bill hAll Star

You would think our manager would realize this, but apparently he does not. I do think the manager and GM get this. I know there was the Stearns quote, but they're aware. This was similar with Jennings last year. His stats skyrocketed because he'd be used as a garbage man or just be kept in after blowing a lead. And again, a large chunk to open this season had too shallow of a bullpen. There have been a lot of times that Claudio has come in against a power lefty with a righty behind him and a lefty after that. He then retires the lefty (or even if he doesn't). Hader's unavailable. So what do you do? Do you pull Claudio right away and go to...Matt Albers who then will get pummeled by the lefty afterwards? Or do you just pray that Claudio gets the middle righty (or two) out in between and then can give you an advantage again against the lefty? The lack of Jeffress and Knebel early in the year moved Claudio from option 4 or 5 that can be deployed situationally to option 2b, with 2a being Guerra. If Claudio doesn't get the first lefty out, you can't bring in Knebel with confidence of getting anyone out past said lefty. You now have to keep Claudio in and pray he gets a righty or two out to get to the next lefty. If not, you are going off the edge of a cliff.

If they used Claudio like he is actually a left handed reliever they wouldn't have a problem. He is great against lefties...however they like to think he is more than what he is. This is due to the Knebel/Jeffress injuries among other things. At certain points, Claudio has been our #2 or #3 pecking order guy and it's not like we have matchup specialists to take some of the RH load off of him if we're trying to get through the meat of the order. There have been many points early in the season when it's, "alright, we've got Bellinger, a righty, then Muncy" or something like that and they just leave Claudio in for the whole thing. Claudio is not great against righties but he's not a ton worse than Albers or Taylor Williams that were available on those days. Once they get bullpen depth, Claudio will be a LOOGY + a handful of ABs against righties to get through to the next lefty. Yes, yes, before you get out the LH/RH splits on Claudio, I see the .900 OPS against RHB. There are certain cases where the lead/deficit means keeping him in and accepting some of the damage against him.

I think that IL stints + options (Shaw) will probably just have to carry us for 3 more months with Shaw, Thames, Aguilar. Once in September, we can obviously carry them all with this being the final year of the huge September rosters. Odds are that the Thames option is declined and potentially one of the other two are non-tendered, but with Mous not being a certainty to come back, you want Shaw as a potential 3B stopgap next year if you think something is there. Depending on how the rest of that goes, you have the option of Shaw, Thames, or Aguilar all for similar prices, Aguilar maybe being the cheapest.

I thought it was a weird move at the time it happened. I can go dig up a link if you'd like. That's fine and good foresight on your part. There is nothing wrong with wanting to keep a league average swing pitcher for $2.5 million or whatever it would've been. These topics and consensus, "head-scratcher" are popping up because he's had a lucky start to the year and is putting up All-Star numbers. Again, maybe you're the one that saw it but I'd guess you or I 9 of the other 10 times we've said, "wow I'd have kept him for that" about a player would end up in the player being average or worse. I will give you this: If the Brewers helped foster this change, then they should've held on. But it was probably a roster crunch issue pre-injuries. https://fantasy.fangraphs.com/on-jordan-lyles-breakout/

1. Lyles is having an extremely lucky season. He's a nice player that I'd have been fine bringing back but he's barely better than the journeyman that he has been the last handful of years right now. BABIP, strand rate, HR/FB% are all well below career averages. 2. Hindsight is not just 20/20 here, it's 20/40.

So...should he be DFA'ed yet?

I agree with most of this and will add 2 things: 1. You mentioned it but "much tougher league" is very important. I'm not firing everyone/quitting whatever plan I have if the Brewers only win 84 games this year. The NL happens to be very competitive right now and with the way baseball is, I'm not holding it against them unless there was some extremely stupid stuff happening in the front office. Now if it happens for a few years then you have to change course. Of course that's the downside of thinking you're in a contention window. You could be wrong and blow 2-3 years finding out. 2. Piggybacking off of #1, I know that Stearns has made some bad moves in his tenure and some think that it is causing some of the struggles this year, but I trust his process. So while we are thin in some areas, I think he will find a way to right the ship if this year is underwhelming. Having some urgency to open up the checkbook a little bit from Mark doesn't hurt.

On top of that, we're very close to the light at the end of the tunnel. In terms of the contract on the books, this year is already paid out unless you think that Braun's salary will inhibit a midseason acquisition. Next year it goes down and is the final guaranteed year. Then a buyout year, which will be interesting. I can't imagine he's worth anywhere near $15 million, but $4 of it is already a sunk cost in the buyout and Mark will probably fear the optics of buying out Braun. The optics? Even the casual fan can see his performance declining significantly. I think the optics of paying a net $11M to burn a roster spot on a replacement level player would be much worse. 2020 is his last year as a Brewer, IMO. Barring some sort of amazing late career resurgence, no way is his 2021 option getting picked up. I assumed the chances were over 100% that someone would comment on that part. I may not have made it too clear, I think we'll decline the option but I do think Mark may think twice about it. Mark picked up a similar option on Aramis Ramirez in 2015 where the choice was, $4 million on nothing or $16 million on an aging starter who was on the decline in the previous season. If the farm system is not fruitful and we're in our last "going for it" year and Braun hasn't fallen off a cliff, you never know.

Why would he do this though? He already made a deal to pay him his worth further down the road. It’d take paying him even more money to do this. On top of that, we're very close to the light at the end of the tunnel. In terms of the contract on the books, this year is already paid out unless you think that Braun's salary will inhibit a midseason acquisition. Next year it goes down and is the final guaranteed year. Then a buyout year, which will be interesting. I can't imagine he's worth anywhere near $15 million, but $4 of it is already a sunk cost in the buyout and Mark will probably fear the optics of buying out Braun.

Greene seems to be pitching somewhat better, but right now most of the stats point to a ton of luck being the difference in his stats between this year and last year.

Well the funny thing is that person was still wrong. I get that he's probably of rotational OF quality these days instead of an everday caliber starter/stud...but he ended up being fine last year and given context shouldn't have been DFA'ed. I also get that we're paying for past production with him and many questioned the extension as it was as well as not shipping him off in the Puig/McCarthy deal. OK, all of that said, he's off to a similar start as last year. Let's see if he finishes as a ~1.5 WAR guy again once the hard hit balls find grass. Domingo Santana lit the first few weeks on fire but is playing bad defense and regressing. Of course if I was given the option of having Domingo's first month vs. Braun's, I'd take Domingo...but there's a pretty good chance that they end up finishing with similar seasons outside of Braun maybe having to sit a few more times. Nuance taken into account, yes it hurts Joe Casual fan to see, "arggg this guy is making $18 million and this guy is making $3 million" but we all know that every team is going to have a few good contracts and a few bad ones. Braun is basically the only bad one outside of Albers' little contract and maybe Chase Anderson depending on how one thinks he finishes the year. It is what it is and all things considered, there's a good chance he's about on par with Domingo Santana this year. I'd bet if you took the time to look the top 15 payrolls in baseball, you'll find maybe one or two who have more wasted money in their payroll. I think Anderson's worth his deal...if you take a more negative view, he's got a little negative value. Albers is getting paid 2.5 I think? And your one bad contract is arguably your franchise best hitter who's nearing the end of his deal. It's not like we've got Chris Davis on our payroll. I'm assuming you mean "one or two who have less wasted on their payroll?

Well the funny thing is that person was still wrong. No, the real funny thing is the poster wasn't wrong. The poster never said Braun should be DFA when the post was made. It was at what point would Braun be DFA. Certainly a fair question now, if Braun plays this way all year, is he gone after the season? Maybe. I remember how horrible it was when I was a kid in 1987 seeing Cecil Cooper on the team and not getting any playing time the last two months of his career. At some point the Brewers will have to let go. I may have read it wrong. "DFAed last year" meaning "we should've DFAed him last year." I recall the thread and there were several people asking to DFA him last year. However, I think the poster meant, "the thread about DFAing him was started last year." In that case, sure. Could happen this year or next but I doubt it. They'll just give him a fake injury if he really looks like he's done later this year or early next year.

Well the funny thing is that person was still wrong. I get that he's probably of rotational OF quality these days instead of an everday caliber starter/stud...but he ended up being fine last year and given context shouldn't have been DFA'ed. I also get that we're paying for past production with him and many questioned the extension as it was as well as not shipping him off in the Puig/McCarthy deal. OK, all of that said, he's off to a similar start as last year. Let's see if he finishes as a ~1.5 WAR guy again once the hard hit balls find grass. Domingo Santana lit the first few weeks on fire but is playing bad defense and regressing. Of course if I was given the option of having Domingo's first month vs. Braun's, I'd take Domingo...but there's a pretty good chance that they end up finishing with similar seasons outside of Braun maybe having to sit a few more times. Nuance taken into account, yes it hurts Joe Casual fan to see, "arggg this guy is making $18 million and this guy is making $3 million" but we all know that every team is going to have a few good contracts and a few bad ones. Braun is basically the only bad one outside of Albers' little contract and maybe Chase Anderson depending on how one thinks he finishes the year. It is what it is and all things considered, there's a good chance he's about on par with Domingo Santana this year.

How do the hard hit stats and things like that look? Last year all those things were still positive to give hope or that he was getting unlucky. Eyeball test this year, that does not seem to be the case. Of course some here and there, but that happens to everyone. For the most part I think his biggest flaw is pitch recognition, flailing at stuff way out of the zone, not getting walks, etc. Basically the same on hard%, LD%, soft% as last year's profile finished. He's putting the ball in the air more and also pulling it more so far. Not sure what to make of that other than maybe he's able to be shifted easier.

I'm not sure if that's true. Teams that have the best analytic minds in the game are signing all home run hitting mashers. Now, that's not to say that they shouldn't have Cains guys like that in there, but launch angle + hitting the home run is still tied to winning in the minds of most GMs. However, the point is that entire teams are mashing the heck out of the ball over the fence. Jarrod Dyson and Tommy La Stella are matching entire seasons worth of home run totals in the first 2 weeks. I'm not sure those guys are trying to hit home runs and I'm not sure Jay Bruce is trying any harder than last year yet he is having a much easier time getting the ball over the fence this year. It has only been a short period, but the home run totals are at 2017 levels (they went back down in 2018).

Something up with the balls again? I'm not sure if they ever un-juiced them but we've got a few weeks going here with HR numbers higher than that spike in 2017.

Schoop yes. Gio, not really. I think the $250K in international slot money lessens the KJ Harrison part of the deal. Lara = no value. The Orioles have Villar for just under $5 million this year with an option for likely $7-8 million next year with arby. The Brewers have Moustakas for $10 million (some of it pushed off to next year) with Hiura waiting in the wings. Ortiz is nothing to me, Carmona - we'll see. Point being, the Brewers were probably going to non-tender Villar and they got to try a different flawed 2B/SS out to see if they'd want to tender him for a high price tag the following year. If all else failed, the money from Villar/Schoop could be used to buy a likely upgrade. I don't care how great of empty stats Villar puts up this year, the Brewers didn't seem to trust him and he wasn't coming back.

Given that this goes into place basically with 1 year left in the CBA, I'm guessing the compromise may be a change to the rules where guys like Eloy and Kris Bryant go down to the minors for a month to start the year when they hit that negotiation (maybe?)

So does this mean, that if the Brewers have a 2 weeks stretch with 4 off-days and decide to go with 14 hitters and 12 pitchers, that Milwaukee can then reclassify Hernan Perez as a pitcher? And if Hernan is then a pitcher, do we now have rules that indicate he can no longer play IF/OF for those games where he is listed as pitcher on the roster? Looks like per the press release: You can bring a position player into pitch if down by more than 6. You have to define a guy before the season. The only way a guy gets a definition of "2-way" is if he has a specific number of innings in the minors (I think 20+?). I could see some guy coming through the system given garbage innings to attain this but I'm not sure it is worth it on either end for that. You're taking time away from minors guys that actually will pitch and it will maybe affect one game all year.

I think 2018 was a failed "let's try this one more time" idea. Not a great idea but I think they're done now. They barely did anything this offseason. I think if they have any sign of struggle this year you'll see a firesale. Most of their issue is that the only tradeable expensive vets are Posey and MadBum, maybe. The issue with them is that nobody wants to offer much for .5-1 year of a declining MadBum and I'm not sure if Posey is worth 3/$66 anymore that he has left. Cueto, Longoria, Shark, Melancon will have to just rot away most likely. Belt, Panik, Smith probably can and will be dealt when their value is at its peak if they don't see them in the long-term plans.

I don't have any complaints with these, honestly. Cain could be higher but to rank Yelich higher than 7 you have to: A. Somewhat neglect defense where Yelich is fine but guys like Betts are elite. B. Assume the 2nd half Bonds-ian OBP/ISO + BABIP are all going to continue into 2019. Obviously it's impossible to rank someone like Vlad Jr correctly. Maybe he struggles and ESPN is laughed off the stage. But you might want to rank on potential and it's possible that Vlad Jr is a top 20 player by the end of 2019.

Moustakas, probably Keuchel, and...? Most of this just seems to be the crappy reality of owners making a switch to the system where non-elite guys won't get long-term deals in their 30s and Moustakas and Keuchel (debatable) were left holding the bag. EDIT: And OK, I guess Maldonado. Pollock, Mccutchen, Eovaldi, Lemehiu, Murphy...all got multi-year deals and guess what these guys all have in common? Also don't forget about Greg Holland last year. Guys that have Boras probably know they are taking a bit of a risk. Moustakas and Howard are still with him even after being screwed (more likely by unlucky year of baseball system changing). Guys will take the chance that they're the next Greg Holland in hopes that they can be the next Eric Hosmer. Boras doesn't have many free agents of worth this year, but many of the other guys like Holland and Britton signed "prove it" deals. Britton may have taken more money and only 1 year to keep trying to bet on himself. Ditto on Moustakas.

Scott Boras is the absolute worst. He's screwed up big time with a significant number of his free agents over the last few years, probably many more times than the general public is aware of. I wonder if athletes will start flocking away from him. Moustakas, probably Keuchel, and...? Most of this just seems to be the crappy reality of owners making a switch to the system where non-elite guys won't get long-term deals in their 30s and Moustakas and Keuchel (debatable) were left holding the bag. EDIT: And OK, I guess Maldonado.

Keuchel and it's not even close. Paying 15+ million dollars to a guy who projects to around 60 innings and would want to pitch in only one rigid, specific bullpen role is a terrible investment. I don't think his role would be rigid or specific with woke Counsell. You could also argue that you'd be paying Keuchel $15 million to pitch hopefully a little bit better than Jhoulys Chacin is not a great investment. And if you extend it to years beyond this one, Kimbrel may age a bit better (though that is debatable). One could maybe compare this to paying up for Case Keenum vs. paying up for Le'Veon Bell. A potentially elite player at a "less important" (but fairly important if deployed correctly) or a pretty good player at a very important position. Of course all sorts of debates can rage on about how good Keuchel will be and how that works into the comparison.

Kimbrel. I'd prefer to get through 4-5 innings with someone else and then close out 50 or 60 games that are close or we have a lead in with Kimbrel, Hader, Jeffress, Knebel, Claudio. Keuchel may be able to push back an inferior starter or move someone else to the bullpen but in theory he could end up being only about as valuable as Chacin was last year. And even with all of that, if they sign Keuchel to a reasonable deal, I'd be fine with it.