The Athletics are a team on the rise, and in doing some of the offseason recaps for the other AL West teams (Angels and Rangers), you don't have to squint too hard to see that this club could be pushing for a postseason spot as early as this upcoming season.
The Athletics are a team on the rise and could be pushing for a postseason spot as early as this upcoming season. Part of that is a weak division, with the Houston Astros on the decline and the Seattle Mariners more or less standing pat, but the other side of the coin is that the A's have some talented young players coming up and ready to make an impact.
In looking over the A's projected stats for the 2025 season, it should come as no surprise that Brent Rooker is projected to be the A's best hitter this upcoming season. FanGraphs' Depth Charts project him for a 133 wRC+ (100 is league average) after he completed 2024 with a 164. They also project him for 3.1 fWAR, which is also a step back from the 5.1 he put up as the team's designated hitter.
While Rooker is the best projected hitter, he's not projected to be the club's best overall player. This is mostly due to his value being with the bat, and not necessarily with the glove, limiting his ceiling. In his career in the outfield, which spans just 929 innings, he has racked up -15 Outs Above Average, which is in line with how the other defensive metrics rate him. His defense appeared to rate better last season at a -1, but he accumulated just 102 1/3 innings in the field in '24 due to an arm injury.
Lawrence Butler would be the logical guess for the best projected player, given that his bat was nearly as good as Rooker's in the second half of the season, and while he's projected for more fWAR with 3.4 (and a 122 wRC+), he's also not the guy the projection systems like at the top.
Instead, they have No. 1 prospect and projected shortstop for the A's, Jacob Wilson, as the team's best player, finishing with 3.7 wins above replacement. What it basically boils down to is that Wilson is projected to be a solid bat (120 wRC+), batting .288 with a .338 on-base, and he's also projected to be the team's second-best defender behind catcher Shea Langeliers.
In his debut season, Wilson played in 28 games and collected 103 plate appearances, finishing with an 86 wRC+ and 0.1 WAR. He was also a below average defender in his short time with the A's, grading out with a -4 Defensive Runs Saved and -2 Outs Above Average. Could have just been jitters. Or it could be that they believe that his true talent over a larger sample of games will win out.
Wilson is a high-contact hitter, and hadn't really struggled in his time in the minor leagues before getting called up to the A's roster. Now, having struggled a little and having a full offseason to prepare his body, adding muscle, and recalibrating his approach to face big league pitching day-in and day-out, he could be in for a big breakout campaign.
It's tough to be a breakout pick when you were the No. 6 overall selection in the MLB Draft just two years ago, but if he ends up being the most productive player on the up-and-coming A's, then that would certainly qualify as a breakout season.
