Multiple things can be true at once. For example:
Ronald Acuña Jr. is off to one of the worst starts of his career. Also: Ronald Acuña Jr. is getting on base at a higher rate than most hitters.
Another: Ronald Acuña Jr. has the lowest hard-hit rate of his career. Also: Ronald Acuña Jr. has been very unlucky this season.
One more: Ronald Acuña Jr. is bad at ABS challenges. Also: Ronald Acuña Jr. is striking out at his lowest rate since his MVP 2023 season with a strong walk rate that's better than his career average.
So, yes, there's been good and bad with Acuña's start to 2026. On the surface, however, it appears mostly bad. His .239 average is the worst of his career through his first 29 games, while his .714 OPS is his second-lowest mark through that span, as are his eight RBIs, 39 total bases and .358 slugging percentage. It's all looked eerily similar to another of his recent seasons. More on that in a bit.
But depending on how you look at it, there's reason for hope or concern. Let's break it down.
THE GOOD
He's crushing a lot of baseballs.
Entering play Tuesday, Acuña's had 28 batted balls of 100 mph or higher. But only 12 have been hits. That means just about 43 percent of Acuña's batted balls of 100 mph or higher have landed him on base. The league average hit rate on those batted balls? Almost 57 percent. That's why Acuña's expected slugging percentage is .499 while his actual slugging percentage is .358.
Does it matter? Yes. These kinds of hard-hit balls are what you want from your superstar player. While Acuña's overall hard-hit rate (43 percent) would be the lowest of his career, a change in luck when he hits lasers would have a dramatic effect on his traditional stats. One tangible example was a nearly 108 mph fly ball he hit against the Phillies on April 18 that resulted in a home run robbery at the hands of Brandon Marsh.
He's still getting on base at a well-above-average clip.
Acuña's .356 on-base percentage entering Tuesday is significantly above the MLB average (.322 through Sunday), which shows that Acuña can still be a key offensive cog even when his batting average and slug are well below his standards. And that can be a big differentiator between a league-average player and a superstar. Much of this is driven by a 13.6 percent walk rate, which is higher than his 12 percent career average.
Does it matter? Yes. The goal is to get on base however you can and keep the line moving. Acuña is doing that. Most MLB hitters would happily take a .356 OBP every day of the week. That Acuña's still reaching base at a strong rate despite everything else shows how valuable he can be. A superstar who still helps the team win even when mired in a long slump is a special player. In this regard, Acuña remains special.
He's striking out at a much lower rate than normal.
Acuña's 18.9 percent strikeout rate is the second-lowest of his career and his lowest since having an 11.4 percent rate in his 2023 MVP season. A big reason for this is because he's making in-zone contact at his highest rate since 2023. He's made contact with 80.5 percent of pitches in the zone this season, up from 73.8 percent last season and above his career average of 79 percent. For comparison, he made contact on 85.6 percent of strikes when he won NL MVP. And while his chase rate is up from last season (25.6 percent vs. 23.2 percent), his chase contact rate is also up (59.5 percent vs. 57.4 percent).
Does it matter? Yes. That Acuña is still making contact on hittable pitches matters a lot. It says he's not being blown away or fooled with any regularity and could mean he's this close to getting on track. If his dip in bat speed is the result of something mechanical -- at 35 degrees, his stance is more than twice as open as it's ever been, for example -- that's sometimes an easy fix once it's identified. If that's the case here, the Acuña everyone expected to see this season could be just a few games away.
THE BAD
He's really struggling vs. fastballs.
Through 29 games, Acuña's batting just .211 on heaters, which would be the lowest mark of his career. Last season, he hit .306 on the pitch. And in 2023, when he won NL MVP on the strength of the first 40-70 season, he hit .338. Though he's been somewhat unlucky on fastballs this season (.249 xBA), he's still a long way from his career .287 average.
Does it matter? Maybe. If Acuña continues to struggle with the fastball -- still the most common pitch in baseball -- it's unlikely that he'll remain a consistent run producer. This would be true of any hitter. But Acuña is not just any hitter, and everyone -- the Braves, their fans, even Acuña himself -- are counting on the "real" Acuña showing up eventually. Related: While his bat speed remains excellent (75.6 mph, in MLB's 91st percentile), it's slowed since last season (76.4 mph) and his MVP season in 2023 (77.3 mph). That slightly slower swing can be the difference between a hit and an out.
His speed is also in a slump.
Even in 2023, when Acuña stole 73 bases, his sprint speed wasn't elite -- just a good-not-great 28 feet per second, which ranked in MLB's 67th percentile. And that was before a second ACL surgery in 2024. This year, his average sprint speed is just 26.5 feet/second, well below the MLB average and ranking in just the 36th percentile. Even without elite speed, Acuña's base running has always been one of his most effective tools. This season, however, that tool looks to be dulled.
Does it matter? Yes and no. Context matters. If Acuña still wants to be a 30-30 or 40-40 guy, then yes, the dip in speed would be a big deal. But if Acuña wants to de-emphasize stolen bases, then it probably won't matter much. There's nothing wrong with a 30-15 or 40-10 season. However, stolen bases aren't the only thing affected by a drop in sprint speed. It also means fewer infield hits, fewer singles turned into doubles, fewer doubles turned into triples and, in theory, fewer runs scored.
He's really struggled with ABS challenges.
Acuña has made 10 challenges and has lost six times. While a few have been understandably close calls from a batter's perspective, most have been questionable -- both in terms of pitch location and timing/leverage. For example, one of Acuña's first challenges of the season came in the first inning with a 1-0 count. The review proved the pitch to be firmly in the strike zone.
Does it matter? A little, but not really. The frequent challenge losses can be annoying to fans, and potentially damaging from a team perspective, but they've not had any meaningful effect on the outcome of games so far. Acuña's poor success rate could mean he's just not seeing the ball as well as he does when he's locked in and raking. When you factor in everything else we've just covered, it's not a bad theory.
So, what's the verdict?
Everything we know about Acuña says the early 2026 version is almost certainly not the true Acuña. We don't have to look any further back than the World Baseball Classic in March, when he carried a .962 OPS and clubbed two homers for a championship Venezuela team and looked a lot like the MVP version of himself. One of those homers was an impressive opposite-field blast off Japan's Yoshinobu Yamamoto, one of the best pitchers in baseball, so it's not like the talent has faded.
But if all this sounds familiar, it's because this season has started eerily similar to 2024, when Acuña played just 49 games and never really got going before his second ACL tear in late May. In those first 49 games, these were his stats: .250 average, four homers, 15 RBIs, a .351 on-base percentage and a .716 OPS. But he ended that campaign on a modest surge that led to an .849 OPS over his final eight games before the injury. Was the "real" Acuña about to break out? We'll never know.
None of that means anything for this season, however.
Ultimately, baseball is sometimes weird and unexplainable. Things just happen. Even the best players can start cold and stay cold for longer than we expect. But talent almost always makes itself known and produces some significant noise.
So, don't be surprised if Acuña gets noisy before too long.