SRB

Why the arbitrary .800 threshold, which Moustakas has barely cleared throughout his career? Park adjusted they have almost been the same hitter for a substantial sample now, that's just a fact. Of course, I'm not saying Moustakas is not a more attractive player given his durability, HR pop, and slightly better defensive metrics, but Moustakas just got a massive contract. I'm talking about realistic options for the Brewers to fill one of several holes they have, and Wilmer Flores seems like a solid 2.0+ WAR player if given a full-time job there. They could cobble together a better roster with a number of value-oriented signings rather than one big position player. Say, Flores and Holt and a guy who might be undervalued like Corey Dickerson. C - Narvaez/Pina 1B - Braun/Flores/Holt 2B - Hiura/Urias/Holt/Flores SS - Urias/Arcia 3B - Flores/Holt LF - Yelich/Braun CF - Cain/Taylor RF - Dickerson/Gamel

Why does this guy get no respect? Am I missing something? He hasn't been abnormally injury prone but no team has let him accrue more than 500 PA since the Mets in 2015 (was that he year he was a Brewer for 10 minutes during a game?), and the lowly Diamondbacks just declined a modest $6 million option. And yet, how is he not almost the same as Mike Moustakas? Solid defense all over the diamond, though primarily 1B/3B/2B in recent years: Flores career at 1B: +2.3 UZR/150 Flores career at 2B: -3.2 UZR/150 Flores career at 3B: -2.4 UZR/150 Moustakas career at 3B: +2.2 UZR/150 Despite a slow start to his career (2013-2015), he has been a solid hitter for years now and is coming off an even better season than Moose: Flores stats, 2016-2019: 1411 PA, .333 wOBA, 110 wRC+, .278/.325/.462/.787 Flores stats, 2017-2019: 1076 PA, .333 wOBA, 109 wRC+, .282/.326/.460/.786 Flores stats, 2019: 285 PA, .358 wOBA, 120 wRC+, .317/.361/.487/.848 Moustakas stats, 2016-2019: 1930 PA, .340 wOBA, 110 wRC+, .258/.318/.498/.816 Moustakas stats, 2017-2019: 1817 PA, .340 wOBA, 110 wRC+, .259/.319/.498/.817 Moustakas stats, 2019: 584 PA, .348 wOBA, 113 wRC+, .254/.329/.516/.845 Even more so than Moustakas, he does not need to be platooned: Flores vs LHP, 2017-2019: 367 PA, .332 wOBA, 108 wRC+, .284/.316/.482/.799 Flores vs RHP, 2017-2019: 709 PA, .333 wOBA, 109 wRC+, .281/.331/.448/.780 Moustakas vs LHP, 2017-2019: 536 PA, .331 wOBA, 104 wRC+, .268/.313/.472/.785 Moustakas vs RHP, 2017-2019: 1281 PA, .344 wOBA, 113 wRC+, .255/.322/.509/.831 The projections systems think he will outhit Moose next year (and keep in mind Moustakas is older and on the decline): Steamer projection for Flores: .341 wOBA, 111 wRC+, .285/.335/.479/.814 Steamer projection for Moustakas: .340 wOBA, 106 wRC+, .254/.329/.516/.845 He's a former top prospect (peaking at #47 on Baseball America's 2009 list), hence being one of the near-centerpieces of a Carlos Gomez trade along with then-risky Zack Wheeler. And he's still only 28 years old!!! Why is this guy not a starter and why shouldn't he be the Brewers starting 3B in 2020? He should be very cheap and almost the same as Moose, trading a bit of power for a bit of on-base skills. Am I missing something?

I'd rather use the same resources to trade for a pitcher. We already have an upside player at SS now in Urias. The gap between our rotation and a Lindor equivalent SP is drastically bigger. Plus, Lindor is great but a lot his value comes from his defense. It's not like we'd be trading for a .400 wOBA middle-of-the-order beast.

This pen is a poor return from Knebel away from being an unmitigated disaster. You have 3 known commodities and 1 is coming back from TJ within the year. Either you like these JAGs (just a guy) way too much or you don't value the pen at all. 2 of them in the pen to start the year, maybe. 1 sure. 5? Just cancel the season. You're missing Bobby Wahl and Ray Black, both of whom have back-of-the-bullpen and massive strikeout potential. I'd currently oder the back of the bullpen as: Hader, Knebel, Black, Wahl. Yes, Knebel and Wahl are coming off injuries, but they are not freakish injuries like Jimmy Nelson's.

GMs don't do everything, especially rank low-level prospects in a team in a different league 2000 miles away. They rely on scouts and talent evaluators on their team to assist when making moves. I would bet $1000 that Stearns didn't even know Freddy Peralta's name at the time he was discussing options with Seattle. That doesn't mean I don't respect the job Stearns does, but blindly assigning all success to him is just plain wrong. And the guys who were advising him on prospects during the Lind negotiations probably were fired when the Brewers cleaned house earlier this year on the scouting side. So that didn't save their jobs. As others have said, it was easy for Stearns to walk away from what the Rangers were offering if he wasn't willing to give the same money to Chase Anderson. This offseason is going to be different as the free agent market is weak in the mid-level talent and loaded with meh talent. Teams are aggressively going after the mid-level to low-level talent as there aren't a lot of options and soon we'll be looking at very bad options across the board. As things are going the odds of a Hader trade are going up. edit: Stearns may have heard of Peralta while with the Astros in his capacity there, but that might only change my bet to $500. I'm not sure that's true. GMs do not work singlehandedly obviously, but ultimately they are the ones interpreting the scouting reports they get and making the decisions.

I'd be willing to take a chance on Bird. I don't see a big difference between him and Dominic Smith, for example, if we want to go with a risky 1B option. And Bird is basically free.

Pass on Lyles at that price. His results were fantastic with us obviously, but even then his metrics were not great.

Urias is very possibly a better defender at SS than Arcia, for the record. Arcia makes spectacular plays but his overall defense is nothing special.

Bumgarner is definitely the highest upside arm available to us. When you are somehow only 30 and as talented as he is, a Verlander-type resurgence is not out of the question

Mancini is arbitration eligible this season and already projected to make about $5.7 million. I certainly don't think he will be cheap, my point was just that I assumed Dominic Smith would be overpriced because of his prospect pedigree, and if both players take a moderate return I'd prefer Mancini. But if Smith is much cheaper that evens things out.

Ranking 2020 free agents plus current Brewers by 2017-2019 FIP (100+ IP as SP), including those that have already signed .. 3. Jimmy Nelson, 3.24 FIP, 187.1 IP [returning from injury] 4. Brandon Woodruff, 3.51 FIP, 180.1 IP 5. Hyun-Jin Ryu, 3.62 FIP, 387.2 IP .. 7. Alex Wood, 3.77 FIP, 330.2 IP [returning from injury] .. 10. Madison Bumgarner, 3.94 FIP, 448.1 IP 11. Dallas Keuchel, 3.97 FIP, 463.0 IP 12. Taijuan Walker, 4.02 FIP, 171.1 IP [returning from injury] 13. Gio Gonzalez, 4.07 FIP, 453.0 IP 14. Brent Suter, 4.14 FIP, 165.0 IP --na. Adrian Houser, 4.22 FIP, 80.2 IP [below ranking threshold] 15. Freddy Peralta, 4.23 FIP, 109.1 IP .. 18. Clay Buchholz, 4.30 FIP, 164.2 IP .. 20. Tanner Roark, 4.32 FIP, 520.2 IP 21. Michael Wacha, 4.36 FIP, 364.0 IP [returning from injury] 22. Eric Lauer, 4.36 FIP, 260.1 IP 23. Kevin Gausman, 4.38 FIP, 452.1 IP Not sure if it makes sense to look much below Gausman for guys to slot into the rotation as opposed to depth. Our internal options are likely better. FWIW, I think Corbin Burnes deserves a look in the rotation again too. He was unlucky, plain and simple. In his 17.2 IP as a starter he has a 3.99 xFIP but got decimated on HR/FB%. We don't need to sign a FA or make a trade. I wouldn't sleep on a rotation of: Woodruff Burnes Houser Lauer Suter/Peralta

The guys I would target are Alex Wood, Gio Gonzalez, Taijuan Walker, and Michael Wacha. The best values available, IMO.

I fairly confident Mancini would cost much more in terms of acquisition value/cost as compared to Dom Smith. Maybe, though the Orioles gave away Villar for nothing and Mancini sort of has a similar offense-only profile to Narvaez who we just got for very little. If Smith is very cheap then I'm all on board with give him a shot.

[sarcasm]All of our pitchers are either already bad or have a 16+ K/9, who needs defense?[/sarcasm]

Here's a question: which would be cheaper to acquire, three years of Trey Mancini or five years of Dominic Smith, and which would you rather have? I think Mancini would be significantly cheaper, and I also have significantly more confidence in Mancini hitting well.

What a player is traded for is an input - one of many - into a player's value. The inputs changed, thus the output (value) changed. Valid, IMO. The Brewers could turn around and trade Urias tomorrow. What he was recently traded for is one of the inputs into his value, thus he needs to update the value to assess a future trade. He's simply updating the inputs, which changes the output. Ok, then his "trade value" is a meaningless black box that should not be treated like an objective numeral figure. In that case it is not his projected value on the field, which is what the average reader interprets the number to mean. But this is a sidetrack from the topic at hand, so I'll stop!

There is a lot that could be unpacked here. You do both. WAR is a counting stat dependent upon playing time and the situational context of how that players skills were used by a team's manager. If a different team thinks they can get more value from that players skills than how he was used previously, then they will value his $/WAR differently than "the market." If his original team has a cheaper up and coming player to replace the other players production, then that will decrease his value to the original team, making him more expendable. Basically "market value" is an average of how all team's would value the player, but obviously every team will place a different value upon the player, that's what makes trades possible and beneficial for both parties. I'm not sure how either of those are relevant. Narvaez (and for that matter, Adam Hill and the comp pick) are not on the free market. Hosmer and Grandal signed 2 years apart so of course their values are going to be different now than when they signed. The other aspect, and probably more important aspect, is that the estimated market value is always seen from the outside while trading partners see things from the inside. There might be reasons outside of WAR that Hosmer (or Urias or Narvaez or Adam Hill or whoever) is valued or devalued that only the owner of that player can know. Thus, after a transaction occurs that seems to belie the previously ascribed "market" value, it would be wise to adjust that market value accordingly (not COMPLETELY, but at least a little bit) Ok, I mean, if you want to declare that any time there's a trade you will adjust one side's value up some arbitrarily defined amount and the other side down by some arbitrarily defined amount, more power to you but I question why even attach a numerical value to what is entirely subjective. You havent addressed the main issue, which is that projected WAR and "market value" (as distinct from $/WAR based on a going market rate) should not be conflated and that it is actually somewhat misleading to do so. From a sabermetric standpoint, Eric Hosmer did not become a better player when he got a huge contract, and Urias should not have become a worse player just because he was traded, at least if we assume scouting reports and projection systems have any real purpose.

Huh? It's not like one of the numbers has to be actually 100% correct and one of them has to be 100% wrong. The most likely scenario when there is a large discrepancy between those numbers is that BOTH are off by a bit. Still, Zillow is an ESTIMATE or PREDICTION...Same as the Trade value ESTIMATE or PREDICTION. The actual trade is the actual market value (or actual value agreed upon by the two parties in the transaction, anyway). It is a sound analogy. So are you estimating projected value based on WAR and $/WAR, or are you estimating some nebulous concept of "market value" whatever that means by slapping a number on a player's actual transaction history. Does Eric Hosmer have a higher "market value" than Yasmani Grandal based on their respective contracts, such that the White Sox would win a one-for-one trade? Does anyone think that a 27-year-old catcher with Narvaez's track record would settle for a 3-year/$5 million contract if he was a free agent tomorrow? The obvious answer to both is no, because the numbers they are using are ostensibly projected performance based on stats and (for prospects) scouting evaluations of talent. How should those change based on a trade? As I mentioned in the previous thread, the most you can infer is that one GM (if you want to treat him as a scout) thinks the players are closer in talent.

Yes, they did. But I think it's important to differentiate when it doesn't happen which it didn't in this case. I thought his explanation was a good one, though, when he pointed out that if Zillow puts a $500,000 estimate on a house that sells for $300,000, they can't insist the house is worth $500,000. They have to adjust their estimates based on the market. I'm pretty sure he admitted they were off on that one, but like any other market, it was never designed to be perfect. It fluctuates based on many factors, one of course, being real life trade results. They have to constantly re-evaluate and adjust. That goes for any value based estimate around. The adjustment wasn't made to save face and try to make it look more even. It was made because they had to adjust values based on what the real life market told them those players were worth. That Zillow analogy makes no sense. Then every single trade is even by definition.

Yeah, those numbers definitely got altered to make this seem more even than it actually was. Just like last week's deal. Joey, I think you're one of the best posters around but I personally think this is unfair to John and their models over at baseballtradevalues.com to assume that without knowing (if that's in fact what you are doing, I could be wrong and maybe you were saying that off an earlier posted projection in which case I apologize).. But as he pointed out, Narvaez was consistently at $5.1M. I checked it this morning and it was indeed at $5.1 well before the return was announced. That was the main reason I didn't expect a significant return so I would disagree with you entirely in this case and say that based on the trade return, John's projections were in fact validated, not altered. To answer SRB (at least in part), you can't just project his WAR out and put a price on it, you also have to subtract his projected arbitration salaries as well. I don't even know if the traditional 9M per WAR value is even applicable anymore or if it is in fact outdated, nor do I know if they use that to calculate value. I'm well aware of that, but Narvaez is projected to make about $2 million in arbitration this year and over the last three seasons (in a more limited role in terms of playing time), Fangraphs pegs his value at $10.5 million, $8.8 million, $14.5 million. So even factoring massive regression (why?) that $5.1 million figure seems very low. At a minimum the projected value needs to take into account playing time (which is part of why I think the whole trade value concept is dubious from the start)

Do we get those pitching staffs too, asking for a friend. That's next on Stealin' Stearns's shopping list. I'd be happy with any of those offense to start with though.

For those wondering about the real world impact of pitch framing and having a bat-first catcher, it seems to have been a good strategy in recent years 2015-2019 framing value (1000+ innings) 65. Omar Narvaez, -22.3 .. 69. Willson Contreras, -33.7 (2016 WS Champion) 70. Robinson Chirinos, -34.2 (2019 WS Runner-Up) .. 74. Kurt Suzuki, -39.3 (2019 WS Champion) 75. Salvador Perez, -45.3 (2015 WS Champion)

Careful, this might be some kind of monkey paw situation where we'll wake up and Stearns has signed C.J. Cron to a $120 million contract.

Defensive metrics for catchers are pretty weird. Grandal is negative on Baseball Reference, then awesome with Fangraphs. I'm not sure what they are using to create their numbers that is so different at times. I believe Fangraphs adds a pitch framing metric and B-Ref does not, and as I recall the pitch framing values can be suspiciously huge. Pitch framing is definitely real, but I'm skeptical how they measure it and how they control for the pitcher. Greg Maddux had a massive strike zone throughout his career and it presumably had nothing to do with who was catching him.

How is Narvaez projected at $5.1 million? He only needs to be worth 1.0 WAR in 2020 alone to exceed that and we have him for three years.