danzig6767

Whether or not Yovani is declining or holding steady or Nelson is just as good is irrelevant to me. He's not going to be a Brewer in 2016 so trading him is the right thing to do. Not only that about Gallardo, Nelson simply needs his chance to try and prove himself vs big league hitters. No point left in having him go back to AAA and dominate mostly guys who either will never play in the majors or would likely be fringe player in the majors. Plus, he's 25, not say 21 where then it could make some sense for Nelson to spend more time in the minors. Time will tell on the three guys acquired, but i have zero complaints about this trade and instead was pleasantly surprised by the return.

Yea, i'm pleasantly surprised. I figured that if Gallardo was traded, it would likely be for some AAA guy who was supposedly major league ready, but with very limited upside. We get these three younger players and free up 9 million dollars. Hard to find a problem with this trade even though there is a chance that none of these three kids pan out in the majors.

Not just Kemp, Myers, and Upton, they still have Smith, Quentin, and Maybin under contract. Preller has also traded for and away a total of five catchers. I can't recall ever seeing anything like the incredible flurry of moves he's made in a short period of time and he can't be done given what the Padres roster looks like currently.

Hey its not like Super Genius Theo ever hamstrung a large market team with killer contracts before... Theo certainly made a number of bad big money signings in Boston, but i think that's a sizable reason why he went about rebuilding the Cubs exactly how he did. He saw how the Red Sox got bloated with a mostly veteran roster full of guys making good to huge long term money. Now with the current Cubs he has a number of highly thought of prospects who will be cheap for years and very hungry to prove themselves. If those prospects can pan out well to varying degrees, Theo knows that it will allow him to selectively spend money on quality free agents, while also having a roster with a nice mix of youthful energy, youthful desire to prove themselves, and quality vets wanting to win vs what he left in Boston. As much i hate to say it, the Cubs could become scary good over the next few years if guys like Bryant and Solar become special, which very well could happen.

Yep Unless you are talking about a superstar player in his prime, why would any GM not at least listen to offers for players on the roster?

Hell no on Scherzer. I don't want Attanasio to even consider just making a kick the tires call to Boras about Scherzer. Nothing.

Too much money for my tastes considering the abysmal season he had last year. Sure there is a chance that was a fluke bad year, but i wouldn't want to risk 26 million dollars to find out because there is also a decent chance that Craig won't regain his hitting ability of the previous seasons. The Cardinals were quick to bail on Craig and now Boston looks to be also. That's telling to me that neither was/is confident that he'll get back to being the hitter he was because an .800 plus OPS bat in this skyrocketing salary environment would be worth quite a bit more cash than the contract he has.

Would you rather that the already super wealthy owners just pocketed even more of the money they are making instead of it going to the players, even if the contracts on the surface seem crazy? Guys like Zack Duke and Butler aren't getting these big contracts even though they aren't difference makers because owners just have lost their minds. They are getting that money for the same reason the Reds will owe Votto 25 million per until he walks to the plate with a cane, baseball is awash in revenues unlike ever before. So as baseball revenues climb substantially, so will salaries for players. Five years from now, players like Butler will make 12-15 million per. Advertisers love pro and college sports because it's a show that most viewers watch live vs recording on their DVR and fast forwarding through their commercials. I'm one of those viewers. Besides sports, pretty much everything else i watch is recorded and i fast forward through commercials. There are also so many channels now vying for sports content, not just the three major networks, so leagues and teams are getting huge huge money for broadcasting rights. Never been a better time to be a pro sports owner as evidenced by what crazy sums teams are selling for. The players in turn also get their sizable cut of those billions.

That's hilarious Stanton will only make 30 million over the next three years. By year four when the real money starts having to get shelled out, if the Marlins aren't winning, i think it's a near lock that Loria trades Stanton and Stanton agrees to be traded to a bigger market team who spends money to compete for titles like say the Dodgers, Yankees, Red Sox, etc.

Baseball is swimming in revenues on a level the league has never seen before, so teams will spend it, even on head scratching contracts.

We'll see how Burnett does next season, but for all of the talk about how the Pirates farm system has turned out so many players to lead their team to back to back playoff berths, a mix of under the radar free agents signings, trades, and other veteran players have also played a significant role in their resurgence the last two years. AJ Burnett Liriano Wandy Rodriguez Volquez Worely Grilli Melancon Russell Martin All of those guys played a decent to large sized role in helping the Pirates get into the playoffs the last two years. They have some nice young to still fairly young players on their roster along with intriguing youngsters in their farm system, but if Burnett can bounce back a bit next year in say the 3.5-4 ERA range, start 30 games, and eat up his typical roughly 200 innings as he's done the last seven years, there could be plenty of value in that for a Pirates team hoping to make the playoffs again.

13 years is crazy, but i'd rather have Stanton's contract on my books if i owned a team compared to say the Votto contract with the Reds. While a healthy Votto is probably the last hitter i'd want at the plate with say the bases loaded two outs in the 9th of a one run game vs the Brewers in an important game, he is already 31 and the Reds will be paying him an insane 25 million per through 2024. Miguel Cabrera is a great great HOF hitter, but he's also 31 and not exactly a guy who keeps himself in tip top shape. Over the next nine years Detroit will owe him 270 million dollars with an 8 million dollar buyout in 2024 which i'd bet will be exercised vs paying him 30 million when he's likely a shell of his former self at age 41. The Angels still owe the declining Albert Pujols 192 million dollars through the 2021 season. This is the same Pujols who has posted back to back sub-.800 OPS seasons. My guess is that by the time Boras gets Max Scherzer signed, he'll instantly join this list if he gets some sort of 7-8 year deal nearing or topping 200 million for a 30 year old starting pitcher who saw his average velocity drop a bit last year even though he was still really good. These super long contracts in the 8 years or longer range do baffle me given the odds are so slim of each one not becoming an albatross at some point, especially when handed out to guys nearing the age of 30 or already older than that. I do understand the high yearly salaries simply because team and overall league revenues are skyrocketing, so the corresponding salary inflation is to be expected. It's just the length of so many of these deals which i can't wrap my brain around, not the yearly salaries.

I thought these 8-10 year deals of late were insane, but now we get to a 13 year deal. Why do teams do this stuff? What's next, a starting pitcher getting 10 years at big money?

I agree, but much of the budget is based on how tickets are selling in the offseason (things like people deciding whether or not to re-up their season tickets). I think this had a lot to do with Attanasio deciding to sign Lohse and Garza over the past two offseasons, and his refusal to trade away any name the fans know. As much as I wish the team would adopt a longer-term strategy for building a team, I understand Attanasio's fear of losing season ticket holders. Unfortunately, many Brewer fans have now been conditioned to hold off on buying tickets until the team "proves they want to win" by signing another mid-30's "name" player in the offseason. At this point, it will take a lot of convincing to get the fan base to buy into any type of rebuild, and the Brewers don't have the high profile or the resources to bring in a big name like Epstein who the fans would inherently trust to do it right. The Brewers may not have the high enough profile to attract a big name GM, but i thoroughly reject the notion that we lack the money to pay one. I read that Theo makes about 4 million per. A top notch GM in pro sports IMO is by far the biggest bargain any team can have and thus i've long wondered why they don't make a lot more cash? Take Beane in Oakland or Friedman when he was in Tampa. To me, each of those two guys would have been a huge bargain even at around say 10 million per year given all of the winning they've produced on near bottom of the league payrolls. Yet, both guys have had multiple pitchers in their bullpens making more to quite a bit more per year. Hell, if a quality GM is smart enough to avoid just one single bad singing in the roughly 3-4 years/7-10 million range, that alone will save the franchise far more cash than that GM himself will make over about7-8 years. If i owned a baseball team who hadn't won in awhile and hypothetically Beane or Friedman were available, i'd be willing to offer 7-8 million per, maybe even up to 10 million per to get either one, that includes if i was a small to mid-market team. Why proven high quality GM's in pro sports don't make significantly more money than the norm is baffling to me. Who is more important to a pro sports team than the guy who puts together the rosters? Who chooses how to spend the 75-200 million for a given team? Who decides on big trades to make or avoid? Yet, many are paid more like say a veteran 4th outfielder in baseball, 6th man in basketball, or average middle linebacker in football like AJ Hawk. I just don't get it. For example. Would you hypothetically rather have Beane at 8 million per running the Brewers with a 110 million dollar payroll or some random new GM hire making 2 million per, thus having 115 million to spend on players? I'll take the Beane scenario without a second of thought.

I'm skeptical of even big name players being responsible for selling many tickets except maybe early in a season. You can have a team with some big names, but if that team doesn't win, most fans will quickly stop caring that a team has big name players on it. I've been going to Brewers games for many years and i can't think of times which i've attended more than a single game mainly just to see a certain player play in person and that was almost always to see a great player on another team. Nearly all other Brewers games i've attended with friends/family were for these reasons 1. The team was good and thus the ballpark was a very fun environment/event to attend. 2. Myself and a few friends wanted to enjoy a nice hot summer day or evening at the park, along with some tailgaiting. The game itself only part of the equation. 3. Larger group outings through either a job, family, or a bar where i've known the owner for years and 1-2 times a year they rent a bus with about 20-30 people attending. If hypothetically the Brewers traded for Tulowitzki or a different big name like that before the season, i'm sure there would be an initial spike in ticket sales. After that though, winning is just mainly what would keep the park full most nights, not so much the names on the jerseys. Be mediocre instead, the shine from acquiring that big name would fade pretty quickly.

Whoever ends up platooning with Lind doesn't have to be a guy who can only play firstbase, kinda as how Reynolds last year could play first and third. A guy like Jason Rogers could potentially be that option. Someone who can play first vs lefties and at other times fill in at third to give Ramirez days off. As for a platoon with Scooter, we are going to need a backup middle infielder or two anyways. So i think it's safe to assume that whoever does platoon with Scooter, that guy won't be as position limited as Weeks was. Had Rickie not been owed 10 million last year, odds are he wouldn't have even been on the team. Adam LaRoche was mentioned often has a hopeful addition, but even he had a terrible .566 and .620 OPS vs lefties the last two years. It would be nice if our farm system could produce a high quality firstbase prospect instead, but it's been a black hole in the minors. Given Attanasio keeps with a win now mandate and there is a dearth of available quality firstbaseman around the league, off the top of my head i can't think of a better realistic option than getting Lind and he also doesn't make big cash either. Mix in that we got him practically for nothing and he hits lefthanded which the lineup badly needed, i'm pretty happy about the move even if it's not some major franchise altering one. Those types major additions don't happen easily.

You are overstating the home run or nothing angle as many others have. Last year was an aberration. Even then they still made it to the NLCS. Most of the time they post good averages. You are overstating the home run or nothing angle as many others have. Am I really though? Why are things the same year after year? Even when they were beasts they still kind of sucked at getting the clutch hit. They were 5th in the NL hitting with RISP, even with an overall team wide batting slump the last month and slightly higher than the Cardinals finished. That's a fact, not an assumption. In 2012 when the team made it to the NLCS, they finished 6th in batting with RISP at .257, nearly the exact same average as their team .259 batting average. In fact, last year their overall team batting average was .250, but they hit seven points higher with RISP. What killed the Brewers in that collapse wasn't just failing to get enough "clutch" hits in however you choose to define that, instead it was that they simply failed to hit period over that stretch be it in early innings, getting on base enough, hitting home runs, "clutch" hits, etc etc. Nearly everyone on the roster went into a slump at the same time and thus the offense collapsed. Hard for any team to score runs when few are getting on base consistently and on top of that, home runs aren't happening either.

You are overstating the home run or nothing angle as many others have. The Brewers even with the massive hitting struggles late in the year finished with a team batting average of .250, while the Cardinals who you keep bringing up just barely finished higher at .253, both being middle of the pack in the NL. As for supposedly needing to hit more doubles which you also say, the Brewers had the 3rd most doubles in the NL, only 10 fewer than the league leading Rockies. When it comes to hitting with RISP, the Brewers finished 5th best in the NL, not near the bottom and again higher than the Cardinals. What happened last year is mainly that the team simply went into a terrible team wide slump at a really bad time and overall they have to draw more walks. To draw more walks, probably going to need some different players. Clearly need a big upgrade at firstbase. Lastly, the surgery on Braun has to to help him to back to being at least close to his former self.

Good luck with that. History has shown that hitting coaches usually don't have much impact on how batters approach their at bats. Guys who are patient, take walks, and mostly swing at pitches in the strike zone did that in the minors before ever making the big leagues while impatient free swingers tend to have been that way in the minors before making the majors. Trying to change that approach significantly after a hitter already has a few thousand at bats under their belt is really hard to do. Maybe you can eventually get a guy to raise his walk rate up a little bit like say how Gomez has the last two years, but expecting a hitting coach to turn long time free swingers into patient hitters isn't all that realistic. then time for a major roster overhaul because this group of lazy free swingers isn't going to amount to anything. it starts at the top and melvin is a problem. when has this overaggressive approach ever won anything? there's a reason why this team misses the playoffs most of the time while the lards are in the nlcs all the time. I don't believe that Melvin goes out of his way to acquire over-aggressive free swingers, it just kinda worked out that way. Braun for all of his skill as a hitter has never been a high walks guy. Ramirez is a lot like Braun. Long time very skilled hitter overall, but mediocre walk rates for as good as he hits. Gomez has worked out great in the trade for Hardy. He's one of the best overall CF's in the game and his walk rate has actually improved a bit the last two years, to the point he had a .350 OBP which seemed impossible years ago, but he'll always be more free swinger than patient. Scooter came from the farm system where Melvin didn't draft the kid. He hit great batting average wise vs righthanders in back to back years, but he had a poor walk rate in the minors and not surprisingly that's carried over to the majors. Davis also came from the minors in the 7th round where Melvin wasn't making the pick. His walk rate in the minors was actually above average, but for whatever reason he's regressed in that area in the majors. Those walk rates in the minors though at least give me some hope that he can do better in the majors as he plays more. Weeks who will be gone always walked well, he just lost his ability to hit righthanded pitching Segura Melvin traded for and plate discipline certainly has been a weakness and remains a major weakness. Reynolds and Overbay both had very good walk rates last year, in fact the best on the team. Both though carried terrible batting averages and Overbay had no power left for his position. FWIW, i'm not completely absolving Melvin for the free swinging roster he put on the field. I'm just say that i'm certain he'd rather have a roster with more guys who drew walks, but as of late our farm system hasn't produced guys like that. When Weeks and Prince were here in their primes, both drew lots of walks in the top four spots of the lineup. Braun walking at a mediocre rate didn't matter because he was raking with .930 to .990 OPS numbers and high OBP rates largely because of .300 plus batting averages. Guys like Davis, Scooter, and Segura are tough to move given all three are cheap and have some positive traits, but their lack of plate discipline hurt the offense. Braun has to return at least somewhat close to his old self. Firstbase can't remain such a black hole.

Good luck with that. History has shown that hitting coaches usually don't have much impact on how batters approach their at bats. Guys who are patient, take walks, and mostly swing at pitches in the strike zone did that in the minors before ever making the big leagues while impatient free swingers tend to have been that way in the minors before making the majors. Trying to change that approach significantly after a hitter already has a few thousand at bats under their belt is really hard to do. Maybe you can eventually get a guy to raise his walk rate up a little bit like say how Gomez has the last two years, but expecting a hitting coach to turn long time free swingers into patient hitters isn't all that realistic.

Boston did have Lester last year pitching great in the playoffs, but i'd argue that their bullpen and offense were the biggest keys to winning their title, same for the Cardinals the previous year. That St. Louis rotation was far from stellar in those 2012 playoffs, but their pen was great and their offense scored a lot of runs. If KC were to win it this year, it's going to mainly be their bullpen, defense, speed, and unexpected home runs that will be the main reasons why.

These playoffs are such a prime example of what largely a crapshoot the playoffs of late have become, with no clear formula required. Had there a game where say any baseball fans before the playoffs could have won a prize by predicting what two teams would end up in the World Series, odds are high that the least likely pairing picked would have been KC and SF. Simply get in and you have a shot. Just look at KC. They were down 7-3 in the bottom of the 8th with Lester cruising. After giving up three runs, Oakland still lead 7-6 in the 9th. Then after the game being tied, Oakland was up a run in the 12th inning, only to still lose. If hypothetically that game could be replayed 10 more times from that exact point in the 8th inning, my money is on Oakland winning all 10 times. Yost maybe gets fired after KC fans rage over his decision in the 6th inning and instead he'll get an extension. San Fran wins multiple playoff games on weird stuff like errors, wild pitches/passed balls, and then seeing eye base hits vs the Cardinals. On the flip side, teams like LA and Detroit with multiple aces which supposedly are required to advance in the playoffs get bounced early. I'm very happy for KC fans to finally experience success after decades of mostly futility. As a long time Brewers fan who witnessed decades of losing, i can relate. That said, the playoffs for awhile now have shown you don't have to be a great team to make the World Series. Don't have to have aces in your rotation. You just need more breaks to go your way than against and get hot at that exact time for whatever reason, then your team could be playing in the World Series.

Don't forget Wade Davis came with Shields in that trade. Davis has had more impact in this playoff run than Shields who has been pretty mediocre for all of the big game James talk.

I wouldn't even call him a "good" base runner, much less superior... He does idiotic things on the base paths that little leaguers are taught NOT to do. He is a fast base runner, I will give him that much, but the league is full of fast guys. When evaluating any player, you have to judge everything. Clearly Carlos makes to many boneheaded decisions on the bases. On the flip side though, he has a 111-25 SB/CS ratio the last three years as an everyday player. There are also the many times he does take that extra base or score via his great speed where he doesn't get thrown out. The brainfarts just stick out way more. So when i look at his overall impact as a baserunner, to me he's still clearly above average, just not elite like he would be if he didn't make those boneheaded mistakes. It's a little similar to him as a batter. While he can be incredibly frustrating at times when he swings at a bad pitch/pitches early in the count with runners in scoring position, he did finish with a .331 BA and .881 OPS in that situation. His overall production at the plate for a CF puts him in the top 5 of his position. He's an elite defender at a key position. Loved by his teammates and seems like a genuinely good guy. Gomez just is such a unique and polarizing player. Overall his positives on the field vastly outweigh the negatives, but some of his mistakes can be so dumbfounding it will leave me and other Brewers fans yelling at the TV, what the hell are you doing Carlos.

No way do i want to add a second year to the deal given his age