HiAndTight

I find it stunning that someone actually compared Brett Lawrie to Rogers Hornsby. I couldn't tell you who it was, I'm sure someone else on here could. It was from a ranking list and I THINK it may have been Sickels. Either way, that wasn't really the point. The point was I'm not sure how exactly the conclusion was drawn that THIS right now is and will be his peak value.

I gotta say, I'm loving watching the Cards lock up money in the players they're locking it up on. Couple that with Pujols and his 30 million dollar contract upcoming, and TLR's....stunning dislike for Colby Rasmus(hopefully they can trade him over for another loogy that TLR seems to love so much) and they just don't seem to have the same leadership they had with Jocketty.

Wouldn't this blow a rather substantial hole then in the "Rogers+Jeffress+Cain" trade? If he's not close, and he's so wild, why would the Royals want him? For the record, I think the Royals hang up giggling after hearing that offer.

I'd gladly throw Hart to Tampa, even taking on a few million in salary for Garza. They want to cut costs, but I think that's more with regard to Garza and Shields as they've got a plethora of starting pitching. They don't want to hit the later arby years with pitchers who are not their best couple. He doesn't replace Crawford, but he doesn't cost 25 million a year either.....

I can't believe it either as I've never used the term "impact arms" and there are more ways to get them. And LoCain's still here...for the time being. He's apparently being shopped as well. Which I have no problems with......if anyone cares.

I really don't understand the grass is always greener argument. As I've said, this isn't me bashing Melvin because I don't like him. This is the first move I've vehemently disagreed with and I've always been a Melvin supporter. I think others have tossed the comment around in regard to my complaining about this trade that some people will complain about Melvin no matter what, which is an easy way to disregard an argument, but that's just not the case. I've been a very big fan of Melvin for the most part. I just think he traded away Ryan Braun for....a better version of Dave Bush. Quite a bit better, but still, a guy who doesn't throw that hard, who had great peripherals coming over from Toronto.

I think I've explained these multiple times, but he had TJ two years ago, hasn't thrown 200 innings, has 2 years left on his contract and is a soft tosser. Still a good pitcher, but for people who are already calling him an ace, or our ace....and I get called delusional for not wanting to have made this particular trade...... Second, going through TJ is not a plus. Some pitchers come back and add velocity, but I hardly think it can be argued that having just about the most devastating injury to a pitcher can be called "a plus."

If you don't mind, I'll bookmark this for future discussions on Melvin. If we're going to blindly have faith in Melvin on this issue because he's been around for a while, then I suppose the same arguments could be made for Suppan, Hawkins, the Lee trade, the Sexon trade, the lack of a Prince trade and other moves that he generally gets lambasted for. In fact I've seen quite a few posts mocking him with regard to Pavano, or aging middle relievers.

We are desperate for pitching....time will tell if this was worth it. I hope I'm proven wrong. And I don't believe he'll be our ace over Yovani either. Yo's younger, more durable, and throws about 5-6 MPH harder. The same could be said about Parra...ok, maybe not the durable part. But there is more to a pitcher than being young and throwing hard.I think some things SHOULD have been assumed in there. Yo's also proven himself a capable front of the rotation type pitcher at 23 and 24 years old. That's as far as I'm going to entertain the Parra-Gallardo conversation however.

I quite literally would have been alright trading ANY other player on that list for pitching. Obviously your expectations go up or down with the player. I'd have expected more for Braun obviously, a nice return for Hart, McGehee's a guy I think we should trade now, Rogers is a fun guy to watch, but his history suggests he has a high liklihood of being a bust, same with Jeffress. Cain...I don't think he'd bring much in return. Weeks is probably my favorite player, but from a more detached place, I'd have been alright with trading him. Odorizzi would have been tough as well. I appreciate being called delusional, in particular when I've never once suggested we'd get a QUALITY(since it must be in all caps) pitcher for mid range prospects. I also haven't seen anyone else suggest that. I'm not sure how my issue with trading our top prospect for a guy who has the issues surrounding him that Marcum does automatically qualifies as "being delusional" because we thought we could get a quality starting pitcher for a couple of mid range prospects. Lets not superimpose other issues into this. I have a problem with trading Lawrie for Marcum, nothing else. I have no preceding issue with Melvin, nor do I have any deluded expectations of what pitching costs. These other things being thrown around, about no matter what Melvin does people will complain, about what YOU think I expect to have to give up for "quality" starting pitchers aside, I don't like giving up the player we gave up for the player we got. Now if everyone else wants to rejoice that we got a good starting pitcher, I'll be right there with them. That's great. I don't think it's great what we gave up for him.

We are desperate for pitching....time will tell if this was worth it. I hope I'm proven wrong. And I don't believe he'll be our ace over Yovani either. Yo's younger, more durable, and throws about 5-6 MPH harder.

So Lawrie wasn't going to make it up for another 3 years? He'll be at AAA this year. Gamel? Jeffress? Rogers? Rivas, Heckathorn, Peralta, Scarpetta? We're going to lose a whole lot of those guys to the rule 5 if they can't make it here in 3 years. Odorrizi's the one big prospect who may not make it until then, and even that's taking a bit of a negative perspective since it's entirely likely, given health, he sees AA this year. What's more, if we're at the place where we just blindly concede to letting every single player go, not just the Boras players who've maintained all along they were going to go to Free Agency, but any and every player on our team such as Braun and Yo, two guys who've already signed below market deals to stay here, then I guess we're kinda dead anyway.

I think I'm one of the few people who is adamantly against that, and I've been a HUGE Melvin defender, so that comment just blindly thrown out there. I'm also curious how you come to the conclusion that Lawrie's value is at it's "Peak"? For a guy who was compared to Rogers Hornsby(which I'm not arguing he's going to be, just that there are those out there who are more than just a little high on him) I find it stunning we can say at 20 years old, "yup, this is his peak value." How about trading FOR a pitcher at his peak? Does that not come into play? Guy had TJ two years ago, hasn't exactly been a work horse and throws 87. Lets take a tick or two off that fastball and see what he does. I seem to recall Dave Bush putting up a very good season in Toronto....and again, NOT saying he's Dave Bush, clearly better, but I see people calling him an ace, and I think that's a bit premature.

I think that's a gross exaggeration. Prince and Weeks were both certainly very highly regarded prospects, but I think they were closer to Lawrie(when all is said and done in reference to their prospect status) than they were to Strasburg.

We always hear this from people when a prospect is mentioned in a trade. "Well, you know teams overvalue their own prospects." Great, they probably do, but you know all those superstars in baseball? They come from teams farm systems. Lawrie IS on the same level of Weeks or Prince...at least IMO, and what he's done moving up to AA as a 20 year old while Weeks was still in college(and performing exceptionally well I grant you) should cement that. I get how valuable pitching is obviously, how difficult it is to acquire, but for a guy coming off TJ surgery, for a guy who doesn't throw hard meaning any loss in velocity could really kill him, I don't like this trade. And we'll see where Lawrie cracks the rankings this year, but I suspect he'll be squarely in the top 10 of all prospects. Obviously signing Weeks is probably pretty likely at this time....though you just gave them a bit more leverage IMO, but that's of little consequence to me as I think Lawrie's more of a 3rd basemen. As a Brewers fan, I honestly hope this trade works out, but to me, as a Doug Melvin supporter, he took a bit hit IMO. And that's not an indictment on Marcum. He'll help us out a great deal in the next 2 years...if he stays healthy. Not as much as Lawrie would have helped us out in the next 6 years. And maybe I am overvaluing....but to me we just gave up a Ryan Braun type talent for 2 years of a guy coming off TJ who throws 87 MPH.

My point is I see that as our best case scenario. An making the playoffs is great, but if you're an 85 win team going in, you're likely going to be a fart in the wind and forgotten about awfully quick as you go 3 and done, or 3 and 1. More likely we're still a team in the low 80's and that's if Marcum stays healthy and things go right.

I do. I don't think this is a move a guy makes in our current situation if he's confident he's going to be around for the long term. I think what's really best for the Brewers is to take a few years off from trying to add impact pitchers and settling for soft tossers(though Marcum's certainly a legit pitcher), let our prospects catch up, and then when we've clear the salaries of some of these guys(or hell, re-sign a couple of them) then be a bit more aggressive. Aggression when it's going to lead to the upside of 85 wins isn't really doing it for me.

I still think Lawrie's long term home is 3rd, but I'm hoping a Weeks extension will provide the same issues. I'd love to see Farris play some short, CF and 2nd base. If his D is that good at 2nd, you'd hope he could play short at least well enough to be a utility guy.

Yes, but how about this: 2010 Hardy .320/.394/.714 (with more home runs and three fewer RBI's in about 175 less plate appearances- and about half the errors with 100 fewer chances) Those aren't exactly impressive numbers. Add to the fact that he's got 6 years in the big leagues now(close to 6 anyway as we all know) and Escobar's a rookie and I fail to see how these numbers are a strong argument for Hardy. Even with the advantage of hindsight it's not THAT clear that Hardy's a better option than Escobar, forgetting expectations that Escobar should be a better defender with more range and his bat should improve a great deal(lets not forget Hardy was hitting below .200 the first half of his rookie year). Hardy looks to have regressed a great deal, and again, Gomez wasn't a good haul for him, but it's not like we traded him and he went back to his 25 HR a year production. He hit 6 last year.

I believe Greinke just waived his no-trade to New York, so it doesn't look like he will block a trade there.

Apparently the Yanks and Jeter are close to finalizing a 3 year deal at 17 million per and a 4th option year for less money with a buyout option.

3.75 xFIP in 2008 4.10 xFIP in 2009 Looks like he's been worthy of a spot in our pen longer than just one year. Those are not exactly good stats for a RP, especially the 2009 ones. 2008 FIP was 4.49, 2009 FIP was 4.28 also not good for a RP. His career HR/9 is now 1.31 in 425 IP which suggests the FIPs are probably more accurate than the xFIPs at this point. Last years 3.74 FIP, 3.39 xFIP and large jump in K/9 makes him look a lot better as a RP than we saw in the rest of his time as a Brewer. It's a little hard to keep track at times. In one thread those are good xFIP numbers(your opinion) and now with Villy he's never been worthy of a spot in our pen(which wasn't exactly filled with guys like Fingers in '08 and '09...not to mention those are a bit inflated by a bad stretch starting a couple years ago. Either way, I disagree. At 500-600 K he was a fine reliever for us. AS his salary continues to increase and our young power arms continue to claim spots, he becomes more disposable, but I think you're underselling him a bit.

He'd have no power if his name weren't Derek Jeter. Jeter's more than his WAR or last seasons below average line. And it's the friggin Yankee's. Give him 20 million over 4 years and be done with it. Jeter's got to be willing to take that. I don't think George would have thought twice about that type of contract. Hell, he may have offered him more.... In the end I think the Yankee's will just pay him "for the sake of paying him."

3.75 xFIP in 2008 4.10 xFIP in 2009 Looks like he's been worthy of a spot in our pen longer than just one year.

I believe he just waived his no-trade clause for New York. And Baird, a Royals exec when he went through his anxiety issues who supposedly helped him get through his issues a great deal is now the assistant GM in Boston. So I think it's entirely likely he ends up pitching for a big market team. That said, I would be willing to give away just about anyone in our farm system for him other than Lawrie.