Milwaukee Brewers: Eric Thames’ has provided a big boost on offense

After a rough 2018 season, Eric Thames has bounced back in 2019 which the Milwaukee Brewers have greatly needed on offense.

Prior to the 2017 season, the Milwaukee Brewers signed Eric Thames who had been playing in Korea for a few seasons. And while at the time it was a low-key signing, Thames would come out of nowhere with 31 home runs and an .877 OPS to play a key role in the offense that season.

The hope entering the 2018 season was that Thames would be able to build upon that success as the full-time first baseman, but an early season IL stint that forced him to miss significant time, along with a red-hot Jesus Aguilar now at first base resulted in lost playing time.

Thames was relegated to occasionally filling in at first for Aguilar, in the outfield for Ryan Braun, or off the bench as a pinch-hitter. Due to that sporadic playing time, he could never get going at the plate and his numbers plummeted. His home run total would drop to 16 and he would post a slash line of just .219/.306/.478.

During this past offseason, many wondered if he would be back in 2019 or traded, as he holds a hefty contract of $6 million this season and if that was the production we would see from him, we can all understand why the Milwaukee Brewers would want him off of the books.

Yet, as he often times does, General Manager David Stearns made the correct call and kept Thames in Milwaukee and so far it has paid off greatly.

This season at the plate, Thames has a slash line of .272/.384/.539, which totals an OPS of .923. All of which would be career highs if the season ended today. He’s also sitting at 12 home runs, including a recent game-winning blast against the Pittsburgh Pirates and he has taken a much more patient approach in his at-bats and has seen his walk rate jump up four percent from last year.

While Thames deserves a ton of the credit for this turnaround, so does manager Craig Counsell for consistently putting him in positions to succeed.

Even with Aguilar’s struggles, the Milwaukee Brewers have maintained a fairly steady platoon for much of the year over at first base, which has greatly benefited Thames who has struggled mightily over his career against left-handed pitching.

Over his five big league seasons, Thames has a batting average of .204, with a .659 OPS, and of his 79 career MLB home runs, only 12 have come against lefties.

However, in 2019 with a defined role at first where he has primarily faced right-handed pitching and has only 28 plate appearances all season against lefties, we have seen Thames flourish as a result.

What has really made Thames’ performance in 2019 all the more impressive is the below average play from some of those around him.

Aguilar has just crawled over the .200 mark at the plate, Travis Shaw is now in Triple-A, Orlando Arcia has been mired in an awful slump the past month, and even Lorenzo Cain is well below his career averages in a number of key categories.

Thames resurgence this season has been a huge lift for this Brewers’ offense.

While the obvious hope is that those players listed above all get back on track, the Milwaukee Brewers will need Eric Thames to continue swinging the bat well if they hope to make another playoff push this fall.