Fear The Chorizo

It makes it an easy call to face the Cubs with Hiura against all the lefties and then send him back down. Don't think it will happen but think it should. Unless Thames goes on the 60 day DL for the groin tweak, they would still need to make a corresponding roster move to add Hiura to the 40 man before bringing him up to Milwaukee....doubtful this happens, because they probably don't want to lose other depth. If Thames is forced to go on the IL, I'd expect a move like bringing Spangenberg or Saladino up before Hiura. He'll be in Milwaukee at some point this summer, but let's not get too carried away with expecting a mid May callup because they're likely to face 3 lefty starters against the Cubs.

Crazy that the Cubs have played 5 fewer games than the Brewers only ~6 weeks into the season...they're in the midst of 10 straight days with games right now before their next off day, then their rest of May and June is kind of absurd - 16 straight days with games, 1 day off, then 17 more straight days with games, 1 day off, then 17 more straight days with games. Then a 2 game set against the White Sox and it's the AS break already. I think one of those long stretches is due to a makeup game scheduled, but that's still nuts. Brewers will be getting 8 days off compared to the Cubs' 3 assuming no rainouts during this same stretch - scheduling is by no means easy and all teams have ebbs and flows where there are tougher stretches of games that put strain on a roster...but there's got to be a way to even rest days out across the league. MLB might never want to go for it because it may seem like sacrilege to not have at least a few ballgames played every day of the year from April-September - but I wonder if building in a set amount of leaguewide offdays into the schedule would make sense. I'd think it'd be easier to schedule makeup games that way, and it should help even out the schedule overall.

That's totally fine by me, but if what he wants isn't available and he's unwilling to settle for a lesser offer to continue making millions of dollars I hope he's ok with sitting out, too. The one thing I don't want to see are quotes from him 2-3 years down the road about how he got screwed and lost a year of pitching in his prime because nobody wanted to give a 31 year old a 5 yr, $100M contract (or whatever his perceived value of himself currently is). Part of that article and his quote leave me with the sense that he's going to have sour grapes.

It's extremely far-fetched if it's for a half season rental...of anyone

Interesting article on ESPN today regarding Keuchel - sounds like he feels like he knows what he should be worth and isn't budging on the number in his mind. Apparently he has turned down multiple offers presented to him by Boras because: "I told him no on numerous deals because it's about principle," Keuchel said. "It's about fair market value. And I wasn't getting that." "That's not me being greedy. That's just my compensation in the market from what the analytical data is telling me. I didn't come up with this. The front offices came up with this. So now they're trying to tell me I'm less than what the analytical data is saying. How is that possible?" "My asking price and my due diligence is not just out of left field. It has come to me through my own career path, my own career numbers, and then what my market is valued at this point in time," he told the website. "To this point it hasn't been matched. It's been less than what it should be. And this is out of principle, what's going on right now. I can't speak for other players. It's a principle for me. I'm not asking for the world." He might not be asking for the world, but he's apparently asking for more than what the market values him at - not sure how sitting out a season really changes that. not that draft pick compensation is truly a big deal when actually signing quality UFA, but at this point teams would be silly not to wait until after the draft so they don't lose a pick by signing Keuchel. There may be analytics that put a generally agreed-upon value to what Keuchel should get in free agency - but if there ain't team willing to pay it in a certain offseason, then that really isn't what the market will bear. Taking a stand for principle is great and all, but it's easy to forget that the year after he won the Cy Young in 2015, Keuchel turned down a $90M contract extension offered by the Astros. He instead opted to go the arbitration route those last 3 seasons with the Stros, earning roughly $30M.

No - when Hiura comes up he's playing 2B and the corresponding roster moves would either be DFA-ing one of the marginal players currently on the 40 man roster that you could hopefully get through waivers (Freitas, Hart, Wilkerson level guys), or working out some sort of trade to make room. He's not nearly a good enough defender to consider him playing SS (or primary infielder considering how the Brewers utilize defensive shifting). The corresponding MLB 25 man roster move should then be figuring out the best option to both improve your offense and maintain roster flexibility (i.e., don't risk losing someone on the MLB roster for nothing in return by having to send him to the minors). With Shaw still struggling mightily at the plate and with still having minor league options, the current best approach would be to option Shaw to AAA for awhile, move Moose over to 3rd, and insert Hiura as the everyday 2B. Shaw could snap out of his funk and Hiura may slump to make this discussion moot and push his initial callup later into 2019 - but right now this move makes too much sense not to think seriously about it.

Yeah, no - Gamel I believe was once a top 50-ranked prospect but never did reach the top 20 (at least in any preseason - BA had him #34 and BP #58 before 2009). He had a great 2007-2008 across A+ and AA, and then suffered some awful luck with the knee injuries at the absolute worst time in his MLB career. 1B was his for the taking after Prince left, and he only got into mid May 2012 before the knee. And I'm probably older than you - plenty old enough to realize how silly the Logan Shafer love was and how even sillier it is to use him as an example to pump the brakes on Hiura's MLB potential. I'm further from being a "prospect hugger" than most here, too - except for the ones that I feel can become special MLB talents - IMO Keston is one that would be incredibly foolish to let go. If we truly are in a win now mode, the move is to call him up in a few weeks. I guess you're right in the fact that Hiura probably won't surpass Trout as potentially the greatest baseball player ever...I'll give you that.

Meanwhile at Wrigley, the vaunted Cubs pen managed to give up 3 runs against the Marlins to give up the lead - if you can find a replay of the last play to end the top 9th, it's pretty fantastic. Grounder to the pitcher with runners on 2nd and 3rd, 1 out, guy on third is caught dead to rights 2/3 of the way down the line towards the plate...Cubs pitcher looks at him for a full second to get started with a rundown, then inexplicably turns to throw to 1st to get the 2nd out and the guy walks home to score another run.

Fake news...it was this morning

wow Grandal...guessing Sipp missed his location a bit there

Ben Gamel - yeah buddy

Nooooo way can you write lol.... Hiura has no MLB at bats. How can you compare until that happens. If you want to compare minor league stats, those are comparable and half way similar. Tools related to athleticism (speed, arm strength, raw power, fielding ability for their respective position), Brinson is hands-down superior to Hiura. Physical traits were the reason Brinson was a 1st round draft pick. The hit tool, which is an offensive ability that can offset and even supercede physical tools because it is what determines how good of a MLB hitter a guy can become, is where Hiura is world's better than Brinson will ever hope to have. Looking at minor league stats doesn't come close to properly comparing the two (particularly when most of Brinson's gaudy AAA numbers were generated playing in CO Springs). If Brinson gets himself on track at the MLB level (and I truly hope he does), his ceiling is probably Devon White in terms of an overall player - which would be great. However, Hiura's hit tool gives him a ceiling of a MVP-caliber offensive 2B - a righthanded hitting version of Robinson Cano without as much pop. You know the old saying "You can't steal first"? Brinson sure knows it now...

We need the best hitting prospect since Braun more than another quality pitcher. Our pitching is emerging as a strength of this team, when Anderson back and jimmy back, look out. The best hitting prospect since Ryan Braun was probably Mat Gamel. Baseball Prospectus had him as one of the top 40 busts since they've been ranking prospects a few years ago and that alone shows you prospects are no sure thing. Mat Gamel flamed out after he tore his knee up - twice - he never got a chance at extended MLB playing time to make that final adjustment before he got hurt. That's not a prospect busting out of MLB because he wasn't good enough. And Gamel was never considered half the hitter Braun was as a prospect. Gamel put up good minor league numbers after taking awhile to develop as a HS draftee picked in the 4th round. However, generational hitting talents don't ever last until the 4th round. Saying Gamel was the best offensive prospect through their system since Braun came up doesn't make them comparable - it just means the Brewers have been bad at drafting/developing offense. Hiura is compared to Braun as a hitter because both were largely considered having the best hit tool in their respective drafts - and Hiura has done nothing but reinforce that projection since. I remember some of your earlier posts poo-pooing Hiura due to a below exceptional two month stretch in AA last season immediately following a thumb/wrist injury, so I know where your head's at.

All that being said, if Hiura continues putting up offensive #'s in San Antonio at a Christian Yelich-like pace, it would be incredibly difficult to keep that righthanded bat off the MLB roster. I don't see his defensive limitations as a 2B only being an issue at all - the Brewers are currently playing a third baseman at that position. And I don't buy into that mental stuff - Shaw moved to a 2B platoon role once Moose was acquired last trade deadline...he was returned back to his role as close to the everyday 3B over the offseason despite resigning Moose, and unfortunately to this point in 2019 Shaw has been awful. He'd be the first to say the same thing, and probably doesn't need to learn that if he doesn't start hitting he might see a demotion - he already knows that. I still think Shaw fits the roster for the next few years, particularly if Moose isn't back in 2020 and/or Thames is gone. If Hiura isn't up until September it's because he cools off and doesn't deserve to be called up 1-2 months from now or he misses time due to injury - his bat isn't something contending teams hold back in the minors while waiting on a guy's BABIP to climb up so he gets back to being a 0.800 OPS player. Another option to consider when clearing 40 man roster space for Hiura is making a trade - one way or the other when Brewers' brass thinks he's ready, they'll make plenty of room.

Yep, this. Shaw has always been a streaky hitter. That's just who he is. It just so happens that this extended cold streak to begin the year coincides with two of the team's top prospects, Hiura and Erceg, hitting very well at AAA. At 29 years old, Shaw is squarely in his athletic prime. There is no reason that he won't eventually come out of this. And a hot-hitting Shaw has proven that he can carry this team for stretches. Yes, but even when he's been in a groove Shaw hasn't hit lefthanded pitching well - particularly for power. With how the roster is currently constructed, being forced to sit Shaw against a lefty starter (unless you want to watch him make 4 outs) sends Moose over to 3rd and then inserts Perez at 2nd - not terrible, but definitely not ideal. If Shaw doesn't start hitting against righty pitching, he's a waste of roster space with how the current roster is built (no room for him at 1st with Thames/Jesus, not a great pH option off the bench when he's scuffling). I think they've got to seriously consider optioning Shaw to get himself sorted out and roll with Moose everyday at 3rd and Hiura at 2nd once the Super 2 cutoff has presumably passed.

I believe he may actually have 2 options left...If he's got that many left and we get into June without him hitting, he's got to be ticketed for AAA unless injuries settle out the middling 1B/3B/2b logjam. If Shaw is performing the poorest and he has minor league options remaining, the writing needs to be on the wall if Hiura is still raking. Last year at this time the 1B roster logjam sorted itself out after Thames' injury, Aguilar started mashing, and the Braun 1B experiment basically ended after he needed an extended run in LF during a Yelich DL stint. Once Yelich was back I'm pretty sure he made the move into RF and things rolled from there.

Hiura is just destroying AAA pitching right now - if that continues over the next 4-5 weeks it will be very difficult to justify keeping him down there if Shaw doesn't start hitting. Milwaukee is 2nd in the majors to tampa in terms of OPS from the second base position, but that's basically because they have a 3B playing there (Moose). Conversely, they are dead last in the majors in terms of 3B OPS despite getting 8 games-worth of offense from Moose playing that position - Shaw has been terrible. It looks like the Brewers can get decent 1B production from what they have on their roster provided Aguilar keeps rounding into form and Thames gets enough ABs. They'd obviously need to make room on their 40 man for Hiura, but there's plenty of fodder on it currently that could easily be shuffled out to make room for his RH bat in Milwaukee.

It's really not, though. No Miley, just added Gio. The three young guys may have been on the staff, but the are in completely new roles. After that, I see new guys Hart, Claudio, Jackson. They tried Petricka and Wilson, didn't work. Add in Wilkerson and Houser, and it doesn't feel like the same staff at all to me. Jeffress doing what he did to rightfully earn an AS team appearance during 2018's first half after Knebel hurt his hamstring was huge for their bullpen - it allowed Hader to be that 1+ IP relief ace and drastically shorten the games the Brewers were ahead or tied, giving them a crazy high win % when they were ahead after ~5IP. We often forget that despite the HR totals, Chase Anderson was solid for most of last year in a starting role. Guerra was also huge for their rotation during most of 2018. Even Suter was respectable most starts until he got injured. Starting this season, Jeffress was still in extended spring training and still isn't close to the pitcher he was most of 2018, Guerra and Anderson were kicked to the pen to make room for Burnes/Peralta in the opening day rotation, and Hader is the quasi-closer who is no longer an option until most games' 8th innings due to how thin the rest of the pen appears to be. Many of the names are the same, but their roles are vastly different - this all works out much better had Peralta and Burnes not fallen on their faces as starters so far this year. The decision to roll with them in the rotation and move veteran options into bullpen roles appears to have been a mistake purely from a 'win now' mentality, at least to start this season. Granted, it may still reap longterm benefits if the young arms figure things out and improve, but only time will tell...and if Burnes/Peralta continue getting lit up, their leashes just aren't going to be very long anymore.

pitch selection is a moot point with Peralta and Burnes - they don't have effective secondary offerings and when their primary pitches (peralta - 4 and 2 seam fastball, Burnes - fastball and slider) can't be located, they're going to get crushed. That's exactly what has happened to them to date. Woodruff will have the occasional blowup inning, but overall you're going to expect that from a young starter. Hopefully Chacin is turning the corner much the same way he did after last April's dreadful start. Davies has been great. Hopefully Gio gives them some consistency, also. Peralta and Burnes have been incredibly disappointing and are the reasons the staff looks horrific - aside from the Knebel and Wahl injuries in late Spring Training.

So how many innings is Perez going to get on the mound later today?

Problem is if he's not a starter, he's not a MLB pitcher. Overall, their pitching is just a hot mess right now.

I'm not as extreme as TBBC, but it could be used as an actual strategy though--taking advantage of a market inefficiency by specifically acquiring pitchers who are good to very good 2 times through an order but horrible during the 3rd time through the order. Currently, most of those types of guys end up as AAAA type starters or long relievers/mop-up guys in the bullpen--but if you purposely acquired or groomed 4-6 of them for that type of role then they could very effectively and very cheaply cover the innings normally pitched by 2 (or maybe 2.5) spots in a 5 man rotation. Playing the match-ups might mean flip-flopping certain guys who begin the game, effectively eliminating the traditional start (rest 4 days), start (rest 4 days) routine for those type of guys. In a way they have been doing this - however they've been able to do so without having to carry all these guys on the 25 man gameday roster up to this point by either optioning them or due to IL/Rehab stints in the case of Nelson and Peralta. While using minor league options can be done to a point, it will be interesting to see what arms get sent down to the minors when Nelson and eventually Burnes return - I doubt they would exchange places with guys currently established in the rotation, which means guys that are stretched out to make starts will be replacing the bottom end of their bullpen. Once that happens, I'd look for a pair of starters like Gio/Nelson, Nelson/Anderson, Peralta/Burnes, or something similar to handle most of the outs in a game.

So I guess now he's back in the camp of a top prospect again? It's now past the point of Brinson just needing time in MLB to adjust - he's proving to be a MLB disappointment that is taking up a majority of his pre-arbitration years of cheap team control by being really bad at the game's highest level. This trade will live on forever and be used as fodder in response to negative reactions to trades from prospect huggers.

like me some Junior Guerra when his split is on and he's painting corners with his fastball

Because part of the benefit I see with my approach is it would largely give the rest of the key bullpen guys a built in day of rest each time through the rotation - where I think this idea has merit is if you have a bunch of starters who are so-so, you can try to give 2 of them every opportunity to combine logging a full 9 innings without needing more relievers to make appearances. IMO, that gives the regular bullpen more time to rest/stay fresh and be more effective during the other 4 games across the rotation. Again, I'm not trying to be specific with just Peralta teaming up with Chacin, I was trying to best answer the questions/scenarios you asked earlier - Maybe the solution is to team one of the young righties with Gio to have a righty/lefty situation. Maybe that's how Nelson gets reacclimated to the MLB rotation. I do think Peralta would be a good candidate for this considering he tends to rack up high pitch counts routinely...so just giving him a start basically guarantees the bullpen is going to need to pick up alot of outs later in that game anyway. Right now the problem is that the same can be said for just about all 5 starters, even with things stabilizing a bit. IMO, the pen isn't nearly strong enough at this point in the season to continue relying on them so heavily. To me the best argument for piggybacking is when you have a roster full of starters you can lean on to get more outs - and a limited supply of quality pen options you don't want to run into the ground before the AS break. Going to a 6 man rotation basically handcuffs the bullpen by not having an extra long man out there, while just sticking with a traditional 5 man rotation would provide an extra long man temporarily - but if there's an injury or sustained poor performance 3-4 weeks from now, your MLB long men in the pen wouldn't be able to just pick up a few starts and give you those same 5+ IP. The DH item I mentioned has to do with removing any late game substitution scenarios where a pitcher needs to get pulled for a pinch hitter - one of your scenarios talked about what happens when a pitcher's spot comes up in the batting order. A DH eliminates that strategy ?, which is exactly why Tampa Bay is effectively taking this approach. I'd argue more often than not if the combination of # times through the order and a pitcher's spot due up in the lineup are both factored in, the # of times a piggy backed starter would have to get pulled due to a late inning pinch hit situation would be pretty small.