5 Oakland Athletics to be excited about in 2024

Zack Gelof is a stud. The second baseman debuted in 2023, getting called up to Oakland just after the all-star break and quickly becoming one of the A's best players. He slashed .267/.337/.504 with 14 homers and 14 steals, adding strong defense at the keystone.

Coming into the year, he was ranked by Fangraphs as the Athletics' 5th best prospect. Though he hadn't been known as a power hitter, he knocked 26 home runs between Triple-A and the majors last year.

Despite striking out just over 27% of the time in the majors, that figure is actually a bit lower than his minor league strikeout rates which is a great sign for his plate discipline moving forward.

According to Statcast, Gelof had a healthy 11.1% barrel rate and his 89.8 average exit velocity was a tick above league average. While he does have a tendency to hit the ball into the ground, Gelof is fast enough to beat out more plays than most.

If Gelof is able to keep hitting hard fly balls, he's going to have a lot of success at the major league level. He's one of the most exciting players Oakland fans will be able to watch for the next few years.

This is an absolutely unhittable pitch from A's top prospect Mason Miller. 102 mph on the outside corner that George Springer just had to stare at.

According to Fangraphs, Miller was the A's number one prospect coming into the 2023 season, and the 76th ranked prospect overall. He battled through a couple injuries last year but ultimately proved evaluators correct in their rankings.

Miller pitched to a 3.78 ERA in Oakland over 33.1 innings, striking out over 27% of batters faced and consistently running his four-seamer into triple digits. His fastball averages 98.3 mph, which according to Statcast places the pitch in the 97th percentile among all major leaguers.

While Miller has some control issues, he has sky high potential. GM David Forst has been explicit about wanting Miller to pitch out of the bullpen in 2024 in an attempt to keep the young righty healthy all year.

Statcast uses pitch profiles to compare guys based on velocity and pitch movement. According to Statcast, the top comps for Miller are Jacob deGrom, Spencer Strider, and Gerrit Cole. If Miller is able to reduce the walks and further dial in his breaking pitches, he's sure to be a terrifying presence for opposing hitters for years to come.

If there's one thing we know about Esteury Ruiz, it's that he's a beast on the base paths. His 67 steals were the most by a rookie since Vince Coleman set the record back in 1985.

Acquired as part of the Sean Murphy trade prior to the 2023 season, Ruiz came to Oakland and immediately slotted into center field for the Athletics. He finished the season with a .254/.309/.345 slash line.

There are certainly flaws in Ruiz's game. He's never hit for a ton of power and he doesn't have the best arm in the outfield. However, his speed allows him to catch up to a bunch of fly balls that other guys can't get to and he doesn't strike out a ton at the plate, which allows him to get on base enough to steal a ton of bases.

Ruiz is about to turn 25, meaning that there's plenty of time for him to fix holes in his swing, add power, and improve as a ball player. He's as electric a player as there is in the game today. He's lightning fast on the base paths and could be an all-star with a few small tweaks to his approach at the plate.

Statcast has him in the 97th percentile for sprint speed. With a full year of playing time, he could become just the 5th player to break 70 steals in a season since the turn of the century. We're extremely excited to see how Ruiz improves in 2024 and beyond.

I'm not sure if I'm alone in this but I love watching JP Sears pitch. His effortless delivery and high leg kick finish are just excellent, and he's a pretty good pitcher to boot.

Sears build off a solid 2022 campaign and finished with a 4.54 ERA in 172.1 innings in 2023. He struck out just under 22% of hitters last year but combined it with a 7% walk rate which is a full percentage point better than league average.

Sears relies pretty heavily on the four-seam fastball, throwing it over 50% of the time, but adds in a sweeper, as well as a changeup that he throws against right handed hitters. All three are decent pitches that he controls well and can use to get whiffs outside the zone.

The biggest problem for Sears has been his inability to induce ground balls. His 29.1% ground ball rate was second lowest among qualified pitchers last year. Because Sears doesn't have elite velocity, hitters were able to square him up more often than you'd like in 2023.

All in all, Sears has a strong foundation to build off heading into 2024. He turns 28 in a couple months, so he's still plenty young enough to further develop his pitches and become a reliable top of the rotation starting pitcher for the A's.

In his first full season at the major league level, Brent Rooker hit .247/.329/.488 and smashed 30 home runs. His Statcast numbers jump off the page. 93rd percentile barrel rate, 91st percentile hard hit rate. Rooker swings hard and does a ton of damage on contact.

Rooker does strike out quite a bit, which is a consequence of swinging hard all the time. However, when he's producing results like he did last year, the 32% strikeout rate is palatable for the time being.

Maybe he won't be this guy forever. He's not the best defender in the outfield and he's already 29, so we might not get this version of Rooker for the next decade. But it sure is a treat for A's fans at the moment.

Rooker pulled most of his home runs in 2023. According to Statcast, he hit just one homer to right field, and three to right center. Everything else was to center and the left side of the outfield. The one homer to right is the one highlighted above.

Yes, it just scraped over the wall, but it came off a nasty 91 mph cutter from Shohei Ohtani. Rooker dug it out of the bottom of the strike zone and pushed it 370 feet out of the park. Look how peeved Ohtani is afterward. What a gem.

Rooker will look to build upon his all-star campaign and become a force in the middle of the A's lineup in 2024. There's a world where Rooker repeats his 2023 season and finds himself in another all-star game next year. We're certainly here for it.