Can Rhys Hoskins Outperform His Predecessors at First Base?

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Photo via Rhys Hoskins - Instagram

Rhys Hoskins

Rhys Hoskins

From 2006-11 the Brewers had the same player at first base in almost every game. Since then, however, it feels like it’s been someone new every day.

From Opening Day of the 2006 season until the final day of the 2011 regular season Prince Fielder played in 959 of 972 possible games for the Brewers, including 947 at first base (the National League didn’t have the designated hitter then, but Fielder was an occasional DH for interleague games in American League parks). He played 162 games in 2009 and 2011 and missed just one game in 2010. If Rhys Hoskins plays first base for the Brewers on Opening Day in 2024, however, he’ll be the 52nd player to follow in Fielder’s shoes since he left as a free agent before the 2012 season.

The average member of the 51-man list of players who have played first base since Fielder’s departure appeared in just 38 games. The list includes five players who started a game at the position just one time (most recently Hunter Renfroe in 2022) and no less than 10 players who played a game there in 2023 when Rowdy Tellez, Carlos Santana, Owen Miller, Luke Voit, Mike Brosseau, Jon Singleton, Mark Canha, Darin Ruf, Victor Caratini and Abraham Toro all got a turn.

Perhaps more notably, however, the rotating cast of hitters trying to fill Fielder’s shoes has not produced anywhere near his level. Since Fielder’s departure his combined replacements have batted .240 with a .319 on-base percentage and .393 slugging. That’s more than 200 on-base plus slugging points below Fielder’s career numbers as a Brewer and it’s significantly below league average production at the position. 

Hoskins is unlikely to put an extended end to the Brewers’ revolving door at first base, as he’s only under contract for two seasons and could opt out after one. It might not take much, however, for him to become the best Brewers first baseman since Fielder. Here are the current leading candidates for that accolade:

Jesus Aguilar, 2017-19

Aguilar had played brief stretches in the majors in each of three seasons with Cleveland before the Brewers claimed him off waivers in the spring of 2017 and he hit his way into a bigger role. Aguilar connected for 16 home runs in a limited role in 2017, then 35 more as a regular starter at first base in 2018 when he made the (to-date) only All Star appearance of his 10-year MLB career. Aguilar’s numbers dipped in 2019 and the Brewers traded him away, but his two and a half seasons in Milwaukee stand out as clearly the best of his MLB career and Baseball Reference values them at 3.8 wins above replacement.

Eric Thames, 2017-19

Aguilar’s ascent into regular playing time at first base was slowed at least in part because the Brewers had another productive regular at the position: Thames returned from an extended stay in Korea for the 2017 Brewers and was a near-immediate sensation in Milwaukee, where he hit 11 home runs in his first 20 games en route to an MLB career high of 31 for the season. The Brewers let Thames leave as a free agent following the 2019 season and he played just one more year in the majors. Seventy-two of his 96 MLB home runs came as a Brewer, and Baseball Reference values his performance in Milwaukee at 2.8 wins above replacement.

Rowdy Tellez, 2021-23

There wasn’t much fanfare for the accomplishment at the time, but last September Tellez logged his 226th game played at first base for the Brewers, the most by any player since Fielder’s departure. The Brewers acquired Tellez in a midseason trade in 2021 and he paid near-immediate dividends in their race for an NL Central crown, batting .272 and slugging .481 in 56 stretch run games. In 2022 he connected for 35 home runs but became much more of an “all or nothing” slugger and across 105 games in 2023 he struggled mightily, posting career lows in batting average (.215), on-base (.291) and slugging (.376). He was also weighed down a bit by poor defensive numbers, so Baseball Reference estimates his full Brewers tenure was worth just 0.5 wins above replacement spread across three seasons.