This off-season, I’m starting a new series highlighting one standout statistic from an Astros minor league player in 2025. The stat might be positive or negative, but it will always be noteworthy.
Previous Stats:
STAT OF THE WEEK:
Zach Cole posted a .260 ISO in 2025.
ISO, short for isolated power, is a measure of a hitter’s raw power and tells you how often a player hits for extra bases. ISO is a useful statistic because it lets you look at the number os extra base hits per at-bat and signals the degree to which a hitter is a power hitter. Cole’s .260 OPS led all of Astros minor leaguers with at least 300 PAs. This was the highest ISO rate posted by an Astros minor leaguer (minimum 400 PAs) since Enmanuel Valdez posted a .279 ISO rate in 2021. The highest prior to that was Kyle Tucker in 2019.
Cole put together a tremendous 2025 season, posting a .260 ISO that translated to 48 extra-base hits in just 358 at-bats. He tallied 22 doubles, 7 triples, and 19 home runs across 97 minor league games. Perhaps the most impressive part of his season was the turnaround, after recording a .649 OPS in April and a .779 OPS in May, he caught fire, producing a .994 OPS over his next 68 games before earning a call-up.
Once in the majors, Cole continued to perform at a high level, hitting .255 with 2 doubles, 4 home runs, and 11 RBIs while posting an .880 OPS over 25 games. His strong finish was worth 0.6 WAR and a 139 OPS+, capping off an outstanding year of development and production.
Cole appears to have firmly established himself at the big-league level and is positioned to compete for a spot on the Astros’ Opening Day roster in 2026.
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