First base: Eric Thames aiming for more consistency with Brewers in 2018

Sixth in a position-by-position series on the Milwaukee Brewers entering spring training. Today: First base.

PHOENIX – Viewed as a whole, Eric Thames’s 2017 season qualified as a success.

Returning to the major leagues for the first time since 2012 after putting up three monster seasons in the Korean Baseball Organization, Thames hit .247, tied for the team lead with 31 home runs and drove in 63 runs with an .877 OPS over 140 games.

But there were plenty of struggles as well.

His strikeout total of 163 was high, he hit just .180 with runners in scoring position, .182 against left-handed pitching and his overall streakiness at the plate served as a considerable source of frustration.

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Thames believes all of that - the good and the bad - will equip him for a more productive 2018 with the Milwaukee Brewers.

“For me, it’s a lot easier now that I know what to expect,” said Thames, 31, who is entering the second year of the three-year, $16 million contract he signed in November 2016. There's also a team option for 2020 that would pay him $7.5 million with a $1 million buyout.

“Last year, I had no idea of what guys I faced threw besides from video. This year, I have a better idea. I hit (.328) in September because of the adjustments. I learned, ‘OK, I’ve got to do this and this. Start training this way and stop training this way.’

“I’m going to apply the same principles to this year. I’m just going to keep my mind on the straight and narrow and stay focused and keep using that knowledge I learned last year.”

Thames, who'd last played in a major-league game on Oct. 1, 2012, raced out of the gate with the Brewers and in a month's time had become the focal point for interview and highlight shows.

He hit seven homers in his first 12 games, tied a franchise record by homering in five straight games and set franchise records with 11 homers and 28 runs scored in April, prompting the Chicago Cubs to question whether Thames was cheating, which prompted a steady diet of drug testing.

He posted a .345 average and otherworldly OPS of 1.276 over his first 24 games but followed that up by hitting just .221 in the month of May and a dreadful .163 in June (although he did beat the St. Louis Cardinals and San Diego Padres with late-inning homers on consecutive days).

The roller-coaster ride continued the rest of the way as Thames rebounded by hitting .284 in July, sagged to .173 in August and then finished strong in September as the Brewers finally saw their postseason push end in St. Louis in Game 161.

The ups and downs were tough on Thames, a tireless worker who also played much of the season on gimpy legs and in May was hit with a case of strep throat.

“There’s a saying – ‘No peaks, no valleys,’ and that’s the way you always want it to be,” he said. “But obviously we’re all human, and there’s times where you want to get the big hit and you don’t, or you chase something out of the zone when you know you should have been looking in this zone. It’s part of the game.

“It’s a long season, a lot of failure. So for me personally, it’s a matter of being even-keeled. No peaks, no valleys and kind of go from there.

“Staying in that mind frame is going to be key.”

Manager Craig Counsell expects Thames will be much better adjusted overall in his second season in Milwaukee.

"Major-league baseball players have this great ability to adjust against each other. That's the talent they have," Counsell said. "Adjustment is constant. It's always happening. What players want to be able to do is speed up that adjustment process - guys adjust to the league, the league counters to them. That's how it happens and that's a little bit of what happened to Eric last year."

In the midst of his dry spells last season, Thames tinkered around with his workouts and pregame routine in an attempt to get back on track. He said he kept the change to a minimum this off-season.

"I’m trying to get to the inside pitch cleaner so I eliminated all chest work," he said. "It’s really hard for me because I have a big chest naturally. I want to be able to get my elbow down so I can be clean to the ball."

The addition of Christian Yelich and Lorenzo Cain and the return of Keon Broxton and Hernán Pérez means Thames likely won't be needed to play in the outfield this year. He started 18 games and played 25 overall in the corner spots in 2017.

The Brewers were in good shape at first base behind Thames last season with the presence of Jesús Aguilar, a waiver claim from the Cleveland Indians who forced his way onto his first opening-day roster with a red-hot spring training and went on to a breakout season of his own.

Aguilar, 27, hit .265 with 16 homers and 52 RBI to go along with an OPS of .837 in a total of 133 games (55 starts). He proved to be the Brewers' best pinch-hitting option as well and finished tied for third in the majors with three homers, fourth with 15 hits and tied for fifth with 10 RBI.

What his role with Milwaukee will be this season remains to be seen. With so much outfield depth, the Brewers will take a look at Ryan Braun at first base this spring with an eye on potentially using him as Thames's right-handed-hitting backup.

"Honestly, that doesn’t depend on me," Aguilar said. "I don’t control those things. There’s nothing I can do. I’ll just get ready here and try to show I can play every day. ...

"They’ve got the power, they’ve got the control and they know what they want to do.

Aguilar reported to camp earlier in the week looking much leaner than a year ago. He said he weighed in at 280 instead of the "290-something" he weighed last season.

While he was remarkably nimble in the field for a man his size, Aguilar's slimmed-down body and improved conditioning should help him state his case to stick on the team.

"Way different. I like it," he said of the change. "I’ve got more range. I feel like I can do more things. Now I feel like I can do things. You know when you get that confidence? It’s good for me."

Aguilar's clubhouse presence also can't be understated, as he was a unifying force in what wound up being a very tight-knit group. He also was one of the ringleaders in the team's fun home-run gantlet that players who'd gone deep ran through in the dugout after rounding the bases.

"It’s about being a good guy to be around," he said. "Being a good teammate."

By the numbers

3 Players who started a game at first base for the Brewers in 2017 (Thames, 103; Aguilar, 52; Neil Walker, seven).

4 Offensive categories in which Thames led the Brewers in 2017 - homers (tied with 31), slugging percentage (.518), OPS (.877) and walks (75).

10 Homers hit by Thames against the Cincinnati Reds in 2017, making him the first player in franchise history to hit double-digit homers against an opponent in a season.

.346 Thames's batting average over his final 17 games of 2017. He also hit three homers and drove in nine runs.

.905 Milwaukee's combined OPS at first base in 2017, which ranked sixth best in the majors.