Brewers Trade Aaron Civale To White Sox For Andrew Vaughn

Vaughn would have to hit the cover off the ball late this season to even be considered a replacement for someone in 2026.  5.85 million in arbitration last year.  If he comes up and posts even a pretty decent .750 OPS, odds are still pretty overwhelming that he would be not be offered arbiration.  Talks about options left is pretty meaningless IMO.  The Brewers will not be paying him 5+ million in 2026 to ship him back and forth between MLB and AAA.  Either he mashes after getting called up later this year, gets paid for 2026 and is in the starting lineup, or he doesn't do anything the rest of this year and is non-tendered.

Vaughn has all the tools to be a serviceable 1B - Just needs to take a walk here and there - Very similar advance numbers to Hoskins

I wouldn’t hate it as a reclamation project and I didn’t have high hopes for a Civale trade either, I just don’t know how this is supposed to work? Pay Vaughn a decent salary but keep him in the minors all year and then non tender him? Is he just purely injury insurance for 2025?

Nothing to lose by stashing him in AAA. And nothing is written saying he's their 1B in 2026. The one scenario where they could've done better is to get a lottery ticket & have it hit in four or five years which is probably just as big of a crapshoot.

It IS getting a little crowded in Nashville (assuming that's where he's headed) finding ABs for all the AAAA personnel there.

I'd feel a smidge better if he could play a little LF but he hasn't been out there in three years, and for good reason from what I've heard.

6 minutes ago, markedman5 said:

We could have traded him for a low rated prospect ( who likely would never see the majors) and thrown in even more money.

i get the sense people would have been happier if we would have just released him.

He had no value and we got a former top.prospect who has been mostly a bust …….if they find something that they can fix great……if not he’s gone.

I’m not sure what people expected……..but again the worse trades are viewed here the better they usually turn out.

im not expecting anything but since we gave up nothing I certainly am not going to whine about the return.

Yeah, I mean, I expected nothing for Civale, so it’s not like my expectations weren’t met in that sense. 

We just don’t have any organizational track record in being able to “fix” hitters, so I don’t have any faith that we will be getting anything out of Vaughn.

The pitching development system in this organization has earned much more of the benefit of the doubt.

1 minute ago, adambr2 said:

Yeah, I mean, I expected nothing for Civale, so it’s not like my expectations weren’t met in that sense. 

We just don’t have any organizational track record in being able to “fix” hitters, so I don’t have any faith that we will be getting anything out of Vaughn.

The pitching development system in this organization has earned much more of the benefit of the doubt.

Think the Brewers have broken more hitters than they fixed.

I think this the equivalent of saying that if you complain, you will get sent to Siberia (i.e. the White Sox).  It's just nothing more than a warning to the rest of the team of what will happen if you ***** about your role.

What a weird deal for Milwaukee. The White Sox get Civale at a discounted price (Brewers kicking in cash), will now be able to flip a veteran starting pitcher at the deadline instead of Vaughn a former #3 overall pick who was a bust for them. 
 

Meanwhile the Brewers are paying a guy 5.5 million to play in the minors with no path to the 26 man roster with Hoskins, Yelich, Bauers, Collins, Cameron, etc. in front of him 

2 minutes ago, LouisEly said:

I think this the equivalent of saying that if you complain, you will get sent to Siberia (i.e. the White Sox).  It's just nothing more than a warning to the rest of the team of what will happen if you ***** about your role.

I remember NFL teams doing that in the 70s by sending them to Green Bay. 

Glad those days are gone.

1 minute ago, umphrey said:

I wouldn’t hate it as a reclamation project and I didn’t have high hopes for a Civale trade either, I just don’t know how this is supposed to work? Pay Vaughn a decent salary but keep him in the minors all year and then non tender him? Is he just purely injury insurance for 2025?

I think it's like markedman5 said - "We could have traded him for a low rated prospect ( who likely would never see the majors) and thrown in even more money."

28 other major league teams either told the Brewers they had no use for Civale or they would give them a 28 year old organizational filler prospect who is currently in A+ ball, but only if the Brewers also sent them the approximate 5 million dollars to cover the rest of the Civale's contract.

The White Sox front office was looking at the remaining 3.65 million they are paying Vaughn for the rest of this season and vomiting at the thought.  So when the Brewers called, the White Sox maybe said give up Civale and 1 million to make it a bit more even money wise.  So instead of the Brewers having Civale and being on the hook for 5 million dollars...they now have Vaughn and his 3.65 million and gave away the million...but the 4.65 million total still saves them 350k.  Attanasio gets a few free steak dinners out of the deal.

If the Brewers did kick in the full difference between salaries...I'm definitely not going to say it was a bad deal because Civale has no value for them unless injuries would have forced him back into the rotation...but there just doesn't seem like there is any benefit because fixing Vaughn to the extent that they would be happy to pay him 5-6 million next year seems really remote. 

Have to think the salaries factor in here a bit.  But yea I'd have hoped to find the flyer on a SS/3B type instead.

I guess one thing to note I don't think I've seen yet is that if the team does flounder and keeps sitting a bit out of the WC and they get a good offer for Hoskins that they take, you'd have this guy to finish the year as a poor man version of him, and reclamation project that if he does well you have him next year.  Or just if Hoskins gets hurt, same thing.

When do the Brewers start getting royalties from the White Sox current rotation?

Time will tell on this one and what the White Sox flip Civale for at the end of July.

Lets not forget the Brewers did not have to trade any real talent to get Montas last year. 
 

So if the White Sox trade Civale in a few weeks for spare parts, then who cares.
 

However, if the Sox end up with real talent then the Brewers probably made a mistake.

Sorry if this has already been mentioned, but McCalvy is reporting that the Brewers do not plan on playing Vaughn in the outfield and the cash offsets the salary difference.  So the Brewers do not save any money in this deal.

The move does give the feeling that the Brewers are planning on dealing Hoskins and they don't think Martinez is ready for his shot (or maybe don't think Martinez is a MLB player). 

And, of course, so far in June, Hoskins = .135/.175/.216/.391 and has probably undone much of the value he built up earlier in the season.  Hard to see the Brewers getting any significant return for him considering the money he is making

25 minutes ago, JosephC said:

Vaughn would have to hit the cover off the ball late this season to even be considered a replacement for someone in 2026.  5.85 million in arbitration last year.  If he comes up and posts even a pretty decent .750 OPS, odds are still pretty overwhelming that he would be not be offered arbiration.  Talks about options left is pretty meaningless IMO.  The Brewers will not be paying him 5+ million in 2026 to ship him back and forth between MLB and AAA.  Either he mashes after getting called up later this year, gets paid for 2026 and is in the starting lineup, or he doesn't do anything the rest of this year and is non-tendered.

I'm thinking by having Vaughn with at least 1 year control, this gives them time to work with him and come offseason get an extension deal done. 2 years pay 4mil with mutual option like 7-8mil. Bargaining chip would be not keeping him down enough days to get a 2nd year team control. 

meh

I wonder if Civale wished he had kept his mouth shut?  

If this takes away at bats from Ernesto in any way, EVER, this does not make me happy.

13 minutes ago, TURBO said:

meh

I wonder if Civale wished he had kept his mouth shut?  

If this takes away at bats from Ernesto in any way, EVER, this does not make me happy.

Another mediocre SP, Frankie Montas got 2yrs/34 million last year as a free agent. 
 

That is what Civale cares about, not where he goes to work for the  six weeks until he’s traded again. Heck, he could probably keep his apartment in Milwaukee instead of moving to Chicago from now until July 31st.

This does not feel like a move that is being made in a vacuum. It is getting rid of Civale for a guy the Brewers must believe has some use and probably also is part of setting up future moves. I do not necessarily think they are planning on trading Hoskins either, at least not at this point. If we are out of contention in a month, then you consider trading Hoskins. Perhaps the team is looking at dealing someone like Black as part of a trade in July, which would free up playing time at 1B for Vaughn in Nashville. I just feel like this is part of bigger plans for the Brewers. Obviously the front office knows there is a bit of a logjam at 1B between Nashville and the big league club.

Send him to the hitting lab. (Do we have one of those?)

9 minutes ago, Playing Catch said:

Sacramento was willing to pay for Ks. Civale only makes sense on certain teams.

Montas went to the Mets as a free agent. Not the Athletics.

Every team shooting for the playoffs wants more SP. The only variance is how badly they want it. 

34 minutes ago, Playing Catch said:

Now, the Brewers can trade Hoskins to the Red Sox.

Hoskins for Story