How Blake Perkins Embodies the Subtle Genius of the Brewers Offense

[Davy Andrews]

Land in an athletic posture, opposing pitchers. Pinch your middle infield toward the bag. The Brewers--led by an unlikely player--are the best in baseball at sending the ball right back where it came from, to great success.

Image courtesy of © Jay Biggerstaff-USA TODAY Sports

Coming into the season, the depth charts at FanGraphs saw Blake Perkins as Milwaukee’s fifth option in center field, penciling him in for just seven plate appearances at the position and no more than a few games at the big-league level altogether. It was understandable. After all, the team already featured defensive maven Joey Wiemer, and in December, they signed Jackson Chourio, MLB Pipeline’s second-ranked overall prospect, to an $82 million, eight-year contact with additional club options. Perkins, on the other hand, was coming off a 2023 season in which he ran an 88 wRC+ as a 27-year-old rookie after signing as a minor-league free agent.

Instead, Perkins broke camp with the big club and started in center on Opening Day. He’s now started in center more than 75 percent of the time, with Chourio, Christian Yelich, and Sal Frelick sharing time in the corners. Not only that, but Perkins been one of the team’s biggest contributors this season, putting up 1.5 WARP, most among the team’s outfielders and fourth-most among their position players. According to Statcast’s Fielding Run Value, he’s saved seven runs for the Brewers, tied for eighth-most in all of baseball. According to FanGraphs, he’s been worth 2.3 runs on the bases, 21st in the league. Lastly, he’s improved his hitting. In 12 different stops in the minor leagues, Perkins eclipsed a .245 batting average just three times, but he’s now batting .243, to go with a 95 wRC+. Bringing batting average into the conversation might sound outdated in today’s game, but that’s the point. Perkins is succeeding by way of a particularly old-school approach: driving the ball up the middle. Sports Info Solutions has been tracking which field the batter hits the ball to – pull, straightaway, or opposite – since 2002. This year, they have Perkins hitting the ball straightaway 44.7% of the time, just behind San Diego’s Jackson Merrill and second among all qualified players. If the season were to end today, that would also put Merrill and Perkins fourth and fifth on the all-time list. Although both players are hitting the ball back up the middle at a nearly unprecedented rate, they’re doing it very differently.

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[Brock Beauchamp]

Awesome first piece, love it!

[sveumrules]

Good stuff, Davy. Enjoy your writing over at FG so was a nice surprise to see you here at BF today.

Not sure if you are taking requests perchance, but something that caught my eye recently was that the Brewers and Guardians have the slowest average fastball velocities in MLB.

Was curious how much of that might be intentionally seeking out pitchers with unique release points and/or movement profiles versus how much was the simple economics of velocity being expensive…but had no idea where to even really begin in trying to get there.

[Brock Beauchamp]

17 hours ago, sveumrules said:

Good stuff, Davy. Enjoy your writing over at FG so was a nice surprise to see you here at BF today.

Not sure if you are taking requests perchance, but something that caught my eye recently was that the Brewers and Guardians have the slowest average fastball velocities in MLB.

Was curious how much of that might be intentionally seeking out pitchers with unique release points and/or movement profiles versus how much was the simple economics of velocity being expensive…but had no idea where to even really begin in trying to get there.

Great idea, I’ll forward this to Davy!

[Brock Beauchamp]

17 hours ago, sveumrules said:

Good stuff, Davy. Enjoy your writing over at FG so was a nice surprise to see you here at BF today.

Not sure if you are taking requests perchance, but something that caught my eye recently was that the Brewers and Guardians have the slowest average fastball velocities in MLB.

Was curious how much of that might be intentionally seeking out pitchers with unique release points and/or movement profiles versus how much was the simple economics of velocity being expensive…but had no idea where to even really begin in trying to get there.

As for the topic itself, I believe this has to be intentional. It's too weird a coincidence for what are, in my opinion, the two best franchises at developing pitching to have the same zag when everyone else is zigging.

And velocity can be taught, at least to an extent. The Twins have made their hay by churning out big righties who throw 95-98mph... except those guys were drafted from lower-tier schools and in college, were often throwing 88-91mph. Louie Varland, Bailey Ober, and David Festa are three examples. The Twins were even able to take Joe Ryan, pluck him out of AAA in the Rays' system, and turn him from a 90-91mph guy to a 94-95mph guy.