Lesser Brewers: Taylor Green

MVBrewers is a player-by-player look at the most valuable members of the 2012 Brewers, as voted on by you. Here's our top ten:

1. Ryan Braun
2. Aramis Ramirez
3. Yovani Gallardo
4. Corey Hart
5. Norichika Aoki
6. Jonathan Lucroy
7. Carlos Gomez
8. Zack Greinke
9. Marco Estrada
10: Mike Fiers

Honorable Mentions: Martin Maldonado, Rickie Weeks, Jim Henderson, Mark Rogers, Shaun Marcum, Wily Peralta, Jean Segura, Jose Veras, John Axford, Francisco Rodriguez

Lesser Brewers: Nyjer Morgan, Travis Ishikawa, George Kottaras, Randy Wolf, Logan Schafer, Kameron Loe, Manny Parra, Alex Gonzalez, Mat Gamel, Chris Narveson, Livan Hernandez, Brandon Kintzler, Tyler Thornburg, Taylor Green

The series now continues with Lesser Brewers, to cover some of the remaining Brewers that we have not covered so far. This is the fourteenth installment in that segment. You can see all the player profiles in the Most Valuable Brewers 2012 section.

A year ago, everyone was talking about Taylor Green.

The 25-year-old third baseman was coming off a season where he hit .336/.413/.583 with 22 homers for AAA Nashville, but had been left in the minors for most of the season despite Casey McGehee's epic struggles at third base. Green projected as the Brewers' potential future at the position, and his minor league career showed significant signs of optimism.

The door more or less closed in Green's face when the Brewers signed Aramis Ramirez, though. Green opened the 2012 season in the minors again and struggled mightily in primarily bench duty when he returned. The Brewers didn't have many opportunities for Green to play consistently, and his bat didn't exactly force its way into the lineup as he hit .184/.265/.340 for the season and .109/.180/.196 in his final 50 plate appearances.

As a left-handed hitter with some power, it's still possible Green could help this team going forward. He played some winter ball in the Dominican Republic this year and told Adam McCalvy he's working on tweaking his swing to be better prepared for a non-starting role in 2013.

With that said, hitting consistently when you're not playing every day is a tough challenge for a young hitter. Teams frequently look for a player with more experience to fill that role.

Best Game

Green got the start in the cleanup spot and was on base three times with a double and a pair of singles when the Brewers lost 6-5 to the Pirates on June 3, and the double drove in Nyjer Morgan with the Brewers' first run. Here's the highlight:

Contract Status

Green has less than one full year of service time in the majors, so he won't be arbitration-eligible until 2016 at the earliest. He also has two options remaining.