Konnor Griffin's spring training success with Pirates goes far beyond just home runs

Since being ranked as the No.1 prospect in baseball, the expectations for Konnor Griffin have been nothing short of astronomical. He's still a few months shy of turning 20 years old but he's already being talked about in the context of a possible extension. Scouts and executives speak very highly of him but for many, this year's spring training was their first glimpse at what he could do firsthand.

Thus far, he has made the most out of the opportunity. He has posted a 1.124 OPS across 15 plate appearances and has an eye-watering .857 slugging percentage thanks to his three home runs. These moonshots are nothing short of impressive and have captured the majority of headlines, for good reason. However, outside of being cool to watch, they highlight something important about his readiness for the big leagues.

Konnor Griffin's quality of contact in spring training so far suggests that he's ready to be called up

Thanks to Statcast being available at every spring training ballpark this year, we can get a closer look at Griffin's batted ball metrics and they are just as outstanding as they seem. He ranks in the top decile of hitters for both 90th percentile exit velocity (109.1 mph) and max exit velocity (111.2 mph). More importantly, he's posting some of the best numbers on the Pirates so far.

Since it's a sample of fewer than 20 plate appearances, it can be difficult to determine how much of this could be sustained over a whole season, especially against a more consistent crop of major league pitchers. Luckily, we also have Statcast data from Griffin's tenure in Single-A this year and it follows a similar trend. Over 231 plate appearances, he had an average exit velocity of 90.7 mph and a max exit velocity of 114.2 mph.

One aspect to Griffin's approach that could use work before heading to the next level would be his plate discipline. He has yet to walk this spring and his chase rate is 32.3%. He doesn't swing and miss much on pitches outside of the zone but poor contact on these pitches is partially responsible for skewing his average exit velocity downward.

Even with these flaws, the young shortstop is knocking on the door of the big leagues. He's already slated to debut some time this year — but given what he has been able to accomplish so far in spring training, making the Opening Day roster isn't out of the question.

Pittsburgh doesn't exactly have the most compelling options at shortstop, which could give Griffin even more of an inside track to the show. The franchise has plenty to turn around but calling up one of baseball's most exciting prospects in years could be a real inflection point for an otherwise struggling club.