bill hAll Star

I have us at $103m spent. Anybody's guess how much is "available". Based on last year, another $25m or so. But no guarantee they open with a payroll as big as last year. Lineup will be something like Cain - CF Yelich - RF Hiura - 2b Smoak - 1b Garcia/Braun - LF Narvaez - C Urias - 3b Arcia - SS Braun will play some 1b as well. If we sign a 3b or Healy wins a job, Urias probably moves to SS. Sogard is available to fill in at 3b/2b/ss. Let's hope your lineup never comes to fruition. It would be one of the weakest lineups in all Mlb and coupled with a very weak starting staff, the Crew would win 65-75 games tops. Do you have a venmo or any other payment service? I'd like to make a monetary bet with you.

Any reason you think that? I think someone is going to give him a 4/110 deal. They'll probably try. The reasoning of them being "in" is that they are $25 million under last year's payroll and 3B is the only glaring need at this point. Some might say either starter or reliever is a need but Stearns seems to be somewhat set there. In the end, you're right...too many other teams with deep pockets and I doubt Donaldson is a Brewer.

I am still very much on the doubtful side that Healy "wins" the 3B job unless they are very confident in Sogard there with Healy as a backup plan. I still think they have plans for a 3B that will make it so that it would be pretty damn unlikely that Healy wins the job.

But I don't like revisionist adds. His 2019 doesn't mean much to me. He's good at 2b 3b and the rest of his utility is not being bad at other spots. Well that's still useful. That's kinda what Hernan was. This goes along with certain guys that have reformed their careers post-30. Guys like Soria and Swarzak (maybe not the greatest examples since they bombed a bit in their next contracts) that changed their pitch mix or developed a new pitch. Or Pomeranz adding velocity as a reliever. Sogard has increased his launch angle and hits the ball hard. What do we make of 2018? Because 2017 and 2019 were pretty good since he's made the changes (and keeps changing more).

Oh yeah, our 2018 rotation was filled with Cy Young candidates so we're really taking a step down from Chacin to Anderson. Chacin was pretty darn good in 2018. I hope Anderson is that good. That's the point. If we're talking about Brett Anderson as a garbage pickup then everything that worked about 2018 was also garbage.

You are probably right but shouldn't the Dodgers be desperate for a World Series Championship by now? Seems like if the Brewers fall out of contention before July and decide to move Hader, the Dodgers could certainly give up a ton of young talent to land him if they so choose. I personally think they should ... and have stated as such, only to be told that "the Dodgers are too smart to do anything like that. They can just throw money at their relief problem and it will eventually go away." Point is, they've tried that in recent years, and it hasn't worked. We'll see I guess. It can be money or it can be lesser acquisitions. Doolittle and Hudson cost the Nats a lot less than Gavin Lux. Though, go figure, Treinen was one of the pieces in the Doolittle trade. Regardless, Brad Hand and maybe Andrew Miller are the two I can think of outside of Chapman recently and while Frazier (and Sheffield) were big pieces, I don't know if the Dodgers are willing to go that far. Mejia was highly regarded but it seems like in all of these cases either the guys slightly busted or the GMs didn't value them as much. That said, Frazier, Mejia, and Sheffield all have time to prove something. In Sheffield's case he has barely hit the majors yet. And none of these guys are bad. I just hold Lux in pretty high regard and don't think the Dodgers are the type to try to fix issues that way.

I was with you until the Hernan part. Their careers are going in opposite directions. Could Hernan be useful to the Cubs? Sure. It's about as likely as Ronny Rodriguez stepping in and paying dividends after some Sogard struggles or something, though. I wouldn't couple Sogard and Hernan in judgment. We've got guys like Jace Peterson now that are in the Hernan category.

I think the opposite seems to be true around here. Everyone seems to say "let's see... how can I find a way to convince myself that this is a really, brilliant move?" See Anderson, Brett. Oh yeah, our 2018 rotation was filled with Cy Young candidates so we're really taking a step down from Chacin to Anderson.

I think a package including Arcia for Seager is probably in the works with the hangup the additional components (Corey Ray?) and cash coming back to MKE. Seager's 3rd year option vests upon a trade so he's a tad expensive. I think he might be the best defensive 3B still out there so that's a definite advantage. Three years (year 32-34 seasons) isn't too long of a stretch for performance decline. We could give them back Freddy. The chances he develops another pitch are about the same as Arcia breaking out... I'd imagine they want to keep giving JP Crawford some chances. He's probably in the same category as Arcia as a guy that once had some cachet as a prospect but is sputtering at the big league level. Difference being that Crawford has more time until his arbitration hits and may align with their window of 2+ years from now. I'm not saying Arcia wouldn't be a good option for them to try out a bit but his ceiling seems low AND even if he turns things around, his control is up right when the Mariners want to get back to trying to contend.

Are we obviously pinching pennies? Maybe in long-term roster construction but it seems like we're handing money out the last few days. Throw in a trade or a big signing and we're pretty close to last year's $120-125 million to open the year.

I find it weird that some people, after watching the last 3 or so years of work, walk into every move with the mindset of, "let's see...how can I find a way to convince myself this is a really stupid move?"

Glad that we now have people suggesting the order of operations for a [so far] very good GM. I'm sure he's just blindly throwing darts. When March rolls around: "Oh, crap! I forgot about a starting third baseman!"

Thames has been a very consistent 2WAR/500PA player over his 3 years with the Brewers. Sogard is also very consistent - he has never had 2 good years in a row. Never. I don't care what Sogard did last year as the chances he comes close to that number is 2%. The chance he put's up a less than 1 WAR year is ~50%. As a backup he's fine for change. As a backup for $4.5M when we don't have a 3B and 1B then that's just crazy. History repeating? Pay Sogard for his 2017 and get his 2018, pay Sogard for his 2019 and get? And the way the offseason is going. Thames will cost more than his option so I doubt Stearns does that and points out his mistake. We're more likely to see Justin friggin Smoak. Sogard Oakland days (I'm roughly averaging these): Hart hit%: 19% Fly ball %: 37% Sogard post-Oakland days: Hart hit %: 32% (34% and 35% recently) Fly ball %: Also around 37% but was at 42% last year We need to figure out what happened in 2018 and if it was just luck and if his extreme breakout was really due to the juiced ball (I'm sure it was) but he's a different hitter since leaving Oakland.

We can't keep Thames as a LH 1B option as he's too expensive so we blow a wad on Sogard. Seriously? My god what an overpay... Sogard and Thames are the same age. Last season, Sogard had a season more valuable than Thames has ever had. We also may bring Thames back.

He is the type of hitter that thrived with the juiced ball (Lemaheiu, La Stella, McNeil). A guy that previously hit the ball hard to all fields but didn't have the power to routinely get it over the fence. With the juiced ball, some of those went over the fence and many more of them hit the gap because it's harder to shift with guys hitting the ball hard with the entire field in play. That's all super fair. His contact ability plays up quite a bit with a juiced ball. If it gets tamed back to normal, he's a fine backup at SS/2b for Hiura/Urias and utility guy. I'm not expecting an 825 OPS out of Sogard with 100 starts or anything. It's a solid fringe move in my opinion. Agree. I would be mildly disappointed if it's a Urias/Sogard combo at 3B with them rotating in at SS with Arcia. I am still thinking there's more to come here, though.

He is the type of hitter that thrived with the juiced ball (Lemaheiu, La Stella, McNeil). A guy that previously hit the ball hard to all fields but didn't have the power to routinely get it over the fence. With the juiced ball, some of those went over the fence and many more of them hit the gap because it's harder to shift with guys hitting the ball hard with the entire field in play.

If we play with the juiced ball: this is very good. If we don't: meh. So is he the 3B? Now I might be confused. Or are we going to dump Arcia?

3and2Fastball is missing a "potentially". Although it could potentially be wrong as well. Stating either as fact is off-base. Past Performance: Moustakis 2 fWAR player Garica ? fWAR (0.4, 4.2, 0.1, 1.8) so the outlier is? Grandal 4.5 fWAR player Narvaez 1.6 fWAR player Future performance (Depth Charts/Steamer estimates for 2020): Moustakis 2.1 fWAR Garcia 1.0 fWAR (not inconsistent from last 2 years, but low in my opinion) Narvaez 0.5 fWAR (low based on past performance) Grandal 4.7 fWAR So how is ~3 of historic fWAR compared to 6.5 fWAR and ~1.5 of projected fWAR compared to 6.8 fWAR qualify for "already replaced"? Expecting 99 percentile results from every Brewer player just verifies your prescription of Brewer goggles. I'm not really sure if it was specified but if the poster just said, "close to replaced offensive production" it wouldn't have been far off. The problem is Garcia is an outfielder so the WAR of his bat is not as high as at 2B/3B and Narvaez is not close to the defender that Yaz is. The streamer/depth chart projection right now is assuming that Narvaez's power was a bit fluky last year. We'll see.

I think Narvaez and Garcia can replicate the offense lost by Yaz and Moustakas. The issue is positional advantage (Garcia/Mous) and defense (Yaz/Narvaez). But they can improve in other ways to offset that.

Like I said, I don't think they are punting 2020 but rather focusing on 2021 and 2022. Do you not agree that their roster turnover for a contender is extreme and that they have lost a TON of talent to Free Agency? I think it's refreshing and advantageous to have a GM that knows he has job security so that he CAN focus on a larger window for contention rather than make willy-nilly moves to try to save the upcoming season (a la Preller-SD or DiPoto-SEA) or to have to make flashy "big name" signings to satisfy their fan base. A lot of Brewers fans are strangely excited by most diamond-in-the-rough signings like Ryon Healy (agree) and Brett Anderson (disagree). Some don't understand the mindset and it's completely understandable. Brett Anderson has put up productive major league seasons as of *checks notes* 2019. He is a good diamond-in-the-rough signing and will help them win this year. Healy is a diamond-in-the-rough signing in the sense that maybe that power can be harnessed better but he's likely AAA fodder (which we need at that position). I would be legitimately shocked if Healy was in a major role to open this season. We need 1B/3B depth and I'm assuming he starts the year in San Antonio or as the last bench bat at the most. I don't really get the "huge roster turnover loss" thing. Yes, Yaz and Mous were big losses. They also had a massive set of underperformers in 2019 that got them only to 90 instead of 96 wins. Those guys are also now gone in the "roster turnover" and most of them I do not expect to ever get back to 2018 production. The only other one is Drew Pomeranz who was with the Brewers for 2 months and was a brilliant trade deadline piece...something that may be replicated again.

The thing is, you can reverse engineer what Stearns does. I don't think he's going to throw "a warm body" or some cheap, undervalued asset out there at the starting positions. Healy is a nice buy-low guy but is basically just AAA replacement-level help. We don't have someone like that at 3B or 1B in the minors that can be replacement level. The payroll is a shade over $90 million. We need a good, lefty bat at 1B. We need a good 3B. There is room in the payroll that Attanasio usually spends for when competitive. The Garcia signing suggests that we're going to at least feign contention. It's easy to see how this offseason finishes. Maybe there is a drastic Hader trade that shakes things up even more but the logical conclusion is taking a risk on someone like Kyle Seager and then picking up Thames.

Basically with you on this. I think he did need to reshape things slightly by getting some high-ceiling guys with more control like Narvaez or Urias but I don't really think it jives with the OP (which I've seen from a lot of fans). Put Seager and Thames on this roster to finish the offseason. Compare this roster to the one on opening day 2018. Will the same magic happen? I don't know...but it seems to be basically the same crowd that said, "what, Mike Moustakas?!?!? We already have a 3rd baseman!" Or "Why acquire Cain when we already have Santana?" is also on the, "I don't see upside in the 2020 roster" bandwagon. Just sit back and trust the process, which will probably have one down season eventually but is still a good process.

I simply don't understand why Corey Ray is getting thrown into all these trade proposals. The Brewers aren't gonna trade off a guy like this when his value is at its absolute lowest. I see Ray as a prime bounce-back guy, and he very well could be a guy who is on the move come the end of July. No way is he dealt now, though, unless another team is valuing him for his upside. Ray certainly hasn't fulfilled his vast potential, but he's got a ways to go before he's "trade throw-in" fodder. I'm with you that if he gets another season to figure out AAA/get things straight, he might go back to a .240/.320/.430 type of slash line...but he'd still be looking at cracking into the majors at 26 (at best) with much worse/clearer issues at contacting the ball than even Brinson or Phillips ever had. We'd basically be giving 3 wild cards to Seattle for a good (injury/age risk) MLB player and my guess is that none of the wild cards will actually turn into much. Back to Ray, I'm trying to think of any of the guys that took until their late 20s to make it to the majors that had this glaring of issues. Guys like Merrifield developed their power in their late 20s but did not have the massive strikeout problems that Ray has. We all just kinda said, "eh, whatever" about giving away Trent Grisham who was already in the majors without the red flags of contacting the ball in the minors and 2 years younger than Ray.

I don't know much about File but I don't think the other two are going to make much of a dent in the majors. So I'd take the Seager side and just pray he's still the 2-3 WAR guy and therefore worth the money.

Yeah, I am fully aware that Bell struggles on defense and started to fade as the season went by last year...but I don't see how this is that bad of a trade. Maybe I'm not as brushed up on/not as high on Lutz as some, but it's possible that neither Ray nor Lutz makes much of a dent in the majors. Instead, you add a very good 1B with some slightly expensive control. Archer I'd almost consider seeing if he could be an expensive reliever or 2-3 inning guy but realistically he's someone you see if you can fix and put back in the rotation.