Catcher position in 2027

[Samurai Bucky]

1 hour ago, RobertCrawley said:

We're a small market team. We have to trade Contreras for some arms or bats. I love that Willie Adames was with us for another year but, I think we would've been much better off if we had gotten a couple of potential starters for him. Contreras is a great catcher, maybe the best in all of baseball, but we're in the World Series because we're willing to make hard trades.

Although a shortstop is an important position, the catcher is the most important.  He is the captain and if you have a good one, keep them if you are able.  Trading Adames made sense because the Brewers had a bunch of shortstops on the team and also in the minors.

Bo Naylor is not the answer, nor is Jeferson Quero.  Contreras for five years keeps the Latin foundation in place and also the clubhouse coefficient.

[craigharmann]

Ultimately, the question is who makes more of our WOAHS SOLVDD. I'd say stick with Wild Bill. 

[Outlander]

The Brewers are going to try to get to back to back World Series so don't really see a scenario anymore where Contreras is traded during the off season. 

[RobertCrawley]

2 minutes ago, Outlander said:

The Brewers are going to try to get to back to back World Series so don't really see a scenario anymore where Contreras is traded during the off season. 

Let's hope it works out. We have him for one more year at the most. There's no way we'll be able to compete with the salary offers he'll get from the Yankees, Dodgers, Phillies, and Mets.

[MrTPlush]

1 hour ago, RobertCrawley said:

Let's hope it works out. We have him for one more year at the most. There's no way we'll be able to compete with the salary offers he'll get from the Yankees, Dodgers, Phillies, and Mets.

Well, the reality is we have zero idea of the long term reality of baseball financials.

I recall Contreras being pretty attached to Atlanta…would it be wild for him to take a slightly team friendly extension to stay after a World Series run? Possible.

I guess I would, personally, shy away of absolutes after a World Series appearance.

[rickh150]

6 hours ago, RobertCrawley said:

Let's hope it works out. We have him for one more year at the most. There's no way we'll be able to compete with the salary offers he'll get from the Yankees, Dodgers, Phillies, and Mets.

At the most…… right. He could be a FA if arby goes from 6 to 5 years.

[MrTPlush]

15 minutes ago, rickh150 said:

At the most…… right. He could be a FA if arby goes from 6 to 5 years.

Brewers hold a team option for Contreras. Even in some wild world where they shortened arbitration and didn’t grandfather current players in, he isn’t going anywhere.

[RobertCrawley]

2 hours ago, MrTPlush said:

Brewers hold a team option for Contreras. Even in some wild world where they shortened arbitration and didn’t grandfather current players in, he isn’t going anywhere.

The Brewers hold a club option for next year for 14+ million. Of course, the Brewers will take it and have him for one more year to play or trade.

But if Wild Bill finishes in the top 4 for the NL MVP, it becomes a mutual option. If that happens, Wild Bill can hit the wilds of the open market as early as next year.

 

[MrTPlush]

6 hours ago, RobertCrawley said:

The Brewers hold a club option for next year for 14+ million. Of course, the Brewers will take it and have him for one more year to play or trade.

But if Wild Bill finishes in the top 4 for the NL MVP, it becomes a mutual option. If that happens, Wild Bill can hit the wilds of the open market as early as next year.

 

Well there is zero chance he is Top 4, I doubt he garners a vote.

[JCREW]

12 hours ago, rickh150 said:

At the most…… right. He could be a FA if arby goes from 6 to 5 years.

Contreras should definitely stay for 2027. If somehow he is granted FA in the new CBA, that would be a tragedy.

If the new CBA has some sort of salary floor around $160M or $170M and revenue sharing, that would make for an interesting situation.

I'd be interested in a Contreras extension of 5/100 if we were going to have to find a place to spend an extra $20-35M

[tmwiese55]

There's a way you could structure it to time the big increase to when Yelich is gone so he kind of takes that face of the franchise salary slot even if its a bit overpriced.  I agree with others that its tough to be too confident in any opinions here until the team knows the new rules. 

If the system is generally the same as now I still don't really see him staying but the vibes right now and if they do win it all could possibly change that and let him be more open to staying.  Still, no way I'd be willing to go beyond 5 years total, and I'd really really not want to do that either.  If he'd be ok with 4 years total (so only 3 more than we're already happy to have) you could probably get me to overpay even knowing the last year might be tough, and some DH ABs will open up after Yelich to help. I don't see anyway he doesn't demand at least 5 though as its almost for sure that if he gets to FA after 27 that someone will still give him a 5-6 year deal then.

[long ball]

I think this World Series run and hopefully a championship will change the way the Brewers act in the upcoming offseason. 
 

historically we’ve traded more guys than not who are entering their final year of team control. That’s Contreras, Vaughn, and Megill this year. 
 

we’d maybe look to move off of Mitchell since he finally had a healthy year and we have already committed to Lara with a long term deal. 
 

we’d maybe look to capitalize on Ortiz turning things around with the bat since Made is getting close to the big leagues. 
 

we’d maybe look to trade Ashby since he makes more money than we’ve traditionally paid relievers. 
 

we’d maybe look to sell high on DL Hall. 
 

we’d let Bauers leave in free agency. 

We certainly wouldn’t look to move on from all of these guys in one offseason but I think these are all guys we’d be talking about on the message boards here. 
 

we will have a lot of time to talk about this over the offseason, but I’ll chime in with my current thoughts which are subject to change once I really start looking at stuff and depending on if we win the World Series or not. 
 

I would ride out Contreras to free agency. I would not extend him. I appreciate what he’s done for the brewers, but I just don’t have any interest in paying for a catcher’s free agent years. 

[RobDeer 45]

18 minutes ago, long ball said:

I think this World Series run and hopefully a championship will change the way the Brewers act in the upcoming offseason. 
 

historically we’ve traded more guys than not who are entering their final year of team control. That’s Contreras, Vaughn, and Megill this year. 
 

we’d maybe look to move off of Mitchell since he finally had a healthy year and we have already committed to Lara with a long term deal. 
 

we’d maybe look to capitalize on Ortiz turning things around with the bat since Made is getting close to the big leagues. 
 

we’d maybe look to trade Ashby since he makes more money than we’ve traditionally paid relievers. 
 

we’d maybe look to sell high on DL Hall. 
 

we’d let Bauers leave in free agency. 

We certainly wouldn’t look to move on from all of these guys in one offseason but I think these are all guys we’d be talking about on the message boards here. 
 

we will have a lot of time to talk about this over the offseason, but I’ll chime in with my current thoughts which are subject to change once I really start looking at stuff and depending on if we win the World Series or not. 
 

I would ride out Contreras to free agency. I would not extend him. I appreciate what he’s done for the brewers, but I just don’t have any interest in paying for a catcher’s free agent years. 

It sure will be an interesting offseason.  Things will be different depending on the outcome of the World Series.  I always wonder how many of these guys would want to stay together or worry about going to a different club and losing the magic sauce we seem to have.  Or going to another team that won't be as close as this.  But of course, money talks!  And when you can make big bucks on a long term deal, it's hard to say no.  

 

I hate saying this, but I think we have to stick to what has made us the organization we are.  I think we need to trade William.  I hate it but if we can get a big haul, including a catcher prospect, I think we have to do it.  Every time we make one of these trades or let a person go, it seems like the sky is falling, but it ends up working out in the long run.  How long of a deal do you think he gets in the open market?  I don't know if I'd feel comfortable going over 3 maybe 4 years and I don't think that gets it done.  I could be way off on that.

[MrTPlush]

Contreras would 30 years old in the first year of a FA contract. Another solid year and 5 years is almost assured.

[markedman5]

15 hours ago, MrTPlush said:

Brewers hold a team option for Contreras. Even in some wild world where they shortened arbitration and didn’t grandfather current players in, he isn’t going anywhere.

In retrospect that was another very smart move by Arnold and company.

[endaround]

1. The offseason can end up being very short. Short as in 3 weeks from signing the labor agreement to opening day.  That makes very little time to get players in and going.  This is likely a large factor in changing catchers and pitchers.  The less turnover you have to deal with getting ready for a condensed season the likely better off you are.

2. Megill likely would only bring back a Cameron Crow type. He will only have about $7-8 million in excess value which is a 40+ grade prospect. Not something that will change much of anything.

3. The short time frame makes moving on from Contreras next year also difficult since the currently signed catchers are not viable (Naylor) or ready (Quero, Dinges). This also might mean Sanchez might be brought back.

4. The Brewers will hopefully be done paying Woodruff to not pitch freeing up a bit of money.

5. Given the short turn around I also don't see other larger trades getting done. I could be wrong but I feel teams will be scrambling to get FA deals done in a very short period of time that trades may languish.

[KCBrewerfan34]

On 10/18/2026 at 4:11 PM, markedman5 said:

We have no idea what we have with Quero because of his injuries …….lots of questions there now.

I’m confident our FO combined with our minor league coaches have a pretty good idea on Quero. Trust the process. 

[Matt Breen]

I love Contreras. But he has put on a lot of miles. He's slow - and will likely get slower sooner than later. He approaching 30 - so a veteran - but not that old. But guys can fall off pretty quickly once they lose a little quickness. 

I think the team should investigate an extension - but not overdo anything. 

Otherwise, if nothing sensible is out there - just ride out 2027. Let Quero be our backup - assuming the team thinks he's ready for it. Then see how Contreras and Quero play in 2027. We can then revisit next year. 

But in the end, I'd love to tie Contreras up for a few years - but I'm not sure it works for him or us financially. 

 

[Brewers Downunder]

Time stands still for no team, but if the Brewers win the WS this year, it would be nice to keep the vast majority of them (if not all of them) together for next year.

[folly412]

The tentative plan at one point felt like working Quero in this year, dealing Contreras this offseason and having a catcher of the future with Dinges coming right behind him. 

Plans change.  There's no way the catcher position can be trusted to anyone other than Contreras for 2027.  Naylor is probably penciled in as the backup, with Matthew Wood added to  the 40 and starting in AAA.  Would not be surprised if Quero winds up elsewhere.

Megill is on the same expiring contract, but I can't see an offer for a 33 year old that would beat having the closer's spot locked down for 2027.  I'd expect offseason trades to look more like the Durbin deal to reprioritize and retool than the more common final year of contract prospect pickup. 

[BrewerFan]

On 10/20/2026 at 1:18 PM, RobertCrawley said:

We're a small market team. We have to trade Contreras for some arms or bats. I love that Willie Adames was with us for another year but, I think we would've been much better off if we had gotten a couple of potential starters for him. Contreras is a great catcher, maybe the best in all of baseball, but we're in the World Series because we're willing to make hard trades.

NO, WE DO NOT have to trade William Contreras.

I understand the argument. We're a small-market team, and historically we've needed to trade players before free agency to keep the talent pipeline flowing. I've supported plenty of those trades myself.

But I think we're overlooking just how dramatically this organization's position has changed.

Where exactly do we need the bats?

Look at what we already have, and what's coming.

• 1B/DH: Blake Burke, Andrew Fischer, Luke Adams, Brock Wilken, Eric Bitonti, Mike Boeve, Tyler Black.

• 2B: Brice Turang, Luis Peña, Luke O'Rae, Trey Ebel.

• SS: Cooper Pratt, who's locked up long-term, Jesús Made, Peña, Jett Williams, Brady Ebel, Ricki Moneys, Diego Frontado and José Rodríguez.

• 3B: Made, Fischer, Joey Ortiz, David Hamilton and Brady Ebel.

• LF: Jackson Chourio, Josh Adamczewski.

• CF: Garrett Mitchell, Luis Lara, Braylon Payne, Antunez, Handelfry Encarnacion.

• RF: Sal Frelick, Sawyer Strosnider, Kyle Jones, with Bitonti potentially an option.

• C: Jeferson Quero and Marco Dinges.
  
  SP-Misiorowski, Harrison was a co-ace the first 3 months, Henderson has just shoved every time he's gotten a chance. Gasser is fully back from TJ, Priester should be back next hear from TOR surgery, Drohan, Patrick, every arm is back save for the 3 we added at the deadline(and I'd definitely bring Senzetela back as he's got that nasty 98-99 MPH sinker and now that he's out of Colorado, I think he could be in line for a big bounce back season... but I'm even more excited about the likes of Cameron Wagoner and then... just how the Brewers squeeze everything out of these guys. Witchrowski, Kuehner, Crow, Angel Zerpa will be coming back from TJ. He looked bad, but had a ~60% GB rate for the Royals in '25, good velo and deceptive... and we were toying with moving him to the rotation. That's just another effective arm to throw at teams.

That's an extraordinary amount of talent, and it's not all five years away. Those guys are MOSTLY 2027 or 2028.

Pratt is already contributing in the World Series. Chourio is locked up for years. Turang and Frelick are established major leaguers. Made and Peña are among the best young infield prospects in baseball. Fischer has legitimate impact-bat potential. Adamczewski, Payne, Burke and the others give us another wave behind them with Payne looking like... a true impact player, Adamczewski looks like a guy who just fits this teams identify, hits the ball hard, for average and enough power to be a threat.

And then there are the kids who are just getting started.

Diego Frontado, a young international signing, put up an OBP around .460. José Rodríguez is another 17-year-old shortstop with elite defensive tools and offensive potential at SS. Ricki Moneys is another talented young shortstop in the system.

And look at Antunez. What he did in center field at full-season ball as an 18-year-old is a BIG deal. That's a substantial jump in competition at that age, and he handled it... and he did so right after that Frias trade that I hated. Well, still don't love it, but Romero has come in big and Antunez has stepped in and provided the power that Frias has.

Milwaukee has arguably become one of the most efficient organizations in baseball at identifying and developing Latin American talent. Made, Peña, Lara, Frontado, Rodríguez, Antunez... it's not one isolated success. It's become a long trend.

And here's the other thing: we'll have another two or three drafts before some of these kids are even approaching Milwaukee. This isn't a finite supply of prospects we're gradually exhausting. We're continuing to add talent faster than we can find places for all of it.

We don't need to draft 3 stars, we don't need another Cooper Pratt draft. We just need to keep adding talent, trade chips, and while we could certainly get more for William Contreras this year, a pick in the top ~35 is... not abad consolation prize on top of running it back in Milwaukee

The point is that we've got potential impact players at virtually every position, with multiple layers of depth.

And the pitching?

We just finished the regular season with the youngest pitching staff in baseball. And that's BEFORE the next wave arrives.

Tyson Hardin is a top-100-caliber prospect. Bishop Letson has appeared on other top-100 lists. Josh Knoth is back from Tommy John, throwing around 98 with those ridiculous spin rates, and beginning to locate again. Of those three, Knoth might have the highest ceiling.

Cameron Wagoner has a 100-plus-mph fastball and a nasty slider. His story is already exception, but it's another potentially overpowering arm that matters. He could eventually become another late-inning weapon, perhaps supplementing the bullpen next year before eventually stepping into a larger role when Uribe presumably moves to closer after Megill is a FA. Ashby and Hall have 3 and 4 years of control remaining I believe.

Then there's just a guy like... Jayden Dubanewicz, a 6'3" pitcher Milwaukee signed after the tenth round, with a fastball touching 98 and a legitimate four-pitch mix. Could he become another Woodruff, Burnes or Peralta? Who knows? Maybe he becomes a trade chip. Maybe he never makes it. But that's exactly the kind of upside this organization keeps finding.

And I haven't even mentioned J.D. Thompson, Julian Garcia and some of the other arms.

Brandon Sproat is another guy I think could be special.

He's got top-of-the-rotation stuff. This year, I thought we saw a lot of stuff without enough actual pitching.

If Milwaukee can get him to harness it, work down in the zone, elevate when he needs a strikeout and use that big curveball effectively, there's tremendous upside.

Maybe he's another excellent long reliever. Maybe he develops into a starter. Maybe he follows something resembling the 2019 Corbin Burnes progression. just puts up a brutal season, the Brewers refine his repetoire, and he becomes a TOR type arm...

I don't know. But I know this organization has an outstanding track record of developing pitchers, and I don't see any reason to assume that's suddenly going to stop.

Which brings me back to Contreras.

In 2017, absolutely, you consider trading him. We needed more bites at the apple. We needed to accumulate talent and build toward a championship window.

But it's 2026.

We're four wins from eating the whole damn apple.

Why are we still operating as though we HAVE to trade one of our best players to create another opportunity several years from now?

The entire point of accumulating all this talent was to get where we are TODAY.

There's value in having William Contreras catching for a World Series contender next season. Real value. Not hypothetical future value.

And I think there's another aspect of Contreras that gets overlooked.

He's given this team an edge. An attitude. A little swagger that we haven't always had.

Not the same personality as Willy Adames, who brought energy and kept everybody loose. Contreras brings something sharper. He's intense, competitive and occasionally looks like he's ready to fight the entire opposing dugout this postseason, a bit more Wilson than William this year.

I love that about him. And I think it's been important to this team.

I'm not suggesting he's untouchable.

If Philadelphia wants to offer Andrew Painter and Alirio Ferrebus as part of a substantial package, I'm listening. Absolutely.

But I'm not trading Contreras simply because he's approaching free agency and that's what small-market teams are supposed to do.

Make somebody offer us a player we genuinely want badly enough to take away a key player from a team with championship aspirations.

And if we do move him, we're hardly helpless at catcher. On top of everything, we have had the best catching since 2010 and a lot of that is Charlie Moore and his ablity to work with catchers like William Contreras who was a bat first catcher who the Braves didn't think could handle catching everyday. They had him down as a DH.

Quero is coming. We could bring Sánchez back(you'd probably want 3 catchers if Sanchez is one of them). Detroit has Dillon Dingler and an outstanding catching prospect in Josue Briceño. There are ways to address the position, including using some of our extraordinary organizational depth to acquire another catcher(of course that's... just an example, Dingler would be extremely expensive, but Brinceno may be more plausible.

That's the beauty of where we are now. We have OPTIONS.

And OBVIOUSLY as you well know, it's not like it's either trade Contreras or lose him for nothing. That comp pick is genuinely valuable the way the Brewers have been drafting recently. We could have 2 1sts in 2028... and that's on top of what could already be three selections in approximately the top 40 this coming draft if the Bauers compensation works out(which I have a very hard time seeing that not working out.

The organization isn't just developing prospects. It's accumulating the draft capital and international talent to keep the pipeline flowing.

We also have the additional revenue from a World Series run, potentially $30–40 million, and a new CBA coming. The owners have already expressed support for sharing local television revenue more broadly, including a 50/50 arrangement. Whatever the final agreement looks like, I think there's a strong possibility the economics become more favorable for teams like Milwaukee even before the WS revenue(which could actually surpass 30-40M pretty easily when all is told).

Contreras remains under control for 2027, and I think it's unlikely the Brewers exercise his $15.5 million and instead agree to a deal for ~12.5. But hey, maybe you say we'll give you 3 for 75M, I'd do that(I sincerely doubt he would).

We don't NEED to trade anybody.

That's the point.

None of this means we should ignore a great trade offer. It means we don't need to manufacture urgency where there isn't any.

Look at what this scouting department has accomplished. Look at the talent in Milwaukee. Look at the talent in Nashville, Biloxi, Wisconsin and the lower levels.

We're not Houston, trying to squeeze another competitive season out of an aging core and a depleted farm system.

We have legitimate impact players, young major leaguers with years of control, and more prospects arriving behind them.

We have redundancies for our redundancies' redundancies.

And we're positioned to keep adding to that pipeline through the draft and international signings.

I liked having Adames for his final season. I wouldn't automatically trade away that production simply because we could have acquired another couple of prospects.

Sometimes the value of a player is the games he helps you win RIGHT NOW.

And right now, we're competing for a World Series.

This is the time to get greedy.

Let's win four more games. Then let's build a team that can come back and win another one next year.

If somebody wants Contreras, make them pay a price that actually improves our chances of doing that.

Because for the first time in a long time, I don't think Milwaukee has to make a trade simply because the calendar says it's time.

[BrewerFan]

On 10/20/2026 at 2:30 PM, Samurai Bucky said:

Although a shortstop is an important position, the catcher is the most important.  He is the captain and if you have a good one, keep them if you are able.  Trading Adames made sense because the Brewers had a bunch of shortstops on the team and also in the minors.

Bo Naylor is not the answer, nor is Jeferson Quero.  Contreras for five years keeps the Latin foundation in place and also the clubhouse coefficient.

I think you're splitting hairs a bit here. SS, C, they're both enormously value positions. I also think you're WAY too premature in your declaration that Quero is NOT the answer. 

We can also trade for a catcher. We have so many high end OF prospects, it shouldn't stop us from acquiring a catcher and we should be upgrading other positions. 
 

Quote

@RobertCrawley
We're a small market team. We have to trade Contreras for some arms or bats. I love that Willie Adames was with us for another year but, I think we would've been much better off if we had gotten a couple of potential starters for him. Contreras is a great catcher, maybe the best in all of baseball, but we're in the World Series because we're willing to make hard trades.

We shopped Adames. We didn't find a deal that was to our liking. The names being thrown around were Gavin Lux, Gavin Stone, Bobby Miller... still guys who could certainly contribute, but we were... a pitch away from getting past the Mets who went 6 with the LAD after beating the Phillies in the NLDS. 

So who knows, maybe if Williams doesn't blow that save, we're looking for OUR 2nd WS in 3 years. 

But what did we end up with? A top 100 prospect in Ebel, an under slot signing, allowed us to sign a couple other guys and... we got to compete. 

Both can work at times. 

[SF70]

4 hours ago, BrewerFan said:

NO, WE DO NOT have to trade William Contreras.

I understand the argument. We're a small-market team, and historically we've needed to trade players before free agency to keep the talent pipeline flowing. I've supported plenty of those trades myself.

But I think we're overlooking just how dramatically this organization's position has changed.

Where exactly do we need the bats?

Look at what we already have, and what's coming.

• 1B/DH: Blake Burke, Andrew Fischer, Luke Adams, Brock Wilken, Eric Bitonti, Mike Boeve, Tyler Black.

• 2B: Brice Turang, Luis Peña, Luke O'Rae, Trey Ebel.

• SS: Cooper Pratt, who's locked up long-term, Jesús Made, Peña, Jett Williams, Brady Ebel, Ricki Moneys, Diego Frontado and José Rodríguez.

• 3B: Made, Fischer, Joey Ortiz, David Hamilton and Brady Ebel.

• LF: Jackson Chourio, Josh Adamczewski.

• CF: Garrett Mitchell, Luis Lara, Braylon Payne, Antunez, Handelfry Encarnacion.

• RF: Sal Frelick, Sawyer Strosnider, Kyle Jones, with Bitonti potentially an option.

• C: Jeferson Quero and Marco Dinges.
  
  SP-Misiorowski, Harrison was a co-ace the first 3 months, Henderson has just shoved every time he's gotten a chance. Gasser is fully back from TJ, Priester should be back next hear from TOR surgery, Drohan, Patrick, every arm is back save for the 3 we added at the deadline(and I'd definitely bring Senzetela back as he's got that nasty 98-99 MPH sinker and now that he's out of Colorado, I think he could be in line for a big bounce back season... but I'm even more excited about the likes of Cameron Wagoner and then... just how the Brewers squeeze everything out of these guys. Witchrowski, Kuehner, Crow, Angel Zerpa will be coming back from TJ. He looked bad, but had a ~60% GB rate for the Royals in '25, good velo and deceptive... and we were toying with moving him to the rotation. That's just another effective arm to throw at teams.

That's an extraordinary amount of talent, and it's not all five years away. Those guys are MOSTLY 2027 or 2028.

Pratt is already contributing in the World Series. Chourio is locked up for years. Turang and Frelick are established major leaguers. Made and Peña are among the best young infield prospects in baseball. Fischer has legitimate impact-bat potential. Adamczewski, Payne, Burke and the others give us another wave behind them with Payne looking like... a true impact player, Adamczewski looks like a guy who just fits this teams identify, hits the ball hard, for average and enough power to be a threat.

And then there are the kids who are just getting started.

Diego Frontado, a young international signing, put up an OBP around .460. José Rodríguez is another 17-year-old shortstop with elite defensive tools and offensive potential at SS. Ricki Moneys is another talented young shortstop in the system.

And look at Antunez. What he did in center field at full-season ball as an 18-year-old is a BIG deal. That's a substantial jump in competition at that age, and he handled it... and he did so right after that Frias trade that I hated. Well, still don't love it, but Romero has come in big and Antunez has stepped in and provided the power that Frias has.

Milwaukee has arguably become one of the most efficient organizations in baseball at identifying and developing Latin American talent. Made, Peña, Lara, Frontado, Rodríguez, Antunez... it's not one isolated success. It's become a long trend.

And here's the other thing: we'll have another two or three drafts before some of these kids are even approaching Milwaukee. This isn't a finite supply of prospects we're gradually exhausting. We're continuing to add talent faster than we can find places for all of it.

We don't need to draft 3 stars, we don't need another Cooper Pratt draft. We just need to keep adding talent, trade chips, and while we could certainly get more for William Contreras this year, a pick in the top ~35 is... not abad consolation prize on top of running it back in Milwaukee

The point is that we've got potential impact players at virtually every position, with multiple layers of depth.

And the pitching?

We just finished the regular season with the youngest pitching staff in baseball. And that's BEFORE the next wave arrives.

Tyson Hardin is a top-100-caliber prospect. Bishop Letson has appeared on other top-100 lists. Josh Knoth is back from Tommy John, throwing around 98 with those ridiculous spin rates, and beginning to locate again. Of those three, Knoth might have the highest ceiling.

Cameron Wagoner has a 100-plus-mph fastball and a nasty slider. His story is already exception, but it's another potentially overpowering arm that matters. He could eventually become another late-inning weapon, perhaps supplementing the bullpen next year before eventually stepping into a larger role when Uribe presumably moves to closer after Megill is a FA. Ashby and Hall have 3 and 4 years of control remaining I believe.

Then there's just a guy like... Jayden Dubanewicz, a 6'3" pitcher Milwaukee signed after the tenth round, with a fastball touching 98 and a legitimate four-pitch mix. Could he become another Woodruff, Burnes or Peralta? Who knows? Maybe he becomes a trade chip. Maybe he never makes it. But that's exactly the kind of upside this organization keeps finding.

And I haven't even mentioned J.D. Thompson, Julian Garcia and some of the other arms.

Brandon Sproat is another guy I think could be special.

He's got top-of-the-rotation stuff. This year, I thought we saw a lot of stuff without enough actual pitching.

If Milwaukee can get him to harness it, work down in the zone, elevate when he needs a strikeout and use that big curveball effectively, there's tremendous upside.

Maybe he's another excellent long reliever. Maybe he develops into a starter. Maybe he follows something resembling the 2019 Corbin Burnes progression. just puts up a brutal season, the Brewers refine his repetoire, and he becomes a TOR type arm...

I don't know. But I know this organization has an outstanding track record of developing pitchers, and I don't see any reason to assume that's suddenly going to stop.

Which brings me back to Contreras.

In 2017, absolutely, you consider trading him. We needed more bites at the apple. We needed to accumulate talent and build toward a championship window.

But it's 2026.

We're four wins from eating the whole damn apple.

Why are we still operating as though we HAVE to trade one of our best players to create another opportunity several years from now?

The entire point of accumulating all this talent was to get where we are TODAY.

There's value in having William Contreras catching for a World Series contender next season. Real value. Not hypothetical future value.

And I think there's another aspect of Contreras that gets overlooked.

He's given this team an edge. An attitude. A little swagger that we haven't always had.

Not the same personality as Willy Adames, who brought energy and kept everybody loose. Contreras brings something sharper. He's intense, competitive and occasionally looks like he's ready to fight the entire opposing dugout this postseason, a bit more Wilson than William this year.

I love that about him. And I think it's been important to this team.

I'm not suggesting he's untouchable.

If Philadelphia wants to offer Andrew Painter and Alirio Ferrebus as part of a substantial package, I'm listening. Absolutely.

But I'm not trading Contreras simply because he's approaching free agency and that's what small-market teams are supposed to do.

Make somebody offer us a player we genuinely want badly enough to take away a key player from a team with championship aspirations.

And if we do move him, we're hardly helpless at catcher. On top of everything, we have had the best catching since 2010 and a lot of that is Charlie Moore and his ablity to work with catchers like William Contreras who was a bat first catcher who the Braves didn't think could handle catching everyday. They had him down as a DH.

Quero is coming. We could bring Sánchez back(you'd probably want 3 catchers if Sanchez is one of them). Detroit has Dillon Dingler and an outstanding catching prospect in Josue Briceño. There are ways to address the position, including using some of our extraordinary organizational depth to acquire another catcher(of course that's... just an example, Dingler would be extremely expensive, but Brinceno may be more plausible.

That's the beauty of where we are now. We have OPTIONS.

And OBVIOUSLY as you well know, it's not like it's either trade Contreras or lose him for nothing. That comp pick is genuinely valuable the way the Brewers have been drafting recently. We could have 2 1sts in 2028... and that's on top of what could already be three selections in approximately the top 40 this coming draft if the Bauers compensation works out(which I have a very hard time seeing that not working out.

The organization isn't just developing prospects. It's accumulating the draft capital and international talent to keep the pipeline flowing.

We also have the additional revenue from a World Series run, potentially $30–40 million, and a new CBA coming. The owners have already expressed support for sharing local television revenue more broadly, including a 50/50 arrangement. Whatever the final agreement looks like, I think there's a strong possibility the economics become more favorable for teams like Milwaukee even before the WS revenue(which could actually surpass 30-40M pretty easily when all is told).

Contreras remains under control for 2027, and I think it's unlikely the Brewers exercise his $15.5 million and instead agree to a deal for ~12.5. But hey, maybe you say we'll give you 3 for 75M, I'd do that(I sincerely doubt he would).

We don't NEED to trade anybody.

That's the point.

None of this means we should ignore a great trade offer. It means we don't need to manufacture urgency where there isn't any.

Look at what this scouting department has accomplished. Look at the talent in Milwaukee. Look at the talent in Nashville, Biloxi, Wisconsin and the lower levels.

We're not Houston, trying to squeeze another competitive season out of an aging core and a depleted farm system.

We have legitimate impact players, young major leaguers with years of control, and more prospects arriving behind them.

We have redundancies for our redundancies' redundancies.

And we're positioned to keep adding to that pipeline through the draft and international signings.

I liked having Adames for his final season. I wouldn't automatically trade away that production simply because we could have acquired another couple of prospects.

Sometimes the value of a player is the games he helps you win RIGHT NOW.

And right now, we're competing for a World Series.

This is the time to get greedy.

Let's win four more games. Then let's build a team that can come back and win another one next year.

If somebody wants Contreras, make them pay a price that actually improves our chances of doing that.

Because for the first time in a long time, I don't think Milwaukee has to make a trade simply because the calendar says it's time.

Congratulations on writing the longest post I’ve ever read all the way thru with interest, since it seems it could have been written by me. That’s how much I agree with your take here.

Yes, if we win the title this year, let’s go back to back and win another. This team has an opportunity to do what no small-market team has ever done — become baseball’s first Small-Market Dynasty.

I’ve been talking about this for years, ever since the true eliteness of our FO has been realized and what they have done in building our infrastructure into the monstrous juggernaut that it is today. 

As you’ve pointed-out in extreme detail, we have everything we need organizationally to sustain the juggernaut that’s been created far into the future — maybe for as long as a decade or more. 

The WS appearance is worth hundreds of millions to this franchise, while a title would likely add $500M to a billion in franchise value. Another title next year with a future as incredible as this team’s and who knows how much that would be worth financially.

Yes, we need to win it all first for this optimistic take to become reality, but with a ten year future as strong as this team has — I’m expecting it to happen at some point. 

It’s like the proverbial snowball rolling down a mountain covered in snow. This organizational juggernaut is real and will keep feeding off itself until it becomes baseball’s first SM Dynasty.

And no MLB fanbase deserves it more than we do.

[TURBO]

7 hours ago, BrewerFan said:

NO, WE DO NOT have to trade William Contreras.

I understand the argument. We're a small-market team, and historically we've needed to trade players before free agency to keep the talent pipeline flowing. I've supported plenty of those trades myself.

But I think we're overlooking just how dramatically this organization's position has changed.

Where exactly do we need the bats?

Look at what we already have, and what's coming.

• 1B/DH: Blake Burke, Andrew Fischer, Luke Adams, Brock Wilken, Eric Bitonti, Mike Boeve, Tyler Black.

• 2B: Brice Turang, Luis Peña, Luke O'Rae, Trey Ebel.

• SS: Cooper Pratt, who's locked up long-term, Jesús Made, Peña, Jett Williams, Brady Ebel, Ricki Moneys, Diego Frontado and José Rodríguez.

• 3B: Made, Fischer, Joey Ortiz, David Hamilton and Brady Ebel.

• LF: Jackson Chourio, Josh Adamczewski.

• CF: Garrett Mitchell, Luis Lara, Braylon Payne, Antunez, Handelfry Encarnacion.

• RF: Sal Frelick, Sawyer Strosnider, Kyle Jones, with Bitonti potentially an option.

• C: Jeferson Quero and Marco Dinges.
  
  SP-Misiorowski, Harrison was a co-ace the first 3 months, Henderson has just shoved every time he's gotten a chance. Gasser is fully back from TJ, Priester should be back next hear from TOR surgery, Drohan, Patrick, every arm is back save for the 3 we added at the deadline(and I'd definitely bring Senzetela back as he's got that nasty 98-99 MPH sinker and now that he's out of Colorado, I think he could be in line for a big bounce back season... but I'm even more excited about the likes of Cameron Wagoner and then... just how the Brewers squeeze everything out of these guys. Witchrowski, Kuehner, Crow, Angel Zerpa will be coming back from TJ. He looked bad, but had a ~60% GB rate for the Royals in '25, good velo and deceptive... and we were toying with moving him to the rotation. That's just another effective arm to throw at teams.

That's an extraordinary amount of talent, and it's not all five years away. Those guys are MOSTLY 2027 or 2028.

Pratt is already contributing in the World Series. Chourio is locked up for years. Turang and Frelick are established major leaguers. Made and Peña are among the best young infield prospects in baseball. Fischer has legitimate impact-bat potential. Adamczewski, Payne, Burke and the others give us another wave behind them with Payne looking like... a true impact player, Adamczewski looks like a guy who just fits this teams identify, hits the ball hard, for average and enough power to be a threat.

And then there are the kids who are just getting started.

Diego Frontado, a young international signing, put up an OBP around .460. José Rodríguez is another 17-year-old shortstop with elite defensive tools and offensive potential at SS. Ricki Moneys is another talented young shortstop in the system.

And look at Antunez. What he did in center field at full-season ball as an 18-year-old is a BIG deal. That's a substantial jump in competition at that age, and he handled it... and he did so right after that Frias trade that I hated. Well, still don't love it, but Romero has come in big and Antunez has stepped in and provided the power that Frias has.

Milwaukee has arguably become one of the most efficient organizations in baseball at identifying and developing Latin American talent. Made, Peña, Lara, Frontado, Rodríguez, Antunez... it's not one isolated success. It's become a long trend.

And here's the other thing: we'll have another two or three drafts before some of these kids are even approaching Milwaukee. This isn't a finite supply of prospects we're gradually exhausting. We're continuing to add talent faster than we can find places for all of it.

We don't need to draft 3 stars, we don't need another Cooper Pratt draft. We just need to keep adding talent, trade chips, and while we could certainly get more for William Contreras this year, a pick in the top ~35 is... not abad consolation prize on top of running it back in Milwaukee

The point is that we've got potential impact players at virtually every position, with multiple layers of depth.

And the pitching?

We just finished the regular season with the youngest pitching staff in baseball. And that's BEFORE the next wave arrives.

Tyson Hardin is a top-100-caliber prospect. Bishop Letson has appeared on other top-100 lists. Josh Knoth is back from Tommy John, throwing around 98 with those ridiculous spin rates, and beginning to locate again. Of those three, Knoth might have the highest ceiling.

Cameron Wagoner has a 100-plus-mph fastball and a nasty slider. His story is already exception, but it's another potentially overpowering arm that matters. He could eventually become another late-inning weapon, perhaps supplementing the bullpen next year before eventually stepping into a larger role when Uribe presumably moves to closer after Megill is a FA. Ashby and Hall have 3 and 4 years of control remaining I believe.

Then there's just a guy like... Jayden Dubanewicz, a 6'3" pitcher Milwaukee signed after the tenth round, with a fastball touching 98 and a legitimate four-pitch mix. Could he become another Woodruff, Burnes or Peralta? Who knows? Maybe he becomes a trade chip. Maybe he never makes it. But that's exactly the kind of upside this organization keeps finding.

And I haven't even mentioned J.D. Thompson, Julian Garcia and some of the other arms.

Brandon Sproat is another guy I think could be special.

He's got top-of-the-rotation stuff. This year, I thought we saw a lot of stuff without enough actual pitching.

If Milwaukee can get him to harness it, work down in the zone, elevate when he needs a strikeout and use that big curveball effectively, there's tremendous upside.

Maybe he's another excellent long reliever. Maybe he develops into a starter. Maybe he follows something resembling the 2019 Corbin Burnes progression. just puts up a brutal season, the Brewers refine his repetoire, and he becomes a TOR type arm...

I don't know. But I know this organization has an outstanding track record of developing pitchers, and I don't see any reason to assume that's suddenly going to stop.

Which brings me back to Contreras.

In 2017, absolutely, you consider trading him. We needed more bites at the apple. We needed to accumulate talent and build toward a championship window.

But it's 2026.

We're four wins from eating the whole damn apple.

Why are we still operating as though we HAVE to trade one of our best players to create another opportunity several years from now?

The entire point of accumulating all this talent was to get where we are TODAY.

There's value in having William Contreras catching for a World Series contender next season. Real value. Not hypothetical future value.

And I think there's another aspect of Contreras that gets overlooked.

He's given this team an edge. An attitude. A little swagger that we haven't always had.

Not the same personality as Willy Adames, who brought energy and kept everybody loose. Contreras brings something sharper. He's intense, competitive and occasionally looks like he's ready to fight the entire opposing dugout this postseason, a bit more Wilson than William this year.

I love that about him. And I think it's been important to this team.

I'm not suggesting he's untouchable.

If Philadelphia wants to offer Andrew Painter and Alirio Ferrebus as part of a substantial package, I'm listening. Absolutely.

But I'm not trading Contreras simply because he's approaching free agency and that's what small-market teams are supposed to do.

Make somebody offer us a player we genuinely want badly enough to take away a key player from a team with championship aspirations.

And if we do move him, we're hardly helpless at catcher. On top of everything, we have had the best catching since 2010 and a lot of that is Charlie Moore and his ablity to work with catchers like William Contreras who was a bat first catcher who the Braves didn't think could handle catching everyday. They had him down as a DH.

Quero is coming. We could bring Sánchez back(you'd probably want 3 catchers if Sanchez is one of them). Detroit has Dillon Dingler and an outstanding catching prospect in Josue Briceño. There are ways to address the position, including using some of our extraordinary organizational depth to acquire another catcher(of course that's... just an example, Dingler would be extremely expensive, but Brinceno may be more plausible.

That's the beauty of where we are now. We have OPTIONS.

And OBVIOUSLY as you well know, it's not like it's either trade Contreras or lose him for nothing. That comp pick is genuinely valuable the way the Brewers have been drafting recently. We could have 2 1sts in 2028... and that's on top of what could already be three selections in approximately the top 40 this coming draft if the Bauers compensation works out(which I have a very hard time seeing that not working out.

The organization isn't just developing prospects. It's accumulating the draft capital and international talent to keep the pipeline flowing.

We also have the additional revenue from a World Series run, potentially $30–40 million, and a new CBA coming. The owners have already expressed support for sharing local television revenue more broadly, including a 50/50 arrangement. Whatever the final agreement looks like, I think there's a strong possibility the economics become more favorable for teams like Milwaukee even before the WS revenue(which could actually surpass 30-40M pretty easily when all is told).

Contreras remains under control for 2027, and I think it's unlikely the Brewers exercise his $15.5 million and instead agree to a deal for ~12.5. But hey, maybe you say we'll give you 3 for 75M, I'd do that(I sincerely doubt he would).

We don't NEED to trade anybody.

That's the point.

None of this means we should ignore a great trade offer. It means we don't need to manufacture urgency where there isn't any.

Look at what this scouting department has accomplished. Look at the talent in Milwaukee. Look at the talent in Nashville, Biloxi, Wisconsin and the lower levels.

We're not Houston, trying to squeeze another competitive season out of an aging core and a depleted farm system.

We have legitimate impact players, young major leaguers with years of control, and more prospects arriving behind them.

We have redundancies for our redundancies' redundancies.

And we're positioned to keep adding to that pipeline through the draft and international signings.

I liked having Adames for his final season. I wouldn't automatically trade away that production simply because we could have acquired another couple of prospects.

Sometimes the value of a player is the games he helps you win RIGHT NOW.

And right now, we're competing for a World Series.

This is the time to get greedy.

Let's win four more games. Then let's build a team that can come back and win another one next year.

If somebody wants Contreras, make them pay a price that actually improves our chances of doing that.

Because for the first time in a long time, I don't think Milwaukee has to make a trade simply because the calendar says it's time.

Thank you for putting in the time to write that incredible post!

I agree with ALL of it!

Your post has me pumped up for a future that I never thought I'd see in Milwaukee!

Kudos!

[thammondwis]

On 10/20/2026 at 1:35 PM, MrTPlush said:

And we may lose it because of hard decisions. What if we didn’t trade Peralta…or probably a little more relevant with less what if, what if we had traded for Skubal? Everyone is flying high thinking “WE DIDN’T NEED SKUBAL” right now. How we feeling about that if we lose 4/7 games? 

Does anyone regret trading for Sabathia? Anyone regret not trading Fielder?

I don’t think there needs to be a hard strict rule to these decisions. I think that limits a orgs options and abilities. Thankfully, I don’t think the Brewers Brass thinks that way after the aggressive Skubal pursuit. I would guess the Brewers will go into the offseason pretty neutral on bringing him back, keeping the door open to go either direction based on offers.

Agree with a lot of your points, but we got to where we are right now by trading guys like Contreras for prospects that will help you in the future.

So, you stick with what works...right?

The reason in my mind to deviate are things like; what if we don't win it all this year, then maybe you go all in for next year (that might mean keeping Conteras for final year and trading some minor league capital to get a player or two to get you over the hump). Or maybe if the new CBA rules necessitate changes in strategy.