A's Nick Allen Could Take a Leap Forward in 2023

The A's aren't supposed to be a good team in 2023. They're coming off their first 100 loss season since 1979, and they haven't made any big upgrades. The A's also traded away their best player in Sean Murphy last month. You can see why fans and people around baseball would be down on the A's for this coming season.

However, the additions the front office has made seem like they could be impactful, with Aledmys Díaz and Jace Peterson solidifying the team's defense and giving Mark Kotsay some platoon options that should improve the offense, too.

Trevor May is a veteran presence for the bullpen that boasts a lot of talent, but not a ton of experience.

The rotation should be pretty solid, too. Newcomer Kyle Muller may just need a shot in the rotation and regular starts to develop into a bonafide major leaguer. Drew Rucinski has been one of the best starters in the KBO for the past four seasons and should be able to provide innings. Ken Waldichuk is a Rookie of the Year candidate and already has wins in games started against Jacob deGrom and Shohei Ohtani, two of the games best pitchers--both of whom are now in the AL West.

But the key for the A's exceeding expectations in 2023 will be the development of some of their young guys, particularly on offense.

Nick Allen, the A's 3rd round pick in 2017, played in 100 games in 2022 and proved that his glove already plays at the highest level. He recorded eight Outs Above Average (OAA) according to Baseball Savant, ranking him 8th among shortstops. Over the course of a full season he would have ranked in the top three.

Offensively is where fan's attention will be focused when it comes to the 24-year-old shortstop this season. He hit .207 with a .256 on-base and a 61 wRC+ in his first 100 big league games. He swatted 4 homers, scored 31 runs, and drove in 19 while swiping three bags. This led to some in the national media saying "The A's let got of Elvis Andrus for this guy?"

There is room for hope with the bat, however. First off, he has some experience now and has had an off-season to make adjustments. The only level that he appeared in twice since turning pro was Triple-A, finishing off the 2021 season there before starting the '22 season back in Vegas.

In his first go-around, he hit .243 with a .302 OBP, and a 54 wRC+ in 39 games. When he returned last season, he hit .266 with a .371 OBP and a 92 wRC+ in 46 games. The reason for the jump in production was that he came close to doubling his walk rate (7.3% in 2021, 13.1% in 2022) and cut his strikeout rate from 19.9% to 16.5%.

In the Majors last season his strikeout rate was 19.6% and his walk rate was just 5.8%. Just little improvements to those two stats could do a lot of heavy lifting, and those should improve naturally with the experience he got this past year.

Allen also had a BABIP (Batting Average on Balls in Play) of just .250, where the league average was .290. Allen has run BABIPs above .300 at nearly every stop in pro ball with the .289 he posted in A ball back in 2018 being the lone exception. BABIP is a little bit of luck, but it also helps when the ball is hit a little harder, giving defenders that aren't as good as Nick Allen less time to react, so improving upon his 83.9 average exit velocity would also help his BABIP, and his overall batting average.

The other key for Allen will be figuring out the slider, which was the toughest pitch for him last season, after he put up a run value of -11 and hit .087 against them. It was also a pitch he saw nearly 30% of the time, and one that he didn't square up very often, with a hard hit rate of just 8.5%.

One key for Allen in 2023 could be working on his approach at the plate. His whiff% was just 22.7% last season, two percent lower than the league average, so he can make contact when he wants. He was also swinging 53% of the time, six percent more than league average, and he swung at 39.6% of the first pitches in an AB. That likely led to some of his poor contact overall.

Going up to the plate with a pitch to hunt, and more importantly one that he knows he can drive into the gap, while also knowing that he can make contact more often than not, could lead to a big improvement from Nick Allen in 2023.

The A's may not contend for a playoff spot in 2023, but there are a number of players, like Allen, that could increase their production in a big way this coming season, and if enough guys make those leaps, then the A's rebuild may not last much longer.