Brewers' Thames can't explain his red-hot return to MLB
Keep on rubbing your eyes in disbelief as you gawk at the 2017 numbers on Eric Thames' Baseball-Reference page. It's alright - he's doing the same thing.
Nobody thought Thames would come even remotely close to replicating the cartoonish numbers he put up over three seasons in Korea after he washed out of MLB in 2012. But that's exactly what the 30-year-old - who came into this season sporting a career .250/.296/.431 slash line in 684 major-league plate appearances - is doing right now in his triumphant, record-setting return to America with the Milwaukee Brewers, and it's made Thames the talk of baseball this April.
It's been such an incredible and unexpected rise that Thames himself - who became so famous and beloved in Korea that fans in the country nicknamed him "God" - can't even fathom what he's doing.
"I was telling my hitting coach back home (in California), 'I have no idea what's going on,'" Thames told Adam McCalvy of MLB.com on Thursday, shortly after hitting his league-leading eighth home run off Carlos Martinez in the Brewers' 7-5 win over St. Louis. "That's what happens when you're on a streak."
(Courtesy: MLB.com)
His surge comes on the heels of a mediocre spring training that had many onlookers wondering if his Korean peak would translate back to the world's best league. Instead, Thames enters play Friday leading all of baseball in nearly every notable offensive category, both standard and traditional.
| BA (Rk.) | OPS (Rk.) | HR (Rk.) | RBI (Rk.) | R (Rk.) | XBH (Rk) | ISO* (Rk.) | wRC+** (Rk.) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| .415 (2) | 1.481 (1) | 8 (1) | 14 (T-8) | 20 (1) | 14 (1) | .566 (1) | 287 (1) |
*Isolated Power
**Weighted Runs Created
Thames' batting eye is also much improved; after walking just 5.2 percent of the time in his most recent big-league season of 2012, he's taking bases on balls at a 12.9 percent rate this month, while cutting his strikeouts down too (19.4 percent).
Related: How the league should adjust to Thames
While Thames is the talk of baseball, and likely will be even if (and when) his stat line begins to look a little more normal, he's still flying way below the radar in his new home compared to the level of fame he achieved in Korea - and that seems to suit him just fine.
"I'm going to enjoy (the relative anonymity), going to a restaurant and having a beer and a burger and being able to kind of chill out," Thames said. "We'll see what happens. Fame is not too bad; I'm not going to complain about it, because they could hate me. I'd rather be liked."