Fear The Chorizo

The coming 40 man roster crunch isn't obvious this season, but if and when enough some of the premium prospects at lower levels force their way towards mlb by being really good at baseball (hiura, lutz, burnes, heck kirby if he ever gets healthy, etc), you run out of space extremely fast and current prospects that are thought to be safely on the 40 man are out of room and their trade value plummets if they aren't immediately contributing on the 25 man mlb roster. If anyone should know this, my guess is a guy on the inside of the Astros operations at the time like Stearns was would. This is why the Astros were willing to part with the prospects shipped in trades for gomez and giles, they thought there were equal or better optons at lower levels and even though it stung to send some of them away they were confident in their personnel department to replenish the system and buy a few more years of a flexible 40 man while strengthening their mlb roster at the same time.

what that list tells you is nothing more than Stearns has done a great job at improving the farm system over just 2 seasons, which I think everyone agrees on - there are still plenty of other prospects in the system he didn't acquire, and the 6 or so names on your list, that could be packaged to land impact MLB players. Or, if 2-3 of the prospects Stearns is responsible for in such a short time wind up netting the Brewers a Yelich-type player for the next 5 seasons, it's not the end of the world. if Stearns' moves have had this much impact on the top 20 prospect list over just 2 seasons, I'm confident that he'll continue making draft picks and trades to further improve it. The system isn't in a state where losing two of the top 5 prospects will cripple the organization - that's where things were around the time of the Greinke and Marcum trades, and the string of poor drafts immediately afterward put the Brewers in the situation that led to Stearns being hired. And I'd rather have Mejia than Brinson + Ortiz, btw. Chang isn't crap, either...

Oh, so Stearns doesn't like the prospects he acquired? That's great. Praise Stearns! Stearns has been GM for what, 2 seasons now? Most of the prospects in the system actually weren't acquired by him. Hell, he didn't trade for Brinson and Ortiz until after Lucroy nixed the trade with Cleveland for what appears to have been a better package of prospects.

Could you imagine having Santana as an OF/DH instead of Beltran making their offense even better? Could you imagine Phillips as a pinch runner/pinch hitter/defensive replacement in the playoffs? Could you imagine Hader stabilizing their crappy bullpen? Nope, because it never would've happened due to their 40 man roster crunch that prompted the Astros to start making deals from a loaded system, and they prioritized other players instead of them. I'm not saying the current Brewer system is anywhere close to what the Astros was 2-3 seasons ago, but those decisions had other forces at play aside from their brass thinking Fiers/Gomez were going to carry them for 4 years and the prospects leaving Houston wouldn't amount to anything.

Wonderful. Why don't we plan on that sustained success 3-4 years out with our own prospects? 86 wins with a ton of guys performing to levels that probably aren't sustainable and we suddenly want to push all-in and give up our prospects for Yelich, Archer, whoever the hell else and hope we can overtake the Cubs or maybe win a one game playoff? It's insane to me. If you tell me which of these prospects will amount to the caliber of Yelich, Archer, and whoever the hell else is 3 years from now, maybe you have a point. Odds are that none of them do, and you'd have a better team with comparable payroll flexibility with Yelich, Archer, and whoever the hell else 3 years from now than keeping said prospects. There will also be additional prospects 3-4 years out who won't be dealt this year that could be better than anyone leaving the organization. you don't know. What's insane to me is being fine with the assumption that there's always a rosier scenario 3-4 years out by standing pat, with the expectation that a team with a national following in Chicago that's about to strike an enormous TV deal around 2020 will somehow run out of money and start being bad at scouting to suddenly be a non-factor in the division.

We we had a rough week out of the break. From August 1 forward we went 31-24, that's without Nelson for a chunk of it. And we had a pretty tough schedule down the stretch. And not even looking at numbers, if you watched the team throughout the season it's abundantly clear that we were better in September than we were in April. It really shouldn't even be up for debate. That rough week still counts. You know my stance but I think we had a ton of guys overachieve that are unlikely to repeat what they did last year and that knocks our win total down without even factoring in Nelson's injury. I think it would be a huge mistake to go and trade a bunch of prospects to try to win this year when we still won't even be the favorites in our division, might not even be favored to finish 2nd in our division and wouldn't even be a favorite to host a one game wildcard. all the potential moves being tossed around are for MLB players that will have multiple years left on their current deals or will have multiple years left before reaching free agency. Yelich has 5 years left on his deal, pretty much what Brinson has left before he's a free agent and he hasn't come close to establishing himself at the MLB level yet. These potential moves aren't for a 1-2 year window to try and contend and if it blows up hold a firesale this July - they make sense because they both improve this year's club but also set them up for sustained success 3-4 years out.

Maybe Peralta/Guerra things won’t go wrong early but other bad things can also happen this year that we aren’t expecting. And other good things can happen...like not having Neftali Feliz closing games on opening day, having guys like Arcia and Shaw settled in as everyday players after a full MLB season under their belt, signing a very good starting pitcher for a relatively reasonable price, having Hader on the MLB pitching staff for a whole season, Braun miraculously staying reasonably healthy...ok that's probably a bit too much to ask!

Keep in mind there are still alot of prospects in the Brewer organization that found there way here prior to Stearns becoming GM. Oftentimes if a newer GM's got one of "his guys" a rung or two below a slightly more established prospect that wasn't his draft pick or acquisition, they'll be much more willing to deal them. Brinson and Ortiz are unique, because they were acquired by Stearns in the Lucroy trade - but they weren't the first option Stearns wanted. The Indians' deal that included Mejia was.

To me, this trade makes much more sense if you think back the to web-o-trades suggestion. You could still deal Santana for that starter plus sing one of the reaming FA's. There are lots of possibilities here. This seems to have all started with the Brewers making a legit offer for Darvish - that in turn drove other teams pursuing him to get into a bidding war so the team that actually signs him prices themselves out of the remaining free agent pitchers. Then, the Brewers shift to making a quality offer for Yelich with prospects - if they land him they get a great player in his prime to play CF or RF depending on how the roster takes shape over the next 4 seasons. Adding Yelich would then allow for a trade of Santana at what could be his peak value from the Brewers' perspective to an AL team that can use RH pop in either a corner OF spot or DH (which is where Santana belongs, IMO). The return for Santana should be a good young starter with a few years of team control remaining to help bolster the rotation - or a very good 2B in the same contractual mode. Finish it off with signing one of the remaining starting pitcher FAs, and you'd drastically improved the rotation even before Nelson returns, drastically improved the OF defense and exchanged a quality RH power bat despite all the strikeouts with a quality LH power bat who hits for a high average.

Yelich would be a monster in Miller Park, whether he be playing CF or RF. He's also the ideal type of hitter for the lineup. I could see sending a prospect haul for him and pushing to upgrade the rotation with one of the remaining FA pitchers after Darvish gets his contract.

If Mejia winds up with the Brewers somehow, I'd be fine with the Brewers parting with practically any of their touted prospects, perhaps more than one. His bat at the catching position, and looking like he can actually stick at C once he reaches the majors, is incredibly valuable - he'd instantly be Milwaukee's top prospect and it isn't really close. I was pumped he was heading to Milwaukee in the potential Lucroy deal that he vetoed. I think the Brewer offer to Darvish prompts his market to get rolling - if the Cubs wind up with him it stinks, but it takes away a potential suitor for all the other FA starters (Arrieta, Cobb, Lynn, et al). I could see the Brewers winding up signing one of those arms to a deal shorter than 5 years, AND swinging a series of trades involving Santana and prospects to pick up another starter (Archer/Salazar), 2B (Kipnis), and prospects.

Cooper is this years Jason rogers...in other words a journeyman 1b who only one person cares about the brewers losing at this point on this board.

Can we just hit the pause button on this thread until some credible new info hits? I've been trying to catch up on this and I swear I read on about page 17 of this thread that we are somehow taking on Bonilla's deferred money, Kevin millar, and two bullpen carts to swing a 7 way trade that ropes the Blackhawks and badgers into the equation to keep the warriors under the luxury tax....I guess I'm all for it as long as we keep Hader in the pen/er, rotation! I think it's great Stearns has a bunch of options lined up depending on how dominos start falling....however it's a dangerous game of cat and mouse because by no means are the brewers ever considered to be driving the hot stove bus across all of mlb. You can try to get too cute and wind up getting burned if the wrong thing goes sideways or some other team swoops in and over pays in fa or trade value for a key piece you need to execute a grand offseason scheme worthy of book deals and movies.

I think one rule change that could help remove the notion of refs giving games to teams has to be getting rid of p.i. calls when a deep ball is terribly underthrown. I can't stand teams getting 40 yards of field position because the qb throws a duck and the wr gets a flag for running back through a db to haplessly go back toward the ball. The db has every right to the position he's in. They already supposedly have uncatchable and tipped ball qualifiers, add the underthrown ball option to declare a no call. Or, make pi a 15 yd penalty like college.

I dunno, I've watched next to no NFL playoff football this year and really have no desire to start this weekend or the Super Bowl. I remember 5-10 years ago, it didn't matter who was playing, an NFL playoff game was must watch for me...I think the product has degraded to a point where alot of people who follow sports closely just don't care about pro football like they used to.

Collusion is the wrong word to use thus far this offseason - I'd call it teams being pragmatic with a crop of free agents that all have warts (age, limited track record, etc) one offseason before there will be alot of free agents without those warts available. Also, Mike Ilitch isn't around anymore to dole out at least one ridiculous contract this offseason, too. When agents are using contracts authorized by that guy as benchmarks for their current free agent clients, they simply don't have a tree to bark up anymore.

How about an owner who managed to walk away with nothing after selling teams from 3 different sports, including MLB? https://www.forbes.com/sites/mikeozanian/2010/11/04/tom-hicks-debt-laden-sports-empire-devastated-his-net-worth/#167debfb6c57 While the franchise values of these teams increased, the costs of operating them incurred enough debt to wipe out any profit gained by selling them. It's tough to really gauge how much owners make/lose when they sell a team, because oftentimes much of the value increase goes straight to paying off debt or gets put into other business interests managed by the former owner. And it's not like sports owners take the gate from each home game straight to the bank in order to buy their next private jet - franchise profits are almost always reinvested into the organization in effort to further increase revenues and pay down debt. When a sports league is doing well financially, you'll never see an owner sell a team - however, when team sales happen it's typically because their balance sheets or the league they operate in forces them to. I will be very interested to see what happens to some of the NFL owners who are highly leveraged into a team and not independently wealthy beyond it if there's a lost season during the next CBA in a few years - I feel like the NFL reached its peak a few years ago and is on the downside of popularity and revenues. Yes, franchises if sold would still be worth oodles more than when they were bought or even founded (Maras, Halases, etc), but I don't see huge windfalls of cash left for ownership groups to divy up after debt & tax payments would be taken off the top.

Fear the Chorizo, Why pay younger unproven players more? Stars that made an immediate splash like Ryan Braun, Kris Bryant, Mike Trout, Stephen Strasburg, etc were all compensated VERY well early in careers, receiving tens of millions by year 3. That's better than most top NFL or NBA picks can say. Heck, NFL players are limited in earnings for their first 4-5 years based on rookie contracts, and the average NFL career is half of that. Also, don't forget NFL contracts aren't guaranteed. I just don't get your argument that MLB players need to be paid more than they currently are in seasons 1-3. Kris Bryant made ~$650K in 2016 and won the NL MVP - and got to play his 3rd year of service time in 2017 at a "record" pre-arbitration deal of $1.07 million. He was also held back for at least 1 season in the minors solely because the Cubs didn't want to start his MLB service time clock. Bryant's 2018 salary of just under $11M is still way too low. Ryan Braun didn't get a $10M per season salary until his 7th big league season, 3 years after he won NL MVP. So even the immediate splash players don't get paid anywhere close to market value for their abilities. And those arbitration bumps after year 3 are nice, but they're still way below what they'd get on the open market if they hit free agency after say 4 years of service time, for example. Plus, many of the premier players in today's game will take things year by year to hit free agency, or negotiate a deal with their team to pay them well but not buy out any free agent years to avoid arbitration - they take that risk on their longterm health because the system doesn't pay them crazy money until they are free agents. And I'm not saying every pre-arbitration player is the same, much like every veteran free agent isn't the same - I simply feel like the salary arbitration process needs to start sooner during a player's service time clock, and that clock needs to be shortened from 6 years down to 4-5. Shifting the MLB salary structure towards younger players is a good thing, IMO. BTW, the average MLB career is about 5.5 years, which is obviously longer than the NFL but just so happens to be just short of an "average" career ever reaching free agency.

The NBA's system is why nearly every team has zero chance of competing in the season and free agency. I think the flaws in the NBA's system have more to do with the game itself - teams only have 12 roster spots instead of the 25 or 40 that MLB carries depending on which roster would be subject to a salary cap. Also, the NBA system has issues because they cap what contract values can be for the best players - I wouldn't want that for an MLB system. I wouldn't want franchise tags or any of the NBA garbage that artificially inflates or suppresses FA salaries. Set up a salary cap that doesn't necessarily need to be a hard cap, but one that imposes luxury tax penalties for repeatedly exceeding it - then allow free market principles to drive player salaries and FA contracts, provided MLB truly has full revenue sharing to even the financial playing field for roster payroll. There's got to be a better way, and paying young players earlier is definitely part of it.

Until baseball actually evens the playing field for what organizations can pay for on-field talent with both a salary cap and floor, there will always be the haves and have nots. To me, the solution includes: 1. more revenue sharing leaguewide, particularly revenues that are driven largely by market size (i.e., TV deals). 2. reducing the # of years of team control organizations have with rookie deals so players get paid for prime year production instead of waiting to reach free agency on the downside of their careers. 3. establishing an NBA-style salary cap tied to luxury tax penalties and a hard salary floor based on leaguewide revenues. Even a rebuilding team wouldn't have an issue meeting a salary floor if revenue sharing was increased and players reached arbitration/free agency a few seasons earlier in their careers than the current system allows.

Just a reminder that we are 27ish days from pitchers and catchers reporting. crazy to think that only half of the top 50 free agents have signed so far this offseason, many to 1 and 2 year deals - I feel like typical free agent periods lead off with the most highly regarded players signing the mega-deals followed by a game of chicken for the mid-level vets. This year has proven to be exactly the opposite, and all the big market teams pushing to stay under the luxury tax threshold to gear up for next offseason to spend like crazy seems to be suppressing the potential suitors for players looking for long term, high dollar value deals. I'm sure most of the remaining free agents will get market value contracts, but I think it'd actually be great for the game to see the tactics Boras uses to fall flat. Even if MLB teams are raking in cash, this version of the CBA and free agency/luxury tax system at least seems to have some teeth that's driving big market clubs to rein in mega-contract spending, if only for one offseason. There's still stupid money being thrown at certain players, but you'll get that no matter what.

Shoulders are always tricky to predict - the fact he injured it doing something other than throwing has always caused me to be slightly optimistic of him returning on the earlier side of rehab projections. won't know for sure until Spring Training how well he's progressing, and am in the group of hoping he doesn't push it too fast and suffer a setback that could've otherwise been avoided by taking a more cautious approach.

Sure, there's tons going on during a game for a head coach to be aware of - but clock and timeout management seems like a constant disaster that ends up costing teams games or at least makes things more difficult than necessary. I can't stand MM's constant use of timeouts near the end of the 1st half when on defense to try and get the ball back - particularly when their defense is far from a dominant unit. Seems like assuming they can get off the field on a 3rd down to give their offense an extra minute to score again before halftime backfires on them far too often. With all the position coaches and quality control jobs for teams on the sideline and booth, why don't teams put someone solely in charge of clock management that can communicate through the HC's headset as to when a timeout should be called? Even someone that could get in McCarthy's ear before a series to remind him that, for example, "your defense hasn't stopped them all half, don't call timeout to stop the clock if they don't get a 1st down after their 1st play and let's just go to half with the score as-is."

And just based on some of the things I seen on this forum, seems like Packer fans think Rodger's injury is the only thing that prevented them from winning the Super Bowl. I'm sorry, did you see any of the defense play this year? A full season of a healthy Rodgers probably gets them in the playoffs and maybe even out of the Wild Card round but I see no way that defense (if you want to even call it that) does anything to stop Atlanta, New Orleans, Philly, or Minnesota. Rodgers' injury is the only thing that prevented them from winning their division and having an advantage against any other team in the NFC playoffs, simply because he's the best player in football. GB is a better team with Rodgers than the Vikings, who are a quality team IMO, and there's nothing in this season's results that would change my opinion of that. They went to the NFC title game last year solely because he was playing well, and his 2017 season was off to a great start. Rodgers is that transcendant a player when he's playing well - GB started 4-6 last season because he wasn't playing well and the rest of the roster was exposed at that time, too. Suddenly he got on a roll and they win 8 straight games despite having an arguably worse roster than their 2017 team. The playoffs have mostly been exciting, hard fought games that came down to the wire decided by some fluky plays and terrible fundamental football - in large part because there aren't any teams head & shoulders above their competition in the conference. Yes, GB's defense is bad - but they wouldn't need them to dominate like the Vikings or Philly now do in order to win playoff games had Rodgers been dropping 30+ a game on opponents.

Watching this year's playoffs makes it even more obvious that rodgers' broken collarbone cost the pack another super bowl berth. Yes the packers have obvious flaws, but they would've easily been good enough with Rodgers to beat these teams. Also, can anyone think of an easier road to a title than beating the titans and jaguars at home followed by facing nick foles or case keenum in the super bowl? As for the terrible play by the saints db, the only thing I can think of is that he was trying to make a play where the tackle would've been in bounds, allowing the clock to run out. Where Diggs caught that ball would've been in fg range, so had he caught it and gotten out of bounds the vikes would've had a shot. Whatever defense was called was the wrong one for that game situation, too. It looked like he intentionally avoided hitting Diggs as he made the catch, too - just horrible coverage and an even worse tackle attempt.