Brewers’ broken offense must be addressed
What are the Brewers going to do with the offensive mess they have on their hands?
As the pandemic-shortened 2020 season comes to a close Sunday, that has to be the primary question for president of baseball operations David Stearns and his staff for what is shaping up to be a critical offseason for the organization. Simply put, there is no way to project any type of success over 162 games next year with an offense that struggles on a daily basis to score runs.
What Stearns and Co. must decide first is exactly how much weight to put on this 60-game season. Is that enough of a sample size to prove this offense is broken and needs major repairs, or do you temper such thoughts because so many players seemed out of sorts in the weird world of COVID ball?
One thing that cannot be denied is this: No regular player had a good season. Small sample size or not, that is a disconcerting fact. The team's best returning hitters from the previous year, Christian Yelich and Keston Hiura, struggled at times merely to make contact, an unthinkable scenario when play began.
It was probably unrealistic to ask Yelich to continue the otherworldly production of his first two seasons with the Brewers. Two National League batting titles. An NL MVP award and a runner-up. Two Hank Aaron Awards for hitting excellence. Two-year totals of 80 homers, 207 RBI, 671 total bases, .635 slugging percentage and 1.050
OPS.
That's about as good as it gets, which is why the club committed $215 million over nine years to Yelich during a surprise contract extension in spring training, completed the week before the pandemic shut down the game. Many of the game's top hitters struggled when the delayed season finally began in late July after a rushed three-week summer camp but none more so than Yelich, beginning with a 1-for-27 drought out of the gate.
Yelich's strikeout percentage is way up (31.5%), he's not driving the ball in the air as often as in past years and, for lack of a better term, has looked out of sorts at the plate most of the season. It might be as simple as losing his way in this bizarre year, a one-off that won't be repeated by a truly talented hitter.
Hiura didn't have Yelich's track record but his banner rookie showing in 2019 helped create the slogan “the man can hit” among his quickly growing fan club. This year, however, he has been a strikeout machine, leading the league with 83 and an alarming 34.9% whiff rate. He has chased pitches out of the zone but also swung through fastballs down the middle far too often.
With Yelich and Hiura struggling, an already thin offense was destined to have problems. The situation was exacerbated by Lorenzo Cain opting out of the season after one week and Ryan Braun experiencing ongoing health issues that prevented him from consistently producing until recent weeks.
A major issue was an overall lack of production from a new group of veteran players added in the offseason after a significant exodus of free agents. Jedd Gyorko, who was platooned in the early going and didn't get nearly enough atbats, has been the only newcomer making any sort of impact (.866 OPS) offensively. Recently added DH Daniel Vogelbach provided some needed punch but an offense this bad can't be rescued by one player.
Once one of the top slugging teams in the league, the Brewers have been punchless too many times. Two new players expected to add some pop, outfielder Avisaíl García and catcher Omar Narváez, have provided virtually none. García, who averaged 19 home runs over the previous three seasons with the White Sox and Rays, has hit two in 2020, none in over a month.
Narváez, who hit 22 home runs last year with Seattle, also has two homers but that only begins to explain the disaster the left-handed hitter has been at the plate in 2020. He is batting .163 with a .547 OPS, has a .155 average against right-handers and has produced only six extra-base hits in 39 games, none in the month of September in 39 plate appearances.
The plan in acquiring Narváez, 28, was for him to be the Brewers' primary catcher for years to come. If the Brewers go forward with him at the position, and this collapse does not prove to be a short-season aberration, that decision would be a costly one.
The lineup was so unproductive that a no-hitter seemed inevitable after a few close calls earlier in the season. It finally happened Sept. 13 at Miller Park when nondescript Chicago Cubs righthander Alec Mills put himself in the record book, recording the final three outs against players who had been at the Brewers' alternate training site for much of the season.
Had the offense failed this badly over a 162-game season instead of 60 games, it certainly wouldn't bode well for hitting coach Andy Haines and assistant Jacob Cruz. Stearns must decide if they deserve another chance after facing the many coaching challenges of COVID ball or opt to try something different.
Two factors are going to make it difficult to fix the offense to any significant extent for 2021. One is a farm system rated among the worst in the game, with no hitters expected to make an impact in the majors in the near future. So, the cavalry is not just over the horizon there.
Another obstacle will be the dire financial consequences of severely limited revenue this year, which almost certainly will affect player payroll next season (and possibly beyond). One person familiar with the team's situation believes the Brewers could lose $100 million this year.
The Brewers already had reduced their payroll about 25% after the '19 wild-card season, which probably explains some of the failures of modestsalary signings last offseason. If it is reduced further for 2021, it won't be easy to add players who might make a difference.
If Yelich and Hiura shake off their inability to adjust to baseball during a pandemic, that will go a long way toward restoring some semblance of a productive offense. But it takes more than two hitters, and who knows what to expect of others currently on hand? If Braun opts to play another season and the Brewers invite him back, expectations would be tempered with his age and history of injuries.
The situation appears so problematic, one wonders if Stearns might decide a roster reboot is in order, something that seemed unthinkable after consecutive playoff appearances prior to 2020. That would take a big gulp with a talent such as Yelich on board, but there are no easy fixes for an offense this bad, even if for only 60 games.
A critical offseason awaits.