Cleveland Guardians Slugger Kyle Manzardo Matches Roger Maris With Bizarre Stat Line

Kyle Manzardo has had a feast-or-famine season at the plate thus far in 2025, as the Cleveland Guardians designated hitter has an .881 OPS in spite of his .211 BABIP.

Cleveland Guardians batter Kyle Manzardo celebrates after a ninth-inning walk against the Chicago White Sox. | Jeff Lange / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images

Kyle Manzardo has brought some serious power to the Cleveland Guardians' lineup this season, but he still hasn't been particularly lucky at the plate.

The 24-year-old designated hitter enters Wednesday's contest against the Minnesota Twins leading the Guardians with eight home runs, 19 RBIs and an .881 OPS through 26 games, ranking second on the team with a 0.7 WAR. Those are all significant improvements from Manzardo's rookie campaign in 2024, when he had five home runs, 15 RBIs, a .703 OPS and 0.0 WAR in 53 games.

At the same time, though, Manzardo's batting average on balls in play has fallen from .290 to .211.

As noted by MLB.com's Anthony Castrovince, only one player in MLB history has finished a season with an OPS of at least .881 and a BABIP of .211 or lower. New York Yankees legend Roger Maris achieved the feat back in 1961 – the same year he won his second consecutive MVP and set the single-season American League record with 61 home runs.

Maris had a career-high .993 OPS and career-low .209 BABIP that year.

Kyle Manzardo of the @CleGuardians has an .881 OPS despite just a .211 batting average on balls in play. Was curious if any qualifier has ever had an OPS that high with a BABIP that low.

It's a fun list! pic.twitter.com/OzUSVObCyE

— Anthony Castrovince (@castrovince) April 30, 2025

Manzardo has played a major part in the Guardians' 16-13 start to the season, so he has still left an overwhelmingly net-positive impact. Cleveland has been able to weather his feast-or-famine showing, and then some.

Cleveland and Minnesota split the first two games of their series at Progressive Field, leaving the fate of the divisional faceoff up to Wednesday and Thursday's contests.

Manzardo is 3-for-7 with a home run, a walk and a strikeout two games into the four-game set.

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