The Athletics went into spring training still searching for an answer at third base, and Max Muncy forced the issue. He won the job, and in nine games this season he has hit 11-for-35 with two home runs, five RBI and eight runs scored while starting at third base every day.
That start has helped make Muncy one of the early standouts at the position across the majors. His.314 batting average and.333 on-base percentage through nine games do not fully capture how well he has fit the role after a spring in which he batted.380 with a.466 on-base percentage, hit five home runs and drove in 12 runs.
The Athletics knew third base was a problem before camp even opened. General manager David Forst said after last season that the club would look for an upgrade at second or third base, and the team followed that plan by trading for Jeff McNeil, adding salary to the payroll and making a run at Nolan Arenado before he used his no-trade clause. That left Darell Hernaiz and Muncy to compete for the third base job in camp.
Muncy did more than compete. His spring production made the choice hard to avoid, and the early season numbers suggest the club may have found more than a stopgap. Through nine games, his 0.4 fWAR was tied for second on the team with Jeffrey Springs, and his 153 wRC+ ranked second among Athletics full-time players. Among MLB third basemen, that same 0.4 fWAR ranked fifth, his 153 wRC+ ranked fifth and his.571 slugging percentage ranked second behind Seattle's Brendan Donovan, who led the group at.667.
That matters because the Athletics entered camp without a settled answer at second or third base and are now getting production from a spot that looked uncertain only weeks ago. Muncy's early work has changed the shape of the lineup and given the club a reliable presence at third, which is exactly what Forst was looking for when he said the team needed an upgrade.
The bigger question now is not whether Muncy can hold the job. It is how long the Athletics can keep calling a player this productive an internal solution rather than one of the team’s real strengths.
