Eric Thames

[LouisEly]

Edit: redundant with reillymcshane's post

[And That]

In other words, there's not really enough data to suggest whether Thames should retain his Korean success, or if he's more or less the same guy he was 4 years ago with the career 727 OPS.

[reillymcshane]

In other words, there's not really enough data to suggest whether Thames should retain his Korean success, or if he's more or less the same guy he was 4 years ago with the career 727 OPS.

Correct.

 

But it does suggest that good hitters in Korea can be valuable major league players.

 

I think so much just depends on the player and his talent. The scouts just have to asses a player and make a judgement as to whether his game will translate to the majors. It's like that with pretty much any league.

[And That]

But it does suggest that good hitters in Korea can be valuable major league players.

Probably.

 

Then again, every time I see so few data points being taken as a sign of something, I think to myself, Bill Spiers hit 3 home runs in his first 5 games in 1991. Little me was so excited.

 

Bill Spiers ruins everything.

[LouisEly]

Kang is the only one with more than one year of ML experience, and he improved from year one to year two. The other difference is that all of them are Korean whereas Thames is American. Thames knows the language, the culture, etc., none of that will be foreign to him. It's not unrealistic to expect the first year to have some struggles with living in a foreign country.

[And That]

I would also argue that Kang, Park, Kim, and Lee aren't really apples to apples comps with Thames as far as KBO players going to MLB. Thames has five years of professional baseball experience in America, whereas the Korean guys did not have that track record.

 

The guy that immediately popped into my head with Thames is Roberto Petagine. He had a number of really, really good years in Japan, came back to the US, didn't stick, and went back to Asia. Granted he was in his middle 30s when he came back, but it did not work out for him.

 

Just scanning the KBO batting leaderboards this year, I see Wilin Rosario has a 961 OPS, Nick Evans has a 957 OPS, Luis "Lucho" Jimenez has a 901 OPS, Danny Dorn has an 892 OPS, and Brett Pill has an 880 OPS. Hector Gomez even has an 819 OPS. So I would look at what those guys are going in the KBO, versus what they were doing in the US. Some of those guys were ok players over here, and I'm guessing that's what Thames would end up being as well.

[splitterpfj]

Major Kudos, JohnBriggs ..... give that man a cigar!