Jacob Wilson's Rookie Year Mirrors Yankees, Dodgers Icons

Jacob Wilson had quite the rookie season in 2025. Unfortunately, his teammate Nick Kurtz looks to be a a generational hitter, so he won't be winning the American League Rookie of the Year award, though he is still expected to finish in the top three when all is said and done.

In looking at some of the leaderboards for rookies since 1975, Wilson was tied with the 1982 NL Rookie of the Year, Steve Sax, in fWAR when the season concluded. Both players ended up with 3.4 on the year, and Sax, now retired from baseball, is on the A's pre-and-postgame shows as a Sacramento native.

Sax was also a member of the all-star squad that Mr. Burns assembled in The Simpsons episode, "Homer at the bat." The Simpsons have been on for decades, and this is one of the most popular episodes in the show's history.

If WAR isn't your style, Wilson was tied with plenty of other greats from the past 50 years, too.

His .800 OPS on the year is tied with New York Yankees legend Derek Jeter in 1996, and Montreal Expos legend Andre Dawson in 1977. Wilson and Jeter were neck and neck in batting average (Jeter at .314, Wilson at .311), while Jeter had the edge in on-base (.370 to .355), and Wilson earned the leg up in slugging (.444 to .430) with J-Willy swatting 13 homers to Jeter's 10.

Wilson's rank at No. 14 for batting average by a rookie since 1975 is one of the more impressive stats that he put up, which ended up just ahead of Jim Rice (.309 in 1975) and Corey Seager (.308 in 2016). It was also a touch behind Jeter (11th), Todd Helton (10th, .315 in 1998) and José Abreu (9th .317 in 2014). Each of these players has been among the best in baseball at times.

For much of the season, Wilson was neck and neck with current Yankee masher Aaron Judge for the batting title, but ended up finishing tied for second with Toronto's Bo Bichette at .311. Judge pulled away at the end, finishing up with a .331 average.

If Wilson had won the batting title, he would have been just the third rookie to have ever earned the honor in baseball history.

The biggest growth area for Wilson heading into next season will come from the experience that he gained in his first full season in the big leagues in 2025. The A's have a young roster, and now many of them have been through the grind of a full year, which is something that's hard to prepare for as a college or high school player. Even in the minors, guys may not play every day.

Players like Kurtz and Wilson didn't get to go through that experience after they were drafted by the A's with their rapid ascents to the big leagues, so this offseason will be about conditioning and preparing to get through a full season of games more than anything.

Meanwhile, the season that Jacob Wilson just completed was still pretty special and put him alongside some big names in baseball history.