The Best and Worst Possible Outcomes of Jesus Aguilar's Home Run Derby Appearance

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Scott Paulus

The Milwaukee Brewers limped into the Major League Baseball All-Star break on Sunday and, for much of the roster, the next four days will be a welcome break for a team that played 21 games in 20 days and struggled mightily to complete that stretch. For Jesús Aguilar, however, it’s going to be another busy week.

Aguilar is one of five Brewers playing in the All-Star Game on Tuesday—the largest All-Star contingent in franchise history. Before that, however, he is the number-one seed in the Home Run Derby on Monday night. Aguilar is the ninth different player to represent the Brewers in the Derby since the event’s inception in 1985, and the first since both Rickie Weeks and Prince Fielder were in the field in 2011.

While it’s exciting for fans to see Aguilar represent Milwaukee in the Derby, the Brewers will likely be holding their breath during his performances hoping he doesn’t get hurt or mess up his swing aiming for the fences. Over the years there have been oft-discussed post-Derby struggles for some of the participants as they work to adjust back to a normal hitting environment.

The evidence supporting something of a “Derby Jinx” is at best anecdotal and, to a point, largely can be explained away by other factors. Participants in the Derby are, by definition, the players who outpaced their peers in slugging in the first half of the season. Many are having the best stretches of their careers and, as such, many of them would have experienced second-half downturns due to normal regression—whether they had participated in the Derby or not. The average Brewers Derby participant has seen their OPS (On-base Plus Slugging) drop by 66 points in the second half. Five of the 11 had theirs decrease by 100 points or more.

Here are some of the best- and worst-case scenarios presented by previous Brewers participants in MLB’s Home Run Derby:

The Best

Richie Sexson participated in the Home Run Derby twice as a Brewer, including the 2002 Derby at Miller Park. Following that exhibition, his production dropped off slightly, with his OPS falling from .882 to .847. Sexson’s second shot at the Derby, however, was a different story: He had a great second half for an awful 2003 team, hitting 20 home runs in 69 games and raising his OPS from .889 to .980.

The reigning National League Rookie of the Year, Ryan Braun participated in the Derby in his first full MLB season in 2008 and continued to improve afterwards. He hit .286 with a .324 on-base percentage and .549 slugging and improved upon all three marks in the second half, batting .282/.351/.560.

In 2007, Prince Fielder had one of the best first halves in franchise history, posting a .996 OPS that was identical to Jesús Aguilar’s as he entered play last Sunday. Fielder was actually better in the second half of that season with a 1.034 mark and 21 home runs en route to the first 50-homer season in franchise history.

The Worst

Greg Vaughn was the first Brewer ever selected to participate in the Derby in 1996, and he did so in the middle of a breakout year. His .952 OPS in the first half of that season was 160 points higher than his career numbers as a Brewer. His production dipped by 119 OPS points in the second half, but the Brewers weren’t harmed by the drop off as they traded him to the Padres shortly after the All-Star break.

Carlos Lee represented Panama in an international-themed Home Run Derby in his first season as a Brewer in 2005 and reached the semifinals, becoming just the second Brewer ever to do so. The second half wasn’t as kind to him, as he saw his production fall by 117 OPS points.

Finally, over the course of his career, Corey Hart was a nearly identical hitter in the first and second halves, but his two All-Star seasons were the exceptions. He struggled mightily after the break in his first such year in 2008, and in 2010, when he also participated in two rounds of the Derby, he saw his OPS drop from .918 before the break to .802 after.