Brewers claim OF Billy McKinney, activate RHP Ray Black; DFA RHP Trey Supak and INF Ronny Rodriguez

[Ron Robinsons Beard]

 

McKinney is a former Top 100 prospect and is 26 years old. Mostly a corner OFer, although he has played a little 1B too. Not a bad guy to take a look at to see if something clicks.

 

Surprising about Supak. He's the Brewers' new Moonlight Graham, as he was active for one game this season, but never saw the mound.

[djoctagone]

billy mckinney will enter 2021 spring training with no minor league options remaining. he has already burned his third option this year.

 

the club has seven days to try to pass trey supak and ronny rodriguez through outright waivers, trade, or release them. if either player clears outright waivers, each will be forced to accept the minor league assignment.

 

ray black is out of options.

[MrTPlush]

His 1.333 OPS will look great in our lineup!

[Lathund]

Supak DFA surprised me. He has an option next year so you'd think they'd give him a chance still. And since he still has an option, there's no chance he doesn't get claimed by someone.

[CheeseheadInQC]

I wonder if Supak was likely to lose his 40-man spot to one of the Brown, File, Bettinger or Francis in the offseason and they thought it was more likely they could sneak him through waivers now than at that point.

[djoctagone]

public service announcement: david freitas, out of options in 2021, still has a spot on the 40-man roster.

[djoctagone]

it should also be noted that in order to make room for ray black, j.p. feyereisen was optioned to the alternate training site in grand chute.

[Jopal78]

24 year old starter who tops out in the mid-90s and is “close” to the majors.... Supak will get claimed.

 

Surprised they kept Freitas, Feyereisen,, Peterson etc who have little to no upside over Supak who at least has Youth on his side

[brewers888]

Supak has to have more value than a bunch of guys on our 40. He may not amount to much but dropping him makes little sense.

[CheeseheadInQC]

public service announcement: david freitas, out of options in 2021, still has a spot on the 40-man roster.

If they didn’t view Supak as likely to keep his 40 man spot this offseason, it isn’t tough to see where a veteran catcher would be more valuable to have at the alternate training site over the next couple of weeks.

[folly412]

Supak must have looked beyond terrible in Appleton if all of Freitas, Perdomo, Healy, and Topa are on the roster over him.

[AKCheesehead]

He must have. Stearns' comments about the DFA were basically "we had to let him go because 2021 would be his last option year so after that he'd have to be in the majors." Umm, yeah, so what?

[brewmann04]

What a stupid move you don't give up on a Young arm

[Eye Black]

Surprised they DFA’d Supak who I thought had a chance to be a long-term contributor for the major league club, but I’m also torn in that McKinney is the exact type of mid-20s hitter they should be taking a shot with.

[markedman5]

Supak DFA surprised me. He has an option next year so you'd think they'd give him a chance still. And since he still has an option, there's no chance he doesn't get claimed by someone.

 

He didn’t get claimed

 

[Ron Robinsons Beard]

Supak DFA surprised me. He has an option next year so you'd think they'd give him a chance still. And since he still has an option, there's no chance he doesn't get claimed by someone.

 

He didn’t get claimed

 

 

Considering the dearth of quality starting pitching in MLB, that is pretty incredible. Happy the Brewers didn't lose him. Does this mean he's a minor league free agent at the end of the season, though?

[markedman5]

I really don’t know anything about the minor league free agent protocol.

[djoctagone]

Supak DFA surprised me. He has an option next year so you'd think they'd give him a chance still. And since he still has an option, there's no chance he doesn't get claimed by someone.

He didn’t get claimed

 

ronny rodriguez also cleared waivers and was outrighted to the minor leagues.

[TURBO]

Brewers sent RHP Trey Supak outright to their alternate training site.

 

It's a bit surprising that Supak didn't get claimed off waivers by another team after Milwaukee designated him for assignment on Monday. The 24-year-old right-hander was named the Double-A Southern League's Most Outstanding Pitcher in 2019. He'll remain a member of the Brewers organization leading into 2021.

[folly412]

Glad to see this, though troubled that he apparently didn't look good enough that they wanted to risk it in the first place.

[areacodes]

What a stupid move you don't give up on a Young arm

 

Is it still a stupid move?

[CheeseheadInQC]

I'm glad he's staying in the system, but I'm not shocked he passed through waivers. He just seems like a tough one to get a handle on what the skill is that is going to bring him big league success. He never became a power arm like was expected; he doesn't miss many bats; while his ground ball rate is slightly above average, no one is going to confuse him for Brett Anderson; he doesn't walk a ton but I'm not sure he's a pure command guy like File apparently is. He had a lot of AA success spread over two seasons, but you could make the case that File, Bettinger and Francis had more interesting peripherals last year. Hopefully he is one of those guys who defies categorization, but those guys are less likely to attract attention on the waiver wire, especially when they don't at least have a good AAA track record.

[pacopete4]

Wheelin-dealin-Stearns does it again.

[djoctagone]

Brewers sent RHP Trey Supak outright to their alternate training site.

 

It's a bit surprising that Supak didn't get claimed off waivers by another team after Milwaukee designated him for assignment on Monday. The 24-year-old right-hander was named the Double-A Southern League's Most Outstanding Pitcher in 2019. He'll remain a member of the Brewers organization leading into 2021.

source? if he was sent to the alternate training site in grand chute, then he would be added back to the club player pool.

[djoctagone]

consider that had rodriguez or supak been claimed, neither would have been eligible for postseason play. seeing how many teams are still in the postseason mix, this may have factored into a team's decision to not put in a claim for either.