bill hAll Star

Khris Davis doesn't have as much in the line of stealing bases, but I'd rather have Khris Davis already at this point in his career if you gave me the choice.

Seems like a pretty fair trade. I think Aoki having 1 year left, being a speed guy entering his mid 30s, and already only carrying a .725 OPS and not extremely impressive on defense makes him a modest trade chip...and they got a modest return.

Random aside from that comment: I'm shocked that Boston would want to "shore up" SS, given that MLB Tonight kept telling me that .620 minors OPS guy batting .400 on infield singles for 2 months was a stud and needed to be featured in the lineup.

I'm sorry, that was an incredibly long post. I'm just trying to note that while in general, I would not build like the Brewers have the past 3-4 seasons, I think the Cardinals incredible system is keeping them afloat +5 games for that and +5 more for being on an upswing in their bigger names while the Brewers are a bit down. I think that is why we see all of our warts. We have had such a horrible system over the past few years, bad replacement player decisions, and this season a lot of bad luck with Braun/A-Ram/Hart/Gallardo where I noted the Cards also have money tied up in similar players that are on an uptick. I am not trying to measure some sort of success out of this for the Brewers, rather note that the Cards have done a lot of the same things recently, but they've kept a steady stream from the minors, mostly without selling off MLB pieces or flipping prospect bats for long-term arms. They've been smart about who they've signed in the majors but have a steady stream of great minor league players at all times. That's the major difference.

In your suggestion a while back that we should have gone with more long-term pitching to build around and less free agent-signing (to the principle, I agree, this is how I would build a team), I still feel like unless we had incredible management and luck, we'd be sitting in the Royals' shoes right now given 20/20 hindsight. And I was definitely a guy that didn't like the path we were going down in ~2010 or so when we started putting more chips on the table. I think it has to do with drafting/development: Braun/Holliday A-Ram/Beltran Wainwright/Gallardo Lohse/Westbook and/or Garcia Hart/Furcal Molina/Gomez Motte/Axford Freese/LuCroy Weeks? I am not saying those entities above are equal, but they are similar dollar/year amounts and in several of the cases, if you asked me before 2012 or 2013, they all seemed like somewhat similar entities. Then you have this: -Segura -Aoki vs. -Craig -Jay -Adams -Descalso/Kozma are more helpful than any utility players we have in the system -Carpenter -Rosenthal -Miller -Wacha -Lynn -Lyons in reserve -A lot of other valuable entities I'm not really trying to argue that this has been a good idea, but pre-2013 or in some cases, pre-2012 if you compare a lot of the slashes I put above, there are similarities. 2012: A-Ram out-produced Beltran and is signed through age 36 (2014) where Beltran is signed through 36 (2013). 2012: Braun out-produced Holliday. Holliday is signed through 36 (2017). Braun is signed through 36 (2020). Both contracts could soon be albatrosses with a bit of value from each. 2012: Gallardo pitches to his career norms and is on a fair deal through 29 (2014). Wainwright is coming off Tommy John and has a below-average year after missing the previous season. Wainwright is signed through 2018 at 19.5 per. Gallardo is now heading towards his Tommy John. 2011/2012: Gomez and Molina both are "defensive stalwarts that provide some offensive value" both signed to fair deals and have blown up into MVP candidates at some point in 2012 into 2013. 2013: Hart/Furcal are once valuable, oft-injured players. 2013: Lohse vs. Garcia + Westbrook. The money is equal and given Lohse is slightly better than Westbrook and Garcia has some longstanding injury issues, Lohse + some replacement level pitcher probably evens there. You get the idea from here. The Cardinals ARE a bigger market. The Cardinals are way more intelligent. I'm not suggesting all luck, but: 1. The Cardinals have drafted and developed way better than the Brewers and that is the major difference. 2. The Cardinals are on the upswing (Beltran, Molina, Wainwright) where the Brewers have a downswing (Weeks, Gallardo, Aramis, Braun, Hart) whereas the Cards only have Holliday and Furcal down. To me, the difference is that the Cardinals have drafted and developed way better than the Brewers. That is the major key, because they've been able to provide OK bullpens and tremendous starting pitching depth. They've paid 3 years, 35 million to a mid 30s pitcher (Jake Westbrook) just like we have. Finally, the Brewers have some issues (again this goes back to minors system as well as head-scratching GM-ing) where they are playing horrendous options like Betancourt, where the Cards get replacement guys like Descalso and on an everyday basis they have Craig, Carpenter, etc. My point is that I can't think of the Cardinals making many more long-term investments in pitchers via trade recently. Or if they did, it was a while ago and they unearthed Wainwright out of unexpected territory. The difference from 2011 until now is that the Cardinals have had a steady stream of replacements, where the Brewers have had incredibly negative value players outside of both teams' top 5 or 6 player core costing $60 million. I think both GMs have proceeded similarly since 2011, however, the Cards have had a much better farm system. The only blame is that you could say that Melvin should have known that coming into one or both of the last 2 seasons. However, I do think that the farm system was such garbage that I'm not sure it could have been remedied, and I think the Brewers have had the absolute worst-case scenario this year. I think if healthy and productive (meaning no Yuni), they are hovering around .500. I'm not asking for a consolation prize, but the warts of this style would not be so present, and the current situation wouldn't be so depressing.

Leyland seems to fail at playing the splits sometimes and really likes the idea of "a closer" (since I is such a different art). Coke for some reason couldn't "understand the role" when tasked with a bunch of righties so they eventually went to Valverde who isn't great anymore, but he's "a closer." Long story short, this seems like a situation to take advantage of.

LA can't be too happy right now with his average fastball at 90.7. Kind of expected, I guess.

Martin is cooling back to normal numbers. His OPS is at his career numbers but he's slugging higher than he has since his 2nd season in the bigs. Give him another month and he'll be back down to .240/.340/.400 on the season. He had a .900+ OPS opening month and has been back down in the .650s the last month and a half. His slugging will probably drop even further, probably somewhere in between .340 and .400 as I would say PNC/NL Central fits right in between Dodger/NL West (.340) and Yankee/AL East(.400) effects on his slugging. As for Liriano, I would have preferred him over Lohse (especially in Miller Park where I want to miss bats) but he will obviously cool a bit as well. That goes without saying but we'll see if he's just in one of his 5 game dominant streaks or he has really figured out how to control all of his pitches.

Exactly how I'd describe guys drafted in the 5th round or later who became impact players in the majors. We're talking about the 7th round here. Guys like Allan Craig and Khris Davis are nice, but they are also very limited defensively and to an extent defensive liabilities. You can load up on those guys in the draft but someone has to play CF and those guys can't. Guys with speed and a strong arm (like Garcia) who have plus range in CF can save almost as many runs as guys like Craig and Davis can create with their bat. I can't tell you how many times I've been wowed by Gomez's ability to track down balls in the OF that I did not think would be caught. The best thing you can do for pitching is to put plus defenders in premium defensive positions (CF, SS, C) behind them. If Garcia can develop into a backup OF/defensive replacement/pinch-runner at the major league level, that's a win for a 7th round pick. I can buy a defensive specialist for 500K and a bag of balls. I'd have to actually trade something for Allen Craig. Guys with plus speed and arm are always available (unless they are absolutely elite at it) but hitters, even decent corner hitters, are very hard to come by.

I'm not sure what you're saying here but I'm saying that guys like Garcia don't project to be plus hitters no matter how much speed they have. It's like drafting a really small PG or undersized PF in the NBA. Not completely apples to apples in this comparison but it's really hard to "teach" what they'll need to become everyday starting, impact players. There's an Iverson or Barkley in those haystacks but you normally end up with guys that just aren't big or strong enough to put up productive numbers in the pros. I'd rather draft a 6'8" small forward that doesn't have the strength or touch on his shot yet. Maybe drafting a tiny guard gets you a useful one-tool guy like Nate Robinson (bulk, sometimes inefficient scorer) but it's almost impossible to become a complete player or guy that is VERY good at a useful tool.

Needles in the haystack. Almost all of these guys end up being offensive liabilities. By power, it doesn't even have to be a guy with 15-20 HR potential. Hitting 5-10 with a bunch of gappers is alright. I feel like the benchmark is to be able to slug .400 in the majors. If you can't do that, you had better be a track star with pinpoint bat control (which probably gets you up to .400 anyways). That "hit tool" that was dominating the minors suddenly turns into .270/.315/.345/.660 in the majors when the pitchers throw right at you and defenses move in. Moreover, if I'm drafting these guys, I'd like to be playing in Petco Park or San Francisco. These guys have a bit more value there. I'd rather use all my picks drafting guys that have a projectable bat and size. Taking a needle in the haystack HoF projection out of the equation, guys like Omar Garcia project to Ben Revere or Nyjer Morgan. Brett Gardner and Bourn are the "home run" (no pun intended) projection. I'd rather draft a guy like Allen Craig in these rounds. Somebody that has a bat that projects to the majors. We have Khris Davis for that but unfortunately, that's about all we have and he's a decent impact bat. I'd like to load my minor league system with guys that could be that. Some miss and never pass AA. Some turn into Craig. A few needles turn into perennial All Stars. That's a better alternative than using picks on guys that have a very likely "best case" as turning into Ben Revere, a defensive guy with no bat.

I've always proposed that they should abolish the "batting average" stat. Is it a bad stat? No, not a chance. However, it misleads most fans. I want wOBA or whatever stat or if I'm doing a quick and dirty search, OPS is obviously good. Average is good in the sense that if I have a great-hitting corner OF, the bonus is that he's a batting average guy. Of course, 90% of this board knows that. However, a general fanbase gets taken for a ride and can't judge players correctly because they just follow the "batting title race" all season and get excited about Gennett because Rock tells them "he's hitting .310 in the minors" every night.

Fair enough. I think we agree. Time to sell. Build around the new core.

This isn't the same as the 2010 time period where we had Braun in his mid/late 20s, Fielder for a few more years, and a fairly young core. Of course we should trade Aoki, he's 31 and a speed-based player. We signed Hart, Weeks, Gallardo in the 2009/2010 timeframe because Hart approached us for a fairly friendly contract, Gallardo's contract ate up his last few arby years, and Weeks looked like tremendous value and he finally "got it" in his mid/late 20s. We also had a reasonable core then. Today's team is different. We are getting older and we are terrible with no farm system. Of course we should trade Aoki and really any of the other veterans but it isn't because of "lessons learned" from 2009-2012.

3 and 2 fastball is wearing some awesome hindsight 20/20 glasses on Gallardo, Weeks, Axford, and Hart. "We should have sold high on all of the guys that have recently fallen apart or gotten injured. Then we should have used that to sign that massive contract that every expert thought was a MASSIVE risk that looks like it has worked 1.5 years into the 9."

That was what I was saying a few pages back. I think, yes, Fielder for a young prospect or Cain (who would be gone now) and/or trading Lawrie, LaPorta, etc. for guys with more service time doesn't guarantee we would have been as good or would have anything coming through. Say we had gotten Minor for Lawrie. Would our team plus Mike Minor be better right now? The Lawrie trade is the only one you can "subtract" from 2011 and have it be pretty similar, though who knows how well we'd have filled out that rotation. Trust me, I am one that wants to build through the minors and get guys with service time, but I think that even if we had made some shrewd trades for pitching, unless every single one panned out, we'd still be sitting in mediocrity right now. As much as they could have evaluated and attracted some young talent in their trades, Melvin has nailed his MLB trades, giving us a few years of fun success. The minor league system has been so barren, I'm not sure that even if Doug nailed 2 trades for younger pitching prospects would be that much different. We are getting absolutely nothing out of our own drafting and foreign signings (other than Aoki).

Yeah, quoted the wrong post sorry.

That's not true, I think the posters with the most experience on here would be able to tab him as not a starter almost immediately. Nobody on here is an actual scout, but if you're a fan or speculator, shouldn't you be making logical guesses on these guys? If he somehow carves out an Eckstein or Counsell career, more power to him, but that is such a tough thing to do. I don't think the most experienced Marlins fans had a "wait and see" attitude on their season before its started in terms of World Series potential. I think people are just trying to reign in the expectations that the general crowd at the game has about guys like Tony Gwynn Jr. and Gennett. People fall in love with a slappy .300 hitter that "puts the ball in play" and when Hunt calls him "can't miss" one has to put out the realistic expectations. I know that many on here may know the reality of it, but nobody is calling Logan Schafer a "can't miss" prospect because he is correctly tabbed as a 4th OF that could develop into a nice starter. I guess it just brings a little reaction when Hunt and the general fan fall overly in love with slap hitters with a cool name like Gennett or Gwynn, Jr. Batting average isn't necessarily a "throw-away" stat, but talking about how he's hitting .300 in the minors all the time on the broadcasts throws off a lot of people that don't understand it can be a misleading stat.

Sorry, I guess I called him a utility guy in terms of his bat. And while you say that people can see into future crystal balls, it is equally annoying when those people are laughed off as crass nerds trying to downplay a call-up or a kid on a hot streak. There's a reason that the projections are what they are. For every time that somebody was wrong about Pedroia or Zobrist exceeding their expectations, they hit on 100 of the other projections. There's a reason that these projections exist. I'm not rooting against the guy, and as fans, we have minimal to no control on Doug deciding that he's our future. However, I think it's nice to have these projections to set expectations for these guys. We'll be pleasantly surprised if he exceeds them.

You have no clue if he is eventually going to be a utility man or a regular starter in the Majors. No clue at all. How about we let him play some in the Majors before we act like we know what he will do. Hunt called him "can't miss" which should be reserved for guys that, you know, are projected to be good players. All indications show that he's going to be a light hitting slap hitter with modest speed. Could he develop? Sure (unlikely), but the joke was about Hunt calling that "can't miss."

One of the most can't miss utility men out there.

If fans are showing up thinking Gennett is the future, the franchise is in some real trouble if he really is their future.

It's not good, but I'd bank on Rickie recovering to a .750 OPS to finish the season than I ever would expect to see better production out of Gennett. I'm fine with the move short-term because the platoon game is a good idea in today's MLB but I'm not expecting Gennett to hit very well. Maybe better than Weeks currently is, but marginally. So, meh.

Not a good hitter? How so? He had a .740 OPS in the minors. That's around the land of Darwin Barney and Chris Getz. If you want a "good" hitting 2B, you'll see .900 minors OPS. That's Kendrick, Altuve, etc.

I could see a .710 OPS or something if he's in a full platoon with Weeks. Nothing that's going to bring the Brewers back since Gennett is not a very good hitter but he'll do alright against righties. I do like that they are playing the modern platoon game.