Something good brewing
THAMES LOOKS TO BRING SUCCESS FROM SOUTH KOREA BACK TO BIGS
Apackage arrived recently f or Eric Thames at Maryvale Baseball Park, the spring training home of the Milwaukee Brewers. It was a fungo bat, thin- handled and light, a tool to help make his hands quicker. Thames had ordered it for $ 30 on Amazon.
“I opened the box and I was taking the bar code off it and the clubhouse guy was like, ‘ Hey, did you buy that bat?’” said Thames, who replied that he had. “He says: ‘ You know, this is the big leagues. I have fungoes back there I can give you.’”
Thames laughed. He was, indeed, in a major-league clubhouse with an eight-figure contract and a team that is counting on him. He was not in South Korea anymore.
“I was so embarrassed,” Thames said. “I was like: ‘ It’s been a while. Just give me a few weeks to adapt.’”
For the past three years, Thames adapted just fine with the NC Dinos of the Korean Baseball Organization. A marginal major- leaguer for Toronto and Seattle in 2011 and 2012, Thames erupted for the Dinos, hitting .348 and averaging 41 homers and 126 RBIs. His on-base-plus-slugging percentage was 1.171; the career major- league record, held by Babe Ruth, is 1.164.
Thames is not Ruth. But the rebuilding Brewers believe he’s of better value than Chris Carter, the slugger he replaces at first base. Last season, Carter hit .222 with 206 strikeouts — but tied for the National League lead in homers with 41. That put him in line to be awarded perhaps $ 10 million in salary arbitration.
The Brewers let him go and Carter eventually signed with the New York Yankees for $3.5 million. Thames did much better on the open market, getting a three- year, $ 16- million deal from the Brewers with a club option for 2020. They don’t quite know how his production will translate, but the possibilities are enticing.
“We expect a productive majorleague player,” said David Stearns, the Brewers’ general manager. “That can take shape in a variety of ways. With a signing like this, there’s a fairly wide variance of potential outcomes and we think there’s a lot of upside there. We’re going to put him in a comfortable environment that will allow him to adjust back to Major League Baseball and hopefully his talents will take over.”
Thames, 30, has played 181 games in the majors with a .250 average and 21 homers. He has just three majorleague stolen bases, but stole 40 for the Dinos in 2015. He has a .296 onbase percentage in the majors, but had a .450 mark in the KBO, where ballparks tend to be small and the talent level is considered to be below that of the Japanese league.
The Brewers did not scout Thames in person, but did study him extensively on video. Pitchers feared Thames and rarely challenged him with fastballs, but he displayed discipline at the plate, laying off junk and waiting for breaking balls he could mash. The pitch patterns will be different now, but the Brewers believe Thames can handle them.
“He’s going to see more consistent velocity than he’s seen the past couple of years, but I think he’s frankly looking forward to that,” Stearns said. “It’s a more normal style of hitting than constantly trying to guess which shade of breaking ball he’s going to see.”
Thames is eager for those fastballs and everything else about the major- league life. He made good money in South Korea — about $ 3.5 million, plus a Kia Sorento for winning the most valuable player award in 2015.
But some of the game’s customs there grew tiresome, like the emphasis on bunting and the practice of dressing in full uniform at the hotel before road games. And while Thames had a few American teammates, communication with others was limited.
Thames was essentially his own hitting coach with the Dino, and reinvented his approach. He watched interviews on technique with stars like Detroit Tigers sluggers Miguel Cabrera and Victor Martinez, absorbing their lessons and teaching himself a new swing after finding his old one too inconsistent.
“I’d be very uphill, so a lot of balls I’d hit would have topspin,” Thames said. “If I got it perfect, it’d be a home run, but if I just missed it a little bit, topspin, so it would be off the wall or even knuckle and it wouldn’t travel as far. Now I work hard to stay short to the ball, but have a flat path — finish flat, not just try to be up there hitting dingers all day.”
By not swinging for the fences, Thames began clearing them regularly.
As a left-handed-hitting first baseman with power, a thick beard and a relatively short frame ( 6- foot), Thames recalls a former Brewer, Prince Fielder. His path to Milwaukee was just a lot less conventional.