TRADE: Brewers Acquire Aaron Civale from Rays, Jump Starting Pitching Market

[Matthew Trueblood]

The Milwaukee Brewers have an opportunity to do something big in 2024, and they have no intention of letting it slide by. They jumped the market and made the first major pitching acquisition of 2024 Wednesday morning.

Image courtesy of © Charles LeClaire-USA TODAY Sports

The Tampa Bay Rays have sputtered and struggled in the daunting AL East this season, and when they elected to make an early move in the pitching market, the Brewers met them there. Aaron Civale should slot right into the middle of the only weak segment of the Milwaukee roster, the starting rotation.

This is a significant deal. Civale, who turned 29 last month, has ugly surface-level numbers this year (a 5.07 ERA, for instance), but he's under team control through 2025. He's also just a year removed from a 2023 season in which he was the Rays' prized deadline acquisition and posted a 3.46 ERA. In 87 innings pitched this year, he has 84 strikeouts and 27 walks. 

Home runs have been the major problem for Civale; he's allowed 16 of them on the year. Not a hard thrower by modern standards, he nonetheless has some upside, as evidenced not only by his 2021 and 2023 seasons but by his pitch mix, which includes a lot of the things (several pitches, multiple fastball looks, little reliance on offspeed stuff) that the Brewers love. We're likely to see Chris Hook and company go to work with Civale, not to overhaul his arsenal, but to tweak pitch usage and find a more successful mixture.

In return for Civale, the Crew surrendered Gregory Barrios, a middle infielder who showed good upside with the bat this year during his time in Appleton, but who never figured to be a substantial part of the team's infield future. Matt Arnold and his staff seem to have bought low on Civale, with the hope and expectation that they can get more from him than the Rays have. That said, they needn't necessarily be done after this, and they certainly kept their powder dry for a bigger trade later this month, if they elect to go in that direction.

There will be much more to come, from various angles, on this trade, but for now, let us know what you think. Was Civale the right target? Did the Brewers do well to jump the market, or should they have waited a bit longer to see what is out there?

View full article

[Kripes - Brewers]

Well, I can't say he's the answer for which we've been clamoring, but it is depth! It would've been really cool if Yandy Diaz was included somehow. It'll be interesting to see how this plays out.

[rickh150]

Great move!! Low cost prospect wise…around 2.5 mil left this year.  Has some history of pitching well…. Still Ks guys well this year. And we get him for 2025 if he does well?  
A+ for trying… We’ll see how he does. 
 

[Brock Beauchamp]

No reason to dislike this move. Bust out the magic pixie dust, Brewers pitching lab.

[biedergb]

Gregory Barrios seemed to be turning the corner, and having a good year offensively. His defense is high quality and likely to stick at SS. With EBJ slumping, Barrios had a chance to become part of the future SS discussion. It now likely falls to Cooper Pratt, who will likely see a bump up to Wisconsin sometime this summer, maybe sooner rather than later. Or Jadher Areinamo will move over to SS, but he seems entrenched as a 2B prospect for now.

If Barrios was having a true breakout season, it will be sad to see him go (as one of the minor league fans), but if this was a season of his career then he picked a good one. Hopefully Civale can provide some quality innings.  He doesn't inspire me too much, hopefully I am wrong (as I have been so so many times), but I had the same feeling on the 2021 Daniel Norris for Reese Olson trade (but I also tend to overvalue our prospects too much).

[sveumrules]

I had Barrios at #16 on my last BF Top 20 ballot due to the contact skills, defense, speed and performance as one of the younger players in the Midwest League.

Big things holding him back are lack of power and rarely walking to this point, that puts a lot of pressure on the hit tool if he’s ever going to be more than a backup SS, but still a pretty safe high floor kind of profile.

As much as I liked his game, he’s the perfect kind of depth to deal in a move like this with Turang and Ortiz already producing in MLB, Cooper Pratt having a higher ceiling and then the various DSL infielders off to hot starts this summer.

[Ro Mueller]

We were seeing something of a shortstop log-jam, with Cooper Pratt and his 36-game on-base streak ready for High-A Wisconsin, Eric Brown Jr. (AA) definitely not ready for a move to AAA, Gregory Barrios squeezed in between (doing well in High-A, possibly ready for AA) and all three players prioritized as everyday shortstops.

It's tough to imagine us trading Pratt or selling low on EBJ, so sending out Barrios as a trade chip makes sense.

I believe that Barrios received a $1 million signing bonus in January 2021 and his prospect status remains bright based on his 2021-24 defensive prowess and 2024 hitting, even if he wasn't showing in the MLB.com top 30 (edit: I think he was #21) or BrewerFanatic top 20. Barrios is also only 20 years old - i.e. 4 months older than Pratt.

[Joseph Zarr]

Brewers doing Brewers things. Trading from depth - my goodness do the Crew have a wealth of middle infield prospects. Buying Low on a guy with good peripherals, some team control, and tools and mix that would likely benefit from some tweaks. We do love to dance with the Rays.

Here's hoping for happy endings for all parties. Barrios had one of the more surprising seasons in the system given his 2023. Love his frame and baseline. Here's hoping he reaches new heights with the Rays!