3 Former Brewers Who Are Struggling Elsewhere

Over the All-Star break, I thought it would be fun to check in on a couple of former Brewers to see how they were fitting in with their new teams. There were three players that stood out who are struggling with their ball clubs in 2022, and the third one might surprise you!

Here is a list of three former Brewers who are struggling so far in the 2022 season.

Struggling Former Brewer #1: Eduardo Escobar

Up first is Eduardo Escobar. Escobar was a valuable addition to the Brewers 2021 roster. Coming over at the deadline, Escobar slashed .268/.342/.458 with an OPS+ of 114 in 48 games with the Crew last season. Combining his switch-hitting with his positional versatility, Escobar had a strong market heading into the offseason.

The New York Mets signed Escobar to a 2-year, $20MM contract in December of 2021. Overall, his numbers have disappointed in the first half of 2022. He has a slash line of .224/.279/.397 with an OPS+ of 91 and a WRC+ of 94. Escobar historically has been a solid bat-to-ball player, rarely posting substantial strikeout numbers. But in 2022, he is struggling with plate discipline and generating an abnormal number of swings and misses.

Escobar has a career high strikeout rate of 25.5% and a chase rate of 32.9%- both up 4% from last season. His walk rate is also below average at 7.2% which is almost one percent lower than the year prior. He has not really excelled defensively either. He is in the 5th percentile in Outs Above Average and has a Win Probability Added (WPA) of -1.29.

While Escobar has shown flashes of power at points in his career, this appears to be a down season for his power numbers as his ISO has dipped from .219 last season to .173 this year. His quality of contact numbers are also down from last season, ranking in the 35th percentile in average exit velocity (88.4) and 24th percentile in hard hit rate (35.8%). He has been struggling to generate barrels too, as his barrel rate of 7.7% is down 1.2% from last season.

While he started to heat up in the month of July, there is still room for improvement for Escobar. For a New York Mets team that is considered to be one of the best teams in the National League, Escobar has fallen short of expectations thus far in his tenure with the Mets.

Struggling Former Brewer #3: Trent Grisham

The third player on this list might be the most surprising of the bunch, and that is outfielder Trent Grisham. By now, the Trent Grisham trade is one that most Brewers fans are familiar with. It was the deal back in November of 2019 in which the Brewers traded Grisham and Zach Davies for Eric Lauer and Luis Urias, and it is a trade that has been heavily analyzed ever since.

In the shortened 2020 season, Trent Grisham slashed .251/.352/.456 with an OPS+ of 123, and won a Gold Glove award with the San Diego Padres. Appearing to be one of the best young fielders in the game, it looked like he was starting to put it together at the plate as well. His quality of contact numbers looked very strong for a player who wasn’t known for his bat. As a Brewers fan, this was tough to see.

However, 2022 has been a different story for Grisham, and it has not been a good one. So far in 2022 he is slashing .190/.292/.330  with an OPS+ of 82 and a WRC+ of 83. Grisham has not really been a threat at the plate. He is in the bottom 7 percent of the league in hard hit rate (28.8%) and in the bottom 10% in average exit velocity (86.4). He has also struck out 87 times in 91 games with a strikeout rate of 24.6%. While Grisham is not known for his bat, it has been his fielding that has been the biggest surprise of 2022.

The Gold Glover has had multiple blunders in the outfield within the last month. On several occasions, he has uncharacteristically misplayed fly balls which have resulted in extra bases and runs, and appears to lack confidence in the field. While he is still graded well in Outs Above Average, his Outfielder Jump has graded below average.

Outfielder Jump is composed of reaction time, burst, and route taken to the ball. All three metrics are noticeably down from his 2020 season. That is important because Outfielder Jump has a massive impact on the difficulty of the ensuing play and is important when analyzing just how efficient a fielder is.

It will be interesting to see how the young outfielder bounces back in the second half of the season. One major underlying factor here is that Trent Grisham is still only 25 years old and has proven to have valuable talent. However, it has not been a good season for Grisham, 91 games into the year.

All the players on this list have shown their ability to be key contributors and have major impacts on their roster, so it will be interesting to keep an eye on their performance to see how they bounce back in the second half of the season.