A discussion on trading starting pitchers with a year of control remaining

[adambr2]

In the current regime, we've seen a pattern of trading high end starting pitchers that we know won't be returning, a year prior to free agency, no sooner, no later, while with position players we often let it ride all the way to the QO.

This of course occurred with Burnes and Peralta. Actually, this goes all the way back to the Yovani Gallardo days, but that was obviously pre-Arnold. 

So has this benefitted us? I'd like to disclaim a couple things here — obviously Matt Arnold is a tremendous GM and I'm not second guessing that. It's okay to discuss whether a particular strategy has been beneficial or if the alternative (taking it all the way to QO) would be better. Additionally, I know that in these arguments, we see a lot of "the players we acquired provided a total of 'X' WAR while the player(s) we traded away gave us only 'Y' WAR in that one season. 

I'm not sure how beneficial that information is, because 1) we're more focused on October results at this point, and these arguments don't really include that, and 2) just for an example, if Joey Ortiz hadn't been our SS the last 2.5 seasons, someone else with unknown results would have been taking his place.

Corbin Burnes brought us Joey Ortiz and DL Hall (also the CB RD A pick in 2024, but this is offset by the lost potential QO pick, so for all intents and purposes the deal was Burnes for Ortiz and Hall.)

Hall is an adequate lefty bullpen arm, nothing more and nothing less. His command has been concerning this year while the results have still been acceptable. We know what we have with Joey, who has a fantastic glove but lacks a strong enough bat to be a long-term solution at the position. 

In the 2024 season, the season ended in heartbreaking fashion with the Game 3 Wild Card loss to the Mets. Would the series have been different with Burnes leading the rotation? Would we have continued to advance deeper in the NL playoffs? These are hypotheticals that of course, we can never know, but are still worth considering when making these kinds of trades. 

In 2026, we are in a position where Peralta would ironically make a much needed addition to the current rotation. Jett hasn't had his shot yet, and Sprout, while certainly having a capable high upside arm, hasn't had the results we'd like to see so far. It's certainly fair to say the jury is still out on this one, but let's also not forget the loss of Tobias Myers in this deal, who has continued to be a reliable long man/swing man. And we also need to consider that Freddy would have brought in a comp pick at the end of the season on our side. 

Just want to hear everyone's thoughts on these type of deals — should we be continuing to do them? Or are the assets we've gained simply not worth losing out on a high end starting pitcher especially for a club that continues to be in contention year in and year out?

[liveforoctober]

25 minutes ago, adambr2 said:

In the current regime, we've seen a pattern of trading high end starting pitchers that we know won't be returning, a year prior to free agency, no sooner, no later, while with position players we often let it ride all the way to the QO.

This of course occurred with Burnes and Peralta. Actually, this goes all the way back to the Yovani Gallardo days, but that was obviously pre-Arnold. 

So has this benefitted us? I'd like to disclaim a couple things here — obviously Matt Arnold is a tremendous GM and I'm not second guessing that. It's okay to discuss whether a particular strategy has been beneficial or if the alternative (taking it all the way to QO) would be better. Additionally, I know that in these arguments, we see a lot of "the players we acquired provided a total of 'X' WAR while the player(s) we traded away gave us only 'Y' WAR in that one season. 

I'm not sure how beneficial that information is, because 1) we're more focused on October results at this point, and these arguments don't really include that, and 2) just for an example, if Joey Ortiz hadn't been our SS the last 2.5 seasons, someone else with unknown results would have been taking his place.

Corbin Burnes brought us Joey Ortiz and DL Hall (also the CB RD A pick in 2024, but this is offset by the lost potential QO pick, so for all intents and purposes the deal was Burnes for Ortiz and Hall.)

Hall is an adequate lefty bullpen arm, nothing more and nothing less. His command has been concerning this year while the results have still been acceptable. We know what we have with Joey, who has a fantastic glove but lacks a strong enough bat to be a long-term solution at the position. 

In the 2024 season, the season ended in heartbreaking fashion with the Game 3 Wild Card loss to the Mets. Would the series have been different with Burnes leading the rotation? Would we have continued to advance deeper in the NL playoffs? These are hypotheticals that of course, we can never know, but are still worth considering when making these kinds of trades. 

In 2026, we are in a position where Peralta would ironically make a much needed addition to the current rotation. Jett hasn't had his shot yet, and Sprout, while certainly having a capable high upside arm, hasn't had the results we'd like to see so far. It's certainly fair to say the jury is still out on this one, but let's also not forget the loss of Tobias Myers in this deal, who has continued to be a reliable long man/swing man. And we also need to consider that Freddy would have brought in a comp pick at the end of the season on our side. 

Just want to hear everyone's thoughts on these type of deals — should we be continuing to do them? Or are the assets we've gained simply not worth losing out on a high end starting pitcher especially for a club that continues to be in contention year in and year out?

I think the topic could be wider. It isn't just starting pitching with a year left of control, it is trading assets at perceived peak value to strengthen the overall organization and doing that top to bottom.

Burnes and Peralta are the most notable examples because they are the top of the chain along with Williams and Hader. But Durbin is an example, Collins is an example, you can drop down recently to KC Hunt and Jadher Areinamo as they possibly qualify. Sometimes it works out incredibly well and sometimes it doesn't in terms of immediate major league impact.

I don't see any way this discussion doesn't turn into "you have to go for it at some point or you'll never beat LA" which is a different discussion... but personally I don't think we have October opportunities without an organizational philosophy of mass value acquisition.

[brooks_quichenick]

41 minutes ago, adambr2 said:

In 2026, we are in a position where Peralta would ironically make a much needed addition to the current rotation.

Are we?

[adambr2]

2 minutes ago, liveforoctober said:

I think the topic could be wider. It isn't just starting pitching with a year left of control, it is trading assets at perceived peak value to strengthen the overall organization and doing that top to bottom.

Burnes and Peralta are the most notable examples because they are the top of the chain along with Williams and Hader. But Durbin is an example, Collins is an example, you can drop down recently to KC Hunt and Jadher Areinamo as they possibly qualify. Sometimes it works out incredibly well and sometimes it doesn't in terms of immediate major league impact.

I don't see any way this discussion doesn't turn into "you have to go for it at some point or you'll never beat LA" which is a different discussion... but personally I don't think we have October opportunities without an organizational philosophy of mass value acquisition.

Williams is probably a good addition to this discussion because that obviously turned into a home run via Durbin.

In general I think I would have a greater willingness to trade relievers than starters, being more replaceable.

I've noticed with high end position players we tend to ride them out until the end and then offer the QO rather than deal them. I think that will be the case with Contreras who I assume we have almost no hope of extending.

[adambr2]

2 minutes ago, brooks_quichenick said:

Are we?

… yes?

At the moment we have essentially a 3 man rotation. 

[brooks_quichenick]

Just now, adambr2 said:

… yes?

At the moment we have essentially a 3 man rotation. 

Our starting rotation is 5th in MLB in fWAR, 2nd in FIP.

[adambr2]

4 minutes ago, brooks_quichenick said:

Our starting rotation is 5th in MLB in fWAR, 2nd in FIP.

Yes, because Miz and Harrison have been downright amazing. It isn’t because we have a deep rotation with legitimate back end starters.

[liveforoctober]

7 minutes ago, adambr2 said:

Williams is probably a good addition to this discussion because that obviously turned into a home run via Durbin.

In general I think I would have a greater willingness to trade relievers than starters, being more replaceable.

I've noticed with high end position players we tend to ride them out until the end and then offer the QO rather than deal them. I think that will be the case with Contreras who I assume we have almost no hope of extending.

Other than Adames have we offered any positional player a qualifying offer under Arnold?

[adambr2]

1 minute ago, liveforoctober said:

Other than Adames have we offered any positional player a qualifying offer under Arnold?

No, but who would that have been other than Adames? 

It’s not like we’ve been dealing position players before it got to that point, except guys like Collins and Durbin who we apparently did not see as part of our long-term future.

I expect Contreras to be the second. With Turang it’s possible that the current middle infield depth allows us to part with him sooner. 

[liveforoctober]

2 minutes ago, adambr2 said:

No, but who would that have been other than Adames? 

It’s not like we’ve been dealing position players before it got to that point, except guys like Collins and Durbin who we apparently did not see as part of our long-term future.

I expect Contreras to be the second. With Turang it’s possible that the current middle infield depth allows us to part with him sooner. 

I was just asking. You said you've noticed we tend to run positional players to a QO and not trade them. I didn't know if I was missing someone other than Adames. I would offer that doing something once is not a tendency.

If it happens to Bill and Brice then we have a few data points.

[adambr2]

13 minutes ago, liveforoctober said:

I was just asking. You said you've noticed we tend to run positional players to a QO and not trade them. I didn't know if I was missing someone other than Adames. I would offer that doing something once is not a tendency.

If it happens to Bill and Brice then we have a few data points.

Yeah, trend was probably the wrong way to put it on my part. Either way I understand we are working with a limited sample size. 

It seems to me that we are more active in shopping high end pitchers than high end position players prior to their contracts expiring, but I’m sure they approach each situation on a case by case basis depending on the organizational depth at that position, the offers that they get, and other factors.

[cragi]

Brewers FO has been flipping players for prospects with a high success rate for a while now. I dont think its fair to pick out a micro trend of one set of prospects returned exceeding those of the other. 

That said, the org desperately needed depth and they have been building just that with their unique draft approach, international pipeline and flips.

But i think the bigger question is how is the league going to adjust to the brewers strategy, which would dilute it? if so and maybe anyways, the brewers depth is create organizational pressure now, and so at what point do they move off this approach and start thinking about bigger pieces as their depth is pretty well solved.

[homer]

I think there's an injury risk factor with a pitcher you don't necessarily have with a position player. I think that needs to be accounted for in the Burnes trade. 

[cragi]

another point ive seen others make is there is a disproportionate injury risk to a pitcher's last year relative to a positional player

[OldHeidelberg]

Many thought Adames would be traded. my memory was there just wasn't the demand they expected as Willy had just come off his worst season with the Brewers. When the offers aren't really offsetting the lost comp pick and the value they get from a team leader his last season you just roll with the comp pick. Plus, Burnes was already moved so the second part of the trade need, saving money, wasn't as big a deal any more. I do expect Contreras will likely be traded as there isn't much question he will be in high demand.    

[Lathund]

I don't think a general rule to do or not to do something makes sense, it's always going to be on a case by case basis. But that being said, I think it's generally the right move to make the trade. One player, no matter how good, doesn't swing the likelyhood of a championship all that much. And if keeping them doesn't win you the WS, it'll most likely not have been worth it. Keeping them makes sense if there is a real chance of extending them, or if you truly look like the best team in baseball and you are a real WS favorite. 

That hasn't really been the case with any of the pitchers the Brewers have traded, so making the trades have generally made sense. Some trades have been better than others of course, but many of the players involved still have years left to turn things around. There is also the QO vs player debate; the prospects drafted from a QO (If you get one; injuries happen) are much more of a lottery. And having something, or multiple somethings/someones, after a star player is gone, matters. I see so many fans mock the "Bites of the apple" strategy, or claim it's not trying to win. I really disagree with that view, it's the only way to have a realistic chance of winning the WS. And that means being willing to constantly look more than one year ahead. Keep making moves that make you better 2-6 years from now, and you'll suddenly be much better 2-6 years from now. 

To bring it back to Peralta. Brewers have one of the best rotations in baseball so far this year. 3.19 ERA / 3.22 xERA / 3.33 FIP / 3.63 xFIP / 3.45 SIERA / 19% K-BB. / .206 BAA (Not including Miz showing tonight). All these numbers are, at worst, 4th in MLB, several of them lead the league. With the exception of career BAA (.203), Peralta rates worse than this for 2026 and for his career overall in all these categories. Which is not the same thing as saying he wouldn't make the team better right now, as him being here would replace some of the worse starts we've had. But it's also not really a position of huge need, and I think it's perfectly fine to give up a small edge short-term for a potential long-term gain.  

There are never any guarantees in this. Sproat might never get the stamina or command to be a great starter. But he has the ability to potentially be one, and as rough as it has looked at times, he isn't far off being a good starter. And you have to take these chances to find potentially great players. Because you can't sign them in free agency, and you can't trade for more than 1-2 years of them (usually anyway, and even then at great cost). If you play it safe and keep the known quantity, you might increase your WS chances for one year by a couple of percentage points. But you'll reduce it ever so slightly for years thereafter. And most of all, you remove the possibility of increasing that chance again. Or to quote Brad Pitt, "If we play like the Yankees in here, we'll lose to the Yankees out there". That is, if we use the traditional formula and conventional logic that most teams use, they will have $100-$200m extra (Or more, in the case of the Dodgers) to beat us with. The only way to even have a chance at truly being the better team, is to use a different strategy entirely. 

[sveumrules]

11 hours ago, adambr2 said:

Yes, because Miz and Harrison have been downright amazing. It isn’t because we have a deep rotation with legitimate back end starters.

After today Brewers starting pitchers are at a 3.13 ERA with 87 ER allowed over 250 IP. Misio and Harrison have combined for 22 ER over their 109.2 IP shaking out to a 1.81 ERA with the Brewers going 13 W - 7 L in their starts.

Sproat (37.1 IP | 24 ER), Woodruff (30.0 IP | 12 ER), Patrick (24.1 IP | 8 ER), Henderson (23 IP | 7 ER), and Crow (10.1 IP | 3 ER) have combined for 54 ER over 125 IP in their starts shaking out to a 3.89 ERA that would rank 8th among MLB rotations on its own before subtracting out every other team's two best starters.

The Brewers have combined to go 18 W - 8 L in their starts which would be a 112 win pace over 162 games.

Not too many teams have SP3 through SP7 that can hang with those kind of results.

What has really killed the rotation's results are the three starts by Gasser (8.1 IP | 6 ER) and Drohan (2.2 IP | 3 ER) plus the two opener games with Ashby (2.1 IP | 2 ER) and Hall (2.0 IP | 0 ER) where the Brewers went 0 W - 5 L with a 6.46 ERA.

[Frisbee Slider]

20 hours ago, OldHeidelberg said:

I do expect Contreras will likely be traded as there isn't much question he will be in high demand.    

If Quero isn’t perceived as a starter in Milwaukee yet, I think Contreras is back next year.

[OldHeidelberg]

2 hours ago, Frisbee Slider said:

If Quero isn’t perceived as a starter in Milwaukee yet, I think Contreras is back next year.

If Quero isn't ready they probably need to plan for life after Bill anyway, I am not sure how much one more year does for them vs a couple of upper level prospects. They could hope to make up his offense at other positions and go with a defense first catcher for a year. Maybe a catcher comes back in that trade or separate trade. But it's hard to say what will happen in 27 right now and who knows, maybe they decide to pay him as their franchise player since Yelich's contract getting closer to end. But my bet would still be with Quero ready to sink or swim they cash Contreras in for prospects and save that 12-13 million or whatever he will get in arby. 

[Samurai Bucky]

22 hours ago, OldHeidelberg said:

 I do expect Contreras will likely be traded as there isn't much question he will be in high demand.    

Contreras brings much more to the team that getting on base -- he calls very good games.  There is no way that Quero will be able to step in and call the game that Contreras calls.  I would rather see Contreras stick around, and then bring up Quero to be the understudy.

[CheezWizHed]

I'd want to tackle the X WAR vs Y WAR evaluation of a trade. 

There are very limited numbers of 4+ WAR players where having a 2 WAR player is much easier to find (or even have a replacement level player have a career year at 2 WAR).  

So I'm not a fan of simply adding up the WAR gained vs the WAR lost to declare a victor in the trade.  Let's use the numbers from the Burnes trade:

• Corbin had 3.9 bWAR the one year with Baltimore
• Joey had 2.8, 0.3, and 0.4 (so far this year) + future years control
• Hall had -0.2, 0.6 and 0.6 (so far this year) + future years control

The fallacy of saying that we gave up 3.9 WAR, but gained 4.6 WAR is that that 4.6 WAR was acquired with 2 spots on the roster over 4.5 years of time; thus a very low WAR/year/roster spot. If your goal is to fill a roster with cheap players so that you are simply "competitive" and not contending (i.e. the Selig era), then this trade is a win.  

But if you really want to contend for a WS, we need each roster spot to be filled with the highest WAR players possible.

As of now, I say this trade was a bust.  Unless one of Ortiz or Hall exceeds the WAR we gave up with Corbin in a single season, I think it remains that way.  It is hard to predict a butterfly effect of the changes, but I'd guess we would be better off if we stayed with Corbin for that one year and get the comp pick instead. 

[igor67]

I guess I am a bit in the middle on this, just tracking WAR does not account for the value of higher WAR single seasons, but as we are now witnessing there is definite value having positive contributors and not complete zeros. If SS and 3B were giving us 2 WAR seasons each right now that would help a lot. So I'm willing to say that someone can look at what we have gotten so far in the Burnes trade and be underwhelmed as a very defensible position. But I don't think Hall or Ortiz would need to be All-stars in the future to make the trade a wash.

[adambr2]

21 minutes ago, CheezWizHed said:

I'd want to tackle the X WAR vs Y WAR evaluation of a trade. 

There are very limited numbers of 4+ WAR players where having a 2 WAR player is much easier to find (or even have a replacement level player have a career year at 2 WAR).  

So I'm not a fan of simply adding up the WAR gained vs the WAR lost to declare a victor in the trade.  Let's use the numbers from the Burnes trade:

• Corbin had 3.9 bWAR the one year with Baltimore
• Joey had 2.8, 0.3, and 0.4 (so far this year) + future years control
• Hall had -0.2, 0.6 and 0.6 (so far this year) + future years control

The fallacy of saying that we gave up 3.9 WAR, but gained 4.6 WAR is that that 4.6 WAR was acquired with 2 spots on the roster over 4.5 years of time; thus a very low WAR/year/roster spot. If your goal is to fill a roster with cheap players so that you are simply "competitive" and not contending (i.e. the Selig era), then this trade is a win.  

But if you really want to contend for a WS, we need each roster spot to be filled with the highest WAR players possible.

As of now, I say this trade was a bust.  Unless one of Ortiz or Hall exceeds the WAR we gave up with Corbin in a single season, I think it remains that way.  It is hard to predict a butterfly effect of the changes, but I'd guess we would be better off if we stayed with Corbin for that one year and get the comp pick instead. 

I totally agree with this. I touched on it briefly in my original post but you described it better. 

It’s a bit of a false equivalency to try to compare trades by subtracting total WAR lost and comparing it to total WAR gained.

If you traded two players who accumulated 2 WAR each for 6 seasons and you acquired a player who accumulated 7 WAR for each of the next two seasons before departing in free agency , you traded 24 WAR for 14 WAR.

That certainly would not mean you made a “bad” trade.

[liveforoctober]

32 minutes ago, CheezWizHed said:

As of now, I say this trade was a bust.  Unless one of Ortiz or Hall exceeds the WAR we gave up with Corbin in a single season, I think it remains that way.  It is hard to predict a butterfly effect of the changes, but I'd guess we would be better off if we stayed with Corbin for that one year and get the comp pick instead. 

This statement is also why the conversation is always good but definitive statements should be generally avoided IMHO.

Someone had to pitch for us in the rotation the year Burnes left. Tobias Myers and Colin Rea had good years for us (combined 3.7 WAR)... do one or either of them see the mound if Burnes is here? Shouldn't we factor in their WAR to a degree in grading the trade?, etc 

It's a much deeper analysis than Player A for Player B ... but the latter is the cleanest way to grade things - as surface level as that is.

[gregmag]

32 minutes ago, CheezWizHed said:

I'd want to tackle the X WAR vs Y WAR evaluation of a trade. 

There are very limited numbers of 4+ WAR players where having a 2 WAR player is much easier to find (or even have a replacement level player have a career year at 2 WAR).  

So I'm not a fan of simply adding up the WAR gained vs the WAR lost to declare a victor in the trade.  Let's use the numbers from the Burnes trade:

• Corbin had 3.9 bWAR the one year with Baltimore
• Joey had 2.8, 0.3, and 0.4 (so far this year) + future years control
• Hall had -0.2, 0.6 and 0.6 (so far this year) + future years control

The fallacy of saying that we gave up 3.9 WAR, but gained 4.6 WAR is that that 4.6 WAR was acquired with 2 spots on the roster over 4.5 years of time; thus a very low WAR/year/roster spot. If your goal is to fill a roster with cheap players so that you are simply "competitive" and not contending (i.e. the Selig era), then this trade is a win.  

But if you really want to contend for a WS, we need each roster spot to be filled with the highest WAR players possible.

As of now, I say this trade was a bust.  Unless one of Ortiz or Hall exceeds the WAR we gave up with Corbin in a single season, I think it remains that way.  It is hard to predict a butterfly effect of the changes, but I'd guess we would be better off if we stayed with Corbin for that one year and get the comp pick instead. 

By your logic, all that matters is how much WAR you get out of the best roster spot you fill in exchange for the one season you lose.  We lost 3.9 WAR; we gained 2.8 from Joey. So by the way you want to measure trades — ignoring whatever marginal benefit the team can milk out of other pieces, ignoring all future years of control — we lost the Burnes trade by 1.1 WAR. That’s a loss, but “bust” seems strong.

I’m not inclined to ignore everything else the Brewers got back in the trade beyond the best single season in the trade year. You’re right that you have to consider roster spots when comparing WAR, but that’s kind of the point of WAR; you’re assessing how much you’re able to improve each roster spot over what you would’ve had there otherwise, which the WAR comparison presumes is a replacement-level player. Each year the Brewers roll with Ortiz or Hall or anyone else reflects the best judgment of a strong organization that the next player available to fill that roster spot would be worse. I think the Burnes trade is just evidence of how easy these trades are to win.