Fear The Chorizo

ah...forgot about that...thanks!

Dallas isn't winning the NFC east (still have lions, dolphins, bills, eagles twice, seahawks, LAR, and Chargers on their schedule), and I think the two wild cards in the NFC are very likely to be Seattle and the 2nd place NFC South or North team. I think they could squeak in the playoffs but I don't think they're very good, to be honest. Pittsburgh does suck but that division is always weird...assuming Cincy finally gets things together I don't think the Steelers have enough offense to be a legitimate playoff team. 49ers have an extended stretch of consistently tough opponents/environments over the next two months...If they are a total juggernaut they could actually do the Packers alot of favors in terms of keeping teams like the Vikings, Seahawks, and LAR down in the wildcard standings.

My point is, it's early - and they've played great against 5 teams so far this season that have a better chance at all missing the playoffs entirely than two of them making the postseason.

Still a looooong ways to go until winning time in the playoffs, and weaknesses show up in a big hurry with a few key injuries. Yes, the 49ers appear to be the best team in the NFC right now - but Philly and perhaps even Detroit probably could make solid cases to the otherwise. If the 49ers stay healthy on defense, Kittle stays healthy, and McCaffrey doesn't suffer his annual injury that causes him to be a shell of his healthy self for a few months, then I'd expect them to be the favorite to reach the Super Bowl. It's also tough to make out what the Cowboys actually are (3-1 with wins against both putrid NY teams and the lowly pats, with a loss to the Cards), and besides them the 49ers haven't exactly played anyone worth a darn yet this season.

Burnes won the Cy young in 2021, and has not been in the conversation for that award in either of the past two seasons because he hasn't been consistently dominant since. I think the Brewers will get a haul for him from somebody for 1 year of control for a really good starting pitcher...but Cy Burnes he is not anymore.

I don't think the Gophers are any good...but it's a blessing that Bucky doesn't have Michigan on their schedule until a potential big ten title game matchup. That team is crazy loaded, to the point they seem to sleepwalk through the game and still have backups playing in the 4th quarter each week.

Yes, he sucks at it...seems like it takes a full two seconds for the ball to get to the qb

Would be nice if the Badgers found a way to get receivers in their program that could catch the football...and a quarterback that had any sort of accuracy, too.

Regarding Polanco, isn't he a FA this offseason? NM...club options I see, but yeah those options may be pricey enough for the Twins to either try dealing him or just decline his option.

I really don't want this offseason to be focused on anything besides sorting out their longterm rotation options and accumulating potential impact talent with trades of Burnes, Adames, and even Devin Williams. Use 2024 as a legit retooling/rebuild season and open up as many MLB opportunities for their young players to sort things out in the OF and at corner IF positions. If Black can even be a hack defensively at 3rd, he should be their Opening Day 3B. If Black fails there defensively and winds up as a DH candidate, there are other 3B prospects recently drafted who may be fast risers through the system, too. Wilken should be viewed as a legit 1B option with his power, probably not ready right away next season but who knows? If none of the young OFs are dealt as part of any trades, Wiemer should start 2024 in AAA with Mitchell and Frelick the other OF starters opposite Yelich - then if Chourio hits the ground running in AAA he's up and Yelich becomes your fulltime DH for the rest of his contract. I think a healthy Mitchell over the course of a full MLB season will give you 25HR. Once (if) Wiemer figures things out at the plate he's your 4th OF with pop and premium OF defense. Plug Turang in at SS and let him mature at that spot on the cheap for a few seasons until sorting out if one of the other Brewers' SS working through the minors pushes him out of the organization or if that's a position to target via trade when the team is once again ready to contend. Yes, the Brewers need more pop in their lineup - but they've got to give homegrown youngsters MLB time to develop and see if they can find that with who they've already got in house. For a bridge, I like the idea of trying to keep Santana around, assuming (and hoping) guys like Canha and Tellez are gone. Also, find a 2B with at least a little pop in free agency/trade (Jorge Polanco from the Twins on a 2-3 yr deal sounds pretty good and likely pretty affordable). Specific to Devin W., they could get a haul for him with a trade this offseason but the Brewers may want to go into 2024 with him as their established closer - and if they aren't anywhere near contention they'd be able to get a haul for him at the July deadline, too.

Slow down a bit - Detroit figuring it out at this point means they're not a perennial NFL doormat. It's borderline impossible for NFL organizations to NOT be good for a 2-3 year window every so often based on the draft and scheduling systems put into place - but without a franchise-altering quarterback there's only so far you're going to go in terms of winning titles and maintaining consistent on-field success. Jared Goff is not that guy longterm for them, so they still have the most important position to figure out if they want to be serious about being among the NFL's perennial elites. The Bears are just a few seasons removed from being the perceived "best team in the NFC North, with the brightest future", and then their organization made a bunch of horrific personnel decisions and wound up right back down at the bottom of the heap in rapid fashion.

DH = Designated hitter - one who doesn't need to play the field and still gets to hit. This team could have used a Chris Carteresque guy capable of hitting 35+HR in a season hitting right handed everyday in the lineup to be their DH. I'm not saying Hiura is the second coming of Edgar or JD Martinez....but the Brewers' insistence on a MLB roster full of guys who can play defense at multiple positions without a position on their roster dedicated to an everyday DH weakens their offense as a whole, and leads to guys like Yelich and Contreras never actually getting days off and likely wearing down because they wind up DH-ing when they need a rest.

That might be what the Brewers were hoping to do...but Hiura may not have wanted any part whatsoever in that plan

Good for Keston - wishing him luck somewhere else on a "prove it" deal that winds up leading to many more threads venting about how the Brewers royally screwed up an opportunity to have a longterm DH option for their organization. I've mentioned it previously, but it wouldn't surprise me in the least to see him wind up in Japan or Korea the next few years before a MLB 2nd act ala Thames.

If you believe the reason the Brewers can't win a WS is because Attanasio is the majority owner of the organization, then we'll just have to agree to disagree and move on

kidding yourself works both ways on many things...and you don't have to go back 40 years in time. The Brewers also had the #1 system in ~2014 timeframe, which largely led to the latest run of relatively routine trips to the playoffs after a few shrewd trades and some young arms developing.

Naw, if your name has "MLB Team Owner" next to it, all of the revenue generated by tickets, parking, merch, advertising just gets dumped straight into your checking account, then you get to decide how much to pay your 40 man roster after you get done buying islands and yachts for your extended family once you see what's left of all that infinite profit.

Correa and Adames are basically the same player, and one has a chronic foot problem who made over $30M this season to hit less than 20 hr and miss 30 games with injuries with 5 more seasons coming at that amount. Despite Adames' poor season, I'd take him 100 times out of 100 over Correa at this point in their careers. Tbh I'd rather have neither

And if they didn't, posters wouldn't be able to gripe about the owner being cheap by not shelling out $400m to keep Burnes around until he's 40 yrs old.

The twins won 87 regular season games in a division that had two teams lose over 100 and nobody else finish anywhere close to 0.500. That's actually really difficult to do, and it wasn't until their divisional opponents fell on their faces that the Twins were on a firm path to over 0.500 themselves. They won two low scoring games at home in October day baseball windy weather in minnesota that limited offense. I wouldn't exactly call any of that due to some mystical attitude. It sucks the Brewers lost, and I'm frustrated with how this organization seemingly puts all its offseason eggs in the basket of run prevention/positional versatility on defense - potentially in the mold of their manager for all I know. I hope it's time they incorporate more of a focus on offensive versatility while keeping a few positions dedicated to premium defenders. There has to be a better way to build a well-rounded roster to win postseason games more consistently than just throwing money at guys and saying, "well we tried" ...there are plenty of teams that spend like idiots and they're all home on couches right now, too.

I guess I missed where the twins just won the world series... its greatthey beat an uneven blue jays team that found their way to the 3rd wildcard in a league that was full of godawful teams this season. Didnt the twins just get done losing like 50 straight playoff games yesterday that were scattered between more than a decade of seasons because they've been pretty awful? Buxton and Lewis were #1 overall draft picks they landed because they sucked at the MLB level bad enough to earn them. Correa is a career ending injury just waiting to happen well before his contract runs out, too.

Yeah, it kind of feels like a whole lot of activity come winter meeting should be occurring this offseason if they go feebly into the night after that disastrous top of the 6th.

Somebody should tell the Brewers they shouldn't try to emulate the Rays' organization all the time...particularly in october

I've long been a proponent of a healthy mix of the two and not being so dead set at building a roster based on positional versatility as such a high priority. The Brewers have proven they can win enough regular season games with their current approach, but they've also proven that if you don't have enough offensive talent you can't win playoff games consistently enough to go on a run.

Yep, the choke job once again falls in the lap of an offense that can't score runs consistently enough...plate a few early and then seemingly do nothing for the rest of games hoping leads hold isn't going to win you playoff games. Being among the weakest offenses in terms of power also does them no favors when they have limited guys who can leave the yard at any given point in the lineup