General Post-Draft Discussion - 2025 edition

[wiguy94]

23 minutes ago, nate82 said:

The Brewers may have an agreement with Woodruff that they won’t offer him a QO.  It may have been part of why he chose the Brewers over the Red Sox and other teams that offered him a contract.

Source?

Edit: Nevermind. I thought you said have not may have.

[biedergb]

1 hour ago, wiguy94 said:

If the mutual option is declined they can offer him a qualifying offer. There are only 2 stipulations for potential FA to not be eligible for a qualifying offer. One is if they have already received a qualifying offer in the past and two is they weren't on their current team at the start of the season. Woodruff has never received a qualifying offer and was on the Brewers to start the season. He's eligible for the QO.

OK. Good to know, I had interpreted that wrong. Thanks

[nate82]

2 hours ago, wiguy94 said:

Source?

Edit: Nevermind. I thought you said have not may have.

Yeah may, we won’t know for sure until the off season.  A lot of these are just handshake deals or just a wink and a nod deal.  I don’t believe there are many where it is explicitly stated.  I believe the last one for the Brewers was with Grandal but I could be misremembering that deal.

[wiguy94]

2 hours ago, nate82 said:

Yeah may, we won’t know for sure until the off season.  A lot of these are just handshake deals or just a wink and a nod deal.  I don’t believe there are many where it is explicitly stated.  I believe the last one for the Brewers was with Grandal but I could be misremembering that deal.

Grandal wasn’t eligible for a QO from the Brewers because the Dodgers gave him a QO after the 2018 season. This is why the Brewers didn't have a 3rd round pick in 2019 as it was forfeited when they signed Grandal.

[nate82]

2 hours ago, wiguy94 said:

Grandal wasn’t eligible for a QO from the Brewers because the Dodgers gave him a QO after the 2018 season. This is why the Brewers didn't have a 3rd round pick in 2019 as it was forfeited when they signed Grandal.

Yeah I knew that wasn’t right but there was someone around that timeframe they gave a contract to and promised they wouldn’t offer a QO to.  I thought it was Grandal but my memory is failing me now on who it was exactly.

[nate82]

It was Moustakas and not Grandal.  2019 the Brewers gave him the one year deal with a mutual option and then didn’t offer him the QO in 2020 off season.  

[Playing Catch]

18 hours ago, wiguy94 said:

Grandal wasn’t eligible for a QO from the Brewers because the Dodgers gave him a QO after the 2018 season. This is why the Brewers didn't have a 3rd round pick in 2019 as it was forfeited when they signed Grandal.

I trust your information, but how do you reference this? I've longed for better transactional records on all of my favorite websites.

[wiguy94]

8 minutes ago, Playing Catch said:

I trust your information, but how do you reference this? I've longed for better transactional records on all of my favorite websites.

Just a google search and found an MLB.com article talking about who got QO in 2018.

https://www.mlb.com/news/list-of-players-who-got-qualifying-offers-c300130990

[wiguy94]

24 minutes ago, nate82 said:

It was Moustakas and not Grandal.  2019 the Brewers gave him the one year deal with a mutual option and then didn’t offer him the QO in 2020 off season.  

Moustakas was also not eligible for the QO as a Brewer because he got one in Kansas City. Moustakas declined the QO in the 2017 offseason which ended up being a mistake because he re-signed a 1-year deal in Kansas City for significantly less than the QO amount.

Lorenzo Cain also got a QO that offseason which is why the Brewers didn't have a 3rd round pick in the 2019 draft after signing him that offseason.

https://www.mlb.com/news/track-qualifying-offers-for-mlb-free-agents-c260724482

[nate82]

1 hour ago, wiguy94 said:

Moustakas was also not eligible for the QO as a Brewer because he got one in Kansas City. Moustakas declined the QO in the 2017 offseason which ended up being a mistake because he re-signed a 1-year deal in Kansas City for significantly less than the QO amount.

Lorenzo Cain also got a QO that offseason which is why the Brewers didn't have a 3rd round pick in the 2019 draft after signing him that offseason.

https://www.mlb.com/news/track-qualifying-offers-for-mlb-free-agents-c260724482

I am getting old my brain can’t remember these things and I didn’t want to do a google search.

[biedergb]

Getting back to this year's draft.  I guess how do you try to avoid having to make bad FA signings or overpay in a trade for quality starting pitchers?  Draft a hundred of them 😉 ... well not quite. But in the past 3 drafts (2023-2025) the Brewers have drafted, signed and so-far retained 33 pitchers!! That's not including the ~12 UDFA pitchers from those years still in the system, or the international signings.  And the key has been to get them to develop and move up the system, which they have done pretty well. Unfortunately injuries happen which is why you draft so many of them. Key IL pitchers include Knoth, Woodward and Timmerman (all '23 draftees), as well as guys rehabbing such as Hayden Robinson ('23) and Joey Broughton ('24). Looking at them by ages (as of 9/1/25)

23-25 year olds: Yoho in MLB/AAA, Manfredi, Kuehner, Wichrowski (all '23) in AA and add Hardin (currently on IL) and DeBerry (both '24 draftees). Timmerman/Woodward on full season IL. And Sam Garcia is the only one in this age group toiling in A ball.

21-22 year olds: Most are '25 college draftees yet to debut. But Travis Smith ('24) is in high A along with Ryan Birchard ('23) who is months younger than a few '25 college draft picks, and only a couple months older than Thompson/Morrison. Chandler Welch is the only one in low A and has had a forgettable season.

20 year olds: Letson ('23 draftee currently on IL) leads the group in high A. But most are in A ball with Bjorn Johnson ('23) with the most innings there this season. Interestingly, Josh Knoth ('23) who is on the full season IL, is still younger than Griffin Tobias ('24). Hayden Robinson who is rehabbing rounds out this group.

Teenagers: mostly '25 HS picks who have yet to debut. But Bryce Meccage leads this group with a almost of full season of low A ball as a teenager who won't turn 20 until just before next season. Dubanewicz is 2 days younger than Meccage and is turning in a fine ACL/Low-A season, as well as fellow '24 picks Dorchies and Renz who are both so young that they are younger than '25 pick Luke Roupe and only a few months older than '25 pick Ma'Kale Holden. Bentley, Flores, Vucinovic and still 17-year-old Cairone round out this group, all of whom are '25 HS picks yet to make a debut.

So pick a lot of pitchers, sign them, develop them, and hope for health. If a pitcher or two from each group can make it the bigs, that will help prevent a team from having to make overpayments in terms of dollars or other capital (prospects etc). Still a long road for most of these kids, but it is encouraging that by draft year and age many are at the appropriate level and many of those are pitching successfully at those levels. The draft philosophy for these drafts is pretty apparent.

(Fun fact Yoho, Kuehner, Manfredi, and even Hardin are all older than Misiorowski/Henderson; and Sam Garcia is only 6 weeks younger than Logan Henderson, just showing how young those two key pieces from the '21 and '22 drafts are; and Quinn Priester is younger than UDFA KC Hunt '23 and Tanner Gillis '24 😲)