gregmag

Oh come on. Please. As usual, your analysis here is very smart, IMHO. But do you have to aggrandize yourself and broadly insult everybody else in this way?

Certainly they should be open to listening to offers for guys like Greinke, Marcum, Wolf, Weeks and Hart. All those guys have from some to a lot of value. I'm not sure a complete selloff is necessary but they aren't going anywhere with no Fielder and missing Braun for a third of the season. Sure they are, because the modest upgrades over the world-historically bad left side of the 2011 infield more than offset the losses of Fielder and Braun: http://espn.go.com/blog/s...ts-brewers-in-good-shape Now of course, there are any number of reasons to think the Brewers won't win 96 games again. For that to happen, a lot of good things came together. You can't reasonably expect Braun, Wolf, and Axford to play as well as they did last year. You can't expect the rotation to be as healthy as it was, or the bullpen to come together as perfectly as it did in the second half. In particular, we need to figure out the 7th inning for next year. OTOH, nobody but Braun and Axford really had a career year. I think Wolf was pitching over his head, but any of the other starting pitchers could as easily be better than last year as worse. Weeks, Hart, Lucroy, and Gomez were very ordinary last year by their own standards. Nyjer . . . who knows? Getting more productive backups than Kotsay and Counsell also shouldn't be a huge challenge. So I'm not saying it will all come together again. But as far as the roster is concerned, I don't see any logical support for the argument that the team right now is worse than last year. To act like we've sunk out of contention range would be a huge mistake.

I wasn't big on going after Ramirez -- I think believing you'll be better off with him taking PT away from Green / Gamel is old school, conservative baseball thinking. That said, it's not an albatross deal at the numbers that are being reported. When you look at what some sluggers are getting on the market, paying $12 million, for three years, for a guy who at least technically plays 3b is a very decent deal. The contract isn't so onerous that you can't move him later if your window closes; maybe nobody else needs a slugging 3b now, especially one who's sliding toward 1b, but someone will want him later. Now you have solid infield coverage in Gamel / Weeks / Gonzales / Ramirez / Green; add a glove-first backup -- Craig Counsell three years ago -- and you're set. I just hope to whatever powers there be that this portends a McGehee nontender or trade. McGehee is like a slightly younger, substantially worse version of Ramirez, even if he bounces back. Having both of them doesn't do you any good. If they're seriously thinking of starting McGehee at 1b instead of Gamel, I'll be very unhappy. McGehee at his best doesn't hit like a starting 1b; Gamel at least has a chance of hitting like one, and he won't cost $2 - $3 million.

I'm really getting tired of the "I'm more impartial than you" refrain that keeps creeping into various posts. You don't have any special claim to impartiality. You have a point, a good point to a very limited extent, IMHO. I agree with you that the objective harm from this could be worse for the sport than for Ryan Braun. More to the point, MLB -- the integrity of the game -- is a lot more important than Ryan Braun, so we have good reason to care more about the interest of MLB. But you haven't made anything approaching a persuasive case that the leak came from Braun's camp. You've just tossed off some assertions that toe the line you've been arguing this whole thread. From what I can see, it would have been extraordinary for anybody in any camp to leak this for well-considered strategic reasons. As somebody suggested above, the likeliest explanation is that somebody with knowledge just mouthed off for petty personal reasons, or for no reason at all. Once that pinprick of a leak happens, responsible people from any camp may feel a responsibility to corroborate or correct the initial report. I'm not by any means dismissing the possibility that the leak was strategic, or that it came from Braun's camp. Those possibilities should absolutely be part of the investigation. But to claim that anyone who doesn't buy this particular theory can't see past their fandom is way off base.

The big, unquestionable scandal here -- as of now -- is that word of this affair leaked. I hope the Commissioner's Office is planning a full-on, publicly accountable investigation into the circumstances surrounding the leak, because it's completely unacceptable. Braun's reputation is irreparably tainted, whatever the facts ultimately turn out to be. I don't blame the news organizations for reporting what they had, assuming that what they had satisfied journalistic best practices. That's their job. But if the leak came out of the Commissioner's Office, then some heads had better be getting ready to roll. As for Braun, I don't have any idea what to think; there are too many conflicting reports. We seem to have good reason to believe that he failed a test that triggers a suspension. Based on that, I think we need (for whatever value any of us places in our discussions here) to be talking about LF options. But I don't have any greater confidence than that in what I know. Also -- special thanks to pebadger for some incredibly thoughtful and informative posts.

Tom Haudricourt's account of the Bolivar pickup: "In the Triple-A phase of that draft, the Brewers selected shortstop Domnit Bolivar from St. Louis. Bolivar batted .276 with nine home runs and 50 RBI at the Class A and AA levels in 2011." http://www.jsonline.com/s...s-o73c9s2-135299393.html I don't expect more than a line about such a minor transaction, but triple crown stats? In 2011? For a non-slugger? Really? I know unemployed people with great work ethics, and I gotta say, continual exposure to Haudricourt's utter laziness really annoys me.

This is the glory of having a low bar to clear. In Yuni's case, the bar was buried several feet underground. Gonzalez figures to be pretty bad, a guy we'll happily kiss off in a year or two -- and he's almost certain to be a measurable improvement over Yuni. Marginal, but easy, happiness. Also, let's take a moment to appreciate that Doug Melvin isn't an idiot. The Brewers did, in fact, understand Yuni's shortcomings.

http://brewersbeat.mlblog...-move-fast-at-shortstop/ Doug says he wants to zero in on a ss. Candidates are Yuni, Gonzalez, and Furcal. Not ruling out any free agent; says Mark A. is on board with . . . something. I don't know whether DM is just covering himself here because he's surprised about Rodriguez or whether he really is this calm about the whole thing. Furcal sounds like a 2-year commitment. I wouldn't mind seeing the team pony up for him, within reason, but we'll need a Hairston type who can take over the position for a month if needed. In general, I'm starting to fixate on the backup infielders issue.

Try this for a silver lining: Because we're about to lose Fielder, the pressure to sign a slugger to a big-money contract this winter is tremendous. That would mean a multiyear contract for a risky and/or declining hitter. Ramirez and Rollins are the best options, and I don't love either one, plus they know the Brewers would pay a premium to try to make up for the loss of Prince. The Brewers can't do that now. They're "stuck" giving substantial opportunities to young players. This could be a disaster, or it could work out fine. But by the end of this year we'll know something about what we have in Green, Gamel, and (to a lesser extent) Gindl, as well as, hopefully, sorting out some of our young relievers. At that point, Greinke, Marcum, and Rodriguez come off the books (unless one or more gets extended during the season), and we can plan our future with a clear head. I'm not saying that financial inflexibility is good. I am saying that being stuck with one year of financial inflexibility may be preferable to locking ourselves in to three or four years of a burdensome commitment to a consolation prize for Fielder. Of course, even if I'm right about any of this, half of it flies out the window for me if we resign Yuni.

I don't think Olney's "report" means anything. This is what the Brewers have been saying for weeks. We all know that they're going to go after him hard if they think they can land him for not much more than 5/100. I don't take Olney's tweet as an indication that anything material has changed -- that some team has now decided to step up with a huge-money offer.

Great to see Santo elected. I think he's a deserving inductee, and the writers should have voted him in a long time ago. Boyer seems like a decent candidate, and I never got to see either play. Statistically, although both played 15 seasons, Santo had over 1100 more PA (9396 to 8268). He had a better OBP (.362 to .349) and, barely, SLG (.464 to .462). Those offensive numbers are close, but if we look at them in context, Santo's edge grows quite a bit (125 career OPS+ to 116). OPS+ incorporates any effect that "watered down" pitching might have had. I'm pretty sure Santo's edge comes from the fact that he played the heart of his career during the dead-offense era of the late 1960s, whereas Boyer's last season of 500 PA was 1966. I'll take the guy who put up two more seasons' worth of appreciably better production. As for being the third-best hitter in a lineup that didn't win anything . . . so what? Was he a great player or not? It isn't his fault that Banks and Williams were on his team, and it really isn't his fault that the Cubs didn't have any pitching. Any team in history that needed a championship-caliber third baseman would take Ron Santo in a second.

(1) The Molitor and Fielder situations could hardly be more different. Molitor would have happily returned for a reasonable contract and a modicum of respect; Sal Bando practically kicked him out of town. Also, signing Molitor long-term would have been self-evidently smart, while signing Fielder long-term for what he's asking, IMHO, would be a mistake. The two situations have about as much in common as World War II and my grocery run yesterday. (I'm not saying they have absolutely nothing in common. Both WWII and my grocery run involved a shortage of tomatoes.) (2) Given my passionate hatred of Albert Pujols, and my standard-issue Brewer fan's hatred of the Cubs and Cardinals, few potential deals would make me happier than if Pujols signed with the Cubs. It would hurt the Cardinals, help the Cubs at the wrong time, and relegate Pujols to a second-division team with miserable fans. Win / win / win. (3) Jimmy Rollins is 4.5 years older than Jose Reyes, and he has three of the classic elements of a player prone to being overrated -- championships, flashy but shallow offensive achievements, plays in a bandbox. Given how bad the ss position has gotten, I couldn't object to making him the Brewers' big offseason signing, especially because both Green and Gamel are better bets than any in-house or cheap solution I can imagine for ss. But with Rollins you have to watch the years. Anything more than four becomes a real problem. Ramirez is a few months older than Rollins. He was good but not great this past year, bad the year before, and hurt the year before that. If we're going to throw money at somebody, and if the price tags are similar, I'd go for Rollins.

I think you're talking more about mind than body and more about present than future. I don't question Fielder's work ethic or commitment to conditioning. The fact that he has had so much success with, among other things, a body type that appears to be unique among successful baseball players speaks very well of his approach to conditioning. You're right to stress that he hasn't missed any games, and that's a great accomplishment. But it doesn't tell us much about what he'll be able to do in the future. All bodies age, and age hits some players harder than others. Prince's body type has already prevented him from having any defensive value, and he's only going to get slower and less agile. No matter how hard he works, in three years he'll be a freakishly stocky slugger entering his 30s. Nobody before him has made that work. Of course that fact doesn't prove anything; again, Prince has made his body work for him this far, and maybe he'll make it work through 35. I'm just saying that this predictive evidence seems relevant to me, and to the extent it's relevant, the news is almost all bad.

I don't agree with this. Look at Jay and Craig on the Cardinals. Breaking guys in as backups initially can be a very smart move. Teams don't do it much now because of the six-year FA clock.

I love this. It's basically how I dealt with Yuni.

I think you're being a little hard on Morris. I agree that he doesn't belong in the HoF, but for me he's a "Hall of Very Good" guy. He finished top 5 in Cy Young voting five times, top 10 two other times. Granting that Cy voters back then paid too much attention to wins, that's pretty high, consistent praise, especially for a guy who played most of his career in Detroit. He went 254-186 for his career, and I do put some stock in career wins -- they reflect both longevity and success over a range of support contexts. OTOH, his ERAs were definitely pedestrian, but I'm becoming uncertain how much stock to put in ERA. It seems, again, more reliable over time, which makes that an important mark against him. His longevity and durability alone make him a valuable guy. I think he was a quality pitcher, just not quite HoF quality. BTW, good catch on Powell and Killebrew; I added them to my post above.

I was just looking at Frank Howard for the Fielder thread, and I started to understand just how deeply the HoF has failed to consider shifts in offensive context. By way of quick and dirty comparison: Dick Allen: 7,314 PA, 156 OPS+ Frank Howard: 7,353 PA, 142 OPS+ Boog Powell: 7,810 PA, 134 OPS+ Rocky Colavito: 7,559 PA, 132 OPS+ Orlando Cepeda: 8,695 PA, 133 OPS+ Willie McCovey: 9,686 PA, 147 OPS+ Harmon Killebrew, 9,831 PA, 143 OPS+ Jim Rice: 9,058 PA, 128 OPS+ Tony Perez: 10,861 PA, 122 OPS+ Andre Dawson: 10,769 PA, 119 OPS+ Eddie Murray: 12,817 PA, 129 OPS+ Dave Winfield: 12,358 PA, 130 OPS+ Reggie Jackson: 11,416 PA, 139 OPS+ Willie Stargell: 9,026 PA, 149 OPS+ Billy Williams: 10,519 PA, 133 OPS+ I'm not suggesting that these numbers end any arguments, but they should start a few. I've placed outstanding 1b/corner guys in four arbitrary groups: first, guys whose mid-careers were circa 1968 who aren't in the HoF; second, guys from that same era who are in the HoF; third, later-era players who are in the HoF and, IMHO, shouldn't be; fourth, later-era players who are in the HoF and, IMHO, belong there. Like I said, this is quick and dirty. Obviously Dawson, for instance, deserves credit for playing some very good CF as a young man. Clearly longevity is a good thing, and you could graph the increased longevity / decreased OPS+ trend very neatly. Also, Dick Allen was a jerk. But still, I think Howard and Allen look like stronger HoF candidates than anybody in group 3. Whether they belong in the same club with the group 4 guys -- that's the hard question. [Edited to add Powell and Killebrew per topper09er's suggestion below.]

Truth, I got Murray from Baseball Reference's lists of comparable players to Fielder. The only guys in my original post who weren't on those lists are Mo Vaughn and Cecil Fielder. In fact, BR lists Murray as the best comp for Fielder through age 27 of both men's careers. I'm guessing the method for that comparison aggregates career stats up to that point, and I assume it takes league norms into account. Of course you're right that Murray had some good years, including one great one, in his 30s. As I said in my original post, his decline started at a much higher level. If we had good reason to believe that Fielder would have Murray's career, and not a career that tracked the guys on that list as a whole, then the back end of Prince's contract demand wouldn't look bad. But that's an unbelievably rosy scenario, IMHO. Also, BRef lists Frank Thomas at 240, which is right where the other guys I talked about top out. But you made me think of Frank Howard, who is an example of an excellent hitter over 240 lbs. -- he's listed at 255. Hondo would be an encouraging comp for Fielder, because he was great through age 34 -- he actually had his best years, absolute monster years, in his early 30s (when the league favored pitching, so his stats don't look as spectacular out of context as they were). But Howard was also 6'7, and he played corner outfield in his 20s (albeit not especially well). Fielder is what you'd get if you squashed Hondo and then fed him pizza for a year. Topper09er, you're saying, if I read you right, that the Brewers would help their post-contention rebuilding process by precommitting about a fifth of their payroll to a guy who wasn't contributing much, for three or four years. That seems like a sure way to make your point about contention cycles a self-fulfilling prophecy. I agree with you that small-market teams, especially, have to ride out contention cycles and that teams, at the margin, should organize those budgets with that reality in mind. But I don't think teams should affirmatively plan for abject failure; I think financial inflexibility is death for rebuilding; and I don't think having little money to spend makes teams do a better job of developing home-grown players.

The Brewers would then have a ton of money and years going forward tied up into hoping that Braun and Prince stay both healthy and productive over the vast majority of their contracts. It also would seem to really decrease the odds of extending Greinke. I understand the appeal of keeping Prince and i won't be upset if it happens, but i just think that 6 years at that dollar amount is to risky, especially that he'd go from a defensive liability at firstbase to a massive liability that needed to be a DH. The only factor that i'm unsure about is exactly how much more money does the new cable deal with FSN bring in each year and thus will it lead to larger payrolls going forward so that Braun/Prince wouldn't be eating up roughly 40 percent of the payroll just by themselves? Fielder at 6 years $120 million is a lot less risky than 5 years of Greinke for $80 million. The failure rate for pitchers is much higher. Fielder will be 33 at the end of 6 years. The potential for serious dropoff in 6 years is pretty minimal. It's when he gets to 34-35 that you need to worry. I'm on record as saying I'd go to $132 over 6 with an option. I think that's about what he's going to get from somebody. I'd rather he get it from the Brewers than the Cubs. I never believed the $175-200 over 8 that Boras threw out there. He doesn't set the market, the teams do. Greinke is expendable. They just spent high 2 picks on college pitchers with high ceilings who shouldn't take more than 3 seasons to get to the bigs. They have at least 2 other guys (Peralta and Thornburg) who appear will be ready within 1-2 years. The ace of the staff, Gallardo is under contract through 2015. Have Braun and Fielder in the middle of the order and a young pitching staff. That's the formula I'd follow. I'm pretty confident that the Brewers understand both the value of money and the value of a front-of-the-rotation starter vs. that of a slugging corner guy. Why I'm confident is that we lost for years with Fielder and crap pitching; add a couple of premium pitchers, and suddenly we're in business. That goes for both 2008 and 2011. That sort of pattern tends to make an impression. Obviously we'd be better off with both, but it's pretty clear what's harder to replace. I understand that you have lower regard for Greinke than any other carbon-based life form does, and of course that's your prerogative. But you can't seriously think so little of him that you're willing to assume safely that a couple of prospects will produce a replacement for him. The failure rate of pitchers is a lot higher when they're young and unproven than when they're in their prime and healthy. As for Fielder's likely course of decline, let's start with the fact that he should, ideally, be a DH now; his defense saps a nontrivial portion of his offensive value. Right now, though, his bat can carry his glove. In two years he simply won't be able to play in the NL. In five or six years . . . I try to imagine it, and I can't even begin. But let's say we don't care about playing, in effect, without a first baseman; let's say we only care about his hitting. Mo Vaughn was done as an elite player at 30; he hung around until 34. Boog Powell was done at 33, and I'm not sure his production between 28 and his great age-33 swan song would pay the freight for Fielder's glove. Cecil Fielder was mediocre after he turned 30. Prince's comparables lists (from BRef, through 27 and career) are full of: (1) guys who flamed out early or dropped off significantly in their 30s -- Powell, Travis Hafner, Dick Stuart, Bob Horner, Glenn Davis, Kevin Mitchell (a few great years for the Reds in his 30s, but as a part-timer), Juan Gonzalez (last hurrah at 31), Greg Luzinski (good hitter through 32, but a DH by then), Daryl Strawberry, Kent Hrbek, Jose Canseco (had a few good years in his 30s; wonder how?); (2) present guys who are just reaching their 30s, some of whom are already showing signs of decline -- Adrian Gonzalez, Jusin Morneau, Ryan Howard, Adam LaRoche, Carlos Pena; and (3) three Hall-of-Famers -- Eddie Murray, Orlando Cepeda, and Jim Rice, all of whom showed significant decline after age 30, although they retained value because they were falling off from a higher level. Obviously that's a lot of guys with a lot of stories. But if you aggregated their age-30, 31, 32, and 33 seasons (I don't have the capacity to do the math easily), you'd get numbers that wouldn't justify keeping Fielder at first base, let alone paying him $20 million. You can bet that he'll be Eddie Murray if you want to, but one of the things that distinguishes Hall-of-Famers is that they defy the odds. In other words, it isn't a smart bet. That's not the scariest part, though. The scariest part is that every player I've mentioned except Bob Horner is listed at 6'1" or taller, and every one is listed at 240 lbs. or less. Prince is listed at 5'11" and 275 lbs. (Sure, a lot of those weight listings are fiction, but Prince's is no more or less reliable than the others.) Can you think of a player who weighed over 275 lbs. in his prime, let alone one under six feet tall, who had a long career, or any kind of career? Right, that means Prince is historically unique. But do you really want to double down on a freak of history as he ages? I believe that Prince is likely to put up numbers over the next three years that will justify a team that can pay for the rest of its needs in giving him $20 million a year. The problems are that the Brewers aren't that team; I said $20 million, not $25 million; and Prince is likely to drag his team down over the last three or four years of his deal. Why in the world would it make sense for the Brewers to pay him what he's asking?

The Bagwell steroids question is the big elephant in this room. I can't pretend to have an answer, but I don't think the two points you're suggesting are enough to hang him. The biggest reasons I'm inclined to give him the benefit of the doubt are his consistency and his routine decline. Most known chronic juicers either had freakish power spurts (Bonds, McGwire, Caminiti) or played well until exceptionally advanced ages (Bonds, Clemens). Bagwell followed a normal development curve with a fairly standard decline. He was great, but nothing he did at his peak was out of character for how he started out. He had one freak season, 1994, but that was driven by an abnormal BA, not abnormal power. I'm not saying this is conclusive, but I need to see a stronger case to conclude that he juiced. Good catch on crime dog -- I forgot about him, and I think he belongs. He tends to fall between the cracks because he moved around a lot, never had a season that stood out from the rest of his career, and slugged clean while some others were slugging dirty. But man, was he good for a long time. He was in the middle of lineups for a succession of good Toronto and Atlanta teams, and he was an on-base machine. I like him quite a bit better than Perez, Rice, or Dawson. For me, those guys epitomize the "Hall of Very Good," while McGriff is the player of that type -- big corner slugger -- who clears the bar.

I like this list. No one else really feels like fighting for from the eligibles. I would fight for Lou Whitaker and Ted Simmons, however. Had they been Yankees.....well you know how that would have turned out. I agree 100% with this, which I mention only because 100% agreement on this topic is extremely unusual. Great debate on B. Williams from both sides. I think how to weigh the postseason is very hard. I don't agree with what seems to be topper09er's view (sorry if I'm reading you wrong) that HOF voting should disregard the postseason. Every player gets the opportunities he gets. Some are luckier than others, and where the postseason is concerned, a good player who gets to the postseason isn't merely lucky. That said, I'm uncomfortable making the postseason a huge part of a player's case, and I think in Williams' case it has to be. I think he's borderline at best, and even with his postseason work, I wouldn't vote for him. This isn't just because I hate the Yankees, either (although I do, passionately); I've argued here that Posada looks to have a strong HOF case. But Williams just wasn't special enough for long enough, IMHO.

There's something I don't get, and I'm sorry if this has already been answered; but jjafnec asked about it a few days ago, and I haven't seen a response: (1) The new CBA says that a group of free agents, which appears to include Rodriguez, would net the teams that lose them an extra first-round pick, rather than shifting the pick from the team that signs the free agent to the team that loses him. But -- (2) The new CBA also says that a team can only get compensation picks if it had the free agent for the whole year. Everything I've read seems to assume, as to Rodriguez, that (1) helps us and that (2) doesn't hurt us. What's the deal? Does (1) go into effect immediately but (2) not until next offseason? If that's right, the Rodriguez trade just keeps on paying dividends. But we can't possibly be that lucky, can we?

Re: Kjeldgaard, I'm very surprised, but it makes a certain kind of sense. Normally beating the snot out of A+ at 25 isn't that big a deal, but the FSL eats home runs for lunch. Obviously the brain trust think he showed some ability last year that could translate to the MLB level. We're looking at filling 1b with a virtual rookie who has somewhat uncertain power credentials and hits from the left side. We aren't likely to pay veteran money for the weak half of a 1b platoon. Several things would need to break a certain way, but stranger things have happened than having Brock up to platoon in May or June.

Wait -- what?!? You love walks! Turncoat. I like Scooter, and I know Brevard is a black hole for statistical projection, but he OBPd .332 there. Hitting .299 is a good thing, but not so good that it takes care of your OBP all by itself. Also, the Braun comparison is way off, given that Braun augments his OBP with big-time power and speed. Gennett ISO'd .106 last year (again, FSL caveats apply; .154 the year before), and he killed his team dead on the basepaths. I like Gennett, and I love your idea of trying him at ss (assuming they haven't already ruled that out based on careful observation). But he hasn't shown either a single standout tool or across-the-board ability. He has a lot to prove next year.

Don't forget, no manager in MLB history has reached the playoffs more quickly than Dale Sveum. He deserves a full shot. Congratulations to him, and best wishes for a lauded but ultimately futile effort to overcome the Cubs' many shortcomings.