bill hAll Star

Right. Braun/Aguilar basically have a week to play most days with an off day tomorrow and at the end of this stretch of LHP. Including today, there are 5 lefties in the next 7 games. After that, a ton of RHP. So Braun and Aguilar should play most of those and then might honestly start 50-60% of the games down the stretch.

Hot take: The order is fine in general. Aguilar will have cold spells. Braun will have cold spells. Cain is good in the leadoff spot but the offense has been good because we made trades to make it deeper. I'm fine with what they go with as long as it gets good hitters the most ABs. If they think against certain matchups that Yelich should bat leadoff - fine. Aguilar will get it going again, Braun may go cold again, etc.

I'm gonna guess: Cain, Yelich, Aguilar, Braun, Moustakas, Schoop, Arcia, Pina, Chacin

Yes, you can switch between rounds.

Are the jokes about guys being out of position supposed to be funny at this point? Seems like we’re getting exactly what was advertised/supported by some on here: better offense at the expense of (maybe?) slightly worse defense which we can sub out of later in games.

Villar’s only production has come against junk pitching. Schoop struggles against a very tough schedule after the trade but it’s nit apples to apples because Villar put up 75% of his post-trade production in one series @Texas and a few games against Toronto.

Ah, I knew he was once a starter but only saw a bunch of 1 inning outings in his recent gamelog and didn't bother to check something beyond 2 weeks ago...oops.

He might get to 4 or 5 if he gets through innings quickly. I'd suspect 2-3 is more likely, maybe a 4th. They're moving him into the rotation but he hasn't really been stretched out. Maybe they let him go up to 50, maybe even 60 pitches.

That seems like a bit much for me. They'd have to kick in even more. We have probably 6 or 7 guys that are the caliber of Zimmermann already for next season. He may be a slight upgrade this year but there are far too many similar or superior options the following years to be paying him $10-12 million/year for 2 more years.

Votto is back but no Scooter: RF S. Schebler L SS Jose Peraza R 1B Joey Votto L 3B E. Suarez R LF P. Ervin R C Curt Casali R 2B B. Dixon R CF M. Williams L P Cody Reed L

I don't think Pina's injury will be a huge deal. Kratz may have to catch 2 days in a row but Pina is a catcher and the report is that he "got 5 stitches." That doesn't seem like something that would keep a catcher out for very long.

Obligatory Colorado Springs-related post: Do the other 9 journeyman-caliber players that are having as good or better of a season there also deserve a roster spot? Check the minor league careers of Bethancourt and Nottingham outside of CS and explain to me how Nottingham is a better prospect. It's hard to tell. Bethancourt seems to be a guy that is currently capped out as a AAAA player. He was a .660 OPS guy in A and AA and started that way in AAA. Now that he's on the Colorado Springs juice he is a "good" hitter and had a solid, yet not spectacular season with AAA Gwinnett before that. However, he has struggled mightily in the majors. Very mightily. Nottingham also had the same numbers coming up and as he might be coming of age, also is having a great season at Colorado Springs. Both of these guys were .650 OPS guys for portions of their minors career other than in the very low minors. Now they're both hitting well in Colorado Springs, but almost everyone does. So, long story short...I don't know? They both had the same trajectory, the only difference is that Bethancourt has failed several times in the majors. Nottingham has had less of a chance to fail so may get the first crack until they find out that he also cannot hack it in the majors.

What value would Nottingham have to the Brewers with virtually no action since July? If he's ready to play, let him play for CS through their playoffs, then recall him. Bethancourt's earned a roster spot with an outstanding season. Kratz will likely be taken off the roster after the season, so no reason not to add a guy like Bethancourt to compete for a job next year anyway. Obligatory Colorado Springs-related post: Do the other 9 journeyman-caliber players that are having as good or better of a season there also deserve a roster spot?

Cody Reed is a reliever right now but he is moving to starter and it's at least somewhat of a bullpen game so it's going to be an interesting lineup card day. Maybe you put Mous and Shaw at 6/7 if they're in the lineup. I'm not sure how far he'll go because he hasn't really been stretched out. The challenge is that if he gets through the first quickly, they can keep him around to try to get Mous/Shaw if they're in the lineup. I guess maybe you still go with mostly righties and Cincy will potentially be out of lefty relievers later in the game to use against them...though, I guess that's also a reason to just get those LH/LH ABs out of the way right away and then it's an advantage later if those guys had started...?

It really makes you wonder why the Brewers tv deal is so dreadful. The number the Rays are getting is way more than the last number I remember seeing for the Brewers. Brewers are the smallest market and signed their last deal back at the turn of the century when they were terrible. In *somewhat* positive news, the Brewers' deal is ending when the Cubs' deal is (2019). So I do wonder if we're expecting to maybe go over that $110-120 million theoretical max that we believe Attanasio has either in 2019 or 2020. Obviously I'd expect the Brewers to go from $25m/year to like $45m/year so it wouldn't be that major of an increase.

This probably isn't random news when the deal goes through. Goodbye competitive balance (whatever was left of it) in the NL Central.

I'm not a big fan of discounting offense simply because they are in the lower third of baseball. These are major league caliber players and they have plenty of talent. It's not like the teams are made up of AA prospects or Independent league players... The reds offense (with or without Votto) isn't very good, but they've lit up the Brewers pithcer's plenty so is our pitching staff made up of a bunch of hacks? Honestly, a lot of these teams these guys are facing are made up of AA players right now. Gausman has seen the Mets once and the Marlins twice. Lynn has seen the White Sox twice. Hamels has seen the Mets once, the Royals once. The NL guys have drawn the Pirates, who you're right, have hit the Brewers well this year but are kinda beaten up right now. The Mets, Royals, White Sox, and Marlins literally are made up of AA players right now. Gausman has seen a Marlins a few times with Starlin Castro hitting cleanup and something called Ortega leading off. I'm not 100% discrediting them. It seems like Gausman has mixed in his changeup more so he also may be legitimately "fixed" at this point as well. But I'd expect Chase Anderson to shut down that trash Marlins lineup as well. When Anderson faced them he gave up 3 ER (not bad) but the lineup had Realmuto, Bour, and other competent MLB players in it.

Can we stop with this misinformation... While it was true that the Brewers were on Hamel's no trade list, it is also true that he said multiple times that he would waive the no-trade clause to go to a contender!!!!! The second part negates the first part... That doesn't mean that if the Brewers and Cubs called offering a similar package that Hamels, with knowledge of this, couldn't have influenced this...or maybe the Rangers could've thrown him a bone as well.

I'm not completely sure about that (Gausman). We were going to non-tender Villar even if he does have a decent 1.5 years of putting up empty stats for Baltimore. Phillips is completely lost at the plate, Ortiz can't strike out more than 8 batters per 9 in AA and supposedly has a live arm, Lopez is just a guy. Carmona is the lotto ticket. The O's got 2 or 3 lotto tickets for Gausman as well as an MLB caliber reliever that truly does throw gas and strike out a lot of MLB hitters. We could back and forth on which group is actually better all day. That's not the point, the point is both of those guys- Gausman and Hamels- were had for packages that could've easily been beaten by the Brewers without selling the farm, AKA not having to give up Burnes or Hiura. Stearns decided to roll with the starting rotation he had, which ultimately has been a mistake to date. It's not just those 2 guys either- Happ, Lynn, Fiers, and yes even Harvey would've helped as well. Stearns decided to use resources instead for a 3rd baseman when he already had a 3rd baseman, and a 2nd baseman who has really struggled. To date, it looks like he played it wrong. That's all I'm saying. I don't know why people have to rush to Stearn's defense on this and act like he made the right moves, or he couldn't have possibly beaten other offers. Or he had no reason to anticipate they might need some rotation help. I still like Stearns and hope like heck these moves end up coming through. Who knows, maybe Schoop goes on an absolute tear the rest of the year, Shaw can suddenly play 2nd base, and Davies comes back and pitches like he did at the end of last year and Stearns looks like a genius. As of now, though, the deadline moves do not look good. The Schoop trade is a loss so far. He risked it on a player that can have some bad streaks like this and he's having a bad streak like this. Our offense was a need and Moustakas has helped that. The team's offense has been vastly better since acquiring him. Soria was a pretty good acquisition. I think most of the starters you mention have been good (Lynn, I'm not so sure. Starting to struggle again and he (like all of these guys, it seems) has only faced garbage offenses as well). There's no doubt he could've grabbed one of those guys. Which one we actually had the right package/player for to win, I'm not sure. Some of those guys like Fiers fetched a Ortiz-esque return but it probably comes down to money. I'm guessing Stearns had the ability to dump $10-15 million for the rest of the year and Schoop's $4 million instead of someone like Hamels or Happ might be the difference in a game or two in the standings.

I'm not completely sure about that (Gausman). We were going to non-tender Villar even if he does have a decent 1.5 years of putting up empty stats for Baltimore. Phillips is completely lost at the plate, Ortiz can't strike out more than 8 batters per 9 in AA and supposedly has a live arm, Lopez is just a guy. Carmona is the lotto ticket. The O's got 2 or 3 lotto tickets for Gausman as well as an MLB caliber reliever that truly does throw gas and strike out a lot of MLB hitters.

For as great as the Hamels pickup for the Cubs has been, Gausman has been nearly as good and the Braves have two more years of control. Reason for optimism for the Braves that they've traded for a better pitcher than he was for the O's: He's throwing a lot more changeups. Maybe this is a big difference in his results. Reason for pessimism that he's the same old pitcher and will regress to his inconsistent 4 FIP self: He's faced the Marlins x2, Brewers (insert jokes here), Mets, and Pirates. That is a dose of what you get in the NL but he has hardly been in a tough situation.

I know that crushing the Reds in general = crushing their pitchers, but Thames is 0/3 with 2 Ks vs. DeSclafani. That's not something I would use to bench Thames necessarily, but I think that in the end, dominance over a team likely has more to do with a random set of success vs. various pitchers and coincidentally a lot of that is against a certain team. If Chris Sale was dealt to the Reds tomorrow, I doubt that Thames would own him because he plays for the Reds. He has some success against various relievers (Amir Garret, a lefty, randomly) but he'll be pinch hitting later in the game so that can still happen.

What I think probably will happen is Chacin starts with an extremely short leash. He may only go 2-3 innings even if he's pitching somewhat well if we're down 1-0 or it's 1-1 or something. What maybe should happen as mentioned is the bullpen game...and I think it should ebb and flow with how the game is going. Assume the Cards for now. I'd probably start Hader. Assume that Carpenter still leads off or at the very least Hader will get to the 4th batter to face him. It can go so many ways. 0-0ish game and Hader is dealing? Maybe you let him bat once and he gets all the way into the 3rd and faces Carpenter again if someone got on. As long as the game stays close, keep moving down the pecking order. Jeffress next probably, Soria after that, Burnes after that...but matchups have to stay in mind. Also you may choose to go with a Jennings/Williams *gulp* matchup inning if you know that you have the pitcher spot in the order coming up soon. If you happen to get up 5-1, now you go to Chacin or someone like that and let him ride for 3, 4, hopefully 5 innings or until you feel like you need to bring someone in. If the game looks like it may go extras, you probably keep your last 2 guys (Guerra and Miley?) in the pen and just live with the consequences of being at a disadvantage in extras...because bullpenning them is probably the reason why you even made it to extras.

I highly doubt these guys made it to the Brewers on waivers. Most teams in the league would put a claim on these guys. You are probably right ... but I would have thought that someone would put in a claim on Daniel Murphy, too, before he got to the Cubs. I know Wheeler and Gray are controlled beyond this year, but weird things do happen at the waiver trade deadline. The difference between Murphy and Wheeler is that Murphy was an older pending free agent with a relatively large contract remaining for the year. The Nats had a lot of motivation to deal him. Everyone will claim Wheeler and it will be very hard to find a deal. He's not owed a ton this year, you have him under control for next year, and the Mets would have him under control for next year...and he's a guy that the Mets would probably offer a qualifying offer to after next year and get a comp pick back at worst. The Mets would be right to ask for some bigger prospects, the other team probably wouldn't offer those prospects, and it would end there. I do think that if Stearns liked Wheeler and he really made it to the Brewers...maybe (very likely not) he'd be willing to give up the package for Wheeler...but I think it would be too rich for our blood at this point. I think the Mets should probably just rebuild, but deGrom/Thor/Wheeler and I guess Matz and if you don't put a dumpster fire behind that on the roster (big ask) and you could honestly be in the playoffs. They'll try it again next year I think.

Well this year it seemed pretty given we needed a nice solid starter, he didn’t get that. If the pitching continues to just bomb thats going to look really bad at the end of the year. He just hasn’t done anything to take this team from fringe, to solid contender. Next year will be huge for him. If he turns in another fringe team in 2019 I’m going to be a bit concerned. I’m pretty neutral on Stearns so far. 2019-2021 is his time to shine in my opinion. He has to put an elite team on the field. It wasn't exactly a secret that DS went hard after pitching at last year's deadline, in the off-season and at this recent deadline. Whatever the reasons, he didn't get that done. I still believe the biggest weakness on this team is a true stopper in the rotation. It think DS agrees or he wouldn't continually be going after that elusive unicorn. So far I think he's done a pretty good job with that whole thing. He might've gotten Gausman or Hamels (both I would put a massive asterisk that time will tell on those guys, it's still only 3-4 starts) and avoided landmines of beating out an offer of Eloy/Cease for Quintana, having Sonny Gray self destruct, or giving up a king's ransom for Archer. At some point he'll probably have to consolidate some of our depth for a more reliable option but so far he has avoided the landmines while missing out on a handful of solid moves.