Tender Decisions

[CheeseheadInQC]

8 minutes ago, brewers888 said:

Just a stupid decision and a big indication that we are cutting payroll big time.

If any team was willing to tender him a contract they probably would have tossed the Brewers a minor lottery ticket to be assured of getting him. I think the fact that he wasn't traded means no team was willing to do that.

[jay87shot]

I guess if he is non-tendered at least we can still try and sign Woody to a multi year deal. My guess is that big market teams can get more creative and throw around way bigger incentives and risk more.

[Axman59]

20 minutes ago, brewers888 said:

Just a stupid decision and a big indication that we are cutting payroll big time.

Stupid? He likely won't pitch in 2024. The Brewers would have been stupid to tender him.

[Axman59]

I wonder if Woodruff qualifies for COBRA health insurance?  😄

[jay87shot]

6 minutes ago, Axman59 said:

Stupid? He likely won't pitch in 2024. The Brewers would have been stupid to tender him.

Agreed, the article/interview of him saying he want to be back around mid-season was likely a ploy by his agent to try and get the Brewers or someone to pick up his option instead of getting like 5 million this year and then being tied to a team option for 2025 if he signs as a FA.

[phnxcrew]

Another brewers ace ending his brewers career with injury and providing the franchise no future value with draft picks or minor league talent.  we really have to start adopting the rays model of trading these guys at their most valuable.

[Sixtolezcano]

50 minutes ago, brewers888 said:

Just a stupid decision and a big indication that we are cutting payroll big time.

This was an inevitable Attanasio decision. There was absolutely no way the Brewers were going to sign Woodruff to ANY type of deal the way Mark runs the team.

[Fear The Chorizo]

10 minutes ago, phnxcrew said:

Another brewers ace ending his brewers career with injury and providing the franchise no future value with draft picks or minor league talent.  we really have to start adopting the rays model of trading these guys at their most valuable.

Hader?

Btw, how many titles has the Rays' model earned them?

I think the thing to learn is that pitching is fickle and incredibly injury prone, and the organization has got to excel at developing pitching talent - something the Brewers have proven to be able to do.

[Underachiever]

I’m both sad that it ended this way, because I really enjoyed watching Woody pitch, and completely understand letting him go. It’s possible the Brewers have gotten a lot of medical advice on the viability of Woodruff ever throwing as hard again. 

[TURBO]

It is almost 100% in the bag that the Cubs are going to sign him.  Watch and see 

🤢

I bet they have already had his agent on the phone...

[Axman59]

Are people here on drugs? Tendering Woodruff would have put the Brewers on the hook for around $11 million with a great likelihood he doesn't throw a single pitch for them in 2024. This is not about the Brewers/Attanasio being cheap. They would have been crazy to tender him. Which is exactly why no one was interested in trading for him for even a used jock strap.

[Outlander]

With all the rumors today it turns out Woodruff really didn't have any trade value. Hard to say the Brewers are stupid for non tendering when no one else is willing to give him a one year deal on an arbitration salary.

[Matt Breen]

There was no way the Brewers - or any team - was going to tender Woodruff a contract in 2024. There's a very good chance he doesn't play at all next year. And then he still would be a FA after 2024. That means you'd pay him for nothing if he walked. To offer up $11-12m to a player who will likely be on the DL all or most of the year would be a terrible management decision. 

The Brewers - or any team they traded him to - would have signed him to a 2-year deal. They would have paid him a smaller 2024 salary and a larger one in 2025. Example: he'd get $3m in 2024 (with a bunch of incentives in case he does come back), and then $10m in 2025. 

But even that's a risk for a team. That's putting a lot of stock in Woodruff recovering. 

Woody did what's right for him. He knew no one would tender him a contract for 2024, so he just said no to any sort of extension as described above. He can still do that sort of a deal now that he's a FA - but find the team that fits him best - both financially and baseball-wise. 

[Sixtolezcano]

12 hours ago, Sixtolezcano said:

This was an inevitable Attanasio decision. There was absolutely no way the Brewers were going to sign Woodruff to ANY type of deal the way Mark runs the team.

I never meant that Mark was cheap. Just looking at past maneuvers he watches where every penny is spent. The best way to predict future outcomes accurately is to look to past history. It really isn’t that difficult.

[mtsportsfan]

13 hours ago, Brewcrew82 said:

What? We haven't been competing? And don't say WS because plenty of teams have competed and not won a WS. 

We've won more games in the last 6 years than almost all of the big markets. 

I get your point and and we have done a really good job of putting a quality product on the field . But , how many World series have we won or even gone to ? How many times have we been bounced in the first round ?  

When was the last time when in a playoff chase that we acquired a difference making player to put us over the top ? If you say Cahna and Santana, we are thinking differently on what a difference maker is ! If there was a sport that needs a salary cap and floor its baseball ! 

[mtsportsfan]

12 hours ago, phnxcrew said:

Another brewers ace ending his brewers career with injury and providing the franchise no future value with draft picks or minor league talent.  we really have to start adopting the rays model of trading these guys at their most valuable.

For sure ,  really hurts for a small market team to lose a top end player with no return ! It's tough ,damned if you do , damned if you don't !

[brewers888]

57 minutes ago, Sixtolezcano said:

I never meant that Mark was cheap. Just looking at past maneuvers he watches where every penny is spent. The best way to predict future outcomes accurately is to look to past history. It really isn’t that difficult.

He most definitely is cheap and has gotten increasingly so the last few years. After the Yelich contract we haven't given any sort of big or even medium sized long term contracts to anyone.

Just look at this first base situation as a great example of being ultra cheap. We traded for a cheap first baseman in Bauers that can't hit which will more than likely even take us out of the running for a guy like Santana who won't exactly break the bank.

Nobody wants to hear this and a few will lob insults my way but I expect the 24 payroll to be at least 20 million less than the one we ended last season with. Attanasio has taken this franchise as far as he can financially. He was certainly an upgrade over the latter years of the Selig ownership but he just doesn't have the money to have us even competitive financially. 

[brewers888]

At this point I see no reason why we shouldn't be selling off all of our expensive short term assets. That means Burnes has to go and Devin should also be available for the right package. We clearly aren't winning a World Series with this group so just sell everything and if we are so lucky Attanasio can cash in and sell the team for a huge profit.

[Oxy]

2 minutes ago, brewers888 said:

At this point I see no reason why we shouldn't be selling off all of our expensive short term assets. That means Burnes has to go and Devin should also be available for the right package. We clearly aren't winning a World Series with this group so just sell everything and if we are so lucky Attanasio can cash in and sell the team for a huge profit.

This might very well end up being the case...but this team won the central w/o Woodruff last year. Ashby is coming back.  Right now it is still a "run it back" situation (as long as the Canha/Santana roles can be filled or better yet improved).  With improvement from the youngsters and a nice FA signing or two this is still very much a competitive team...meaning it's likely they make the postseason. 

[Fear The Chorizo]

5 minutes ago, brewers888 said:

He most definitely is cheap and has gotten increasingly so the last few years. After the Yelich contract we haven't given any sort of big or even medium sized long term contracts to anyone.

Just look at this first base situation as a great example of being ultra cheap. We traded for a cheap first baseman in Bauers that can't hit which will more than likely even take us out of the running for a guy like Santana who won't exactly break the bank.

Nobody wants to hear this and a few will lob insults my way but I expect the 24 payroll to be at least 20 million less than the one we endd last season with. Attanasio has taken this franchise as far as he can financially. He was certainly an upgrade over the latter years of the Selig ownership but he just doesn't have the money to have us even competitive financially. 

After the Yelich contract, can you blame him for not wanting to extend huge dollar contract extensions the past few offseasons in free agency when Yelich frankly underperformed in seasons 2020-2022?  Meanwhile, arbitration salaries for their best players have steadily been climbing.  The Brewers have been able to sprinkle in homegrown, pre-arbitration players onto their roster rather than playing heavily in veteran free agency, and that's likely to continue in 2024 with some of the prospects they have knocking on the door.  Would you rather the break Chourio in at some point next season making league minimum the next few seasons, or instead would it be better to throw $12-15M a season at a 30-something hitter on the downside of his career so payroll stays higher? 

The combination of replacing Tellez with Bauers and nontendering Woodruff likely shaves off around $15-17 million in 2024 payroll commitments they would have been obligated to spend had they tendered those two players.  Both of them spent large parts of last year on IL, Tellez had a bad year when he was healthy and Woodruff just got done with a shoulder surgery that likely has him out all of 2024.  Let's see what the Brewers wind up doing with that $17M in budget first in free agency or in the trade market before jumping to a conclusion that they're ultra cheap.  If they turn that savings into a free agent DH or starter that is actually healthy and able to contribute to the 2024 MLB team, then that's making the team better on the field with the same budget they would've had to pay guys who were going to be a net negative for 2024.  Also, the Brewers could trim payroll by quite a bit from their 2023 amount and still have a more talented roster while keeping Burnes' and Adames' increased Arby salaries around and adding a FA or two, because they had roughly 25% of their 2023 payroll give them next to no positive onfield contributions last season due to injury and/or poor players collecting checks.

Or perhaps you want them to go on an unsustainable 2-3 year spending binge like what the Padres just did, only to not win a WS and now look at having to watch an expensive and aging roster get steadily gutted while taking out loans to cover bloated payroll commitments.  

[brewers888]

5 minutes ago, Fear The Chorizo said:

After the Yelich contract, can you blame him for not wanting to extend huge dollar contract extensions the past few offseasons in free agency when Yelich frankly underperformed in seasons 2020-2022?  Meanwhile, arbitration salaries for their best players have steadily been climbing.  The Brewers have been able to sprinkle in homegrown, pre-arbitration players onto their roster rather than playing heavily in veteran free agency, and that's likely to continue in 2024 with some of the prospects they have knocking on the door.  Would you rather the break Chourio in at some point next season making league minimum the next few seasons, or instead would it be better to throw $12-15M a season at a 30-something hitter on the downside of his career so payroll stays higher? 

The combination of replacing Tellez with Bauers and nontendering Woodruff likely shaves off around $15-17 million in 2024 payroll commitments they would have been obligated to spend had they tendered those two players.  Both of them spent large parts of last year on IL, Tellez had a bad year when he was healthy and Woodruff just got done with a shoulder surgery that likely has him out all of 2024.  Let's see what the Brewers wind up doing with that $17M in budget first in free agency or in the trade market before jumping to a conclusion that they're ultra cheap.  If they turn that savings into a free agent DH or starter that is actually healthy and able to contribute to the 2024 MLB team, then that's making the team better on the field with the same budget they would've had to pay guys who were going to be a net negative for 2024.  Also, the Brewers could trim payroll by quite a bit from their 2023 amount and still have a more talented roster while keeping Burnes' and Adames' increased Arby salaries around and adding a FA or two, because they had roughly 25% of their 2023 payroll give them next to no positive onfield contributions last season due to injury and/or poor players collecting checks.

Or perhaps you want them to go on an unsustainable 2-3 year spending binge like what the Padres just did, only to not win a WS and now look at having to watch an expensive and aging roster get steadily gutted while taking out loans to cover bloated payroll commitments.  

Big difference between being reckless like San Diego and we now know there was good reason for that and inching closer to the Oaklands of the world.

[Fear The Chorizo]

20 minutes ago, brewers888 said:

Big difference between being reckless like San Diego and we now know there was good reason for that and inching closer to the Oaklands of the world.

The ironic thing is in terms of both W/L record and the potential for a team to relocate, the Padres are much more comparable to the Vegas A's than the Brewers are at this point in time.

 

[DR28]

********, hate seeing Woody go and if we trade Burnes...................... My god, could be a LONG season and we could lose 100 games.

[Ewitkows1]

7 minutes ago, DR28 said:

********, hate seeing Woody go and if we trade Burnes...................... My god, could be a LONG season and we could lose 100 games.

We aren't even close to that. If Burnes goes, we'll get a young pitcher back. We might not be 90+ wins but we'd probably be in the low 80s

[DR28]

8 minutes ago, Ewitkows1 said:

We aren't even close to that. If Burnes goes, we'll get a young pitcher back. We might not be 90+ wins but we'd probably be in the low 80s

This team was built on starting pitching and we're gonna have only one of those starters left... And I love Freddy... Sure hope Ashby is healthy so he can join Peralta in the rotation.

Isn't a guarantee that we get a young pitcher back... We could get all hitters back.

Offense is gonna be bad again.

Sorry just not feeling very good about 24 at this point... Hopefully we actually try to improve the offense this winter, but highly doubt that if that last couple winters are any indication.