DataBaseball
2026
José Tena headshot

DH · 2026

José Tena

Age
25
B/T
L/R
Height
5' 10"
Weight
195 lb
Number
#8
Born
March 20, 2001 in San Cristobal, Dominican Republic
MLB debut
August 5, 2023
dbWAR
.7
3 season(s)
PA
232
AVG
.238
OBP
.310
SLG
.381
wRC+
91
100 = avg

José Tena is a designated hitter for the Washington Nationals. In 2026 he hit 5 home runs and knocked in 20 RBIs, notching 50 hits across 232 plate appearances in 89 games. His batting average was .238, 2.3% lower than the league average of .244. He reached base at a .310 clip and slugged .381, for an OPS of .691, 3.9% lower than the league mark of .719 — 9th of 14 on his team, and 238th of 417 among MLB batters with 100+ plate appearances. He averaged 91.5 mph off the bat, hit 49.3% of balls in play at 95 mph or better, barrelled 7.0% of them and made contact on 65.3% of his swings. Adjusted for his ballpark and league, his 91 wRC+ puts his offence 9% below average. That comes to -0.0 dbWAR — -1.7 runs with the bat, -0.5 on the bases, -5.5 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+91
wOBA.309
ISO.143
BB%8.6%
WAR-.0

How the WAR is built

Runs above replacement, 2026. These four terms sum to -0.0 runs, divided by runs-per-win to give WAR.

Batting-1.7Baserunning-0.5Position-5.5Replacement+7.7
BattingBaserunningPositionReplacement

WAR by season

0.40.2-0.0242526

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.
SplitPAABHHRBBSOAVGOBPSLGwOBAK%
vs LHP18145036.357.500.571.47333.3%
vs RHP2141964551762.230.294.367.29629.0%

Spray chart

Where every ball he put in play landed, 2026.

Loading 142 batted balls…

Contact quality

How hard and at what angle he hits it, over 142 tracked batted balls in 2026. Percentiles are against qualified batters.

Barrel rate
7.0%
10 barrels
Exit velocity
91.5
mph average
Max exit velo
114.0
mph, hardest hit
Hard hit
49.3%
95 mph or better
Sweet spot
32.4%
8–32° launch
Launch angle
8.8°
average
Barrel rate7.0%
Exit velocity91.5 mph
Hard hit rate49.3%
Contact rate65.3%

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.

.091.154.190.080.2508 AB.46213 AB6 AB.23517 AB.26730 AB.40020 AB.29417 AB.30813 AB.12516 AB
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 José Tena 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.
SituationPAABHHRRBIBBSOAVGOBPSLGwOBA
All situations232.238.310.381.309
Bases empty13111833441236.280.351.466.359
Runner on first4540603414.150.244.250.233
Runners on1019217116832.185.257.272.245
RISP565211113418.212.268.288.253

Runners on includes runners in scoring position, which is the convention every reference uses. Counted from play-by-play, 2026.

Batting

Standard and advanced, by season.

Trend
2026892325052032068.238.310.381.143.3288.6%29.3%.309-1.791-0.0
2025481693701631537.243.314.355.112.3198.9%21.9%.298-2.3880.4
202444168433156741.267.298.354.087.3424.2%24.4%.288-3.3840.3

Head to head

Put José Tena beside up to three others.

Compare — add up to 3 more players
José Tena

Similar players

Nearest 2026 seasons by discipline, contact, power and speed, on rate statistics rather than totals.

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.