kramnoj

Right, but when the option is to move Hart to a position that he hasn't played since he was a teenager You may be going for some hyperbole, but this isn't true. He did play in 48 games at 1B at age 20 and has played a few games in the minors since then, most recently in 2006. He even started a game there in the majors in 2006. It will be interesting to see how Gamel and Lawrie perform at their other positions. If Lawrie can play 3B and Gamel can play RF, then go ahead and move Hart to 1B. Casey can be a bench player until he gets too expensive, or until he gets replaced by better options.

Probably to most teams, but I think we could get similar value for those 3 years from a cheaper, cost controlled player who isn't a mental breakdown away from swinging at 55' sliders again. It's easy to say could. Which specific player would this be. and what would you do with the money saved? The Brewers don't have anyone ready to replace Hart, and they aren't going to be hurting for money over the next few years either. This may not be the most efficient use of money, but I think it is a reasonable way to use the resources available to the Brewers.

As someone repeatedly said here, actions speak louder than words. Hart wanted to stay, and he did. He just wasn't going to sign for less than he believed he was worth. Assuming Prince isn't going to stay, and I don't know anyone who thinks he will, the Brewers will have money to afford Hart and retain all their current players, plus have some money to spend on free agents. And given that it's a three year extension, he will be a free agent again when most of the young talent that will be on the team will be in the arbitration years, or before.

17 Martin Perez LHP 42 Tanner Scheppers RHP Those are two players in the Rangers system as ranked by Baseball America. I don't know enough to have a strong opinion on what else should be included in an offer.

Our "first group" of young talent came along just before the trend of locking guys up early. That started with Braun, Tulo, Longoria, etc. John Hart did this with the Indians in the 90s. Here is a good article discussing the practice: http://www.usatoday.com/s...oversial-contracts_N.htm The Brewers didn't miss out on this. They offered it to Hart and Fielder, and they declined. There would have been no benefit to doing it with Weeks. They did it with Sheets, and then declined to offer him another deal.

Yes, and you were trusting a tweet as evidence of the stupid logic. Serious reporting isn't done in a tweet. We don't know how accurate Rosenthal is with this. Did he get this from Melvin? From Ash? From some dude in marketing who overheard 10 seconds of conversation in the cafeteria? Or is this something that has made it through the sportswriter grapevine, and it's been distorted each time it went along? Even if it's accurate that the Brewers will use the next two games as evidence, we don't know how it will affect the team's decisions. Will Melvin really turn down a great deal for Fielder or Hart just because the Brewers won two games? Or will it more likely have an affect on lesser players like Bush and Edmonds? If the Brewers are only 6 GB in a couple days, maybe it's worth it to keep those players and see what happens rather than giving them away for a prospect that won't probably pan out.

You can call it stupid logic, with the Brewers being 8 GB right now. But the Rockies were 8 GB this time last year and made the playoffs. Now I don't want to repeat what the Mets did by trading away Kazmir for a veteran pitcher who was probably inferior to Kazmir at the time of the trade. But the Brewers don't have to trade their best players now. The only players they are losing this year are Bush and Edmonds, and we're not missing out on much by not giving them away. I don't have a hard time seeing the Brewers passing the Reds. It's much tougher to see them passing the Cardinals, but if the Brewers aren't happy with any offers for Hart and Fielder, there's no reason to trade them just to trade them and toss in the towel.

Don't know if this deserves a new thread, or an amended title, but I saw a recent listing of RSN ratings and thought it would be interesting to see the difference a year makes. Brewers still rank high relative to other teams, at number 8, but have dropped about 27% from last year. MLB TEAMS’ RSN Ratings (ranked by avg. rating) Team RSN Avg. rating (change) Avg. no. of HHs (change) St. Louis Cardinals FS Midwest 9.70 (+41.6%) 121,197 (+41.6%) Minnesota Twins FS North 7.85 (+26.4%) 135,966 (+26.5%) Philadelphia Phillies CSN Philadelphia 7.20 (+16.5%) 212,774 (+16.7%) Cincinnati Reds FS Ohio 6.52 (+48.9%) 59,897 (+49.4%) Boston Red Sox NESN 6.25 (-35.8%) 150,636 (-35.8%) Detroit Tigers FS Detroit 6.23 (-1.9%) 117,761 (-3.8%) Tampa Bay Rays FS Florida 5.52 (+70.9%) 99,681 (+69.4%) Milwaukee Brewers FS Wisconsin 5.20 (-26.9%) 46,893 (-27.2%) Colorado Rockies FSN Rocky Mountain 4.88 (+55.9%) 75,122 (+57.5%) Seattle Mariners FSN Northwest 4.83 (-15.6%) 88,582 (-14.9%) San Diego Padres Cox/SD4 4.79 (+14.6%) 51,415 (+15.3%) New York Yankees YES 4.38 (-5.4%) 328,217 (-4.6%) Atlanta Braves* SportSouth 3.66 (+16.2%) 87,383 (+17.1%) San Francisco Giants CSN Bay Area 3.48 (+10.1%) 87,118 (+11.3%) Pittsburgh Pirates FSN Pittsburgh 3.44 (+5.8%) 39,730 (+5.7%) New York Mets SportsNet New York 3.25 (+1.9%) 243,540 (+2.7%) Cleveland Indians SportsTime Ohio 3.13 (-4.9%) 47,599 (-5.1%) Baltimore Orioles MASN/MASN2 3.06 (+10.5%) 33,451 (+9.6%) Florida Marlins FS Florida 3.05 (-12.1%) 46,912 (-12.6%) Arizona Diamondbacks FS Arizona 2.96 (-12.4%) 55,468 (-11.6%) Kansas City Royals FS Kansas City 2.82 (-22.1%) 26,546 (-21.8%) Chicago Cubs CSN Chicago 2.71 (-39.1%) 94,877 (-39.0%) Texas Rangers FS Southwest 2.66 (+1.9%) 67,681 (+4.1%) Houston Astros FS Houston 2.46 (-19.6%) 52,237 (-18.9%) Chicago White Sox CSN Chicago 1.85 (-18.9%) 64,769 (-18.7%) Los Angeles Dodgers FS Prime Ticket 1.63 (-17.3%) 92,244 (-17.2%) Washington Nationals MASN/MASN2 1.34 (+139.3%) 31,290 (+140.7%) Los Angeles Angels FS West 1.23 (+11.8%) 69,608 (+11.9%) Oakland A’s CSN California 1.23 (+46.4%) 30,792 (+48.0%) * Braves broadcasts are split by SportSouth and FS South. The FS South coverage has a 4.09 average rating (up 8.2 percent) with an average of 97,650 households tuning in (up 9 percent). Notes: Comparable data for the Toronto Blue Jays was unavailable. Ratings listed are for games played through the Sunday prior to the All-Star break compared with the same time period last season. Source: SportsBusiness Journal analysis of Nielsen Media Research data from http://www.sportsbusinessjournal.com/article/66312

Thank you for the response. Smoak and LaPorta can be looked at the same. If you have the best FA to be pitcher, and you trade him in early July, you will get a top 15 prospect as the centerpiece. The rest of the deal won't be super-attractive, but you will get one top prospect back. Halladay's haul was two top 30 picks and one at 81 and he has been in the elite of of pitchers over the last few years. We have the Dodgers involved in two trades where they gave up good prospects. And a couple of trades where players not in the top 50 are involved. I could easily be wrong, but IMO a player not in the top 50 isn't a top, top prospect, and the Brewers would not improve all that much by getting one or two when they could possibly get that talent in draft picks by letting a player walk.

I think the deal they made wasn't smart, I think Macha does dumb things like all managers, and add me to the long, long line that recognizes that the JS beat reporters aren't anything to write home You don't just offer your opinion, you insult the individuals. Most here don't go that far. Why do you? If you could elaborate on the budgetary constraints of the DBacks, I'd appreciate it. If you haven't taken the time to consider this, why are you in such a rush to insult the front office and the decisions they have to make? While the stated attendance is down only slightly from last season, there are reports from Dbacks fans at bbtf that many people aren't showing up to the game. If parking and concession is down, the team team needs to adjust their budget. And if people with tickets already paid for aren't being used this year, chances are that those people won't pay for tickets next year, so that budget needs to be adjusted as well. Corporate sponsorships and suite sales could be down because of the hard hit economy in Phoenix. Keeping Haren until the offseason would have yeilded a better return than this one, and would have been a good investment. This is stated far too definitively. You have your confidence that Haren will regress to the mean, but this isn't just a recent thing. Per the splits at bref, over the last 50 games, Haren is a 4.61 ERA pitcher. This year, it's a 4.6 ERA in 21 games. At bbtf, it was said that Haren wasn't a good 2nd half pitcher. I looked at bref to see how much was true and how much was opinion, and in his career, his ERA is almost a run higher in the second half. Now, that is far from predictive, but if Haren has a history of being better in the 1st half and fading in the second half, and he's already struggling in the first half this year, the Dbacks may not have wanted to wait on statistical regression to the mean, when they had a trade that they could make now. The market this offseason would have potentially been huge on Haren, since there are so few top-level arms on the FA market (given that Lee is all but assured to be a Yankee). This is only true if Haren doesn't limit the teams he would be traded to.

I really don't know where you come up with me having an incessant need to call baseball people stupid You don't? You called the Diamondbacks vapid, you said Macha isn't smart, you are constantly ripping on the Journal staff. Clearly, given DBacks' interim GM Jerry Dipoto's comments, the move was largely driven by the fact that Saunders's W% is good -- that he's a "winner". The problem there is actually believing what front office people say. It has to be understood as PR or gamesmanship first, logical statements second. Maybe "deal that many organizations could've beaten" would be more appropriate. That only matters if Haren would accept a trade to those other organizations. If he didn't, and the Dbacks needed to clear some salary, they traded away their most expensive, most valuable asset for the best that they could. Since you don't know the budgetary constraints of the Dbacks, you need to defend calling them vapid.

I clearly lost track of what this topic is supposed to be, but the Diamondbacks could flip Saunders if they want to. Back to the point of the topic, how many top prospects have been traded recently? I could be wrong, but it seems like most times a player gets traded, people talk about how weak the return is. I wonder if our perceptions of trades needs to change. And if that is true, I don't think we should expect a huge return that people are hoping for with Prince.

Derek Lowe got that money as a 36 year old before last year. Now, that's certainly a cautionary tale of why it's not good to do such a thing, but there were multiple teams that bid up Lowe's price. As with anything in the market, it will be supply and demand that decide their contracts. Age will be a secondary factor.

I really hate that kind of knee-jerk, reactionary stuff. Excellent point. The DBacks gave Haren away for a crap deal. You don't think is reactionary and knee-jerk? How much do you know about the Diamondbacks budget? How confident are you that Haren over the last year is really a fluke, and not closer to his future performance level? Haren in his last 50 starts is a 4.53 ERA pitcher who gives up a HR a game. He is still striking people out, and his k/bb ratio is outstanding, but that isn't keeping the score down. The Diamondbacks aren't going to contend for the next couple of years. They got 2 major league arms back, a young pitcher, and a player drafted a year ago. And the best part about trading for a player drafted a year ago is that the other team paid the signing bonus. They didn't get a lot back, but it could turn out to be a good trade, and they saved some money. Given the NTC, they didn't have access to shop this around and get the absolute best talent available. Calling the front office vapid is just more of your incessant need to call baseball people stupid.

Cot's is the best baseball contract site: http://mlbcontracts.blogs...1/milwaukee-brewers.html I'm no expert on arbitration, but if the Brewers bring everybody that is currently under contract for next year or in arbitration, I see the Brewers at about $60M for next year. That is imprecise, I could easily be off a few mil. So if the upper limit of payroll is around $90M, the Brewers could have up to $30M to spend this offseason, even keeping Prince and Hart. But there's not that much in pitching that will be available. I think most people would assume Cliff Lee goes to the Yankees. After that there is Javy Vazquez and Ted Lilly. Each of them could easily get 3-4 years at $10-15Mil. Or the Brewers could try to trade offense and sign offense with Werth or other options.

Therefore, in my opinion, trading Edmonds only to have Gomez prove his knuckleheadedness on a full-time basis only hurts the Brewers in the short term and does nothing for the long term. Nothing is too strong. Nothing is what at least one person said came back to the Brewers when Gross was traded. That nothing made the majors last year. If any contender wants to take Edmonds and offer the Brewers a lottery ticket, the Brewers should do it.

Hawkins could be back this week. I really don't know what the Brewers are going to do to make a spot for him. Villenueva has only had 5 apperances in July. I thought he might be an option to go down, but I thought there was discussion that he would have to clear through revocable waivers first. One option would be for Bush to be traded this week, and then Hawkins could be called up to replace him. We might as well trade him, but I'm not really aware of a market for him. I think the best option for him to be traded is to be packaged with Fielder so that he is the White Sox 5th starter with Hudson+ coming back. I just don't know how likely that is. Braddock could be sent down. That is the easiest thing to do, but he has pitched well, so that really doesn't support the message that players will create their own playing time. The Brewers could try to trade away Riske. Heck, they could just give him away. He's going to be gone, and the Brewers are going to need to clear another spot whenever Davis is ready to return. So, predictions, expectations, hopes? What do you think is going to happen, what do you think will happen?

Everyone is acting like these guys are going to be free agents and they need to be moved now because they will be gone in two months. Everyone? How many exactly are doing this? I think there's a couple of reasons people are excited to talk about these players being traded. It's been a year or so of frustrating baseball, and people want to have something good happen. But some of these people don't want the good thing to be the Brewers winning right now, because they know that Prince will be gone at some point, and indications are that Hart and the Brewers won't come to an agreement. So rather than lose them for potentially nothing at worst, or lower draft picks than were assumed, or even just getting draft picks when the could have been traded for better players, some want to strike while the iron is hot. If we are going to rebuild, or reload, then it's understandable to want to make the transition happen sooner and get on to anticipating building the next run at the playoffs and beyond. The waiting is the hardest part.

It is uncommon to have a high OBP without lots of power, but it can be done. Brett Butler's career OBP was higher than his slugging. Butler isn't that close of a comp, just noting that it's possible.

Was a good game to go to. Was worried when the Crew was down 5-1. Biggest applause, of course, was when there was a message on the board welcoming back Uecker and the camera went to him and he took a couple of bows. Very nice moment. It's amazing to me how popular Counsell continues to be. The second biggest applause went when he came in to pinch hit. Hopefully Hart just has some swelling and won't miss much time. He stayed in for the rest of the inning, so with luck, it's not too bad.

Just in case anyone is using this thread to follow Suppan, it isn't a surprise that Suppan's previous start, a team win against the Dodger's, wasn't posted here. 6 IP, 5 hits, 1 each of ER, BB and SO.

McGehee isn't a decent DH for any team Do you not know this isn't true? Or is it that you are incapable of, or unwilling, to write things that aren't so definitive? Casey would have been an upgrade for DH for the Rays this year, a team that is currently in position to make the playoffs.

I guarantee you that many here would trade the current active man roster in it's entirety for the Top 20 through Top 45 prospects from Baseball America. How many is many, and how are you going to back up this guarantee? That's just silly. What was Carlos Gomez' peak on this list a few years back? 52, before 2008.

Is it worth more to Milwaukee to keep him on the staff as a closer for the remainder of his contract (the specs of which I don't have) The Brewers will have Axford for at least 5 years beyond this one. Looking at service time, the Brewers may even get another year. He had 28 days of service time coming into this season, and was in the minors until May 14th this year. I don't know what it would take to give up Axford. Is there a team desperate enough for a bullpen arm that they will give up a good SP candidate? Sure, if the Red Sox felt the need to give away one of their AA SP that is ranked by BA, I would probably do it.

Him taking a pitching spot on this team cost the Brewers games. The statement was that Suppan's failures put the Brewers in this situation. Suppan doesn't have any control over how he's used. At this point, Suppan's ERA+ isn't significantly worse than Narveson.