gregmag

I agree that playing Santana in cf would be better than parking him on the bench or dumping him in AAA because you can't find room for him. But I also agree that playing Santana in cf has a major downside, and I think we should make a very strong effort to avoid it. Santana's approach at the plate needs work. We all know this. That work is very important, because his bat (and to a much lesser extent his arm) is what could make him a star. Playing a guy out of position, setting him up to fail defensively, isn't a great way to help him focus on maximizing his offensive potential. Maybe Santana has the kind of personality where it wouldn't make any difference, but I would never bet on that. Also, cf is more physically demanding. The cf has to move on a lot more plays than the corner guys do. Santana's young and strong, but he also carries a big body, so a marginal increase in fatigue could come into play. Also, I don't care much if we lose, but having fielders who can't back up our young pitchers is probably the most damaging way for this team to lose. I'm a Davis fan. I think he's a useful player. I'm also a charter member of the move-Braun-to-1b windmill-tilting club. But I'd much rather trade Davis and bring in some guy to play cf than rely on Santana as the cf.

Great post. That is a very interesting comparison on a couple of levels. First, like you're saying, it's very useful for gauging Lucroy's value. They're almost the same age; Luc is a few months younger. They both have above-average defensive reputations, though I'd think Luc gains in that comparison even beyond playing a generically more important position because of his framing. Maybe you deduct a bit from Luc's column because he's coming off a down year when he was hurt. Overall it's close to an apples-to-apples comparison, and Luc looks like the somewhat shinier apple. It's also an interesting comparison for putting the idea of trading Luc in perspective. I've struggled with this a lot; I haven't been a strong partisan either way. But if you ask yourself whether it made sense for the Reds to trade Frazier and you answer "yes," which I do, then it becomes harder (by no means impossible, but harder) to make a case for why the Brewers shouldn't trade Lucroy.

I was thinking about this, and reillymcshane said something similar above. I think the answer is that you just have to be smart. You sign someone like this so that your staff can get a close look at him and work with him some. The fact that a downstream stupid move (overrating him and giving up assets) becomes possible doesn't make the initial move (signing him to a technically risk-free deal) a bad one. It just means you have to trust that you'll make intelligent downstream decisions.

I think it's safe to say that Stearns likes positionally versatile, high-OBP guys whom he knows from Houston and that he doesn't mind players of smaller stature.

Segura is who he is. I agree that he's very unlikely to hit. He has value, though, because he's an excellent defensive ss. Moving him to 2b would hurt his value. Moving him to 3b would kill it c Defense also tends to deteriorate with age. Given that I don't think his bat is going to blossom, I'd be aggressively open to moving him now.

I'm sorry, but this just doesn't make logical sense. You appear to be saying that (a) dumb luck is possible with veterans but not with prospects, or possibly (b) we're doomed anyway, so we might as well spend more money while we're losing. That's not beating a drum. It's more like muttering incoherently under your breath. Look, you've expressed the view that you feel too old to have patience for an extended rebuild. (I strongly suspect you'll actually outlive most of us here, but you don't have to believe me.). I get that. If you think you've only got x number of years to watch the team, you don't think they're going to contend in x years, and you'd rather see wins than losses, that's perfectly legitimate. It's a sport. We all want what we want out of it. Your preference is as valid as anyone else's. But don't try to dress up your preference as an argument. The reasons you want what you want, as far as I can understand, have no relevance for anyone else.

I strongly agree with every word you wrote, as usual -- except for the "not" that you left out of the sentence "We are going to win next year."

Assuming the December dealing is done (and if it isn't, that will just be more fun), and if I have all the info right: In 2015, the Brewers added 22 players to the organization by trade, waiver pickup, or Rule 5 who are still in the organization now. Of those 22, twenty were born in the 90s. (The four oldest members of the group all came on board today: Pina, Walsh, Lambson, and Zac(h/k) Jones.) In contrast, the Brewers in 2015 only gave up one player born in the 90s via trade or waiver who was here at the start of the year: Cy Sneed. (Two other 90s babies, Luis Sardinas and Daniel Fields, came and went in 2015.) The Brewers appear to have given up about a dozen older players via trade or waiver. That's quite an infusion of young talent. The "talent" part, of course, is qualitative, but all the acquisitions seem to have a purpose. Interestingly, the group is pretty spread out in terms of relative age and organizational level. Stearns, on his own or viewed together with Melvin, isn't just getting 21 year-olds, or just getting AAA players, or just getting guys who look to have primarily long- or short-term value. He's making the system younger, and he's obviously privileging the minors over the majors, like you do in a rebuild. But he's acquiring guys for all levels of the system, including a few players who have a chance to help save our MLB vets from utter despair next year. The team has not lost any player who appears likely to improve on what he's been, other than Cy Sneed. The vast majority of the new players have some positive performance history, and they're nearly all young enough to develop well past where they are now. For my money, this looks like a very positive first phase of a rebuild.

I was hoping for a prospect, but we needed somebody like this in the system. I wonder if we could have gotten a better second piece by eating some of Rodriguez's salary, then just signed a guy like this off waivers or as a minor league free agent. Who knows. This would seem to confirm that Rodriguez had pretty low value. Given how well he's been pitching, that seems most likely to be about his domestic violence record. If instead it just reflects a weak market for relievers, then we shouldn't rush to move more of our pen guys. But I hope one or more of them will bring some good offers.

People always make this argument about how the team has to be halfway interesting, but they never really quantify it. Assume we're about a 70-win team at this moment. Assume we can only get a replacement-level guy to replace Lind. Assume Lind would have been worth 2 WAR to us next year. (Obviously any of these assumptions may be high or low, but I'd argue they're reasonable.) Is someone really going to argue that the difference between 70 and 72 wins will make a significant difference to the fan base? With Rodriguez I'd argue the difference is even less, because closers don't add a ton of value and because we have strong in-house candidates to replace him. If you aggregate all our trade losses -- Gomez, Fiers, Parra, plus Lind and Rodriguez -- then maybe, maybe, you're looking at as much as a ten-win swing. But even if we're talking about ten wins, can anybody tell a credible story about how that significantly affects the organization's health? Especially given BrewBalls' point about the diminished payroll? I might take this concern seriously if I thought the tear-down would poison the fan base by making them bitter for years. But (a) that never happens, anywhere; fans always come back when the team gets good again; (b) people in Milwaukee don't tend to get bitter; and © Brewers fans are used to losing anyway. I think actual contention for the playoffs creates excitement and juices attendance. But if we're trolling for 80 wins when the three teams ahead of us have a great shot at 90, then I don't think anybody much cares. At that point, we're better off giving up 10 or even 15 wins as the price of building a sustainable future contender.

I was just about to say . . . we seem to have worked this deal over pretty well. MORE TRADES!

Fangraphs has these WAR numbers for Lind: 2010: -0.7 2011: 0.2 2012: -0.1 2013: 1.6 2014: 1.5 2015: 2.2 2016 (Steamer projection): 1.3 A lot of people keep tossing around the notion that Lind is "a 3-win player." That's only plausible if you make all the following assumptions: (a) 2015, and not any other recent season of Lind's career, represents his true talent level; (b) Lind will likely avoid a decline at age 32; © Lind will likely stay healthy going forward; (d) Baseball Reference WAR is more accurate than Fangraphs WAR. If I'm Seattle, and I'm trying to drive a hard but honest bargain, I tell David Stearns that I value Lind as a 1.5 to 2.0-win player at the dead end of the defensive spectrum who will require a platoon partner and late-inning defensive replacement. For the privilege of paying $8 million for that season, I'll give up something but not a whole lot. If I'm Stearns, and assuming no other team is making an irrational offer, I think: I could hold onto Lind until the deadline, but he'll be 32, has a major injury history, and is coming off his best season other than his age-25 outlier peak, so better to deal him now. Then I think: I could maybe get a mid-top 30 prospect or two out of Seattle's weak system, guys who have already gone a great distance toward showing that they won't be useful big leaguers. Luis Sardinas types. On the other hand, I could aim below the radar and take some young kids with room to grow. How this deal went down makes perfect sense to me.

Sure, we don't know how things will turn out, but one has to wonder if Stearns was trying to be too clever. ^^This^^ GMs in football have been fired over good draft picks... because they take a guy in the first or second round, because they know hes first or second round quality, and thats great, but not when you could have gotten him in the 4th or 5th round. now in the 4th and 5th round there is no more 1st and 2nd round talent to take, because you sacrificed the value of the other picks already. They call it 'smartest guy in the room' syndrome. this move really feels like that. I don't see any support for this. It assumes so much that we just don't know. It's just as likely -- more likely, if we assume people behave rationally -- that Stearns had a lot of information on a lot of players and used it to go out and get what his information told him was the best return available. Trying to be smarter than you are is indeed a bad thing. But actually being smart is a very good thing. I don't see how you guys have enough information to presume that Stearns was trying to be smarter than he is. That's a huge leap.

BA note on Herrera signing from 2014: http://www.baseballamerica.com/international/mariners-sign-dominican-pitcher-carlos-herrera/ Important not to confuse him with the Rockies' ss prospect of the same name.

Another thought about this: Stearns isn't sticking to one kind of trade target. He's all over the map. Betancourt is 20, played at A+ (and we still have a PTBNL coming). Villar is a 24 year-old big leaguer. Flores is a 23 year-old big leaguer. Now we've gotten three teenage pitchers. He's trying to solidify talent up and down the system. That seems like a smart rebuilding strategy. Obviously what matters is how everyone pans out, but I like the approach so far.

Preseason squib on Peralta from Fangraphs: "RHP Freddy Peralta (only 5’11 and right-handed isn’t a good start, but he’s up to 94 mph with a clean arm action and delivery with a chance to start)." http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/evaluating-the-prospects-seattle-mariners/ It's hard to find info on these guys. Maybe perversely, I kind of like that. Brewer Fever's comment above is spot on: "pure scouting trade." Minasian and crew are out scouring the minors for good value talent. Early returns on Houser, Barrios, and Collymore are encouraging. I'm happy to give our scouts the benefit of the doubt

Here's a Fangraphs writeup on Missaki from June 2014: http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/prospect-watch-early-appalachian-standouts/ Theme: pitchability.

I completely agree. These are three lottery tickets, which is a reasonable return for one year of a platoon 1b (albeit a really cheap, really good platoon 1b). At a glance at their pro stats, it looks like these three guys have two things in common besides youth: smaller size and outstanding K/BB ratios.

Missaki, Herrera, Peralta.

I was just about to say the same thing. Neidert seems more realistic as the headliner.

In principle, I like lottery tickets for Lind a lot more than I like someone like Peterson. But the devil is in the details . . .

I'm right there with you re: Strong and re: overthinking the moves. It's fun to try to understand this stuff. Plus I have trade anticipation fever. We have to obsess about small things until something big happens.

And yet what you said had exactly the opposite effect. You took a perfectly civil conversation off course in order to feed your personal agenda (Me: "A charge is not a conviction." You: "DON'T TALK ABOUT RACE!!!"), and now you're being condescending about your own bad judgment. Please follow your own advice: Stick to baseball.

Yeah, the player is yours as soon as you claim him, right? It's the same as the moment a trade is completed. I wouldn't be shocked if we drafted two. I'm still wondering about Stearns' timing in creating the other three spots. Let's say the roster's at 37. He pulls off a 2 for 5 trade(s), and all 5 new guys have to be on the 40-man, bringing it to 40. Couldn't he clear more spots right before the Rule 5?

What the hell else has the last half of this thread been about? How about you worry about what you have to say, rather than trying to limit content to what you approve of, and I'll worry about what I have to say? I'm sure if I fail in my effort to respect the rules of the board, the mods will let me know. I sure don't need your input.