If Sal Frelick Starts Second Half on Injured List, How Will Milwaukee Brewers Adapt Lineup?

[Matthew Trueblood]

Image courtesy of © Benny Sieu-Imagn Images

It seems overwhelmingly likely that the Brewers will take the field Friday to begin the second half without Sal Frelick. The team's everyday right fielder and leadoff man will probably require an injured-list placement, and if he turns out to have a hamstring strain of any severity, he'll be out until at least mid-August. That leaves a gaping hole in the team's plans, not because they lack depth—they don't—but because of how well Frelick has played all season. He's batting .294/.354/.404 this year, with a terrific strikeout rate of 12.7% and 17 stolen bases in 21 tries. He's continued to play excellent defense in right field, and his bat speed and quality of contact this year are greatly improved. 

Replacing Frelick on the roster would be relatively easy. Blake Perkins is ready and waiting at Triple-A Nashville. His entire first half was wiped out by the foul ball he hit off his own leg early in camp, and by unexpected setbacks on his rehab journey. Now, however, he's set to return, and his combination of solid switch-hitting skills and elite outfield defense should make him the natural choice. He can play center field much of the time, pushing Jackson Chourio to right.

Isaac Collins's emergence as a solidly above-average player has made this blow much easier to absorb than it might have been otherwise. With him, Chourio, Perkins and Christian Yelich all in the mix, the team has good outfield depth. They have versatile players all over the roster, too, including Caleb Durbin (who played the outfield at times in the minors), Anthony Seigler and Jake Bauers.

Offensively, though, Frelick's value will be harder to replicate. Garrett Mitchell is the kind of dynamic hitter who could step into the void, but he's gone for the year with his own injury. Frelick has a 108 projected wRC+ for the balance of the year, according to the ZiPS projection system. Collins (103) is close to that level, but he was already a part of the everyday lineup. This absence, if it lasts for any length of time, will mean more time for Bauers (98), Perkins (83), and/or Seigler (77). That leaves Pat Murphy with some challenges in constructing his batting order, especially with Rhys Hoskins still on the shelf.

Against right-handed starters, we could see a starting nine of:

1. Brice Turang - 2b
2. Jackson Chourio - rf
3. Christian Yelich - dh
4. William Contreras - c
5. Isaac Collins - lf
6. Andrew Vaughn - 1b
7. Caleb Durbin - 3b
8. Blake Perkins - cf
9. Joey Ortiz - ss

That's missing some of the punch that the team used to get in the middle third, though. Hoskins could punish pitchers for letting traffic accumulate on the bases, and Turang was an effective all-fields threat. Having Vaughn stand in for Hoskins and Turang forced to slide way up to replace Frelick thins things out at the bottom.

Hopefully, a few days of rest will get Frelick right more than expected. There's still a chance he plays even this weekend, and certainly one that he plays before the end of the month. If the team has to get by without him for a prolonged period, though, it's going to be hard for the lineup to continue churning out runs the way they have over the last two months.

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[Team Canada]

Relevant stats via McCalvy: since Frelick moved to leadoff, Milwaukee is an MLB-best 20-7 while leading the Majors in runs per game (5.85) and on-base percentage (.351) and ranking second in average (.282).

We need to stop acting like the offense is holding this team down.

[Matthew Trueblood]

2 hours ago, Team Canada said:

Relevant stats via McCalvy: since Frelick moved to leadoff, Milwaukee is an MLB-best 20-7 while leading the Majors in runs per game (5.85) and on-base percentage (.351) and ranking second in average (.282).

We need to stop acting like the offense is holding this team down.

... Is anyone acting like that? I'm earnestly asking; it might be something on Twitter or in the forums or whatever. But our consistent message here, from front-page writers, has been that the offense is producing like mad lately. There are legitimate questions of sustainability, which even the team itself is aware of, but the offense has been an ENGINE of the team's success for the last month-plus.

[JCREW]

1 hour ago, Matthew Trueblood said:

... Is anyone acting like that? I'm earnestly asking; it might be something on Twitter or in the forums or whatever. But our consistent message here, from front-page writers, has been that the offense is producing like mad lately. There are legitimate questions of sustainability, which even the team itself is aware of, but the offense has been an ENGINE of the team's success for the last month-plus.

I think that last year's results for Ortiz and Contreras combined with the norm that a 1B should be a thumper, make us all feel like we're solid, but not at peak productivity.

We imagine this team with 95 wRC+ for Ortiz, 120 wRC+ for Contreras, and maybe even more out of Hoskins/1B, and it, combined with our rotation and the back end of the bullpen... It's just something to dream on. 

[JCREW]

3 hours ago, Team Canada said:

Relevant stats via McCalvy: since Frelick moved to leadoff, Milwaukee is an MLB-best 20-7 while leading the Majors in runs per game (5.85) and on-base percentage (.351) and ranking second in average (.282).

We need to stop acting like the offense is holding this team down.

Of our 9 regulars, only Ortiz is below positional league average by OPS. 

[JohnBriggs12]

I think they should consider buying the contract of Jared Oliva.  Perkins needs a little more time and Oliva's been putting up solid offensive numbers including 25 steals in 29 attempts and an .844 OPS

[wiguy94]

13 minutes ago, JohnBriggs12 said:

I think they should consider buying the contract of Jared Oliva.  Perkins needs a little more time and Oliva's been putting up solid offensive numbers including 25 steals in 29 attempts and an .844 OPS

Who are you DFA'ing to make that happen? Also while Oliva's production looks quite good, the underlying numbers are really bad pretty much across the board.

[Team Canada]

7 hours ago, Matthew Trueblood said:

... Is anyone acting like that? I'm earnestly asking; it might be something on Twitter or in the forums or whatever. But our consistent message here, from front-page writers, has been that the offense is producing like mad lately. There are legitimate questions of sustainability, which even the team itself is aware of, but the offense has been an ENGINE of the team's success for the last month-plus.

Sorry, by we I don't mean the writers at all, I mean the collective forum. There's this residual assumption based on very real past struggles that the weak spot is the offense. "Sure, we have a surplus of pitching and our defense is awesome, but if we could only fix our hitting, we'd have something."  
Bottom line is if you take out the opening Yankees series, this team has been darn good, and if you start even later, they're amazing. It's a really, really good team, and they're scoring runs too.

[igor67]

I think part of the difficulty is still trying to adjust to how low league average offense has sunk. I mean we are still talking about how great Frelick's line is, but it is basically Mark Loretta's career line .295/.360/.395 with some more steals. There's just an initial reaction to looking at those stat lines that takes some effort to overcome.