NievesNoNO

Well said. I think each of the young guys has shown some really good things and some really bad things. Woodruff has a .440 BABIP against. No way that stays put. Burnes spin rate is elite and he is getting a lot of swings and misses. The problem has been missed location. When he has missed he's been hammered. The thing to remember about his hard hit rate is that it's only slightly worse than Jacob DeGrom's which speaks to small samples as much as anything. Peralta is kind of who he's been - great for one start or most of a start and then bad for a start or an inning. No reason to panic just yet. Agreed. I've actually been encouraged by what Woodruff, Burnes and Peralta have shown early in the year. Obviously, things haven't gone completely as planned for each of them but when they're throwing well there's some high end potential. At worst, if they just can't get things worked out, you know what kind of asset they are in the bullpen. The most frustrating thing for me (at least last night) was the walks from the back end of the bullpen. I know you can't just run 'em over the middle of the plate against MLB hitting but I'd rather give up HRs than walks to average players.

Players are not replaceable for MLB. The owners might be. BUT, MLB as entertainment IS replaceable to the general population. So, it's in the best interest of both sides to make nice and figure out the differences with their Monopoly money. The players stand to lose more. Again, when you have individuals being paid $30 million complain about how unfair things are that doesn't sit well with the general public. I mean, we're seeing guaranteed investments in individual players going north of a QUARTER BILLION dollars.

Why? In what other area of life other than sports do we expect the employees pay to go up every time revenue goes up? And I’m sure these players who demand more pay if profit goes up will gladly take lower salaries if the owner loses money right? Players need to understand one thing. They are worth what the owners decide to pay them. For years and years and years players were getting absolutely absurd amounts of money in contracts that were terrible for the teams. Owners finally wised up and said “screw that” and stopped paying huge amounts for average to below average output. But let’s face it, they are still getting huge amounts of money (on top of all the other perks pro athletes get). The minimum salary.....the absolute lowest amount of money you can be paid, is over $550k. It takes me 6-7 years to make that. And that’s just for the bad players. If you are even halfways decent you’re a millionaire. And if you’re smart with your money you can retire in your mid thirties. I’m sorry but I will NEVER side with players on money issues. Safety issues? Sure. Money? Never. Owners are businessmen whose goal is to make money. Are they greedy? Sure. But what business owner isn’t? I’m sitting here paying $15 to park a car within walking distance of Miller Park and $4.50 or whatever it is for a friggen hot dog and I’m supposed to feel sorry for pro athletes who want more money to play baseball for a living? Sorry. I wish we had a like, no, LOVE button on this site! Great post Paul! I'm with you all on this. I will never side with the players.... well at least not if the current scenario is considered bad or getting cheated. Being a pro baseball player is one of the best gigs on earth. These guys travel in luxury at no cost to them, they stay at the best accommodations and paid stipends for top shelf food, again at no cost to them and then are paid to play a child's game. Yes, they are entertainers and only a super select portion of the population can do what they do, so obviously they should be compensated appropriately. In comparison to other pro sports the player pool is larger, the career expectancy is longer, the tole on your body in comparison is minimal, and they're getting guaranteed contracts. Are Dexter Fowler and Tulo giving back any of their contracts from last season? Yes, I'm cherry picking but you get the point. When I see guys spouting their mouths off who are making about 30 million a year, saying how broken and unfair things are I really am left with a sour taste in my mouth. I honestly, could care less what the owners are making. They are making the business decisions and overseeing (or at least hiring somebody to do so) operations. They player's only responsibility is to play; and probably show up at a few community functions. Yes, I do think there could be some tweaking of the system; I think a salary floor is a good start, especially with revenue sharing. I'm for making what you can, however the players need to be careful, imo. Look, most of these owners don't need their baseball franchises to be wealthy. When push comes to shove, the general public could care less if MLB continues. Give it some time and people will find other stuff to do. People like me and I'm sure many on this forum would be disappointed for a bit longer but in the end it's just entertainment and a game. The sport is already losing a battle to interest the younger generations. Take a way a year or so, or get the public viewing you as a bunch of overpaid whiners and see where things go. I love the Brewers and baseball and I don't see that changing, but I also used to love NFL football and quite frankly I'm mostly done with it. There's plenty of stuff I should/could be doing other than following pro baseball.

If you're going to give 300 million to somebody I guess a 26 year old 3B\SS is the guy to take a chance on. Thoughts on his hustle aside, he's in the lineup every day. I'd take him over Harper at $300 million.

Agreed. If we're dreaming on a WS then we really need to set our sights higher than James Shields. He shouldn't be in the discussion for this roster, imo.

I don't see anything to love or hate this deal. Even on his best days he was league average-ish. If not for being a former Brewers prospect I don't suppose most anybody would find much to this signing. I guess somebody has to play infield at AAA when Hiura and Dubon are on the MLB roster.

Agreed on the incompetent management decisions

The NFL's product is a joke. It only exists in it's current form because of the popularity of fantasy football. Take away fantasy football and the NFL would've already collapsed like the NHL did. Shared revenues haven't really helped the likes of the Browns, Lions, Redskins, Raiders, Jaguars, Jets or Bengals in the last decade.

So just so I understand this: you're advocating for a system that essentially makes every player a free agent every season and pays them based on a predetermined ranking system? Am I understanding that correctly? If so, I don't see how that changes teams deciding that a particular player isn't worth whatever that scale says he's worth and just declines to hire him. I do think it's an interesting thought; I just don't think that's in the best interest of any of the parties involved. Though, a new fantasy type draft every season might be entertaining I'd change: - drop the schedule to 150 games to provide for additional playoff games/teams or starting the playoffs sooner - maybe you could talk me into a salary floor. Overall, the financial aspects of the game seem ok to me. I feel like it maximizes the potential pay for the individual players and allows teams to "rebuild". - I already don't like the added replay and challenges. Get rid of challenges in favor of a (near) real time video umpire. There's no good reason that can't happen in any professional sport.

This seems more credible than a lot of the nonsense we've seen. I thought I remember Keuchel having some negative comments towards the Brewers bullpen heavy approach during the playoffs last year. Based on that, I'd be surprised if he picked us...assuming we are even involved. That said, I'm sure he could get more on board with our approach real quick if we offered him the most money. Cue up the "But can the Brewers fit him in their very concrete and unmoving budget" posts. In all seriousness, the Brewers are out for value. I am convinced that they have no set player budget, other than the idea of getting the most for their money. I am disappointed they haven't brought in a guy to start at 2B yet, but perhaps the value just hasn't been there yet. If they've truly floated a 3-year offer to Keuchel, it means they see value there. I think there's likely a max to what the ownership is willing to spend on payroll. That said, I don't underestimate the desire for Mark A to do something that hasn't been done in Milwaukee. In the grand scheme of things, what's an extra 15 million or so to become a legend in a state? For right or wrong, I think there's still a level of personal ego $$$, if you want to call it that, that can still be leveraged in the Brewers situation that is available currently that might not be there if they had won a WS (recently..... or ever).

Yeah, the talent would transcend time. I agree, if given today's training and luxuries, the older generation greats would be as good today as they were then. If you're asking, "could Ruth walk straight out of the 1930's and drill a HR off Hader" I seriously doubt it.

1. Bryce Harper - Phillies 2. Manny Machado - White Sox. Antics aside, he's really good, plays every day, and still young. A perfect fit here in my book. 3. A.J. Pollack - San Francisco. A match made in heaven. Aging, injury prone OF with speed. Seems like a SF staple. 4. Dallas Kuechel - Padres 5. Craig Kimbrel - Red Sox. Grandal, type 1-year agreement seems possible. 6. Mike Moustakas - Brewers 7. Marwin Gonzalez - Rangers- I have no idea why. They've got money and watched him play next door the last few years. 8. Gio Gonzalez - Oakland 9. Adam Jones - Indians: This makes so much sense, which means it probably won't happen.- Agreed. 10. Wade Miley - Brewers 11. Jose Iglesias - Twins 12. Josh Harrison - Angels

I'm not sure that the contract makes Greinke a match. I will say that his personality always made me think once he lost his velocity or got a big payday that he would just kind of coast or call it a career. His been quite the opposite of that. He's managed to lose velocity on his fastball just about every year but has managed to perfect his pitching craft to the point where if you just looked at the stats and some peripherals you'd have a hard time distinguishing him now from his decade younger self. I think his performance at least should be solid for the next 3 seasons yet.

Oh man... this could be it's own topic. Agreed on pretty much all the IR stuff. The way it's being used is generally against the spirit of the game, imo. It was intended to "get the call right". Flat out, it hasn't done that. Of all your items listed to me #3 would be at the top of my list. If you're going to use video as an officiating tool, then there should be real time video officials. Add to the crew or take from the current on-field crew. The product is worsened by the constant stoppages in game action. Also would move your #9 up the board. This is another item that has worsened the action and flow of the game. I liked it better when the game just proceeded with what the officials determined on the field. The constant replays of half the plays and dang near stopping the game every series, trying to determine if something is a catch by whatever the NFL standard is has become nauseating. Also could be remedied by real-time video officials. And I agree, it's a catch unless it's clearly not a catch. None of this controlling the ball through the ground BS or did the ball move a fraction of a cm before the player went to the ground. All those things are completely not in the spirit of the game of football. I could probably tolerate the "safety" rules if the rest of the replay stuff was cleaned up (dang it, thanks McCarthy).

By their coach. If Payton runs the ball three times, instead of trying to get cute on first down and throwing and incomplete pass, that doesn't happen. They have the same short field goal, and the Rams get the ball back with less than a minute left and no timeouts. Agreed. There was some pretty good entertainment going on and all most people want to talk about is what calls were missed. Yes, the officiating could always be better; maybe at time it SHOULD be better. I'm just surprised more people don't care about the players and coaches making the MILLIONS of dollars making multiple mistakes throughout the game. It's the American way to blame somebody else though.

Good posts here. Let me say that, imo, there really isn't such a thing as building for the future in the NFL though. The short term deals by draft picks and the nature of the NFL pretty much require them to contribute immediately. I would like to see them put their resources into the defensive side of the ball. I'm not going to take the time to break things down, many of you have already done that. Given the contract of Rodgers, he needs to be relied upon to carry the offense. With him, Adams and Aaron Jones on that side that should be good. The majority of the remaining financial resources need to be allocated to the defensive side. I've hated the idea of needing to try to give your "Hall of Fame" QB more weapons to be successful. He needs to carry the load; unfortunately his salary demands it of him for the team to be successful.

I think the days of 6-10 year contracts is just about dead. I think some of this conversation revolves around the players are being Drastically under-compensated for their first 6 years in the league. I think for the good-great players yes, they are likely under-compensated for 3 of those years. Using Manny Machado as an example. He's made 27 million over the last 2 seasons. Not full market value but not horrible; I guess you could argue maybe he's 15 million short on full market. I have a hard time saying an unproven rookie should make anything other than the league minimum $500,000ish. If I was a player I'd really focus on years 2-4 in the next CBA. There could be some adjustments there based on performance with a capped limit. Maybe the arbitration process starts a year sooner. I don't necessarily think there's a problem with the that system. I think a salary floor might be a better way to get fair contracts to those veteran players entering FA for the 1st time. Many teams now are taking the position of either we're going to try to win a WS or we're not going to try to win. If each team was forced to spend a moderate amount on payroll you'd at least see the better players given fair money. I mean if you're going to be forced to spend some money you may as well get it spent on the best players. I mean in the end I guess it's up to the player to decide if they're getting a fair amount of the pot. I'd argue they're doing fine. I for sure wouldn't base my argument around wanting 5-6 year deals of guaranteed money for non-guaranteed results but I think there's an opportunity to adjust that year 2-4 window where there's a more significant gap. I don't hear any talk of players returning money for poor seasons or injury.

Interesting. Thanks for sharing. "And the numbers were eye-opening: Just about every baseball free agent was being paid more than he was actually worth to his team in terms of the added revenue it would see thanks to extra wins. According to one researcher, Graham Tyler—then an undergrad econ student at Brown, and until recently the Rays’ director of player operations thanks in part to his pioneering studies in this area—teams only earn an extra $1.5 million from each additional win, meaning that a truly rational profit-maximizing owner (more on this in a minute) wouldn’t spend more than $6.75 million a year on a Machado-level talent. Anything more than that, and you’re better off staging a Marlins-style teardown" I'd love to see the study related to this. So, is this saying that the difference to the owner revenue based on mostly park attendance and game day revenue streams for say a 60 win team vs 100 win team is roughly $60 million? I'd like to know what the baseline is that is being used. Are they saying it's 1.5 million per win across the board or at a certain level? I'd have a hard time believing there's any difference in revenue between a 80 win and 85 win team.

I could be talked into a 10 year deal for Machado. As others have said, he's certainly not prime ARod but he's still really good and has rarely missed time. He does come across as a jerk. I'd wager that over the course of the next decade, Machado will be more valuable than Harper.

I'm not really sure there's an issue with money... or they wouldn't have signed Grandal. I think both Anderson and Thames will play in important role this season. I'm not saying don't explore; I just don't think either brings back anything useful. They have more value to the 2019 Brewers than they can get back, especially if they're making a run at a WS.

I could see the Brewers entering the mix on a short term deal similar to Grandal or maybe 2 years. I don't think it's super realistic but they might value Kuechel different than some teams. They don't seem to care as much about velocity and K% as some. He was way more attractive to me a couple years ago putting up ridiculous GB% numbers. He still generates enough now, but the reduced ground balls and K% would have me cautious.

I'd trade Knebel in the right deal. When that curve is working, he's almost unhittable. However, when it's not he doesn't have really anything else to get him through an inning. I'd have to be overwhelmed to trade him on this team for this season. His stuff can dominate the league's best hitters. That's what you need in the playoffs.

There's not a lot of teams that he'd be an upgrade for. His value is his defense and being adequate while being cheap. He's probably more valuable to the Brewers right not than most other clubs. I'd think teams in a similar position to the Brewers this season would have an interest and maybe the Marlins if they intend on trading Realmuto.

Chase Anderson for me as well. He was a bit unlucky and seemingly had his worst moments down the stretch and the team lost confidence in him. Maybe he lost some confidence in himself as well. Woodruff- I'm not sure what his role is going to be but he's going to be good at it. Things really looked like the came together for him late in the season and playoffs. Thames- I think he stays on the roster and offers production both in the 1st and 2nd halves. He has his worts but he can still be a valuable piece. I think he gets enough AB's to deliver 20 HRs coming in some big moments

Agreed on Asdrubal. Not exciting but a FA for less than 10 mil I guess won't be. He fits the needs. If it's not him then, I might switch to a pitcher. I also like Derek Holland and Justin Wilson, though neither of those are clear upgrades.