What have you done for me lately? We spew all kinds of cliches about the length of the fantasy baseball season, but ultimately our lives are spent living in one-week bursts of setting lineups. It is that philosophy that placed Seth Brown of the Oakland A’s on my radar as a first baseman of note.

 

 

Fantasy Baseball Player Spotlight: Seth Brown

Raise your hand if you had Brown down as the third-best first baseman over the past 30 days, entering play on Monday, as measured by wRC+. Brown’s mark of 180 places him directly ahead of Pete Alonso (171) and right behind Vladimir Guerrero Jr (181) with everyone staring up at Paul Goldschmidt and his 215 wRC+. 

So, what did Brown do to end up in such lofty company? And what does that mean for the future; both the rest of this season and for next year?

In 20 games over that stretch, 76 plate appearances, Brown is hitting .290 while walking at a rate of 9.2% of the time and posting a strikeout rate of “just” 19.7%. Let’s be honest though, that is not what really moves the needle, as instead, it is his seven home runs and 10 RBI which is reflected by his .333 ISO. 

It is clear that Brown is surging from a power perspective to bring his home run total for the season up to 17 in 373 plate appearances overall. With 48 RBI, Brown has shown some ability as a run producer in the lineup that certainly is not the strongest, although he is considered more of a one-dimensional depth option overall with his .233 batting average for the season coming into play here. When looking at the back of Brown’s baseball card for this year, what really stands out is something that I am not planning for or expecting to generally continue is his eight stolen bases. At the same time though, knowing that it is possible does help. 

With a 24.4% strikeout rate overall this season, the improvement we are seeing from Brown in this department certainly helps, and the batting average improvement can also be tied to the normalization of his .266 BABIP. There is still some work to be done here, but the fact that Brown is moving in the right direction is key as we hunt for power and run production without giving anything away in any other categories. 

In 112 games at Triple-A in 2019, Brown went deep 37 times while driving in 104 runs, scoring 101 times and hitting .297, so the ability and upside is there. By no means am I suggesting that Brown can duplicate that production at the major league level, but considering we have seen him have success before, anything we see now is not completely out of nowhere. 

Brown’s average launch angle of 15 degrees shows that he is capable of the long ball, but he also is not selling out to get there either and his 11% barrel rate reflects the solid contact he is making. I am not going to suggest there is 30 home run upside here, but would anyone be surprised at 25?

By looking at Brown’s production on an overall level though, we are really missing out on his true value. Granted it requires some depth and roster management, but the results could truly prove to be worth it with a little advanced planning. 

Oakland is also well aware of this as the left-handed hitting Brown has 289 at-bats against right-handed pitching and just 57 at-bats against southpaws. His production clearly represents a strength here as 16 of his 17 home runs have come with the platoon advantage and his batting average is also notably better; .242 vs. .175.

The other area that Oakland has a lot less control over is Brown’s home/road splits. While he is batting better at home (.240 vs. .224) in 38 fewer at-bats (154 vs. 192), his power clearly plays better on the road with 13 home runs and 35 RBI compared to four and 13 at home. 

If used correctly, there is solid value to be found with Brown in deeper leagues, but it may take some work to maximize the situation. 

 

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