HiAndTight

Isn't winning a WS the point of playing baseball? I'd gladly gut the Brewers system if it meant a trip to the WS. I probably would also....and if David Price guaranteed a world series victory, I might have a different opinion. But he does not. He guarantees that we DO end up losing out on a LOT of service time(24-30 years) of VERY GOOD to decent big league production for the opportunity to try and win it all with Price these next 2 years. Put it this way, in 2011, would you have traded David Price for Lucroy, Gomez, Peralta, Nelson and another prospect? Because those players values at that time is at least what it would have taken to get Price(at his current value). No guarantee Coulter, Nelson, Arcia, Taylor+ ends up being as good, but these will be a bidding war for a dominant left handed ace, and we're going to have to give up a LOT to get him. I'm with the others who'd rather give up Taylor Jungman for a Martin Prado type player who can provide depth at a number of positions....for example.

Yes, last year was a low point, and we did clear out the upper levels, but I think you're discounting the performances of some of our young players a bit in this assestment. Coulter IMO will be a top 100 prospect, perhaps a top 50 if he continues to progress, Arcia could be on the threshold, Taylor may be rated a big lower, but most on here agree he's our 2nd best prospect. But it's the depth of the guys who are producing. Bradley, Jungman, Crazy, Magnifico among several others are taking steps forward. We haven't had many guys regress this year.

What exactly makes you believe that Taveras is just a "nice player," and wouldn't be as good as Khris Davis when the consensus among scouts is that he projects to be a #3 hitter who can hit .300 and hit 25-30 HR's while having the ability to play CF before ultimately moving over to RF because of his arm strengh. How does Khris Davis, as nice a player as he's been, match up favorably to him? I would take Taveras over Davis in a heartbeat as I believe would virtually every single major league exec, including Melvin. At the VERY-VERY least he'd be a platoon player with Davis this year as a big left handed power bat who can hit for average. Taveras is a blue chip prospect with the ability to be an elite big leaguer. Davis is a nice player who might hit for some power, but he's not on the same level.

So based on what I said about Philly/SD doesn't that statement just agree with why I said he'd be a good fit for those 2 teams? They are in an injury riddled rough patch with Pitching. It does if you take my entire post and everything I've said and ignore it and instead focus on this. Those two teams are 18 games under .500 and are the 2nd worst team in MLB and the 5th worst team in MLB record wise. So why on EARTH would they want to give up something of value...or hell, even just take Estrada at this point? As I've said repeatedly, MAYBE a team like the Yankees or another team trying to WIN this year might want Estrada just to give them some decent starts while they deal with injuries. There is no logical reason I can see that two of the worst teams in the game would a 31 year old pitcher with a very low ceiling who's been declining for the last 3+ years and who is going to cost 5-6-7 million dollars next year when they have no chance to contend. This is again setting aside the fact that he may not even be one of the 5 best starters on either team. Did you, as a Brewers fan want the Brewers to go out and try and trade for a guy like Bud Norris(whom you've brought up on several occasions) who's younger and got a stronger track record than Estrada when we were in almost the exact same situation as both Philly and SD? No, of course not. We wanted to see how guys like Thornburg, Nelson, Fiers and others could perform rather than bringing in a veteran on a team that wasn't going to contend. Far be it for a team to think ahead to next year. Just because SD has some prospects to call up, doesn't mean they can't get a guy to get through this season while getting a look to how he performs in their ballpark. Those prospects San Diego will have to decide are they ready to begin next season and if they look poor in Spring Training. You now look at Team control decisions. Keeping them down in AAA through June to keep the better,younger SP under control for 1 more year. Why get 15 starts from a guy who has 3ERA potential and lose a year of team control being a 5ERA in them? When you can just pitch Estrada with a 4ERA in the same 15starts and then if that prospect is what Nelson is this year, call him up? And again injuries. So many injuries I'd rather take Estrada as a fallback guy than to have to pick through the SP FA scrapheaps and sign Aaron Harangs/Johan Santanas last month of Spring Training in emergency. Well, I wouldn't rather do that as Harang has pitched significantly better than Estrada and cost less and Santana is an outlier and shouldn't even be considered in this conversation as Baltimore was never truly counting on him. And those prospects they've got will almost certainly pitch for them this season. This reminds me of the conversation in which we were talking about trading Braun to the Marlins for Stanton and Fernandez. What in the Padres history tells you they'd rather bring in average starting pitcher with an injury history for 6 million dollars rather than go with their own talented young pitchers? Also, they don't lost an extra year of service time if they bring them up to start next year, they just won't be super 2 guys. So again, if you want to look for teams that MIGHT be interested in Estrada's services, I don't think it makes any sense whatsoever to look at the worst teams in baseball as opposed to the top teams in baseball who might deal with injuries. The worst teams are going to look to the future and would want to acquire guys with higher ceilings rather than stopgaps when they're not in a position to contend. Estrada to the Padres doesn't make any sense on any level other than using the "what if these extraordinary circumstances arise and maybe they want to do this," type scenarios." Maybe it's a combo type deal. Estrada plus Morris for Alonso. A kinda perfect change of scenery guy. Milw, then has their 1b situation clearer for next season. San Diego gets a look at both Estrada/Morris for next season moving forward. That trade would make more sense for SD if you just took Estrada out of it. Estrada probably has negative value to SD right now. As I said, they have Cashner, Ross, Kennedy, Wisler who's struggled a bit in AAA, but was great in AA this year and has a 10.5 K/9 rate, and Casey Kelly. Right there, you're starting 5 and a very good starting rotation, and they have depth should injuries arise. ESPECIALLY for a team that's not likely going to contend next year. I just don't get when the smallest market teams decided to start paying 6 million dollars to "take a look," at aging veterans when they have what appears 5 good starting pitchers who would be making a combined 11 million dollars this year.

Again, that's where I take exception to this debate. The argument that Marcum is the one who got us to 96 wins and the NLCS. I believe we would have gotten there without Marcum, and frankly, it'd have been tough to do worse throwing someone out there in the post season given how terrible he was. So again, it's not so much about losing Lawrie, it's about what we got for Lawrie at the time given his value and what Marcum did(or didn't do) for the Brewers in the limited time he pitched for us.

Yes, but just because you are great relative to the general population doesn't mean you have any business being on a MLB roster. The Brewers have had a remarkably horrendous bench this season. I don't see how anyone could argue that it has been even close to league average. The notion that it's "normal" to have a bench so far below replacement value ignores the entire point of the replacement-level baseline... Exactly, I'm a proponent of removing Estrada from the rotation in favor of Nelson because Estrada is a soft tosser who gives up a lot of HR's. Now if I had to step in the box to face him, and I played baseball(not at a real high level, but since we're comparing them to normal people who've played baseball) his fastball would look like 100 MPH to me and I wouldn't touch his change. Obviously these guys are great players in the sense you're talking about. Hell, the guys hitting .200 in rookie ball are great players and often times the best players to ever come from the towns they grew up in. But that doesn't make them great for the professional stage. I'm still a fan of Bianchi however. Despite all the numbers and quantifiable data, he just has a pretty good approach and I could see him coming back up after some regular PT and producing much better. The rest...yeah, they're bad...when compared to the major leagues.

According to who does Estrada STILL project better than Nelson? He certainly doesn't to me. Nelson and his mid 90's fastball and a nasty slider and he doesn't give up HR's. I'm not going to get too hung up on his strand rate as he's pitched just 16 innings in the big leagues. The prospect of replacing Estrada has far more to do with his dominance in AAA and pure ability than picking apart those 16 innings over 2 years to try and cling to the fact that he's not a better option than Estrada. Obviously nobody knows what Nelson is going to do in his first extended big league action. He just as easily come up and dominant the way Fiers did in his first stint. I agree with you on Gallardo...to a point. I don't think the Brewers turn down his option year, but I would like to see the Brewers be proactive and trade him while he still has good value. Yesterday was an outstanding game by Yo. He looked like he did prior to last year. More life on his fastball, the curve looked great, he was getting in on guys hands. If he can just keep performing at a higher level for another couple months, he could still have very good trade value. But he certainly does look like he's starting to decline, and he is a really good sorta litmus test to see if the Brewers can identify that and trade a guy a year too early as opposed to a year too late as they say. The Rays are the only team that I know of that does this regularly, so I'm not expecting it, but I'd certainly like to see it.

I have a feeling Brett Lawrie would be getting a Rickie Weeks type reaction from the fans had he stayed in Milwaukee given how he's performed. He had such incredible hype coming off his first big league action that he was compared favorably to guys like Trout, Harper and Profar as the elite young players in the game. Now FF 3 years and he's racking up a lot of K's and has a poor OBP and I imagine he'd be getting more pressure from the fanbase than he's getting in Canada. I still believe in Lawrie and still think he's going to be a very good 3rd basemen(where I think he ultimately ends up as I think that is where his athletic ability plays best). But for a guy who was supposed to be such a "can't miss," guy after 2011, he's disappointed. Though he has a career WAR of 11.2 from ages 21-24 in what amounts to roughly 2 full seasons worth of games(332).

Well, I get what you're saying, but when people use the cliche you can never have enough pitching, I think they're referring to....well, for lack of a better way of articulating it, really good pitching. Power pitching, high ceiling talented arms. Not just bodies who can be 4 or 5's. Which I think is what we truly have an excess of right now(and I'm not even sure it's that much of an "excess," either. Obviously cheap back of the rotation pitchers are valuable, but a lot of them, you don't know if they will ever make a big league staff. I certainly don't think it's a given that Pena, Hellweg, Bradley make a big league staff. I do believe someone like Gallardo has trade value in a trade if he pitches close to how he's pitched over his career. I'd trade him before declining his option. And I was one of the posters who mentioned not tendering Estrada. I do believe he's a solid back of the rotation type guy, but I don't think those types are all that hard to come by, and we can do better than him right now.

This is the only way that I'd extend Gomez. I would be willing to go a bit higher than 3 years and 60 million to get it done, but there is no way I'd want to wait until his contract is up because I do think he'd be able to command a 7 year deal for big time dollars. No idea what that will be in a few more years. It could be 7 years and 210 million with the money coming into MLB. And as good as he is right now, I don't think he's going to be a premier player at 34-37. So 3 years, even 70 million. And maybe he's a Carlos Beltran type player who at that point can earn 2 year deals for good money to finish his career. I'm just appreciating the fact that we've got this guy, we've got him in his prime and get to watch him play with SUCH enthusiasm. I doubt we'll see him end his career in Milwaukee, but I'm going to love watch him in the meantime. And who knows, the guy is so crazy(in a good way) maybe he really does love the Brewers and wants to sign here at a hometown discount.

I think it's just about as simple as it gets. Teams that are contending want to add impact players who can significantly improve their chances to win a World Series. The Brewers have almost everything you want. Good pitching, good relievers, good position players(poor bench). But they're lacking an ace. Someone who could possibly matchup with Kershaw or Wainwright. And he's not exactly a rental. As far as the trade scenario, the Brewers would have more success trying a three team trade, trading Gallardo for prospects and then trading those prospects to the Rays along with a couple of their own. I'd be happy to just go with what we have however. Maybe Nelson gets a shot and has a Wacha like run and we make a couple small tweaks, ie, adding a bench player or two. But as nice as Price would be, I don't want to sacrifice 18 years of team control for him at this point.

If they get 3 lottery picks it needs to not involve next years pick as they will probably be pretty bad next year too. They will be pretty bad, but so will the draft. For example, a #14 pick in this year's draft is probably better than a #3 or 4 in next year's draft. What are we possibly basing that on? There is a lot of talent in this years Freshmen class as well. Not like last years, but guys like Turner, Okafor, Mudiay, Alexander, etc..etc...it's obviously early, but I'd rather have a top 3-4 pick in next years draft than the 14th pick in this years draft any day of the week. Plus, if we're bad next year, even if we're only the 6th or 7th worst team, we've got a shot at a top 3 pick. Not a chance I'd give that up for...who? Lavine from UCLA? McDermott? Mudiay, could be a freak at PG. At 6'5 with incredible quickness and athletic ability, he could be a Russell Westbrook type PG to team with Giannis, Wiggins/Embiid and perhaps a pick in the 20's from this year. It'd be great to add multiple players from this draft because it is a really good draft, better and deeper than just about any in the past decade plus, but I don't think it's quite as good as you are making it out to believe.

Yep. Pretty ridiculous idea IMO. Except for the fact that Nelson has been absolutely dominant, not only in the minor leagues, but he's given up 7 hits and 1 ER in about 16 innings in the big leagues. Nelson looks like he'd be a clear upgrade over Estrada. If you can improve your rotation by adding in a pitcher who can throw in the mid 90's with a plus slider and is a big GB pitcher and is 25 vs a older pitcher who throws 88 and is giving up HR's at a ridiculous rate, why wouldn't you? I think the answer is Nelson's service time. Once there isn't any question that he'll get another year of arbitration, I think he gets his shot.

Of course I think a team trading for Estrada would be a trade for a "move to win." Otherwise it'd be foolish for a small market team like SD to trade for Estrada when they're going to have a decent rotation next year(assuming Kelly is ready to go). So why would they want to pay 6-7 million dollars for a #5 pitcher? Especially when they have guys like Matt Wisler a top 50 prospect in AAA, Kelly, another top 50 prospect back from TJ, to go with Cashner, Kennedy, Ross. They also have a handful of prospects in AA and AAA who have had success in the minors. So why with three good starters, a couple of top prospects in AAA would they want to pay 6 million for a guy who has no place in their future? It just doesn't make sense. And the Phillies...Estrada would be awful in Philly. He'd likely give up even more HR's in Philly than in Milwaukee. They could afford him, but why would they want him? Plus, the Philles also have guys to go with Hamels, Lee and are far more likely to add one of the several top FA pitchers. The teams that would WANT Estrada are the teams that are close to a playoff spot THIS YEAR and could use a serviceable #5 starter. I don't think Estrada has much trade value, but I think he has absolutely none to a team that's not in contention this year. I think any team that would give up anything for him would be a team that's dealing with injuries, but just needs a guy to get them through a rough patch. I just don't see any team trading for a 31 year old pitcher this year when they're out of contention in the hopes that he's going to help them out when he's a year older.

[sarcasm]Wow...you were WAAAY off. They picked 12th...[/sarcasm]

And Law continued to stand behind that through the 2011 season when he left Sale out of his top 50 players 25 years of age and younger and didn't even include him in his "honorable mention," list. Then he bashed the White Sox for making Sale a starter. I haven't heard him say he's wrong to this day(perhaps he has, but I've seen several times where he stands behind his asinine comments. You're right. Guys make mistakes or Albert Pujols wouldn't have lasted 12 rounds. But I doubt after he was hitting .340 guys were STILL trying to defend that. I don't think they would be the first 3 ranked players and your opinion that they would be doesn't prove that the system is poor by any means. Adam McCalvy was just on 540 today talking about the Brewers farm system and how he believed one of the main reasons it was underrated was because they don't sell their prospects to the publications doing the rankings like other teams do. They don't communicate with Baseball America, or whoever while obviously the Yankees prospects get the benefit of the doubt 99 times out of 100. But given what our pitching has done this year, the progressions they've made, what Coulter has done, I don't see this system being nearly as poor as you're portraying it. And even if Kodi, Parra, Gatewood and Harrison sign, there is no way I'd move any of them above Clint Coulter, a big power hitter who can draw walks and is exceptionally talented behind the plate. Even if his receiving skills are not yet refined, he's 20 years old. Not sure how a guy who came in with such acclaim and who is posting a line of roughly .290/.420/.550 and very good athleticism would be knocked off the perch by three other high school players. Forgetting Tyrone Taylor, Arcia and others. Don't get me wrong, the 4 young players we're hoping to add to our system have extraordinary ceilings and they should and will be ranked highly. But I think it's about time to start giving our system a bit more credit than what some of the publications have done. Lucroy-Never a top 100 prospect. Top 5 catcher in the game right now. Peralta-rated somewhere in the 60's. Davis, Gennett, Thornburg..they were afterthoughts. Nelson was a top 100 prospect, but rated in the low 90's. We're not and we have not better a top 10 or 15 system. But again, I don't believe we're one of the worst. God...you should be the guy who calls Harrison to try and talk him into signing. His future football career took a REALLY quick turn for the bad pretty quickly there. Blows out an ACL 2 weeks in, then has concussion issues and can't see straight anymore before coming back to baseball where because of the injuries he's not good at anymore! Yeah, I'd sign up for that as well! But...he's a 4 star WR recruit and with his size and strength, he certainly could have an NFL future. Or maybe he just loves football more than Baseball. But hey, he can always play minor league baseball and then go back and try football in 2-3 years if he's not progressing at all. All kidding aside, that would certainly be the smarter route. He'd be older than normal by the time he entered the NFL(assuming he did become an NFL prospect) but he'd already have a couple million and would still have time to pursue an NFL career.

There's no guarantee that Juan would be putting up those same numbers in Milwaukee. Toronto has now taken 3 players off the scrap heap and they've turned into HR monsters. They must be doing something right. I think it's a bit premature to say that the Jays turned Francisco into a "HR monster." Bautista showed some power, but he qualifies as a guy they took off the scrap heap. Encarnacion on the other hand showed big power in Cincy and put up some pretty good seasons at 23,24 and 25. The bottom line though is that Melvin has made a lot of really good moves to put this team in position to win, but had they at least let Overbay and Francisco compete in ST'ing that would have been one thing, but IIRC, Overbay had an 0 for 20-something streak while Francisco hit very well making the move even more baffling. I hate to belabor moves after the fact, but this one is really hurting(less now than a month ago since the offense picked up).

Absolutely. How much better could this list look with Kodi, Gatewood and Harrison on the list, not to mention Parra(assuming he signs and I have no reason to believe he won't at this point). That is 4 potential elite prospects...insomuch as one can call a 16 year old and three 18 year old players who have yet to play a professional inning elite prospects, but all the same, those 4 could make this a lot more interesting. Plus, we get to see a few starts from last years pick Devin Williams. Someone said that we could be one really good draft away from having a top farm system again, and while Crew07 pointed out, you can't do that in one draft, but the young talent we're adding has the potential to at least really give this system one helluva lift. Add in all the other guys who continue to improve and I'm feeling pretty damn good about the direction the Brewers are heading at this point.

It'd be really nice to see Jeffress not only back with the big league club, but truly contributing to it. His command has been the only thing holding him back. He's still walking guys too much, but 5 of his 12 BB's in his 21 IP came in his first three outings. He could be a real boost. Throw him, Henderson and Nelson into the equation....somehow and that could be some really nice added firepower for the pen and or rotation. Also really interested to see how Leon does in AAA. It's just nice to have a lot of power pitchers as options in the upper levels of the minors to supplement a already pretty good staff. K-Rod/Smith/Thornburg/Henderson/Jeffress/Duke or Gorz/Nelson or Fiers(I'd like to see Nelson in the rotation, but it'd be hard to argue against him pitching out of the pen down the stretch if we're making a push and potentially into the playoffs).

SD is a notorious Pitchers ballpark. And they have what? Like 4 of their young SPs on the DL with TJ? Again Estrada becomes an arm(perfectly suited for 1year) to get them through these injuries and at the worst he winds up in their bullpen or traded away again. I don't know if 4 of their young pitchers are on the DL with TJ. You tell me, you're making the argument. I know Kelly had it last year, and Josh Johnson and Jason Marquis have had it this year(hardly young pitchers). But even still, their 5 starters may well be better than Estrada still. His FIP is lower than any of the 5 starters for the Padres. But more importantly, do you think that SD is going to win this year? I don't. You must if you think they would want to trade for Estada. About Philly and wanting Estrada? Well they can certainly pick up Burnett's option with Lee/Hamels that gives them a 3man rotation. Their #4/5 starters Kendrick and Roberto Hernandez are Free Agents after this season. Seems to me Philly could use filling out a rotation for next season. Heck maybe even just to get through this season. The Phillies could do a lot of things. I don't see why they're adding a pitcher and giving up anything(you believe he could net a legit 1B/3B prospect as you've said in other threads) this year when they're one of the few teams that are likely out of it when they could just go out and pick up a #5 pitcher next year. When your teams not in contention a back end guy like Estrada who you can have for insurance for next year as well has to be valuable. Like I said before he goes 6ip(in these pitcher's parks maybe 6.1-6.2ip) Gives up 3-4runs so keeps the team in the ballgame. He has to be a better option than what Philly and SD are tossing out for their #5s today. What's Estrada going to cost next season? 6mil? 7mil? So the back end price is right too. That's why he's a good fit for both ballclubs. Now, I don't know who we can grab from them in return. It appears pretty bleak looking for the C prospect or the bench player. San Diego is the best fit. Between Carlos Quentin/Yonder Alonso/Seth Smith bench guys or maybe a Jesse Hahn or Cory Spangenberg. Philly is as much of a pitchers park as Petco is a hitters park. And I just don't see him being valuable to a team that's out of it already because he might be able to be their #5 pitcher the next year when maybe they might be a contending team. Don't you think they have a little bit more to worry about than who may or may not be their 5th starter after their done losing this year? Especially if Estrada might not be good enough to be their 5th starters right now and he's insurance as you put it, for next years team. Sorry, I just don't see Estrada having any trade value, I don't think many teams are going to want to trade for him, and I don't think any that are out of it this year are looking at a guy who's going to be 32 and can't break a mirror with his fastball to start for them in the future. We just don't and won't agree on this regardless of where it's posted.

4.5 is just an arbitrary figure. If you believe Nelson is better, does it really matter if he manages to hold is ERA at 4.3 as opposed to 4.5? And I just don't see why either Philly or SD would want Estrada. Philly plays in a sandbox and is 9 games under .500 in a tough division. There doesn't seem to be any match there. SD plays in a hitters park, but why would they want a 31 year old back of the rotation starting pitcher? I think you can get either the bench player OR the C prospect for Estrada, maybe a little more(C+ prospect) from a team like the Yankees who might need a guy for a month because of injuries.

This is entirely illogical to me. I would really want the GM and Coach that's going to be running this team through this rebuild to be the ones to pick the player. Otherwise you're really hamstringing them. To be honest, I'm fine with keeping Hammond around. Hammond has made repeated comments about how he really likes the news owners and how they understand the need to build the right way and to build through the draft. Hammond didn't come out and say it, but it certainly sounded like he was suggesting that Kohl did not feel that way and he was forcing them to try and be competitive. And Hammond has drafted well. With regard to Drew, he never had a chance, so I don't know how good he is. Either way, a move should have been made immediately if they were going to make one IMO.

What is Embiid's injury history? As far as I know it's just the one singular injury. I understand the concern about him being a big man and all that goes with that, but I don't want to pass up on Hakeem because of the Greg Oden's of the world. And as far as nobody talking about Exum at #2, I don't know why not? There are 4 elite players. Exum is a 6'6 PG with better combine times than players like Paul, Curry, Lillard and others. According to many reports I've heard, scouts have said that had he played in college this year, he'd be a legitimate contender for the top pick, and is a unanimous top 4 pick. Finally, what makes Wiggins better suited for the SF position? Parker I get. He's not as athletic and is slower. But Wiggins is perfectly suited to play SG. He's long, he's got exceptional quickness and is already a good defender. I go back and forth between Wiggins and Embiid as the guy I want most, but I'd definitely take Exum before Parker. I want a long, athletic team that can defend in the half court and get out and run. If you have either Exum at the Point or Wiggins at the 2 with Giannis, Henson and Sanders right now, that's a lot of athletic ability and upside to start with.

He'd sure look good now. So would have Juan Francisco. But he was hurt last year I believe and had a pretty bad year with an OPS of like 690 or something. I thought he would have been a nice guy to take a flier on(one that's paying off at the moment) but for 6 million dollars? That was a little steep. His career splits are nearly identical with an .820 and .816 OPS vs RH/LH pitchers respectively. I would be really hard pressed to give him a 2nd year if it were up to me, MUCH-MUCH less a 4 year deal. And for what? 40-50 million dollars? I don't see any possible way that ends up working out well for the Brewers. Give him a 1 year deal for 8-10 million. If he doesn't take it, then try and get by on what we have or a trade later on in the season. I'm also thinking Morales is going to want to try and hit the open market fresh next year and try and prove his value. He's also been primarily a DH since his ankle injury. I like that the Brewers have more money and are spending more money, but that additional payroll doesn't really help you all that much if you have guys on the roster making big money who are kinda useless. Ramirez and Weeks are costing the Brewers...what, 32 million for what they're going to provide this year? There's always going to be that "tax," at the end of a contract where you're paying more than you think a guy is going to be worth in order to get him to sign, but this seems like a deal that going into it, it's just too obvious he's not going to produce much, especially at 1st base when he's 34/35 years old to even consider it.

No, those teams should not be and the reason why should be pretty obvious. Estrada is a 31 year old pitcher who throws 88 MPH, has a 5.49 FIP and is leading the league in HR's. He is not, nor was he ever one of the top 5-10 prospects in the game, he's not 24 and he didn't throw 173 innings with a 3.06 ERA last year as Miller did last year. He has not averaged 220 innings over the past 7 years(playoffs included) with an ERA/FIP of 3.31/3.50 over that time period while also having a 7 year 153 million dollar contract like Cole Hamels. He has not averaged 200 innings over the past 4 years, is not 28, has not been in the top 3 of the Cy Young voting with an ERA of 3.15, FIP of 3.42 over the past 4 years like Gio Gonzalez. Liriano is at least closer than these others who are in entirely different circumstances and leagues than Estrada, however the Brewers have better pitching depth than the Pirates(particularly with Tallion done for the year). And he's also pitched 163 innings last year putting up an ERA of 3.02 and an FIP of 2.92. Estrada -.5 WAR this year. Hamels 1.0 WAR Gonzalez .7 WAR Miller -.5 WAR Liriano .5 WAR