2025 Team Previews - Athletics
As part of my 2025 team previews series, I go through all fantasy-relevant players on the Athletics ahead of the 2025 season.
Check out the intro and team links page here.
Intro
I don’t even know what this team is going to be called next year. You are well aware that they have fled Oakland, much to the chagrin of social media baseball fans. Will they be called the Sacramento Athletics? Will they just keep going with “Oakland” until they get to Las Vegas? Will they change the branding entirely? Can we get them to be called the Las Vegas Redskins Indians Aunt Jemima Baseball Team now that the Democrats lost the election?
I feel like we’re on our way to them just giving up the game and naming themselves Fanduel. Everything is gambling now. That is where the demands and expectations for perpetual growth have taken us. It’s not enough to just sell the same number of jerseys and tickets as last year; organizations must constantly be searching every nook and cranny for extra profit to keep that trend line tilted to the top-right. Growth can’t last forever. Unless it can. Somebody on Twitter told me once that it could. That didn’t make sense to me, but it is true that our economy is a massive house of cards built on nothing but confidence and speculation. So I suppose the house of cards will keep pushing the trend line upwards until it all just hits drops to zero.
But back to my initial depressing point. States and sports have become more and more dependent on gambling income to keep the arrow pointed upward. It was a slow enough creep to have most people not really notice it, but think back like 5-10 years. You would never see a betting line shown on the ESPN ticker, and sports betting outside of Nevada was still all pretty taboo. Imagine if you were time-warped from 2014 to 2024, and you turned on an NFL game. You’d be amazed.
But hey, gambling is cool. Unless it ruins your life. I wouldn’t want my boys doing it. But they’re only like three years old on average. I imagine by the time they’re 21, you’ll basically have to place a bet to even be allowed to watch sports.
Or maybe we’ll undergo a revival, and we’ll get back to the old days when the players didn’t make much money, never changed teams, and played for the love of the game. That actually sounds awful. Gross.
The Roster
The Athletics were far from a pathetic offense last year, and they seem poised to return all of their main guys in 2025. They scored 643 runs, which was the fifth-least in the league, but it was an improvement on the 2023 season when they finished dead last with just 585.
Management threw out there that they will be increasing their payroll dramatically this offseason. I didn’t believe that until they signed Luis Severino to a record-setting deal for the franchise. That bolstered their rotation significantly, and it also suggests they’ll be signing some more free agents this winter. Here’s the new-look rotation:
It is still far from good, and I’d still call it a bottom-five rotation in the league. But maybe they aren’t done.
I’ve committed to letting these team previews flow out slowly and evenly through December, January, and February, so I’m pushing forward with Oakland today, even though the roster is likely to look different by the time we get to March.
The New Ballpark
The days of the Athletics playing in Oakland are over. They will play in Sacramento for the next few seasons in a minor-league ballpark. That changes the projections, and it creates a bit of a challenge for us to figure out how.
The dimensions are very similar, and the climate shouldn’t be that much different, although it will be hotter on average in Sacramento than in Oakland. The biggest difference is the foul ground.
![OC] Here's how the field of the Athletics temporary home, Sutter Health Park, compares to the Oakland Coliseum. : r/baseball](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F9e071edf-362a-41ca-b4a3-c3020391cdfb_1080x1080.jpeg "OC] Here's how the field of the Athletics temporary home, Sutter Health Park, compares to the Oakland Coliseum. : r/baseball")
Lots of balls that would be foul-outs in Oakland will find the seats and extend counts in Sacramento. That benefits the hitters and hurts the pitchers, albeit slightly.
Overall, I don’t think it makes a significant difference in how we value these hitters. There isn’t all that much to like, regardless. Let us move forward.
Hitters
Brent Rooker
Age: 30
Pos: DH*
*Rooker will have OF eligibility on some sights. He played 14 games in the outfield last year. That’s enough to qualify on ESPN and Yahoo, but not on NFBC or some other sites which require 20 games.
Rooker has been one of the biggest surprises in baseball over the last few years. He had a breakout season at the age of 28, and you don’t see that very often. His professional debut happened in 2017 after being drafted by the Twins, and it took him until 2020 to make it to the Majors. He played just seven games in that goofy abbreviated season and then spent half of the 2021 season in AAA. His first real, consistent crack at MLB pitching game in 2023. Since getting the chance, he’s taken full advantage.
2023: 526 PA, .246/.329/.488, 30 HR, 61 R, 69 RBI, 4 SB, 33% K%
2024: 614 PA, .293/.365/.560, 39 HR, 82 R, 112 RBI, 11 SB, 29% K%
Only three hitters hit more home runs in 2024 than Rooker, and he managed an elite RBI total despite not having much help in that lineup.
His launch profile was one of the best in the entire league. His 90th-percentile EV was way up there at 108.5mph, and the launch angle histogram is one you’d like to model any power hitter after.
Because of that elite launch profile, he was able to turn in a high batting average despite another high strikeout rate. He whiffs a lot (66% Contact%), and we should expect another K% in the 27-31% range next year.
He will need to keep a very similar launch profile to avoid his batting average dropping significantly. His .362 BABIP shows that. He’s around league average in speed, so he’s not legging out a bunch of infield hits.
I think the power is secure. He hits the ball very hard and has had no issues elevating the ball over the last two years. I’m on board for that. The thing I’d be hesitant about is the batting average. His BABIP in 2023 was .317, so I would very much expect a significant fall from the .362 he posted last season.
His expected batting average last year was .269. The age is also a reason for pessimism. He’s not in danger territory, but he’s old enough for us not to believe he can continue to improve.
The DH-only thing is also a pretty big issue in some league types. In a five-outfielder league with one utility spot, that creates a roster crunch. We shouldn’t destroy the guy’s rank for that, but it is enough to break a tie with a similar hitter that can be used at a real position.
You are going to pay a pretty big price tag to get Rooker, and the downside is pretty alarming if he falls to a .240 batting average and settles into the 30-homer range rather than pushing toward 40 again. It’s just not that hard to find a player on waivers that hits home runs, so I can see a path here where Rooker is a somewhat replaceable player next year. That makes me not want to use a top 60 pick on the guy like we’ll have to.
Rank
He’s a very similar player to Jake Burger. And the best outfield comp I have at this moment is Jorge Soler, so here we go:
Projection
94 R, 36 HR, 85 RBI, 8 SB, .247/.331, .486, $10.50 roto value
Lawrence Butler
Age: 24
Pos: OF
Butler proved to be one of the 2024 breakout hitters. It took him a bit of time to really get going, and he was sent down to AAA early on in the season, but he really went off after his recall. The final MLB line:
451 PA, .260/.315/.488, .803 OPS, 24% K%, 8% BB%, 22 HR, 18 SB
After his recall, from June 18th onward:
330 PA, .291/.330/.565, .896 OPS, 22% K%, 6% BB%, 20 HR, 15 SB
There was some “streakiness” along the way:
He did a ton of damage in July and August, hitting 18 of his 22 homers in those two months. The best sign of the 2024 season for Butler was his ability to drop the strikeout rate. He was at 27% in a short sample in 2023, and that settled at 24% last year - which is not at all a concerning figure. He also hit the ball much harder in 2024:
Average EV 2023: 87.7
Average EV 2024: 90.590th Pct EV 2023: 101.9
90th Pct EV 2024: 106.6
Those are huge movements upward. He also did a good job getting the ball in the air with a 44% GB% and an average launch angle of 11 degrees. It’s all very good news.
All of that goodness, and I have yet to mention the steals. He’s not the fastest guy in the league (around 60th-percentile speed), but he’s aggressive on the bases. He posted a 19% stolen base attempt rate last season and swiped 18 bags in about two-thirds of a season. That attempt rate is most similar to that of Randy Arozarena and Brandon Marsh. We are probably looking at Butler as a 25-steal guy over a full season.
His expected batting average tracked with his actual around .260, so that’s a fair expectation for next season.
The ceiling is through the roof for Butler. He’s young enough to believe he can continue to improve, and we’ve already seen him at an easy 20-20 pace. The underlying numbers all check out, so I’m excited about Butler in 2025.
Rank
I’ll take him over Rooker in the outfield, and I even ended up pushing him above the two young shortstops I like (Neto & Tovar). Here’s what he landed:
Projection
95 R, 31 HR, 75 RBI, 23 SB, .256/.310/.468, $13.90 roto value
JJ Bleday
Age: 27
Pos: OF
Bleday had the best season of his career in 2024:
640 PA, .243/.322/.437, .759 OPS, 20 HR, 74 R, 60 RBI, 2 SB
That was after he hit just .167 and .195 in his first seasons in the Majors. He made plenty of improvements at the dish:
K%: 24% → 19.5%
BB%: 13.9% → 10.4%
Brl%: 6.4% → 8.3%
GB%: 44% → 35%
He seemed to have made a change in his approach. He was more aggressive (43% Swing% → 45% Swing%), and he slowed down the bat a bit to make more contact (105.1 EV 90 → 102.2). Even with a bit less bat speed, he managed a decent barrel rate by getting a good number of balls in the proper angle range.
Sweet Spot%: 30% → 37%
Launch Angle: 15.5° → 18.6°
His hard-hit rate stayed the same, and the average EV ticked up a tiny bit. He swung the bat hard when it was advantageous, but he seemed to find the right mix of not selling out at the wrong times.
His bat speed is nothing to get excited about, as that falls into the 45th percentile, and he’s also not much of a base runner with 56th percentile sprint speed.
All of this makes Bleday more of a floor play than a ceiling play. He’s a solid centerfielder, so he’ll be in the lineup every day - and he should put up another useful MLB season. I don’t think he’s someone to get excited about for fantasy purposes. The power and steal upside just isn’t there for me, and I don’t think he’s a batting average asset either.
Rank
Projection
73 R, 20 HR, 77 RBI, 6 SB, .232/.321/.399, $7.57 roto value
Shea Langeliers
Age: 27
Pos: C
You draft Langeliers for the purpose of getting 20+ homers at the catcher position. We have never been able to expect batting average or steals from the guy, but his defense keeps him in the lineup, and there is real power in the bat.
He did his best work in 2024:
534 PA, .244/.288/.450, 29 HR, 58 R, 80 RBI, 4 SB
A 29-homer season for a catcher will get you pretty high on the player rater, and he finished as the #4 guy on my list. Some of the other data points:
K%: 27%
BB%: 8%
Brl%: 12.8%
Cont%: 71%
GB%: 38%
90th EV: 105.5
xBA: .240
He made gains in contact and lowered his strikeout rate by two full points, which pushed his expected batting average up to .240 after he was barely above .200 the year prior.
Langeliers is still in his prime years. He has 82nd-percentile bat speed, 61st-percentile sprint speed, and a very solid launch profile. His pull rate was very high at 45%. I have no reservations about his ability to hit homers.
Your approach at the catcher position should be league-dependent. There are plenty of options, and in some leagues, the best way to go is still to punt the position. Just take the 10th or 12th best guy with one of your final picks. But Langeliers is definitely one of the better options this year. He’s easily top ten and probably my #5 or #6 guy.
Rank
I have one catcher ranked so far, and it’s Logan O’Hoppe. That’s not a bad comparison at all, but I’ll put Langeliers behind him because I think O’Hoppe has similar power with a much better batting average.
Projection
61 R, 23 HR, 71 RBI, 4 SB, .228/.295/.438, $9.50 roto value
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