Jack Brannigan: Flexing Strong Exit Velocity Numbers Early In Pro Career

For the second straight season, the Pittsburgh Pirates used their third round pick on a two-way player. This year’s edition, Jack Brannigan, reportedly doesn’t want to pitch and instead wants to hit at the professional level. The Pirates liked him as a pitcher, just like Chandler.

Like Chandler last year, Brannigan is getting a chance to hit after signing, but isn’t going to pitch until next season at the earliest.

After playing two games in the Florida Complex League, Brannigan was promoted to Single-A Bradenton Marauders on August 6.

Brannigan has gotten off to a great start with the Marauders. He has a slash of .333/.417/.714, with two doubles, two home runs, four RBI, and two stolen bases in just six games.

It shouldn’t really be a surprise that Brannigan is handling Single-A pitching so well, as he was one of the top hitters on a Notre Dame squad that reached the College World Series. He hit the go-ahead home run against top ranked Tennessee in the game that clinched their victory in the Super Regionals and earned them the trip to Omaha.

What’s also been impressive has been Brannigan’s analytic numbers, and he’s been putting up plus exit velocity numbers in the early part of his pro career.

	Jack Brannigan	MLB Average
Exit Velocity	90.9 mph	88.4 mph
Launch Angle	25.17°	12.1°
Sweet Spot%	64.71%	33%
Hard Hit%	29.1%	35.8%
Barrel%	11.76%	6.7%

Brannigan has been incredible at barreling up the baseball, also sporting a 35.5% line drive rate (10-25° launch angle). His sweet spot percentage (8-32 degrees) is nearly double what the major league average is.

It’s a small sample size of just 17 batted ball events, but it’s impressive nonetheless to hit at that rate. The highest exit velocity he hit this year was 102.5 mph on the home run he hit against Palm Beach last week.

One thing noticeable about Brannigan is his willingness to go the other way. According to Fangraphs, he has an even pull/opposite field rate of 41.2% through his first six games with Bradenton.

Looking at some of the video of Brannigan during Palm Beach, you can see some of his biggest hits coming by going the other way.

In the first clip, Brannigan takes a 1-2 fastball the other way for a double. He had watched two other fastballs thrown for called strikes on the other half, but took the third to the right center field gap.

That’s followed up with Brannigan jumping all over a breaking pitch that caught a little too much of the plate, but was way out in front and scorched it foul. The next pitch was a fastball on the outer half that he put a good drive in the other way, but fell just short of the warning track for a fly out.

Finally, he is able to work a seven pitch at-bat that involved fouling off two breaking balls that dipped just below the strike zone, allowing him to drive a 2-2 fastball off the right center field wall. He saw a first pitch fastball, but then worked through five straight breaking balls before the pitcher threw anything else.

Brannigan has proven to be a tough out, and makes hard contact, while showing all the right metrics in believing he will continue to hit for power as he progresses through the system — eventually against more age appropriate competition.

While the intrigue rests with his potential on the mound as a two-way player, the righty is showing to be very capable with the bat and that he could be a prospect to watch even if they decide not to have him pitch.