Playing Catch

I agree with the eye test on Abrams. Last night's error wasn't just poor execution. It looked lazy. Side-armed from the hole moving away from first base with little chance of getting the out. Just bad decision-making. With that said, I thought the whole team looked like they were disappointed at not being acquired by a better team.

A tale of two rookies starting at 3B for their respective teams.

And at the time, the consensus was that the Brewers overpaid for him in prospect-terms, which many here want to do in order to demonstrate the team playing for 2025.

Seriously. What would Priester's value have been yesterday? Wow. Fangraphs projects him to collect a modest 4.3 WAR over the next 3 seasons. Mason Miller is projected to accumulate 3.1 WAR, just as a quick and dirty comparison.

I don't think their philosophies are as different as they seem on the surface. When Travis Shaw was playing 2nd base, it was the peak of 3TO, unbalanced shifts, and launch-angle. Every left-handed hitter, and nearly every infielder had to be a power hitter to have any value. Stearns was riding the wave of metrics at the time. Since Arnold took over, the Brewers have been at the absolute forefront of predicting how rule changes and bull-penning will change the game. Defense, Team Speed, Platoons, and making good swing decisions are key, accepting hitting hard shots on the ground instead of selling out for launch angle. This happens to fit in well with how teams value those players. The Yankees weren't going to play Durbin at 3rd base. The Brewers are one of the few teams willing to roster guys like Perkins, Collins, and the versatile Seigler.

I think the Reds move for Ke'Bryan Hayes was interesting. He is signed through 2029 but has hit like Joey Ortiz for nearly two full seasons... at THIRD BASE. Methinks they are imagining all of the Brewers' infield hits turning into groundball outs when they play each other for the next 4 seasons.

Lockridge has an interesting minor league journey. A Yankees 5th round college pick in 2018, the Yankees stashed him in their system through Covid, and all the way to AAA until trading him to the Padres at last year's deadline, as a would-be Rule 5 draftee. The Padres added him to their 40-man a week before the Brewers added Isaac Collins last September. Based on his minor-league numbers alone, it looks like the initial development plan was to be a tooled-up, all-around hitter. This worked for him until 2022, his ONLY sub-par season in the minors as a 25-year-old in AA, where he hit 14 HRs and had 18 SBs with an on-base% of .300. After that season, it looks like he TOTALLY changed his approach to maximize his speed, probably doing pushups like Willie Mays Hayes every time he hit the ball in the air (his GB/FB ratio was 1.09 in 2022. In 2023 it was 1.93, in 2024 it was 3.26). In the following 2023 season, he played in 16 fewer games, but struck-out 50(!) fewer times, sacrificing 10 extra-base hits in the process. But with his new, shiny .379 OBP, he improved from 18 SBs to 40. While his ISO suffered, his SLG actually IMPROVED from .378 to .414. He has continued that trend in AAA this season with an OPS of .877 with THAT profile. He is a fascinating case of a guy that understood that he had to change significantly to carve out a big-league role. Time will tell if it works out for him.

I like the visual. You can see why the Brewers wanted Lockridge.

He turns 21 next month, making him about the same age as many players that were recently drafted. If he and his minor-league production to date, (an erratic, but skilled defender at short, league-average hitter with projection remaining), were available to be drafted this year, for what kind of bonus would he have been drafted? This season, he's improved on both his BB% and his K%. That's impressive.

It's August 1st, and the Brewers have the best record in baseball. 5th in Runs Allowed, and 8th in Runs Scored. They have the deepest rotation in baseball, with quality at the top, so much so that starters are being turned into 3-inning save guys despite having a really good bullpen. Their record is not a fluke. The Brewers ARE the bullies.

I just posted in the Transactions forum, but I concur. Suarez is an obvious upgrade to the Brewers at the dish, but the lineup/defensive ramifications to his playing every day end up dulling his shine, and other than Ke'Bryan Hayes, I'm not sure there were any infielders that could sniff Ortiz's defense, other than Correa, which was a unique case. There are moves that I would have made, but usually when the choices are between MY being wrong, and Matt Arnold being wrong, I'm guessing I'm wrong 9 out of 10 times. And as dlk9s just posted, NATIONAL outlets from outside Brewerland, felt the Brewers were the only contender that didn't have any obvious holes.

C If one presumes that the only players available were the ones that got moved, there really weren't a lot of clear upgrades available. I think those of us on the outside believe guys like Suarez, O'Hearn or Castro were examples of clear upgrades, but Even Carlos Correa is having a league average season offensively and defensively, and he's often hurt. The Twins fans I know were glad to see him leave. I think Durbin playing his way to becoming a legitimate, all-around starting 3rd baseman really made it challenging to find obvious on-field upgrades. If they acquire Suarez, he is starting everyday at 3rd, right? So is he starting in Ortiz's place? Then you're doing musical chairs with the infield, and losing your best infield defender. Does Suarez start at DH? Then Yelich is in left, and Collins is on the bench. Does that make your team better? Since June 1st, Collins has a wRC+ of 152. Do you replace Ortiz like-for-like? In an ideal world, yes. But other than Correa, which sounded like a unique case of his being okay to move to Houston, no better-than-Ortiz shortstops were available. In terms of replacing the Monasterios and Seiglers of the world, it's also tricky. Those guys don't have a lot of hit-tool, but they do everything else decently enough. They can run a little, Seigler hits from both sides, they both looks competent in the field. I'm guessing they are great in the clubhouse, for what that's worth. They both have options, so when players come back from injury, or there's a brief roster crunch, they don't just have to be DFA'ed. The Brewers improved with the Jansen trade. They improved with Shelby Miller. They mitigated challenges of outfield depth by adding a guy that replaces everything you get (except the bat) from Frelick/Chourio/Perkins/Collins.

15-15. I'm not sure what people have seen from the Brewers that would lead them to predict the Brewers to have a losing record in the month. I guess Chourio being out, or a general disbelief in BrewVooDoo?

His slugging percentage comes from where, exactly? Hustle-doubles? For a guy that can run like he can, and gets on base at a .400 clip?? I mean, I wouldn't want to face him as a pitcher in a tight game, that's for sure. And these days, the game is all bull-penning anyway. How are you gunna score a big run late with a pinch-hitter against the Mets or Padres bullpens? With a cromulent, albeit strikeout prone, power hitter, or a guy with Lockridge's profile?

I think that one of the reasons today's deadline felt a little chaotic around the league was simply because the wild-card era really makes it hard for teams to determine where they're at, in terms of buyers/sellers/otherwise until perhaps the last few days. Being able to be nimble in that market is probably a sign of a competent organization. There's a lot of inter-departmental communication that has to be on the same page to make moves like the Brewers did today.

This is an astute observation. If Arnold was being "opportunistic," and there wasn't time to vet prospect opinions, it was one way to do things quickly, against the deadline.

Hmmm... more sensible that way. I hadn't considered near-nil prospect-value going back in the deals. Instead, they actually added near-nil prospect-value (no disrespect to Lockridge's game).

Whoo boy! Things just got interesting around here!

Lockridge looks like a Garrett Mitchell replacement(?) Fits the Collins, Durbin, Perkins mold.

I wish I knew the real value of Monasterio and Seigler's defense in comparison to Willi Castro's. It just seems like adding Castro and say, O'Hearn, and subtracting Monasterio and Seigler would really set the Brewers up, in terms of making a lineup from now until November. They would have starting-caliber cover at every position.

This is a great idea. But with their injury-issues, and their being in first place, they really need Dubon's versatility. Probably more than they need pitching.

Those Dodgers and Padres teams are going to get old quick. Padres already on the hook for $133,000,000 in guaranteed contracts in... 2030. Of course, no Dodger or Padres fan cares so long as they have a shot at the title, but with those aging rosters, I'll be curious how they unravel the knot. Miller goes to his first of four arbitration seasons in 2026. He'll still have a ton of value for the next year or two before his salary catches up to his talent.

I think this is a reasonable beginning hypothetical in terms of on-field value/team control, but Marte's contract and 5-team no-trade clause would be significant hurdles. In addition, the Diamondbacks are a well-run organization that wants to compete every season and Marte is MVP-caliber. I think the Diamondbacks would need more than that in order to try and convince "their" guy to waive a no-trade clause. And I just don't see that organization doing that, as it really upsets their applecart.

I was listening to an MLB podcast yesterday, and the two hosts were laughing about how the Brewers were not only the best team in baseball, but that after studying the Brewers these last few weeks, they were extremely impressed the Brewers didn't have any holes they needed to fix. They were taken aback a little bit. I love the deadline as much as the next baseball fan, but many of the narratives are media-driven. Regional, or team-specific media, as much as national media. I think that within the baseball world, the acquisitions of Priester, Vaughn, and Jansen, along with guys like Big Woo and Misiorowski really do represent additions, and that objectively, the Brewers, when compared to the other contenders, are in really good shape. Can they add? Should they? That depends on one's point-of-view, of course, and everyone's opinions are valid, but at least from the outside, the Brewers are considered an outlier in terms of their "completeness".

I guess I will always think of you when I think of Areinamo, as you were one of the first to identify him as an underrated prospect. I appreciate that. Sorry to lump you in with the trade-naysayers.