Does it matter that Chourio isn't working many walks?

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MILWAUKEE -- Jackson Chourio’s Major League career began last season with a four-pitch walk.

In 2025, he didn’t take a walk until the third full week of the regular season, in his 78th plate appearance. He then doubled his total with walk No. 2 on Friday night against the A's while pushing past 90 plate appearances for the season.

Does it matter? Brewers coaches and front office gurus have been kicking that question around.

Chourio is producing, after all. He went into Friday’s games ranked sixth in MLB with 45 total bases, nine shy of the MLB-leading Aaron Judge and one ahead of Shohei Ohtani. Chourio was tied for fifth in the league in extra-base hits, led the Brewers with five home runs and 17 RBIs and trailed only Sal Frelick with an .803 OPS.

So, what’s the big deal if he had a higher batting average than on-base percentage until Tigers starter Jack Flaherty walked him on four pitches on Tuesday night?

Brewers manager Pat Murphy was in the “concerned” camp before Chourio took that walk this week. Here’s some of the reasons why: Chourio’s 41.5 percent chase rate going into Friday’s games put him in the fourth percentile in MLB, according to Statcast, and his 1.2 percent walk rate was in the second percentile. Over the course of a long regular season, that can be troubling.

“He’s got to be willing to walk,” Murphy said. “You have to be willing to win the pitch. He’s so talented, he can put so many balls in play. But over time, if you’re facing [crafty pitchers like] Jose Quintana, he’s going to say, ‘I’m going to scoot it over a little bit.’ There’s no batting title with no walks. There’s no All-Star with no walks.”

There are always exceptions, of course. Luis Arráez won last year’s NL batting title with 24 walks in 672 plate appearances with the Marlins and Padres, and that walk rate (3.6 percent) wasn’t even the lowest for a batting champion. According to the Elias Sports Bureau, Tim Anderson (2.9 percent walk rate in 2019) and the aptly-named Hal Chase (3.3 percent in 1916) won league batting titles with the lowest walk rates on record.

And then there’s A’s shortstop Jacob Wilson, who went into this weekend’s series against the Brewers batting .338 with zero walks in 71 plate appearances.

But generally speaking, Murphy’s point stood.

“The league will find it. Your weaknesses are like an Easter egg hunt,” Murphy said. “You know what I mean?”

Let’s pretend we don’t.

“Nobody ever goes to the Easter egg hunt and doesn’t find all the eggs, do they?” Murphy said.