Milwaukee Brewers: Eric Thames resurgence provides a huge lift

While the Milwaukee Brewers offense has struggled to consistently produce, the resurgence of Eric Thames has been a much needed and welcomed surprise.

Looking to build upon his strong 2017 season with the Milwaukee Brewers, Eric Thames’ 2018 season was derailed by an early thumb injury and a red-hot Jesus Aguilar that would take over most of the playing time at first base.

Relegated to the occasional pinch-hit opportunity and filling in for Aguilar at first or for Ryan Braun in the outfield, Thames struggled mightily last season.

On the year, he would finish with a .219 batting average and that included a combined average of only .133 in the months of August and September. Thames would also total only 16 home runs, down from the 31 he had knocked out of the park the previous season.

Entering this past offseason, the prospect of trading Thames was likely on the mind of many Milwaukee Brewers fans as paying a salary of $6 million for that kind of production is just not ideal. However, GM David Stearns would hold on to the hard-hitting lefty and boy has it paid off.

Prior to the season, with a lineup of Christian Yelich, Lorenzo Cain, Travis Shaw, Ryan Braun, Mike Moustakas, Yasmani Grandal, and others, the Brewers looked like they were poised to have one of the most explosive offenses in the league, and it was unknown where Thames would fit in.

Unfortunately, the Milwaukee offense has struggled to consistently produce and a number of those names are really struggling.

It took the first few months of the season for Aguilar to get his average over .200 and since then he has been traded. Shaw is still in the minors, Cain is well below his career averages in many major offensive categories, Braun has been out, and Orlando Arcia can’t seem to put it all together at the plate.

As a result, Thames saw a lot more time at first base and luckily for the Milwaukee Brewers, he has bounced back from his disappointing 2018 season.

This year Thames has a slash line of .259/.362/.500 with an .862 OPS. All of which are above his career averages and he is very close to setting career highs in all four categories. His strikeout rate is down, his walk rate is up, and his wRC+ – which takes runs created and adjusts that number to account for external factors such as the ballpark and ERA – that sits at 119 is a career-high as well.

Thames has also come up with some clutch hits late in games that have either given the Brewers the lead, tied the game or brought them within striking distance. As of late, Thames most recent big moment was a walk-off home run against the Texas Rangers about a week ago.

For a team with World Series aspirations at the beginning of the year, it’s been a bit of a rocky road up to this point – especially with the lack of offensive production at times.

However, they still find themselves in the thick of the NL playoff race and I have to ask, where would this team be without Eric Thames’ bounce-back season?