HR	BB	SO	AVG	OBP	SLG	wOBA	K%
vs LHP	5	5	1	0	0	0	.200	.200	.200	.178	0.0%
vs RHP	17	13	0	0	3	3	.000	.235	.000	.172	17.6%

Opponent batting by the side the hitter bats from, 2026. Counted from play-by-play, so totals can differ from the box-score season line by a plate appearance or two.
Split	PA	AB	H	HR	BB	SO	AVG	OBP	SLG	wOBA	K%
vs LHB	3	3	0	0	0	0	.000	.000	.000	.000	0.0%
vs RHB	1	1	1	1	0	0	1.000	1.000	4.000	2.015	0.0%

Spray chart

Where every ball he put in play landed, 2026.

Loading 15 batted balls…

Contact quality

How hard and at what angle he hits it, over 15 tracked batted balls in 2026. Percentiles are against qualified batters.

Barrel rate: 0.0%
Exit velocity: 86.2
Max exit velo: 101.3
Hard hit: 33.3%
Sweet spot: 20.0%
Launch angle: 9.1°

Barrel rate0.0%

Exit velocity86.2 mph

Hard hit rate33.3%

Contact rate85.7%

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, 2026.

Below averageLeague averageAbove average

Batting average by location of the pitch that ended each plate appearance, catcher's view. The bordered square is the strike zone; the outer band is chase territory. Cells with fewer than 8 at-bats are left grey rather than shown as signal. League average on the same attribution is .243.

Situational hitting

How César Salazar hits by base state, outs, score and late-game pressure — each read against his own season line.

Split by

By who is on base when he comes up. The season line is repeated as the baseline.
Situation	PA	AB	H	HR	RBI	BB	SO	AVG	OBP	SLG	wOBA
All situations	22	—	—	—	—	—	—	.056	.227	.056	.173
Bases empty · thin	16	13	1	0	0	3	2	.077	.250	.077	.191
Runner on first · thin	3	3	0	0	0	0	1	.000	.000	.000	.000
Runners on · thin	6	5	0	0	1	0	1	.000	.167	.000	.124
RISP · thin	3	2	0	0	1	0	0	.000	.333	.000	.249

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, 2026.

Pitch sequencing

What César Salazar throws in each count, and what he follows each pitch with. Select any cell for the breakdown.

ShowBatter

Eephus

Select a count to see exactly what César Salazar throws in it.

Pitch arsenal

What he throws, how hard, and how often it misses in 2026.


Eephus	100.0%	10	51.1	1,426	20.0%	0.0%

César Salazar's arsenal by usage. Velocity is average release speed in mph, spin in rpm, and whiff rate is misses per swing — the cleanest single measure of whether a pitch beats hitters.

Batting

Standard and advanced, by season.


2026	7	22	1	1	3	3	.056	.227	.056	.000	.067	13.6%	13.6%	.173	-2.6	-2	-0.2
2025	9	16	3	1	2	2	.231	.375	.231	.000	.273	12.5%	12.5%	.302	-0.2	92	0.0
2024	12	32	8	8	2	6	.320	.387	.400	.080	.381	6.3%	18.8%	.346	+0.9	122	0.2

Pitching

Standard and advanced, by season.

																			Trend
2026	1	0	1.0	0	0	0	1	1	0	0	9.00	16.09	1.00	0.0	0.0	216	385	-0.1
2025	1	0	1.0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0.00	6.14	0.00	0.0	0.0	0	148	-0.0

Head to head

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César Salazar

How these are computed

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.