Rumor: Brewers Among Teams Looking At Middle Infielders

[Brock Beauchamp]

Jon Morosi tweeted that the Brewers are one of four teams looking for middle infield help.

Curiously, the names mentioned are Tim Anderson, Paul DeJong, and Vidal Brujan.

Tim Anderson of the White Sox is having an abysmal year by his standards. The former batting champion has an average around .240 and a sub-.300 on-base percentage and slugging percentage.

Paul DeJong could be an upgrade but he plays for the Cardinals and teams are reluctant to trade within the division, though it does happen.

The third name, Vidal Brujan, has a OPS under .500 in 2023. He's a consensus top 100 global prospect with very little experience against MLB pitching.

Frankly, I'm not sure any of these names make sense for the 2023 Brewers stretch run. 

 

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[nate82]

44 minutes ago, Brock Beauchamp said:

Paul DeJong could be an upgrade but he plays for the Cardinals and teams are reluctant to trade within the division, though it does happen.

The Brewers were willing to trade with the Cubs for Bryant or Rizzo.  The Cubs on the other hand were not willing to trade Bryant specifically to a rival because of optics.  It is why they got a poor return on Bryant.

I would stay far away from DeJong and Anderson.

[brewmann04]

I think he just putting something out their as the brewers are usually  tight lipped 

[StearnsFTW]

Pass on those three.

[Jenkins5]

Honestly, if CWS aren’t expecting much with down year & power outage, I wouldn’t mind Anderson. Now, he has only played 2 career games NOT a SS (2B twice this season) which is where he’d have to play unless they for some reason tried him at 3b. 
 

He doesn’t walk but has always hit for high average & isn’t a high K guy. Power has dropped past two years. Sometimes guys like him just need change of scenery. He has had stress of contract & them deciding they prob weren’t going to extend. That can throw guys off game. Maybe, he comes over, gets new life, gets back to hitting way he is has done most of his career,  

 

Don’t think he is best fit but he’s a 2 -4 War guy every year with wRC+ usually over 110. Defense has usually been pretty good. If it is him or Turang down the stretch at 2B, I’m betting on Anderson’s bat producing more.

[owbc]

Baseball savant tells me that about half of Tim Anderson’s struggles are due to him hitting literally everything on the ground (he has 0 HR this year) and the other half is plain old bad luck. His xWOBA is 40 points above his actual wOBA and 40 points below where it has been in the last 3-4 seasons. It also lists 2018 Jonathan Schoop as a similar batter and we all know how that went. Hard pass. 

[Devinep]

The Brewers think 1B and DH are so easy to find that they never need to invest anything in them. Now that they have trash for those positions, maybe do the “easy” thing and go get a bat or 2 for those spots. And between Urias, Monostsrio, Turang, and Miller (with some of them not playing 3B as much when Anderson returns) leave 2B 

[sveumrules]

16 minutes ago, Devinep said:

The Brewers think 1B and DH are so easy to find that they never need to invest anything in them. Now that they have trash for those positions, maybe do the “easy” thing and go get a bat or 2 for those spots. And between Urias, Monostsrio, Turang, and Miller (with some of them not playing 3B as much when Anderson returns) leave 2B 

Winker’s $8.25M is the 5th highest salary on the team this year.

Cutch’s $8.5M was the 4th highest salary on the team last year.

They’ve spent big (by Brewers standards) on DH, it just hasn’t worked.

[BraunWeeksFielder]

Typical Brewers move to trade for a position not necessarily seen as a need at current. I would be open to moving Wiemer, Turang and two other prospects for a sure fire controllable 2B, if it meant we could sign Adames to a condensed extension. It feels like this trade deadline will be rather interesting with the impending exodus 

[sveumrules]

Just now, BraunWeeksFielder said:

Typical Brewers move to trade for a position not necessarily seen as a need at current.

Brewers 2B have a 67 wRC+ (27th) and 0.3 WAR (22nd) this year.

Second base is definitely a need.

[Samurai Bucky]

3 hours ago, sveumrules said:

Winker’s $8.25M is the 5th highest salary on the team this year.

Cutch’s $8.5M was the 4th highest salary on the team last year.

They’ve spent big (by Brewers standards) on DH, it just hasn’t worked.

... this means the Brewers Front Office...

[Fear The Chorizo]

3 hours ago, sveumrules said:

Winker’s $8.25M is the 5th highest salary on the team this year.

Cutch’s $8.5M was the 4th highest salary on the team last year.

They’ve spent big (by Brewers standards) on DH, it just hasn’t worked.

Maybe next offseason they shouldn't throw that kind of money at an aging outfielder who can't hit righties and a guy fresh off neck surgery to provide offensive impact.

I'm all for the Brewers spending more payroll than this for a primary DH in order to actually get a good option into the everyday lineup.  To me it feels similar to the Brewers' approach under Melvin trying to split the difference in terms of payroll expenditures signing a slew of #5 starters for $8-$10M a season to fill out a rotation, when they'd have been better off spending more in free agency to bring in better talent or just letting younger internal options provide similar and likely better production at a fraction of that cost.

Specific to this thread, count me out on adding more middle/utility IFs to a 40 man roster already loaded up with them right now.

[Fear The Chorizo]

...if it meant we could sign Adames to a condensed extension.

You could honestly insert anything at the front of this statement, and I would say no thank you.

[endaround]

23 minutes ago, Samurai Bucky said:

... this means the Brewers Front Office...

That's unfair.  They are also paying $2m each to Hiura and Voit.

[jay87shot]

What about a trade for a mlb ready prospect with the Rangers, they have Seager, Semien, Duran in the bigs and then Acuna and Foscue in the upper minors. I think Foscue is mlb ready and fits our mold of low k players. Foscue for Houser and a throw in or Foscue for Daniel Guiallrte and Janson Junk.

Connor Norby and Michael Busch would probably be similar prospects. However Busch is more a LF/1B defensively. 

Edit:Tyler Freeman would be interesting to.

[wiguy94]

2 minutes ago, jay87shot said:

What about a trade for a mlb ready prospect with the Rangers, they have Seager, Semien, Duran in the bigs and then Acuna and Foscue in the upper minors. I think Foscue is mlb ready and fits our mold of low k players. Foscue for Houser and a throw in or Foscue for Daniel Guiallrte and Janson Junk.

Connor Norby and Michael Busch would probably be similar prospects. However Busch is more a LF/1B defensively. 

I had posted a while back that Houser could be an interesting trade piece for us at the deadline, but with Miley and Woody both on the IL, I would be a bit hesitant to trade him right now. If the staff was fully healthy, I would be all for that type of trade.

[ELCABALLO45]

Paul DeJong at 2nd with his defense and his power especially at AFF does intrigue me a little.