Don't Overlook the Value of the Conditional Draft Pick Brewers Acquired in Devin Williams Trade

The Brewers traded longtime reliever Devin Williams to the Yankees Friday, receiving infielder Caleb Durbin and starting pitcher Nestor Cortes in return. It was a difficult deal for some fans to evaluate, because it involved acquiring a player (in Cortes) who will become a free agent at the same time Williams will, next fall. Durbin is the main piece, because he's under team control for at least six years (should he pan out), but the fact that much of the remaining value was tied up in Cortes was a wrinkle.

Usually, the Brewers take a long-term focus when trading away players who are approaching free agency. It was their willingness to accept far-off value that allowed them to scoop up Freddy Peralta for Adam Lind, and when they dealt Josh Hader to the Padres in 2022, they did take back Taylor Rogers—but that was as a tertiary piece, with Esteury Ruiz and Robert Gasser as the main components of the package. Cortes is much more important to this deal than Rogers was to that one, and it feels odd that the team targeted a player with just one year of team control, even though the Yankees sent some money to the Crew in the deal.

The key to understanding Matt Arnold's approach lies in the roles of the players exchanged here, and in the way the free-agent market has unfolded this winter. To grasp the idea, consider this list of pitchers and their FanGraphs WAR (fWAR) for the last three seasons:

• Nestor Cortes: 396 innings, 7.8 WAR
• Michael Wacha: 428 IP, 7.5 WAR
• Nathan Eovaldi: 424 IP, 6.1 WAR
• Nick Pivetta: 468 IP, 5.4 WAR
• Nick Martinez: 359 IP, 5.3 WAR
• Yusei Kikuchi: 444 IP, 5.1 WAR
• Sean Manaea: 457 IP, 5.0 WAR
• Luis Severino: 373 IP, 3.1 WAR

Other than Cortes, all of the above are starters who became free agents this winter, and who were offered the qualifying offer (or would have been, if they were eligible). Wacha has already signed a three-year deal, without hitting the market. Severino got $67 million from the Athletics, to spend his next three seasons in West Sacramento. Eovaldi got $75 million over three years from the Rangers, and Kikuchi got $63 million over the same term from the Angels. Martinez accepted the qualifying offer to stay with the Reds. Pivetta and Manaea are unsigned so far, but each is in for a big payday.

In other words: if Cortes has a healthy and characteristic season (and especially if he benefits significantly from the change in his home park and the defense played behind him, as I fully expect), he's a shoo-in to get the qualifying offer next winter. The Brewers would have had the same right with Williams, of course, but for a small-market team, it's hard to extend that to a reliever. If Williams has a fully healthy and characteristic season, you'd probably still have to do it, but the team was never going to spend $21 million or more per year on a reliever. That's part of why they were so proactive about trading Hader, and why they were never going to consider keeping Williams.

The risk, of course, lies in the fact that relievers just don't enjoy anything remotely similar to the market starters find in the modern game. The Brewers aren't the only team who views those hurlers as replaceable. On the contrary, the whole league feels that way. By contrast, almost every team in the league will pay through the nose for a reliable starter. Most of the names rattled off above already signed for (or will sign for) salaries similar to that offered by the QO, on multi-year deals. And Cortes is the best of the bunch.

One key talking point this winter is that teams don't pay purely for track record or durability, the way they once did. Cortes will need to have another strong season in 2025 to be worthy of the QO, and not just in terms of superficial statistics. However, his pitch mix and peripheral numbers are good enough to attract plenty of bidders, when he's healthy. He survived a scare with his elbow this fall. If he remains intact for the Brewers, he'll have a very robust market afterward.

When trading away a player like Williams (or Corbin Burnes, a year ago), teams set the expected value of an extra draft pick as the absolute floor for the return. By moving those players a year before they reach free agency, they know they're giving up the right to extend the QO and recoup a pick when the player signs elsewhere. With Cortes, though, the Brewers got back not only a player who fits their needs even better than Williams did for 2025 (albeit in less stellar fashion), but a player they can comfortably make that very offer to 11 months from now. In effect, assuming he stays healthy this year, they acquired a draft pick, in addition to Cortes and Durbin.

In almost every trade made by the Brewers front office in recent years, there's an extra layer to unpack, which makes it more favorable to the Crew than it appears at first glance. This one is no exception. Cortes is not a superstar, but he's a huge upgrade for the team's rotation, and despite being destined for free agency after 2025, he'll return value for the team beyond that year, if things go even moderately well.