Blue Jays rookie Davis Schneider is already a sensation, but he remains a mystery box

Most Toronto Blue Jays fans have already seen enough of Davis Schneider to know that they're smitten.

The rookie is a former 28th-round pick underdog story wielding a glove with an epic tale of its own, and he's hit .529/.579/.882 in his first four MLB games — setting an impressive record along the way.

Add in some top-notch lip foliage and you've got the recipe for a fan favourite. In fact, less than a week into Schneider's MLB career, there have already been merch sightings in the wild.

While Schneider didn't take long to worm his way into the hearts of Blue Jays fans, it will take the team itself quite some time to figure out what it has on its hands.

That's because the 24-year-old is the type of player who wins with reliability, not imposing physical tools. When a top prospect like Elly De La Cruz arrives on the scene and hits a mammoth 112-mph home run in his MLB debut while demonstrating he's one of the fastest men in the game, it's easy to say "this guy is going to be a star."

As good as Schneider has been, it's impossible to say the same.

His max exit velocity (107.5 mph) is in the 30th percentile among MLB hitters, while his sprint speed (27.2 ft/s) is in the 47th percentile. A four-game sample can't tell us definitively if those numbers represent his ceiling, but his Triple-A results offer some clues that it might not be far off.

His max EV with the Buffalo Bisons (109.7 mph) this season would rank 184th among 267 qualified MLB hitters. It's tougher to pin down his exact sprint speed without Triple-A running data, but Schneider has never stolen more than 17 bases in a minor-league season — and we've already seen him go full-out to log an infield hit in the majors, so it seems unlikely he has another gear.

From a defensive standpoint, it always takes a long time to determine a player's true talent or potential, especially when they aren't burners and lack a cannon arm. That will be especially true with Schneider because he bounces around the diamond and may take a while to accumulate a larger sample at an individual position.

None of this means Schneider can't excel at the major-league level, but his strengths are ones that leave room for uncertainty until he spends some time playing against the best players in the world.

Schneider has excellent plate discipline with a 15.1% walk rate in his minor-league career. That's an important skill, but we don't yet know if MLB pitchers will consider him enough of a threat to not simply pound the zone.

Pitches against him in his first four games have come in the zone 58.5% of the time, way above the MLB average (48.5%). Right now he's constantly getting challenged, and if opponents continue to see that as a viable strategy it will be hard for him to run a massive walk rate.

While Schneider doesn't absolutely scorch the baseball, some of his contact quality numbers at Triple-A were excellent nonetheless.

His max exit velocity was modest, but his average exit velocity (89.8 mph) was strong. If he could replicate that number in the majors, it would rank behind just Matt Chapman, Bo Bichette, and Vladimir Guerrero Jr. among Blue Jays regulars.

Producing his Triple-A sweet spot percentage (40.0%) in the majors would have him trailing just Bichette and Brandon Belt in Toronto.

Those metrics speak to a guy who compensates for mediocrity in pure ball-striking by regularly getting his barrel on the ball with solid juice and a launch angle likely to yield strong results. Belt is a good example of precisely that type of hitter, as he hasn't hit a ball harder than 109.9 mph since 2015, but has put up above-average numbers for more than a decade.

Consistency is what made Schneider special at Triple-A the season, but it's impossible to judge a player's ability to produce the same type of outcomes over and over again without a large sample. Like most 28th-round picks, he's the type of player who continually needs to prove himself. Even a spectacular debut hasn't brought that process to an end.

Without loud tools, Schneider will have to earn his keep with production — and production doesn't happen overnight.