Ennder

He actually gains value as a DH because his defense at 1B is worse than the positional adjustment they apply to DH. Fangraphs did an article on him that suggested if he plays to his projections he'd be worth 6.1M this year and something like 9M next year so most likely we didn't get a good deal here. Of course if he goes to arbitration at 8M this year and wins then the deal probably was a good one.

Fangraphs had him at -7.8 runs on defense and +23.9 on offense. in 2007 he was -7.3 runs on defense and +49 on offense. In 2008 he was worth $12.1M in 07 it was 20.8M. I've seen other defensive metrics that had him closer to -12 or so. So roughly 1 or maybe 2 losses from his fielding.

I think a lot of people are going to be proven wrong by Fielder this year. He is a better hitter than he showed last year and it wasn't just gaining some weight gain that caused problems. He just had a slow start. Yeah his defense stinks but his offense still has value, more than Howard in my opinion.

But CC isn't on the team anymore so the fact he overperformed last year doesn't matter if you are subtracting his 2008 value from the wins. If you take our 90 wins and remove what CC and Sheets were worth last year(both roughly 5 wins) we are at 80 wins, assume Torres and Hoffman are even and that the Hall/Lamb platoon matches what Branyan/Hall did last year. So we have 80 wins plus a win or two extra from the offense probably being better this year and then 2-3 wins in Gallardo and improvements from Parra. Assume Bush+Suppan is a wash. So as the team stands right now we are probably sitting in the 83-84 win range. If we add a Looper type we are in the 85-86 range, if we add Sheets maybe 1-2 more than that depending on how healthy he is. That is on the fringe of the WC race where a little luck or a breakout by a Weeks or Hart or Gamel or something or a mid season trade can push us into the playoffs. If you want the more pessimistic case you would go with our 86-87 pythagorean wins from last year and call us in the 79-83 win range I guess, which gives us a range of 79-84 wins right now as a team which I can live with that opinion too even if I disagree with it. The people who say we will be lucky to win 70 games are the only ones that are really out in left field on things. The math agrees with my general feel for the team. Right now on paper it just feels like we are a slightly over .500 team. Especially since the central hasn't really improved at all this offseason. The Reds made some bad moves, the Astros have tread water or gotten worse, the Pirates are worse, the Cubs are most likely worse or at best the same. The Cardinals haven't done anything but they of course still have Pujols which can turn a mediocre team into a .500 one.

On the flip side we underperformed overall from a talent standpoint. We had way more guys have worse years than expected than better years which probably makes up for that.

Braun, DiFelice, Gallardo, Julio, Lawrie, Periard, Rottino, Swindle, Welch. I hope that Gallardo doesn't play is all I have to say. http://mlb.mlb.com/mlb/news/wbc_09/roster.jsp?sort=mlbclub

I don't think the Cubs are worse than last year, just riskier. They made moves that didn't really improve the team and hurt the depth of the team somewhat and added more injury risk come playoff time with Bradley. This is not a good offseason for the Cubs. It isn't a disaster and I still think they win division handily but they hardly have had an offseason that Melvin should be looking at as to 'how to run a MLB team' as was suggested.

If he plays defense like last year he is an asset, if his defense slips he is a liability. Regardless of what he is I just hope he plays a bit less next year.

So once Zambrano goes down we got what, Dempster, Lilly, Marshall, Olson, Guadin?

Right now the Cubs arent' any better than last year, they have more risk on their team and their minor league system isn't as good. If that is how to run a MLB team I'm glad Melvin never learned it. Now that DeRosa and Pie are gone I don't see what package the Cubs have that would get Peavy unless they completely gut their already weak minor league system which is something the Brewers couldn't afford to do.

I don't see why you are bothering to argue with hauser42 over Sheets at this point. This is the same guy who didn't post on the boards for months and then suddenly showed up with a bunch of Sheets bashing posts the minute he got hurt back in 07. I think he dislikes Sheets more than he even likes the Brewers.

Not to mention what if the team doesn't go into a collective slump in September, Sabathia doesn't have to wear himself down pitching on 3 days rest. We win a very winnable game 1 against the Phillies and we are quite possibly going deeper into the playoffs than we did.

This is a combination of multiple things with Verlander. In 2006 there was a good bit of luck in his numbers, he probably should have been in the 4.00-4.50 ERA range given how he pitched. 2007 he did pitch better but his FB% spiked and his BB/9 got worse but it was masked by his K/9 going up. 2008 the FB% go up again and his BB/9 go up even more but the K/9 regressed some and he had LOB% issues. If you look at xERA trends you probably see the real picture better, 4.33, 3.85, 4.56. All the innings he put on his arm in 06 and 07 probably did have something to do with the slip as well but he never really was an 'ace'. I wouldn't be against trading for him but I wouldn't be lookin at him as a sub 4 ERA pitcher. It won't really surprise me at all to see him right around a 4.00-4.50 ERA again next year.

BPro came out with the Padres top 11 prospects today. Inman came in as a just missed behind 2 star prospect Drew Cumberland who they said had the perfect world projection as a high AVG SS with limited OBP skills and limited power. I still think people are really overrating this guy. http://www.baseballprospe...rticle.php?articleid=8419

If we pick up a SP I'd say we are in the thick of the wild card race and it will depend on injuries, over/under performers etc. If we go with our current roster I think we are on the outside looking in.

I think it is more a case of a very heavy pitching market this year more than anything and the fact he is a type A FA which really kills a players value these days. Same reason Hudson, Cruz, Perez etc are sitting out there unsigned. Teams with protected picks are mostly not looking for veterans right now and those without protected picks either don't want to lose one or already spent their cash on someone else.

If the season started today their payroll would be lower than last year. They also probably have a lot of dead money in those long contracts because the odds of those players staying healthy for the entire contract is very low. There is a lot of risk in their offseason signings.

He has gotten worse two years in a row now, his best year with the Brewers was in 06 and his 07 was just terribly unlucky. His second half last year was largely fueled by a 23% hit rate which he can't hope to sustain. However if he keeps his K/9, BB/9 and GB% at those second half levels he could give an ERA around 4.

You do realize a salary cap wouldn't give you this at all though? It might be 'more even' but it certainly wouldn't be even.

I think Yost was a below average manager so I expect them to bring us an additional 0-6 wins, that is using the assumption that the manager can be worth somewhere between -3 and +3 wins overall which is just an off the hip guess on my part. I don't know the coaches well enough to really say what difference it will make from an emotional, motivational etc standpoint.

If every single team went into every season exactly even in talent and the games were basically won or loss by a coin flip I'd absolutely hate the game. Football is a lot like this now. Team gets a few lucky bounces and they go from a 7-9 quality team to a playoff team.

You would think the Yankees should lose their 2nd round pick for CC and the Brewers would gain an extra supplemental at the start of the round. I'd be much happier with that situation.

The situations don't matter because you are looking at this stuff in vacuum. They have run studies on how accurately OBP, AVG, SLG, OPS can predict runs. OPS does a very good job, weighted OPS that gives more value to OBP than SLG does an even better job. Never seen one that suggests AVG is more useful than anything else, in fact AVG has less predictive value than OBP or SLG by themselves much less the two combined. Here is an example of some of the Math behind it, found this with a quick google search, I'm sure there is more in depth stuff out there but it all ends up with the same conclusions in every study I've ever seen. http://bluethinktank.blog...2005/12/power-of-ops.html Here is an article including the value of each given result in 2007. http://spiff.rit.edu/rich...ball/lwts/lwts_intro.html Rickie Weeks that year had a .235/.374/.433/.807 and was worth 13.2 LWTS/603 (this includes some value for his 25 SB and losing value for different types of outs etc). He was the 3rd most productive offensive 2B in the NL that season behind Utley and Kent even though he hit .235.

The yankees have about the 4th best team in baseball probably and the #1 salary. They have to overpay players to play there and since they always go veteran heavy they rarely have impact rookies. Better revenue sharing would be a great boon for baseball but a salary cap just isn't needed.

That is where optimism vs pessimism vs realism comes into play though. The optimist assumes all the ifs work out, the pessimist assumes none of them works out and the realist takes the middle ground. Last year the Twins weren't considered contenders and due mostly to a lot of luck with RISP they ended up in the playoff race. Last year the White Sox weren't really considered contenders and due to a few breakout players they ended up in the playoff race. Last year the Tigers were supposed to be a world series team mostly because the entire team had career years at the same time in 2007 and they ended up out of the hunt early. Last year the Rays were considered improved but not in the race before the season by most people but BPro picked them to be right in the thick of things because of all the young talent. The Brewers as they sit right now are probably a slightly over .500 team, if we bring back Sheets or a Looper type we are on the outside edge of a playoff race. If a few things break our way or we make a mid season deal we can still make the playoffs this year. The season is not over in January regardless of what some posters seem to think.