LouisEly

I thought we agreed on three moves... 1) Trade Aoki - the Giants desperately need OBP at the top of their lineup, have pitching to give back, and could market him to the Asian community. Giants weren't going to make a move at the deadline because they were too far out of it, but could easily make the trade in the offseason. Giants have pitching to send back - Kickham could provide young LHP plus add in a lower level pitcher. Schafer takes over in RF. 2) Khris Davis stays hot and they trade him - realistically, he's not a RF or he would have been playing there already, and I think the Brewers could use more LH balance. Strike while the iron is hot, and trade from depth. His age, salary, and production could bring back quality young pitching or 3B. Gindl and Halton are your backup OFs or platoon in RF. 3) Pipe dream is that the Dodgers trade for both Weeks and Ramirez - Uribe is a FA and Ellis has a $1M buyout (or pay a 37-year-old $5.75M) so it is possible. The only infielder the Dodgers have who is younger than Weeks is H-Ram, and he is only one year younger. Maybe to help balance salaries the Brewers take a flyer on Billingsley returning to form plus a couple of pitching prospects, Dodgers give $3M for Billingsley's 2015 buyout in case he's done or waive the $3M and ask for better prospects. One of the best things that could happen to the Brewers would be for the Dodgers to not win the World Series, causing the Dodgers to go all-out for 2014. I'd listed to offers for Gomez, but it would take a haul for me to deal him. I think part of his cooling off has been him forced to bat cleanup/3rd because of Braun and Ramirez being out. He probably felt more pressure to hit for power in the #4 spot, and moving him back to his normal spot might get him to focus more on getting on base. The Brewers also need someone to take over as the face of the franchise for casual fans to identify with post-Braun, and Gomez is an exciting player who could fill that role. That could be very valuable in terms of revenue from casual fans.

You can have a weak schedule for a month, but not for three months. San Francisco won the World Series last year and with pretty much the exact same team has won one more game than the Brewers this year playing in a weaker division.

Start thinking about your final prospect rankings. I have time the week of Labor Day to put together the list. Please have it posted by Labor Day.

Realistically you can't expect more than three moves in an offseason. I was thinking about a thread for "3 Wishes for the Offseason" where you could wish for three realistic moves. Would you be willing to change the thread to a 3 moves for 2014?

If you use ERA, the line between a #1 and a #2 is roughly 3.00 (when I drop the minimum IP to 80, the #32 ranked pitcher in ERA is Gaudin at 3.06), and between a #2 and a #3 is roughly 3.75. An era of 4.50 is a low #3/high #4.

In your opinion it means nothing. In his opinion it means something. The purpose of this forum is for people to be able to express their opinions. RBIs in and of themselves are not a perfect stat, but like chickinbrickn says they are important because scoring runs is half of the bottom line of the game. BA w/RISP isn't perfect either because it doesn't take into effect sacrifices (bunts, flies) that score runs or move runners over - it treats them as a non-event (neither an AB nor a hit) but they are a successful AB in that scenario. There needs to be an OBP-type stat for RISP that measures hits + sacrifices per AB w/RISP or an inherited runners/allowed to score type of stat that shows number of RISP and % of those driven in or advanced. Just like pitchers need to hit their spots in certain situations, batters need to execute in certain situations and both are an important part of the game. Back to 1B, obviously Francisco is not a good defender right now. But given that he has had very limited experience at 1B prior to this season, do people think that playing 1B through the rest of the season plus a season of winter ball and a full spring training at 1B will allow him to improve enough to be serviceable at 1B?

And chances are that the 2nd round draft pick will be a mediocre major league baseball player, if even that. Just like the 2nd round pick that the Brewers gave up for signing Suppan. Unbelievable that the Gods of Pitching Identification and Development, the Cardinals, could whiff on a pitcher selected in the 2nd round.

What splitterftj said - do you keep two backup OFs for two positions, or do you keep two backup IFs for four positions? For those who haven't noticed, Roenicke has been doing a good job of putting the young guys in positions to succeed. He's playing L-R matchups, guys who have had success against certain guys in the past, etc., which has helped Gindl, Davis, and Francisco have success. Build the confidence of those guys so they can either perform better in the future, or make them look better in case you need to deal them in the offseason to acquire young pitching.

Buxton hasn't done anything at AA yet, much less the majors. Delmon Young tore up A-ball and AA as an 18/19 year old #1 overall pick and was the #1-#3 overall prospect for four consecutive years, but has been a 1.3 career WAR player in the majors. Until Buxton puts up consecutive >.950 OPS seasons in the majors like Trout, I'll take the guy who grades out to be like the guy who started the All-Star game for the AL this year.

For those who haven't noticed, Francisco has put up a .837 OPS since joining the Brewers, and his OBP is .080 higher than his BA so he isn't hacking at everything thrown at him. They have mentioned that Francisco has spent a lot of time with Narron working on his pitch selection and his swing. I'm torn if I want to bring back Hart on a one-year-deal (if they can get him at $5M or less, hoping he reverts to form and can flip him for a prospect) platooning Francisco against tough RH pitchers, or make Francisco the starter with Halton platooning against tough LHP. As much as I feel bad for Gamel and want him to succeed, I think Francisco is the better option for next year and beyond. Those concerned about Francisco's defense, remember that he has played very little 1B prior to this year. Playing 1B during winter ball, and a full spring training, should help improve his defense significantly. As for Abreu, he is already 26 so he'll be 27 next year, same age as Francisco. Cespedes has regressed to a .740 OPS with an OBP <.300, so I don't know that I want to invest $10M/year for 6-7 years in an unproven 27-year-old, especially since Abreu hits RH. I think I'd prefer more LH balance in the lineup with Francisco at ~$2M (arbitration guess).

While I agree that you shouldn't draft based on organizational need, I do think you should look at certain positions and how the players drafted at those positions in the last 2-3 years are performing. With three of the top four picks of the 2012 draft being RH-hitting OFs, unless the next Mike Trout is sitting there I don't want them to draft a RH-hitting OF in the first round, or with any of their top 4-5 picks.

I bought a refurb laptop off of eBay earlier this year with no frills - Windows 7, smallish hard drive and low RAM (but you can easily replace the RAM and get an external hard drive for <$100), but a 15.6" screen and with Office 2010 full version installed for $150. Works just fine, laptop barely had any scratches on it, looked practically new; only thing I regret is that it has a LCD screen, and I wish I had spent more for a LED screen for visibility in different light conditions. Figure what you need and check eBay - you can get good deals with software installed, as well as purchase a Square Trade warranty to protect it. RAM is easy to upgrade if you can get a good deal on one. One thing to be careful of - some university software/applications don't work with Windows 8 yet. Better check with them first to find out what will/won't work.

Sounds like you're trying to take care of an older family member. I know how challenging that can be. My grandmother was in the hospital recently, has high blood pressure, and she said when they served her a meal with a lettuce salad, "They didn't give me any salt to put on my lettuce - how can you eat lettuce without any salt?" My grandmother doesn't like taking vitamins because of the size of the tablets and has had issues with diarrhea, so I bought her liquid vitamins two years ago. I've stopped asking her if she needs more because she doesn't use them.

Could have been claimed by a team that was looking to block a trade to a competitor, and that team was willing to absorb his salary but had no intention of giving up any talent for him. Could have been claimed by a team that was not in contention this year, but is looking to retool in the offseason and compete next year. What we know now is that whatever is left on his contract is not scaring teams away from him.

I didn't choose to include the quote because it wasn't relevant to my discussion or argument. My initial post was in response to Trwi's post the prior page that called out injury risk, not age-related regression. Of course I think it's possible for there to be age-related regression. I also believe that the end of the trade deadline isn't the end of the world, and that what happens in the offseason is a much better indicator of the Brewers plans for 2014 and beyond then what happens at the trade deadline. Reading article #1 the attrition rate at age 36 is the second lowest age besides age 24 and the attrition rate drops from age 34 to 36, suggesting a decrease in injury risk beyond age 34. And I don't see the article state whether the differences at each age are statistically significant; just because the slope of the line appears to increase doesn't mean it is statistically significant. The article does state, "Although pitchers aged 37 and up appear in the chart to be as vulnerable to injury as very young ones, that is also the age at which pitchers will begin to retire voluntarily. The uptick in injury risk at the tail end of a pitcher's career is probably not as substantial as what is implied here." The article also says, "However, it may be more proper to associate the pitching motion itself with the underlying risk of injury observed among pitchers of all ages." Shame on me for reading articles in detail with a critical eye. Article #2 implies mechanics is the biggest cause of injury just as article #1, and I don't see anyone say Lohse's mechanics are poor. As for the third article, the link is bad - it just goes back to this thread for me. But I assume that it compares pitchers to position players, which isn't what I am arguing about. The title would suggest investing in hitters instead of pitchers, and I believe you've been advocating investing in pitching. Article #4 is common sense and applies if a player gets injured. I'll give you that one.

Yep. If this was 2006 I would absolutely, 100% agree that not signing Suppan and instead spending that money on signing a handful of high bonus draftees and international free agents would be the right thing to do. But it isn't 2006. I'm looking forward playing within the rules that are currently in place, and not looking in the rear-view mirror. What I gather about reading that article is that the Pirates spent the bulk of that $50M on signing players and not on their scouting system. Obviously something you can't do anymore. At least until next year when the Brewers have more draft and international pool money. Remember, everything that people are saying about the Pirates and Cubs right now the rest of the division was saying about the Brewers five years ago.

If that's the problem, then yes, and that's a good point. I'm not convinced it is scouting though; it could very well be player development (a poster in the minor league forum claims to have talked to a scout at a game who said the Brewers have talent but do a terrible job with development), or it could be drafting players who used PEDs in college/HS (which I strongly suspect), and if it is either of those then throwing money at scouts won't rectify the issue. But these are discussions for another thread. I'm still in favor of bringing Axford back.

Here's an interesting website: http://nutritiondata.self.com/ Lots of good stuff here. One thing I like is that it has a drop-down menu for portion size that will automatically adjust the nutritional information for different portions. For example, for butter you can select a pat, a tablespoon, an ounce, or a stick, and it will change the fat/calories/sodium/etc. automatically to the total for that amount. It has nutritional information for many restaurants, but mostly national chain fast-food. It also has a calculator to adjust your nutritonal needs where you can enter your gender/age/height/weight/lifestyle (sedentary, active, very active, etc.) and adjust accordingly. For example, based on my height/weight/age/lifestyle, my daily energy expenditure is ~4100 calories. A 2500 calorie diet is not something I can sustain for more than a couple of days. If you are a very active athlete who exercises and sweats a lot, you do need to increase your sodium intake a little above USRDA. As for flavor, one thing I like to season/marinate/flavor my food with is lime juice. Just about anything sauteed in lime juice tastes better (including asparagus, beet leaves, spinach), and it adds no sodium.

Do the Brewers not scout Asia because they don't have the money to, or because so few players from Asia sign to come here each year, thus not making it economically worthwhile? Is it because players in Asia are under contract with teams there and are not free agents like Latin America, and thus have to get permission from those teams (be "posted") to come to the US, then those teams auction the right to negotiate a contract with that player and thus every MLB team knows which players want to come here and which ones don't? How many players from Asia has each team signed over the last few years? Is it because it doesn't pay to scout players of whom so few want to come to the US each year? Is it because they really abuse pitchers arms there, causing them to burn out quickly? I'm pretty sure they have TV coverage of games there, thus making it easy to watch film of a player, something they can't do in Latin America. There's also a lot more players in Latin America that want to come to the US (like almost all of them), versus only a couple each year that come from Asia. If the Brewers won the right to negotiate with Aoki - a very good player - without scouting him, it tells me two things about the rest of the teams in the league - 1) few if any have any scouts in Asia (which means there's a reason for that), and 2) if they do have scouts there they aren't very good to not make a recommendation to bid on Aoki. Yes, there have been some good finds there - so far Darvish and Ryu have done very well, but they come with risk - Ryu was signed for $36M and Darvish for $56M (not sure if that includes the fees they paid their teams just for the right to negotiate with them, which was $51.7M for Darvish and $25.7M for Ryu), but Matsuzaka burned out quickly, was washed up by the age of 30, and the Red Sox paid him $20.3M over the last two years of his deal for him to pitch a total of 83 innings to the tune of a 6.94 ERA and 1.60 WHIP.

I never questioned age-related performance regression. I'm questioning age-related injury prone-ness.

Given what the Brewers got for K-Rod, and the upside that Ax has when he's "on", I think it's worth taking that gamble to see if they he can right the ship and get a decent prospect in return. Otherwise, given the limits and penalties for overspending on the draft and IFAs, there isn't much you can do with $4M to acquire young talent.

There is a "General Thoughts on the Franchise" thread. And you can't dump a ton of money into signing domestic and international players - there are limits on the bonus pools for the draft and for signing international free agents, and if you go over those limits you forfeit draft picks. You are aware of this, right? Now, back to Aoki. How about we wait until after the winter meetings are over, when all 29 teams are possible trade targets for Aoki and not just the 12 that are in the playoff hunt (or the 7 that don't have their division or a wild card spot sewn up already)?

Please post statistics that prove this. I would be really interested in the number of starting pitchers who have been put on the 15 and 60-day DLs over the last three years, what % of them were over/under 30, and how that compares to the total number of starting pitchers who are over/under 30. I'd do this, but I really don't have the time right now. The 2013 Brewers are soundly disproving this theory. Mark Rogers (27) has missed the entire season, Estrada (29) has missed 12 starts, Gallardo (27) is on the DL, Burgos (25) has been sidelined almost two months total, and Fiers (28) has been out for almost two months. Meanwhile, Lohse (34) has missed one start. Worrying about payroll for two seasons is just as short-sighted as signing 34-year-old players. And because of the bonus pool limits and penalties for the draft and international signings that money can no longer be diverted into prospect acquisition. It's not limiting the Brewers from doing anything that you are advocating. Yes, I'd agree. I'd also counter that if they were 26 they would cost $100M+ to acquire or retain, not $36M. I'd have to believe you'd agree with that too. Their average salaries are less than qualifying offers to free agents. How do you know it's not because there is very little competition for the playoffs this season, and the teams that typically would acquire payroll (Yankees, Blue Jays, White Sox, Angels, Nats, Mets, Phillies, and Giants) aren't in contention this year. How do you know that these teams aren't going to try to retool in the offseason and acquire Lohse? I get what you're saying. I'm just saying that I'm patient to wait and see and not jump to assumptions.

It's not racist if it applies to everyone. This too. The fighting is based on the assumption that they will attack you/jump you, which sounds like what happened to Tanner, and not just surround you and threaten you. It's also based on principle and not economic loss; behavior is repetitive, and these people are going to repeat their behavior until there are repercussions. If they get an eye gouged out or a knee rearranged they will think twice about doing it again. And the police can call the area hospitals looking for someone coming in with an eye gouged out or a messed up knee fitting the description of the attackers - that's one way to catch them. I have a friend who was held up at gunpoint outside of his house in LA. That's a different story.

That's a good question. It's a situation where your life isn't being threatened - they just want to rob you - and using a gun in a non-life-threatening situation can get you in trouble. And if the assailants are black (in McEvoy's case they apparently were) and you are white you could have a national media situation on your hands. But this behavior isn't going to stop until the risk for the assailants is greater than the reward. Another option is to carry mace or a tazer. If you're not carrying the answer is to fight dirty. Too often when people get in a fight they just try to punch people in the face. Wrong. Go for the eyes, throat, knees, and nuts. I have long arms so I can gouge someone in the eyes before they get their hands on me. Hit them in the throat so that they temporarily can't breathe. If you kick them in the side of the kneecap hard enough you can dislocate their kneecap, and if they grab you from behind you can give them a mule kick to the knee or shin. And if someone is trying to mug you the nuts are always fair game. If someone can't see, breathe, or stand it's really hard for them to do anything to you.