MLB · 3B · Cincinnati Reds
Ke'Bryan Hayes
B/T R/R · 5' 11" · 215 lb · born Tomball, TX, USA · age 29 · draft 2015 rd 1 · played 3B 81, DH 2 · MLB debut 2020-09-01
Last 14 days (through 2026-09-01): 7 G · .222 AVG · 0 HR · 0 RBI · .555 OPS
Injured 10-Day · Left groin strain. (roster status, as of )
211 plate appearances scored this season His season card →
The card rack
FlagshipKe'Bryan Hayes [Gold] #127 · 2026 Topps · 46 recent sales 7N ▼0.1%
Live on eBay now · asking, not sold · as of 2026-09-01 · paid links
The rookieKe'Bryan Hayes #P-9 · 2020 Topps Update Prospects · 16 recent sales 7N ▲0%
Live on eBay now · asking, not sold · as of 2026-09-01 · paid links
Paid link — as an eBay Partner, FVR earns from qualifying purchases. · Flagship = his most-traded card (the market’s reference); the rookie = the top card of his first card year. As of September 1, 2026 · trend is FVR's own nightly archive · prices via SportsCardsPro · what these terms mean
Scout’s note
A first-round pick in 2015 out of Tomball, Texas, Ke'Bryan Hayes was in the majors by age 23 and has played 706 big-league games with a .245 average and a .659 OPS — numbers that underwhelm the scouting reputation he arrived with. The engine says the reputation had it right. Hayes's EV95 of 104.85 is modest — harder than 35% of the sample but below the league median of 105.7 — yet his results on contact fall further below the physics than 99% of qualified hitters, a luck gap of -0.1447 that makes him our No. 1 breakout candidate. At 29, with a .153 average and .463 OPS in 78 MLB games for Cincinnati this season, he has been as cold as any hitter in baseball. The gap between barrel and box score is the widest on the board, and the season says the line has not caught up to it yet.
Note written · FVR scout (GLM-5.2)
Current signals
The read: Hayes is hitting the ball harder than 35% of the 379 qualified MLB hitters in our sample (EV95 104.8; league median 105.7), while his results on contact run further below the physics than 99% of them. Loud bat, quieter stat line — the breakout shape; he ranks No. 1 of 20 on the breakout board.
OWED — his contact has outrun his line. Where he sits in the league →
- EV95 (mph)
- 104.85
- Luck gap (park-adj)
- -0.1447
- Overlay score
- 1.1723
- Sprint (ft/s)
- 26.9
- Age
- 29
Where he stands
throughAgainst the 379 qualified major-league hitters — 100+ balls in play this season, the same field the boards are chosen out of. Right is better on every row.
- EV95104.835
- Deserved (xVal)0.38055
- Got (aVal)0.2251
- Luck gap (park-adjusted)flipped-0.14599
today · 30 days ago, against the 338 men who qualified then · the tick is the midpoint · the number at the right is the percentile, the number beside it the measurement itself.
What he’s paid
Under contractA market fact, not an engine read: what a club decided about him, on the season before this one. Figures from Cot’s, as of .
- 2026 salary
- $7.00M
- Tax hit
- $8.85M
- Service time
- 5 yr 75 d
- Guaranteed
- $70M
The deal 8 years $70M (2022–2029), club option for 2030 — $8.8M a year on average, worked out by us rather than stated on the sheet, and not the same thing as the tax hit above
On the sheet: 8 y/$70M (22-29)+30 cl opt · agent Ballengee · 3 / 3 options left
After this season, as the sheet has it
| Season | 2027 | 2028 | 2029 | 2030 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cash | $7.0M | $7.0M | $8.0M | $6.0M |
| Tax hit | $8.9M | $8.9M | $8.9M | Option |
Cash and the tax hit are two different rulebooks and are never subtracted from one another — see the payroll board for his club, Cincinnati Reds.
A second set of books
The same contract, read by MLB Spreadsheets (Ethan Hullihen), as of . We keep two sources on this because one source cannot check itself.
- Tax AAV
- $8.9M
- Guaranteed
- $70.0M
- Term
- 8 yrs
- His class
- Extension
What the sheet prices each season at
| Season | 2026 | 2027 | 2028 | 2029 | 2030 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Salary | $7.0M | $7.0M | $8.0M | $8.0M | $12.0M |
A base salary under his own reading, and never subtracted from the cash figure above: a signing bonus lands in one and not the other, so the two disagree on most men without either being wrong. And the sheet does not mark which future seasons are GUARANTEED — a club option and a projected arbitration award are both just a number here, so read past the end of the deal as his forecast rather than as money owed.
Two sources, read a month apart, put this guarantee at the same dollar. That is the check, and it passed.
The tax AAV above is his number under the CBA’s own rulebook, not the average we work out from Cot’s total. On a contract with deferred money the two come apart on purpose — and neither is subtracted from the other.
What we said about him
Filed before the fact, with a metric, a threshold and a deadline, and never edited afterwards. This is the call we have on him. The whole record →
results on contact, vs the filing baseline — +0.022 from a baseline of 0.2107 (frozen at filing, off games through ), by .
Resolved : +0.0138 against the +0.022 we called.
A call is filed with a metric, a threshold and a window, timestamped, and never edited afterwards. Corrections are appended and the original stands. Hits, misses and open calls are all counted at the ledger.
On the record
Tap card to enlarge
Ke'Bryan Hayes cards on eBay →Paid link — as an eBay Partner, FVR earns from qualifying purchases.
Collect Ke'Bryan Hayes
If the signal is right, the cardboard usually finds out later. Current listings:
Ke'Bryan Hayes cards on eBay →Paid link — as an eBay Partner, FVR earns from qualifying purchases.
Not financial advice. We take positions only after publication — never before. Misses stay on the record.
Umpire favor
-1.1 net runs over 31 graded games — the zone cost the umpire more than it gave, on balance.
The line
| Year | Team | Lvl | G | AB | R | H | HR | RBI | SB | BB | SO | AVG | OPS |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2020 | Pittsburgh Pirates | MLB | 24 | 85 | 17 | 32 | 5 | 11 | 1 | 9 | 20 | .376 | 1.124 |
| 2021 | Pittsburgh Pirates | MLB | 96 | 362 | 49 | 93 | 6 | 38 | 9 | 31 | 87 | .257 | .689 |
| 2022 | Pittsburgh Pirates | MLB | 136 | 505 | 55 | 123 | 7 | 41 | 20 | 48 | 122 | .244 | .659 |
| 2023 | Pittsburgh Pirates | MLB | 124 | 494 | 65 | 134 | 15 | 61 | 10 | 28 | 104 | .271 | .762 |
| 2024 | Pittsburgh Pirates | MLB | 96 | 365 | 38 | 85 | 4 | 25 | 11 | 23 | 75 | .233 | .573 |
| 2025 | Pittsburgh Pirates | MLB | 100 | 369 | 34 | 87 | 2 | 36 | 10 | 18 | 81 | .236 | .569 |
| 2025 | Cincinnati Reds | MLB | 52 | 158 | 16 | 37 | 3 | 13 | 2 | 18 | 30 | .234 | .657 |
| 2025 | Total | MLB | 152 | 527 | 50 | 124 | 5 | 49 | 12 | 36 | 111 | .235 | .596 |
| 2026 | Cincinnati Reds | MLB | 78 | 196 | 19 | 30 | 5 | 8 | 1 | 13 | 40 | .153 | .463 |
| MLB CAREER | 706 | 2534 | 293 | 621 | 47 | 233 | 64 | 188 | 559 | .245 | .659 | ||
Bio & season lines: MLB StatsAPI · refreshed nightly · abbreviations →