A's, Miguel Andujar Avoid Arbitration
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The Athletics entered the offseason with five players destined for arbitration, with Brent Rooker, Seth Brown, Miguel Andujar, Austin Adams and Dany Jiménez all due for salary bumps.
The A's essentially non-tendered Jiménez and Adams, then came to terms on a $2.7 million contract for 2025 with Seth Brown. Earlier this week, the A's signed DH/OF Brent Rooker to an extension, eating up his arbitration years entirely. The deal has five guaranteed years at $60 million.
On Thursday, the A's came to terms with Andujar, avoiding arbitration, on a one-year deal worth $3 million, as was first reported by Mark Feinsand of MLB.com. MLB Trade Rumors had projected him for $2.8 million earlier this offseason. This will be his final season under team control, as he'll be able to test free agency following the 2025 campaign.
With all of the A's contracts now settled, and the rest of the roster still pre-arb, the payroll projection for the club over at Roster Resource sits at roughly $97 million, still shy of the projected $105 threshold the club needs to reach to avoid a grievance being filed by the MLBPA.
Andujar and Brown figure to be part of a platoon in left field, at least to begin the season, the way the roster is constructed. Andujar missed some time to begin and end the 2024 season, his first with the A's, but in between he played in 75 games and hit .285 with a .320 OBP, good for a 103 wRC+.
Brown was optioned to Triple-A during the season, but got into 124 games and hit .231 with a .283 OBP and 14 home runs, good for a 91 wRC+. He was equally productive against both righties and lefties over the course of the full season, but was a much better hitter in the second half, after returning to the club, posting a 107 wRC+ while hitting .263 with a .304 on-base.
Andujar posted solid numbers overall, but was much better against left-handers (Brown is also a lefty), so that is where the platoon option makes sense. He went 23-for-56 (.411) versus southpaws, saw his walk rate jump up from 3.1% to 8.2% and he posted a 192 wRC+ in the small sample size. Only Aaron Judge posted a higher wRC+ last season overall, so Andujar was a legit masher with a lefty on the mound.
It also doesn't hurt that his strikeout rate dipped below ten percent, sitting at 9.8%.
With Brown and Andujar combined, they could form a pretty solid player in the aggregate, especially if Andujar continues to produce like he did in 2024.
On the defensive side, Andujar showcased a terrific arm in left on a number of occasions, but the advanced metrics weren't big fans of his range in the field, giving him a -7 Outs Above Average score. That ranked among the worst left fielders in the game, with only Teoscar Hernández (-8), Bryan Reynolds (-9), and Jesse Winker (-9) finishing with worse scores. Given that Andujar played in just 75 games, that's a stat that really stands out.
The A's are likely to make another move or two before Opening Day, but with Andujar officially signed, the roster is fairly set ahead of the 2025 season.
Jason has been covering the A’s at various sites for over a decade, and was the original host of the Locked on A’s podcast. He also covers the Stanford Cardinal as they attempt to rebuild numerous programs to prominence.
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