Brewers slugger just made one of the least surprising decisions of the offseason

One of the first major dominoes of the Milwaukee Brewers offseason (and the least surprising) has fallen as first baseman Rhys Hoskins has made his decision on his player option for the 2025 season. Hoskins decided to exercise that option and return to Milwaukee for a second season.

The decision by Hoskins comes as little surprise as the slugging first baseman's 2024 season was well below his career norms in his first year back from a torn ACL. He posted the lowest batting average, on-base percentage, and slugging of his career and posted a below-league average OPS+ for the first time in his career.

With the first base free agent market led by Pete Alonso and Christian Walker, Hoskins would've had a difficult time finding a contract that would've paid him more than the $18MM salary he'll earn on his player option.

Rhys Hoskins returning to Brewers solves one problem, but causes another

It has seemed that the Brewers have been seeking a new solution at first base every single offseason going back to the departure of Prince Fielder in free agency more than a decade ago. The turnover at the position has been non-stop. If Hoskins opted out of his deal, the Brewers would once again be on the search for a new first baseman. Now, that's no longer the case and that position is solved.

There's optimism that Hoskins will improve next year as he gets further away from his ACL injury. The power was still there with his 26 home runs, right around his average output, but the overall numbers dipped in 2024. His knee being back to 100% and the extra time away from surgery should help Hoskins improve his performance and historically players have been better two years past surgery than one year.

However, this does lead to a bit of a budget crunch as Hoskins will eat up $18MM of payroll and is set to be the Brewers second highest paid player in 2025 behind Christian Yelich. Both of them combined will take up $44MM of payroll space and the Brewers carried just a $116MM payroll in 2024. They'll likely have a similar total payroll in 2025 and just two players will take up more than one-third of that total.

That will leave little room for the Brewers to make further improvements to the roster in free agency this offseason. They'll be hoping for and needing a better year from Hoskins in 2025.