Fear The Chorizo

let me know the list of pitchers on the wrong side of 30 who underwent significant shoulder surgery and were equally as dominant in the years afterwards to justify signing Woodruff to any kind of longterm deal knowing he's likely out all of 2024 that makes this a no brainer for both sides. by the way, that list is incredibly short. For Woodruff, probably a no-brainer to be paid anything with guaranteed money in seasons 2 or 3, yes. For the Brewers, I just disagree it makes any sort of sense unless Woodruff is willing to take significantly less $ for 2024 to rehab (<$5M), what his arbitration salary would have been next year for 2025 (say $10-12M), and have a club option in the neighborhood of $15-20M for 2026.

Glasnow was 28 when he signed said 2 year extension that bought out his 1st year of free agency, and he still had two years of arbitration control when he signed it. He made roughly $5M during what would have been his last year of salary arbitration in 2023 following his missed 2022 season due to TJ rehab. Woodruff will be 31 headed into the 2024 season that he likely won't get on a MLB mound for, and that's also his last year of arbitration before reaching free agency. Based on his body of work, Woody's 2024 salary arbitration figure is likely to be more than double that of Glasnow's even with the understanding he probably won't pitch next year due to injury. The timing of when the arm injuries occurred is just different between the two pitchers. And I'd much rather give a younger pitcher a 2 year deal in this scenario who's recovering from TJ than a shoulder surgery. That being said, I'm not sure TB is too thrilled to be having to pay Glasnow $25M next season after he was only able to pitch in 21 games during 2023 due to an oblique and back spasm issues....also not great things for a 6'8" pitcher to have in addition to arm injuries. It sucks, but it's in the Brewers' best interest to just move on and use the savings of not offering Woodruff arbitration to keep Burnes around unless a team pays a king's ransom in trade value to get him this offseason.

Not when factoring in that prior to the 2023 season, unbalanced schedules led to more interdivision games that suppressed win totals for teams playing in stronger divisions. Makes sense the AL central's overall record is so brutal when they beat up on each other and then get pummeled when playing outside its division. Here's another way to look at it - once getting into the playoffs, what teams find a way to win at least one series to get to the league championship series? Division Representatives in the League Championship Series since 2018: AL West - 7 (Astros were in the ALCS all 6 seasons, 7 counting the 2017 season) NL East - 5 AL East - 5 NL West - 5 NL Central - 2 (Brewers 2018, Cards 2019) AL Central - 0 I don't think I ever said the NL Central was the worst division in baseball, but I have said it's likely one of the two weakest year in /year out with the AL Central - nothing I or you have posted in this thread would refute that.

Checks notes, yep that all shows the NL Central has the 2nd fewest division wins in this timeframe, or I guess from your perspective the 5th most.

I don't see a reasonable argument that Counsell can manage a bad team, but now when the really hard questions and higher expectations come, he'll just crumble. I guess my biggest counter to that is I really don't think the Brewers should be considered to be a bad team in terms of talent level on paper over a majority of Counsell's tenure as manager - particularly once they had Yelich in the fold and young, talented pitching across both the rotation and bullpen. To me it's more about the environment surrounding a team in NY compared to the smallest market in MLB - sure, he could excel in that spot and be fantastic, but I don't see him as being the type of personality that thrives on that type of attention.

Cleveland and Min have both been in short term retooling/rebuilds due to roster turnover over chunks of that 6 year stretch, too. If not for a late season surge by MN the AL central winner this year could have been sub- 0.500. Until this season, both the Pirates and Reds could be routinely counted on to lose about 100 times a season and be an afterthought in preseason predictions. The Cubs still spent big in 2018-2019 because it was the aftermath of the buildup to their 2013-2017 seasons where they were truly trying to win it all and all the arbitration salary bills came due before they started trading everyone away. The Cards have been the consistent biggest spender in a division they expect to be in contention for every season, so it's no surprise they have a top 10 win total in all of baseball despite an awful 2023. The top two NL Central clubs the past 6-7 years have typically been the Brewers and either the Cards or Cubs....credit goes to Milwaukee for being that consistent top two team during that stretch, but how much of that goes to CC compared to the front office really is debatable in a division that hasn't had more than 1 team both spending big and wanting to contend each season. Following their 2018 trip to the NLCS, EVERYTHING was set up for the Brewers to establish a stranglehold on the division and use it as a springboard for deep postseason runs - despite making the playoffs 4 of those 5 seasons that bite of the apple approach hasn't worked out them come October at all. Again, I'm not saying the lack of postseason success over the past 5 seasons is heavily influenced by CC being a bad playoff manager - however I I do think it's fair play to look at it negatively if we're going to also heap potentially underserving praise towards CC for managing a team that has consistently found ways to win ~90 games a regular season in one of baseball's two weakest divisions. I don't know if the Brewers of the past 5 seasons win as many games had they been playing in the AL East of NL West over that stretch, and because of that they probably aren't in the playoffs 4 of those years in the first place.

At this level, I think it's more mental for guys with any kind of perimeter game who can't make at least 70% from the line...it's not like they don't practice excessively and work on improving technique. I've always though less is more with free throws, and seeing Giannis go through a 15 second ritual every shot from the stripe is just painful - and winds up getting the entire arena putting even more pressure on himself. Just get the ball, bounce it a time or two, line up the seams and shoot the damn thing.

100% - going into this season the first 6-7 games I saw as a potential advantage for the Packers to get off to a better start recordwise that many assumed they would because there weren't playing any juggernauts on paper. The problem with that guess on my end is how poorly the offense has performed, wasting three very winnable games. The Defense IMO has actually underperformed based on the personnel they have on that side of the ball - due to a combination of a ton of injuries (once again) and weird game planning/coordination (once again). It feels like what the Packers' defense tends to do midseason after they get gashed early, then skate through a part of their schedule where they're respectable against bad offenses, only to get gashed again late in the year.

I don't disagree that he's a good manager...but the flip side of all these points is how much of this "get into the postseason" success is tied directly to the division the Brewers play in over the last few years? That payroll disadvantage isn't nearly as dramatic in the NL Central - particularly in seasons before 2022 when they had unbalanced schedules facing the constantly rebuilding Pirates and Reds along with rebuilding Cub teams since 2019. And being 8th best in terms of postseason games played actually sounds pretty poor considering most of the playoff fields each year have 10-12 teams in it, and the Brewers have been in the postseason all but one of those seasons. That stretch includes their NLCS run to game 7 against the LAD, since then they've been just plain bad in the playoffs. After the 2018 season, there was a clear window for the Brewers to be consistent contenders in the NL Central based on where the other teams in the division were at with their rosters - here we are 5 seasons later and the Brewers haven't advanced beyond the initial round of the 4 postseason berths they earned while being one of the best 2 teams in the NL Central, which has been considered the weakest of the 3 NL divisions each of those years. I think Counsell's biggest strength as a manager is bullpen management, and doing so using the full 40 man roster with cycling arms between AAA and MLB along with maximizing the value his best relievers provide the ballclub. I think his biggest weakness is related to putting lineups together that go beyond being handcuffed by the personnel he gets to choose from. It's yet to be seen how he can manage a team in an outsized market with outsized personalities and way more pressure to win it all than Milwaukee ever will have, and I'm not sure he's cut out for that type of a situation just based on his personality....and I think he'd be the 1st to say the same.

Is there a stat somewhere out there that lays creedance to CC being the best or top 3 managers in MLB? Don't get me wrong, I think he's a good manager when it comes to navigating the day to day grind of the regular season. However, Counsel has been at the helm of the Brewers for 9 seasons, with 1 NLCS appearance and just 1 playoff series win to show for it despite making the postseason 5 of the last 6 seasons. Many people state that CC finds a way to get the most wins with the roster he's dealt - yet that seems to vanish when the postseason arrives. It just seems to me that he's universally considered an elite manager and I'd imagine most of us as Brewer fans are quick to agree with that notion, but he doesn't have any hardware as a manager to prove that's the case.

If CC moves on, I wish him well in the big Apple...but I don't know if he's the type of personality that will thrive in a major media market with constant expectations. Counsel's entire playing career happened in small-mid size markets with little to no media pressure, and being the Brewers' skipper enables him to deal with media that almost never held his feet to the fire. He is obviously a really good manager, but his experience with that role has been with an organization where he had to squeeze the most wins out of rosters that had talent holes due to budget constraints, and very few Type A personalities in the clubhouse. None of that will be the case with the Mets, and Counsel's best traits as a manager may not be seen with the type of rosters the Mets will have more often than not. I think the perfect scenario for CC is to use the Mets interview as leverage to get a new contract in Milwaukee.

So that leads to the question, who is the current Packer wide receivers coach over the past 2 seasons to develop and groom the stable of young wideouts? None other than Jason Vrable, who was promoted to that role/passing game coordinator in February 2022 after the last Packer offensive coaching staff exodus to other NFL coaching/coordinating jobs. So he's as green on that job as the receivers he's trying to develop. Most of Vrable's resume talks about how he worked with Davante Adams during some of his huge seasons of Packer production...but it makes no mention of the fact Adams was already an established star with Rodgers throwing him the ball, and other offensive coaches were actually coordinating the passing game. I've noticed this without even watching all-22 film - there are multiple Packer receivers in the same general area all the damn time, either running the same routes, getting rerouted by physical DB play at the LOS, or just wandering across the field without a clue on what they're supposed to be doing. With all the young receivers, part of this season has to be evaluating who can actually play receiver at the NFL level regardless of who's throwing them the ball - so much of the passing game is based on timing and precision route-running. Yes, Love has an M.O. with accuracy being an issue - but we've got to remember Rodgers threw 12 picks last season with a more veteran receiver room than there is now in Green Bay when his previous season INT totals could be counted on 1 hand playing with Adams in the mix. Sometimes it's difficult to determine if Love is inaccurate with the ball placement on a throw or if the Receiver is in the wrong spot...when both are routinely an issue, passing offense looks like a train wreck at the NFL level.

Generally agreed, although the Rangers were among the best teams in the AL throughout the first few months of the season before scuffling in July/August badly enough for the Astros to overtake them in the division standings. They very much deserved a playoff berth this season. Despite me being happy the Dbacks beat the teams they did to reach the WS (Brewers are the exception, obviously), I don't think their regular season body of work should've landed them a playoff berth. 3 wildcard teams in a three division league of 15 teams is too many, as evidenced by 5 teams being within 2 games of one another for WC spots #2 and 3 in the NL, all with low to mid 80s win totals. With the current postseason format, unless MLB wants the entire world series to be played in November each season there isn't time to have 7 game division series when factoring in off days between rounds. One argument could be to reduce those off days, but with the total number of teams in the bracket there has to be a pretty concrete schedule on when each round ends/begins, which winds up leading to many more offdays than necessary if series wrap up quickly.

For a league with a 162 game regular season, yes I think 12 out of 32 would still be too many. I get that $$$ rules all and shoving as many teams into whatever weird playoff format they have likely wins out, but that doesn't mean I like it. Baseball is random over short bits of games - had MLB found a way to get the Athletics in this year's postseason, honestly they wouldn't have much worse odds to make the WS than the two teams that are in it. My point is for as random as baseball is for two weeks here and there, the best teams tend to wade through all of that over the course of 162 games - so a reduced playoff format with fewer teams would still lead to random playoff outcomes, but it would exclude more of the teams that just shouldn't be given the opportunity for winning a World Series based on their body of work over a 6+ month regular season playing almost everyday. If playoffs expand further, are we then playing two months of postseason baseball, with the world series routinely being decided in between snow flurries and cold/rainy November nights if the wrong teams make the playoffs? Had the Twins gone on a run, they'd be playing home World Series games next week where the high temps are barely above freezing. Expanding the playoffs further would put those games another week into winter. The current playoff format makes more sense to me if they aren't already playing 162 regular season games. any sort of further expansion should demand the regular season be pared back down to 154. To me, baseball is different than the other major sports, and regular season success should carry more weight due to the marathon that it is.

Not really, just get back to valuing teams that perform the best over a regular season that has 162 games played instead of pushing for an NFL or NBA style format that plays 17 or 82 games and let's half the league into the postseason. Not saying go back to what baseball was like when just the two division Champs made the playoffs and played a best of 5 series to see who made the world series, but 12 out of 30 teams making the baseball playoffs is too many.

eh, most people figured the NL World Series rep would be from the NL West or NL East this season ;) It is total randomness once the postseason starts, which is why I think if baseball wants to get back to feeling like one of the best teams each year wins the World Series, they need to reduce the playoff field to put more value on regular season success.

I don't care where you are located - $600K is not a starter home, and not having similarly sized condos/homes that are being built to sell at roughly 1/3rd of that price even in urban areas is exactly what's wrong with the current housing market. Interest rates are starting to crush everything despite consumers doing their best to hang in there over the past year, and rates are more likely to keep climbing than stay the same or dramatically drop anytime soon. The interest payment on the national debt is now pushing $700B, basically double what that payment was just two years ago in large part due to the Fed's rate hikes to try and curb inflation - that's about the 20th largest economy in the world paid just to carry the debt, not reduce it. Also, when rates go up, government revenue drops, spiking deficits and making this growing problem even worse.

Honestly Ginkel should start the 9th...but I'm sure he won't

Ginkel has thrown just 1 slider that's even been hittable, and Turner was way off balance and popped it up...just filthy downward movement on that pitch.

very nearly was, but Ginkel did managed to get that left foot behind the rubber - doesn't have to throw to 2nd on that. looked almost like he got a cleat stuck or something.

there was one out...but yeah you have to make that guy hit his way on in front of the top of the order

They give quality ABs throughout the lineup and stay within themselves...and both Carroll and Marte have been huge all postseason.

This isn't meant to jinx anyone, the Phils could easily come back late in this game and wind up back in the WS - but I think this Dbacks run is worth a deeper dive when it's exactly how the Brewers should approach building and developing their roster. Checking notes - the Dbacks ranked just behind the Brewers in 2023 team payroll at the start of this season. What's even more impressive is that includes nearly $40M in retained salary for players no longer on their roster due to releases/trades/declined options/etc...most notably $18M to Madison Baumgarner in late April, and I believe he's owed $14M more next season to sit on his couch at home and yell at everything. The Dbacks' active payroll would be in the Tampa Bay/Oriole realm of the low $70M range - you can win without carrying an unsustainable payroll as a small market club, if you make wise personnel decisions when they need to happen. Kudos to the Dbacks for moving on from sunk costs when veterans no longer are good enough on the field to help the ballclub. Pretty glaring difference to how things have shaken out with the Brewers, who by comparison nursed a completely washed veteran like Winker through an entire season with IL/rehab stints so they could get him on their playoff roster, primarily because they had to pay him close to $8M in salary.

Love went 10-for-13 in the first half, and only had a missed FG to show for it. That's because just about everything was either a swing pass, bubble screen, or instant checkdown - I can't recall a single throw that went more than 5 yards downfield in the 1st half. When you have a roster full of receivers whose primary value this early in their careers is to get downfield, that type of gameplan basically eliminates them from being a worry for the defense - the Broncos' defense is T.E.R.R.I.B.L.E., and they were able to sit on all the underneath stuff and pitch a 1st half shutout because the game plan was putrid. Besides late game panic/catchup mode, this offense hasn't looked diverse and unpredictable since the 3rd quarter of the Falcons game, when they went into a shell mode to allow ATL to come back and win in Week 2. They didn't have Jones or Bakhtiari that game either - and they were still moving the ball up and down the field on the road for most of that game against what appears to be a pretty decent defense. They now look nothing like that team another month into the season. There should be alot of heat on MLF and company, even with a young roster - it's painfully obvious receivers are running the wrong routes/not on the same page as Love, and that falls in the lap of the coaching staff to correct it. Wicks has to be on the field much more often, because he seems to at least have a clue on where he needs to be when he's running routes.

Agreed, and once again injuries seem to be among the biggest problems for this team, which sucks for a young roster that desparately needs to play together in game situations to have a prayer to develop - I get that injuries happen in the NFL, but it's an incredible rarity for the Packers to be one of the teams who avoid the injury bug over the course of a season. Stokes basically ran into another hamstring issue the first time he stepped back onto the field in a game. Jones is a shell of himself with a bum hammy. We have an undersized cornerback getting paid a ton of money with a bad back. half the defense has knee or or ankle issues. Every time a ball is thrown towards Watson, you have to see if he winds up heading to an injury tent afterwards. It's insane.