Ben Rice Stats Prove He's The 'Real Deal'
Ben Rice will celebrate the two-year anniversary of his major league debut later Thursday and the anniversaries are different in terms of the Yankees knowing what they have as compared to his potential.
Rice was originally called up when veteran Anthony Rizzo broke his forearm in a Sunday night game at Fenway Park in a collision at first base. During the two months Rizzo was out, Rice showed some flashes, including a three-homer game against the Red Sox that made him the first rookie in team history to do so.
Still, Rice's first taste of major league pitching was mostly a struggle in terms of the surface numbers with a .171 average, seven homers and 23 RBIs.
Despite the low average, the Yankees believed there was a potent bat based on some "under the hood" numbers that indicate things like bad luck.
Ben Rice now a legit MVP candidate
If Aaron Judge's rib fracture was not limiting his normal production and eventually sending him to the injured list indefinitely, then there's a good chance he would be on the way to a fourth AL MVP.
Judge is injured on a long-term basis for the first time since 2023, and the Yankees feel they can handle his lengthy absence significantly better this time around since they are not trotting out the likes of Willie Calhoun, Isiah Kiner-Falefa, amongst others in their lineup.
Rice is among the reasons for being more capable of surviving Judge's absence, something manager Aaron Boone noted on Tuesday by quipping, "he's got a one" in front of his OPS and "he's got a two" in front of his homer total, so that's pretty good.
Rice heads into his two-year anniversary among eight players with 20 homers. He also has a 1.001 OPS, making him and Yordan Alvarez the only players with an OPS over 1.000.
What does Statcast say about Ben Rice?
The Yankees fondly refer to Rice as "Benny Barrels" due to his penchant for hitting the ball hard.
In terms of the always-popular exit velocity, Rice is 25th at 92.1 mph, which is 3.9 mph behind major league leader Oneil Cruz, who is currently injured.
Another way the Yankees and others gauge Rice's progress is hard hit percentage, which gives a player credit for hitting the ball at least 95 mph. Rice is 38th at 48.4% and has 88 batted balls hit at least 95 mph.
Within the context of a qualified first baseman, Rice is among the best on the Statcast leaderboard.
His average exit velocity is third and only trails injured White Sox rookie Munetaka Murakami and Atlanta's Matt Olson. He is eighth among first basemen in hard-hit percentage.
Compared to last season, Rice's Statcast numbers are slightly down as his hard-hit rate was 56.1% last season and the average exit velocity was 93.3, The tradeoff was Rice hitting .255, 26 homers and 65 RBIs with a performance that accelerated towards the end of 2025.
A year ago, Rice was batting .181 in June, but after that, there was a gradual improvement. After hitting .232 in July, Rice batted .298 over the final two months as Paul Goldschmidt struggled down the stretch.
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How is Rice performing vs. lefties?
With any left-handed bat, the question is how they will perform against left-handed pitching. It is why managers often platoon and utter the word "reverse splits".
Rice won't be platooning anytime soon. He is hitting .282 against left-handed pitching and .284 off left-handed starters.
Rice's performance against lefties is a stark improvement from last season, when he batted .208 off southpaws and an even worse .164 versus left-handed starters.
Rice's success against southpaws is also part of the Yankees' largest success against those pitchers. Through 72 games, the Yankees are hitting .259 against those pitchers, which is fourth in the majors and their .801 OPS off those pitchers is the best in the game and aided by 33 homers off lefties and 92 walks versus those pitchers.
Will Ben Rice be an All-Star?
The short answer is yes. Rice will probably join Cody Bellinger and Cam Schlittler at the midsummer classic next month in Philadelphia.
Whether Rice's selection is via fan voting or other methods is unknown.
Earlier this week, the first set of results in All-Star balloting was released, and Rice was a distant second to Vladimir Guerrero Jr. Rice was at 509,830 votes compared to the 603,014 votes for Guerrero, who has an entire country behind him due to his identity as a franchise player for the Blue Jays.
Guerrero is experiencing somewhat of a down year in terms of power with only three homers, but also has a stranglehold on starting All-Star games. Guerrero has been the AL starting first baseman in four of the previous five All-Star games, so Rice catching him in the fan balloting might be a difficult challenge.
The last Yankee first baseman to start an All-Star game was 2009, when Mark Teixeira did it, and before that was Jason Giambi in 2004.
Rice may not become the starting first baseman in the All-Star game, but his emergence as an 12th-round pick out of Dartmouth is an All-Star story paying off for the Yankees.
Related: Key Ben Rice Stats Show His Beast-Mode Start Isn't a Fluke
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This story was originally published June 18, 2026 at 9:13 AM.