JosephC

This appears to me the most lop-sided trade made this year in terms of surplus value. Verlander's surplus value estimate as follows. Average WAR values between Baseball Reference and Fangraphs for the last three years with 2017 pro-rated to cover the full season are 2.55, 5.90, 4.14 with a three year average of 4.2 (interesting that the three year average is nearly the same number as the 2017 value). I still think at his age (will be 35 right around the start of next season), there has to be the assumption that there will be some decline in performance moving forward, so I'll just go with a decline of 0.5 WAR per season. That puts his WAR value at 0.83 for the remainder of 2017, 3.7 in 2018 and 3.2 in 2019. With 1 WAR being worth 8.56 million in 2017, 9.16 million in 2018 and 9.8 million in 2019, it would put Verlander's value at 72.357 million assuming nothing happens with the vesting option year in 2020. As far as remaining salary, there's approximately 4.667 million left for this season and 28 million due in 2019 and 2020 for a total of 60.667 million. 72.357 - 60.667 = +11.69 million = Verlander's surplus value. Franklin Perez is listed in the 26-50 range on both the Baseball America and MLB.com top 100 lists which puts his prospect surplus value at 31.886 million. Daz Cameron and Jake Rogers are both easy calls as "top ten organizational prospects" which puts the surplus value of each of those players at approximately 10.7 million. Most recent updates at MLBTradeRumors has the Astros getting 16 million + a PTBNL OR cash considerations. Those details have already been updated a couple of times so I'm curious to see if there will be any more updates with different numbers. I'm going to assume the PTBNL will be a fringe prospect or another small cash payout but for now will assume that has a 1 million dollar value (will generally put a fringe prospect's value at 2 million but it's unlikely a cash payout would approach that number, so will just assume 1 million). Astros get: Justin Verlander = 11.69 million surplus value 16 million dollars 1 million dollars (as PTBNL/cash consideration) Total = 28.69 million Tigers get: Franklin Perez = 31.886 million surplus value Daz Cameron = 10.7 million surplus value Jake Rogers = 10.7 million surplus value Total = 53.286 million Pretty much a "we're going for it" move for the Astros. This trade will obviously be worth it for them if they win the World Series. If they don't, Verlander will likely have to pitch at a 4.75 WAR value for each of the next two years for the surplus value numbers to even up, and that is pretty unlikely.

Latest on MLBTradeRumors is that the Astros and Cubs have talked to Detroit and the Tigers have not moved at all on their demands for Verlander. Hard to believe that Stearns wouldn't have been willing to meet the asking price in July but would be willing to meet it tonight (especially with another month off the calender).

Upton may have 88 million left on that deal but with the season he's having I think chances are better than even that he opts out unless he loves southern California. But it makes sense for the Tigers to get whatever they could for him because he would have been even more likely to opt of if Detroit had retained him considering they are likely entering a rebuild. All things considered, I think it was a pretty good deal for both sides with the potential to be a great deal for the Angels if he elects to stay there.

As far as the Brewers swinging at non-strikes, Fangraphs has numbers for the last 30 days and over that period the Brewers have swung at 30.8% of pitches that have been outside the strike zone. That is below average but not terrible, 11 teams rank below that (Braves are the worst at 35.0%). But when the Brewers do swing at pitches outside of the strike zone, the O-Contact % (pitches on which contact was made on pitches outside the zone/swings on pitches outside the zone) has been the fourth worst in baseball. Interestingly enough, the team's Z-Contact % (pitches on which contact was made on pitches inside the zone/swings on pitches inside the zone) over the last 30 days has been the worst in baseball. So it's not like they are swinging at too may bad pitches, but rather swinging and missing too many pitches both inside and outside of the strikezone. Maybe most of the hitters need a set of Sogard glasses?

August OBP for the 8 Brewer hitters with the most at-bats this month. -Domingo Santana = .350 -Keon Broxton = .321 -Ryan Braun = .320 -Travis Shaw = .308 -Orlando Arcia = .293 -Manny Pina = .274 -Eric Thames = .272 -Hernan Perez = .259 I don't necessarily think it's about strikeouts. The NL team that's scored the most runs this month are the Cubs with 185. As a team they've struck out 265 times in August. The Brewers are dead last in scoring runs in the NL this month with 97. As a team they've struck out 267 times. It's not necessarily about making non-productive outs, it's about making outs and the Brewers have done that at way too high a rate this month. Having half the bats (+ a pitcher) with OBP's under .300 is almost a sure way to not score many runs. Some of the other bats have been much better in August -Jonathan Villar = .365 -Neil Walker = .404 -Jesus Aguilar = .286 -Eric Sogard = .404 -Stephen Vogt = .318 Obviously Walker wasn't here the whole month which is why he wasn't in the top 8. Pretty amazing that Villar figured out to get on base this late in the year when his monthly OBP's from April through July were consistently bad (.267/.301/.282/.258)...now it looks like Counsell needs to figure out how to get him more at-bats. First base has been kind of an offensive black hole this month. Aguilar has OPS'ed a very respectable .821 this month, but the combination of his and Thames OBP is truly ugly.

Actually I wouldn't say Garza had a good first half. I'd say he had a good first five starts and it's all been downhill after that. Since his first five starts of the season, here are the numbers (including tonight): 16 games, 79 2/3 innings, 87 hits, 50 earned runs, 37 walks, 53 strikeouts That's a 5.65 ERA and a 1.56 WHIP. This is where I think some of the WAR algorithms are whacked as it's really hard for me to believe he's above replacement level (and really hasn't been since 2014).

Miguel Gonzalez entered the 2017 season with a career MLB ERA of 3.80 (107 ERA+) and WHIP of 1.28. The FIP was high (4.51) but he had a solid track record of pitching better than the FIP would indicate (715 1/3 innings pitched). In 2016 he had a 3.73 ERA, 1.24 WHIP, 109 ERA+, 3.71 FIP and an average WAR of 2.35. I don't see how current day Garza can be compared to Gonzalez at all. Garza currently has a season ERA of 4.67, 1.40 WHIP, 94 ERA+, 4.94 FIP and an average WAR of 0.8. Gonzalez entering 2017 looked way, way better than Garza currently looks. And Gonzalez has been better than Garza this season as well (4.30 ERA, 1.43 WHIP, 100 ERA+, 4.65 FIP and an average WAR of 1.65). Garza will be entering his age 34 season. Here are the 3 year splits from 2015-2017: 5.03 ERA, 1.50 WHIP, 83 ERA+, 4.76 FIP and an average season WAR of +0.23. IMO those numbers are not worth a 5 million dollar salary.

Yep. Nicasio and/or some of the other relievers still out there could make some sense if the price is right. Like you said, the Brewers would trading for somewhere between 10-20 innings of Nicasio, which even though they may be high leverage innings, should not be worth a ton in prospect value. There might be some market for Nicasio though, so the Pirates may be able to leverage something better than they maybe should get. This is also assuming that Nicasio cleared waivers. MLBTR posted a nice review of the guys still out there. In addition to Nicasio, guys such as Craig Stammen, Clayton Richard (as a reliever), Derek Holland (as a reliever), and Drew Storen could be fits as well. That MLB Trade Rumors column was where I initially got the idea for Nicasio. The other pitchers they had listed scare me. Just not a fan of Richard and Holland at this point. While Stearns picked Feliz this off-season, I really wanted Storen so I've been following him. Storen got off to a good start statistically, but his peripherals weren't very good and it started catching up to him in July and he's really crashed in August. I want no part of him now. Stammen is really hard to judge. Love that fact that he has a 2.55 road ERA (4.36 in San Diego), but his BABIP is a pretty low .265 but his HR/FB% is a terrible 21.8%. It all comes out to a FIP of 4.64 but a xFIP of 3.80 and who know what to think of that going forward? Although I would say it's probably not even appropriate at this point to try to figure out any type of projections since we are only talking about 1 month-plus...maybe somewhere between 12-20 innings of work. Just about anybody could get hot or go cold over such a short time-frame. Even with the short timeframe I think Stearns might improve the team's chances slightly with another bullpen acquisition. If the price was low on Stammen I would be interested.

Denard Span would be a downgrade from Broxton. Mediocre OBP (.317) and an awful -24 DRS (also negative UZR/150). Also is due a minimum of 9 million in 2018 and at least a 4 million dollar buyout in 2019. I don't think there is another bat out there worth going after. Pirate reliever Juan Nicasio would probably be my top candidate. Downside is that he is a free agent as year's end so the Brewers would probably be trading something away for about 12 innings of work. He'll only scheduled to make about 600k for the final month. Righties slashing .238/.316/.402/.718 off of him, lefties are only at .202/.248/.242/.490. At home he's posted a 2.87 ERA and 1.15 WHIP, on the road he has a 2.83 ERA and 1.08 WHIP. BABIP number is reasonable. Only concern moving forward is that his HR/FB percentage is 7.8% which is really low, so there would probably be some upward movement of the ERA when moving into Miller Park. But even so, his xFIP is 3.65 which is still a very respectable number. I wouldn't be willing to pay more than one fringe prospect for him because it's probably only for 12 innings of work and if there are just 2 bad innings scattered in those 12 then he probably doesn't make any difference in wins/losses down the stretch.

I wouldn't trade any of them and I have no problem having the two rookies start the season as bench players. Braun, Santana, Broxton, Brinson, Phillips and I'd feel pretty good about those five. Love the fact that Brinson and Phillips can play all the outfield spots and one is a lefty bat and the other is a righty bat. Maybe Braun stays healthy and Broxton gets off to a huge start and earns 150+ start in centerfield, but my gut feeling is that there will be enough at-bats for all five of them.

One had to assume that the bullpen was going to take a step backward this year considering the closer, the top setup man and the top lefty were dealt...and it was a virtual lock that the 2016 bullpen leader in appearances (Torres) would not match the previous year's performance. That being said, I agree that there seems to have been opportunities for Stearns to make a bullpen move (in addition to Swarzak) that really could have helped down the stretch. I know he made it perfectly clear that the Webb trade happened because of the option situation and he would provide the Brewer's additional flexibility into the future, but it does seem like a puzzling move now since the Brewers could have used some more immediate help. I do think Stearns had the right philosophy pre-July when it came to handling the bullpen. With the volatility of relievers, I feel it was a no-brainer to move Jeffress, Smith and Thornburg considering the returns...and I would make that same argument even if all three of those pitchers were performing at a high level this year. I also liked the idea of the 1 year, 6 million dollar flyer on a veteran pitcher, unfortunately Stearns invested in the wrong one. But I like that approach and actually hope Stearns does that same thing times two next year considering they should have the payroll space to do it. Relievers are so up and down, Feliz was bad this year but two reliever acquisition next year could produce opposite results. One thing I give Stearns huge credit for though is dumping Feliz when he did...I think a lot of GMs wouldn't want to admit the mistake and would have kept him on the roster and cost the teams more game.

I don't think we'll see Burnes because of the 40-man roster ramifications. No question that there is current excess on the 40-man and they could remove someone like Espino in the corresponding move. But once Burnes goes on he can't come off, and that would tie up a 40-man roster spot as the Brewers try to navigate through the off-season. To me that wouldn't be that big of a deal, but it's likely that Stearns would see it differently. My problem with adding Burnes now would be the management of his workload. Would it be like with Hader, where the plan would be to only throw him for 1 or 2 innings every third or fourth day? I think it makes it pretty tough on Counsell to have two relievers in the pen that can only throw once every three or four days. If that's how Burnes needs to be handled then I'd rather use other options like Wang and see what he can do.

Orf has been frequently mentioned in Fangraph's "fringe five" series and it seems to have raised his profile quite a bit. I don't think the Brewers will put him on the 40-man roster but there could be enough good "data" on him where another organization might take him in the Rule V draft (maybe 40-50% chance????). As reillymcshane points out, Orf is helped by Colorado Springs but he is still OPS'ing .781 on the road this year and has extensive experience playing 2B, 3B, LF, RF in the minors and can also play SS and 1B. I don't know if he has a spot in Milwaukee but looks like a pretty decent Rule V possibility for a second division team in need of a utility player.

I think WAR does a pretty good job of assessing Matt Garza's value. Below replacement level in 2015, and will be about 1/2 win over replacement level in 2016 and 2017. If a 2018 win is worth 9.16 million, Garza's projected value will be about 4.6 million which means even at a 5 million dollar salary he still has negative surplus value. And the majority of teams will probably downgrade him further because of his age and recent loss of velocity. I think he is in Tommy Milone territory. IMO declining the option is probably the smart move (unless he shows a near miraculous turnaround over the next few weeks) and if that happens he likely winds up in spring training next year on a split contract (or else he just retires).

Woodruff should be in Garza's spot now. Pretty incredible that the Brewers are going down to a four man rotation for the rest of the month and decided Garza is one of their four best starters?! Can't figure out what would be so attractive about Garza's 9.16 ERA/1.98 WHIP in August that would motivate the Brewers to keep him in the rotation. Too small a sample size? How about the totally mediocre 4.81 ERA/1.40 WHIP/5.10 FIP he has on the season. Maybe his historical performance should keep him in the rotation? From 2015-2017 he has a 5.07 ERA/1.50 WHIP/82 ERA+.

Concept would be much more sound if the top and bottom of the strike zone was the same for every hitter. If this change ever did occur I'm guessing we'd hear similar complaints. But instead of "the umpire screwed up, that pitch was 2 inches outside" the argument would now be "the system operator screwed up when he set the top of the strike zone, that pitch was 2 inches high if the zone had been set correctly."

FIP and xFIP over 5. Thought for sure a couple weeks back that the Brewers would pick up the 5 million dollar option and at a minimum hold onto him for insurance, but now it doesn't even look like he's worth the relatively small investment.

All for replacing Garza at this point. The five starts at the beginning of the year look like a complete fluke. Since that time he's started 14 games and over that span he has a 5.80 ERA and 1.51 WHIP. Only two of those fourteen starts have been quality starts. All for trading a fringe prospect or two for an upgrade. If not then it's time to just release Garza and give Jungman or Wilkerson a chance. Garza's combined WAR between Fangraphs and Baseball Reference is down to 0.5 so people can forget about that 5 million dollar option actually holding value.

I actually came up with long-term numbers much better than I expected when doing a surplus value estimate on Stanton. Doing 10 year projections on players is going to be questionable enough but even more so with Stanton considering his injury history. I figured the most fair way to do it was just to take his average WAR over the last three seasons, project him with that figure though his age 32 season and then reduce the WAR by 0.5 for each season after that. His average WAR between Fangraphs and Baseball Reference for the 2015-2017 seasons (2017 value extrapolated to a full season value) are 3.8, 2.1, 6.6 for an average of 4.2. So I projected him as a 4.2 WAR player from 2018-2022 and then I have him dropping 0.5 WAR per season so in the final year of the deal (2028) he is credited at 1.2 WAR. 2028 is an option year, but he has full no-trade protection so I would assume he demands that season be turned into a player option to waive his no-trade rights and therefore that season is counted in the estimate. Doing that puts his value at 435.20 million. He is scheduled to make 310 million so his surplus value would be approximately 125.2 million. That is obviously a pretty huge value and puts him a level above Jose Quintana in terms of what the Marlins could expect in a trade. When talking the Brewers, Brinson would have to be included as piece #1 with several more high-quality pieces after him. The numbers just wouldn't make sense otherwise. But as noted above, there is an opt-out after the 2020 season which changes everything. If you only run the numbers for the next three seasons, Stanton's value is 123.67 million and he's due to make 77 million. So if he does opt out the surplus value is 46.67 million. That puts him slightly above Sonny Gray territory. 46.67 million would take Brinson off the table, and a proper return would probably look something like Isan Diaz + Brandon Woodruff + Freddy Peralta. The opt-out really changes things and shows how hard it would be to make a deal. Marlins probably would want 125 million in surplus value back and trading teams would likely only want to give up about 45-50 million in prospect surplus value. Stanton just looks like he would be a real difficult player to trade.

As we trade for phillips and brinson... and draft ray to add to clark. This team has invested so heavily in plus athlete OFs that many have questioned why soo many... yet we are turning to Villar at CF. I always wanted this team to platoon more... but now its come and gone too far. Villar in the outfield is a short-term move to get lefty bats in the lineup. Stearns could have made some bigger moves at the deadline with Brinson and Phillips and the fact that he held onto both of them tells me he expects those players to be long-term contributors for the Milwaukee Brewers. I expect both of them to be on the team out of spring training next year. Considering Broxton's low OBP and below average defensive metrics he likely wouldn't command much in a trade so it makes sense to hold him. Braun, Santana, Brinson, Broxton and Phillips fairly likely to be the five outfielders out of spring training. I don't see Villar fitting into this mix, but could provide an additional outfield option when the inevitable Braun injury occurs.

I'd be surprised if Stearns signed Walker for 2018 and beyond. To me it seemed like a strict rental type move. With Thames, Aguilar, Villar, Arcia and Shaw the Brewers already have five infielders all under team control for multiple seasons. They will look for a cheaper option to fill the sixth spot, and Dubon should at least be an additional insurance piece (at a minimum). They could deal one of those five infielders and that could open up a spot for Walker, but being where they are why deal a younger, controllable piece for an older veteran that will likely command over 10 million per season? If the Brewers spend money this season it would more likely be moves like signing Nelson to a 4-5 year contract and making a couple 1-year, 6'ish million dollar deals on relievers (like Feliz, but hopefully these would be hits and not misses). Swarzak could be one of the relievers but he'd more than likely get a 2 or 3 year deal (would definitely prefer it just be 2 years considering the up-and-down nature of most relievers). Other significant investments on the cheaper end would be giving a long-term deal to Arcia (money early in the contract would be small but later in the deal would be pretty good) and grabbing a back end of the rotation starter for insurance (cheap Milone type, again hoping for a hit and not a miss).

Just looks like Counsell was willing to do anything to get all his lefty bats in the lineup. Almost wonder if the organization were already thinking about something like this when the Walker deal was made? I guess we will never see Santana in centerfield again as long as Counsell is the manager. No problem with that.

Please God no...I am sick of Boston-New York enough already. I don't need to hear about Boston's Stanton vs. New York's Judge for the next decade. If I'm in Miami's GM chair and the Red Sox called and offered me Devers for Stanton straight up, I would have signed on the dotted line within about five seconds. Devers could crap out or maybe be the next Brett Lawrie, but man has he looked good so far!

I wouldn't touch Stanton with a 10 foot pole. Just got through with a Votto evaluation in the Votto thread but Votto is much easier to project because he's been healthy and has played most everyday in four of the last five seasons. Stanton: 2012 = 123 games played 2013 = 116 games played 2014 = 145 games played 2015 = 74 games played 2016 = 119 games played I'm not even going to crank the numbers on him. If I were the Marlins I would trade him ASAP. It's possible that maybe this all turns around and he's good for 150+ games per season once he gets into his 30's, but I wouldn't be betting on that. More likely is that he'll miss, on average, 40-50 games per season for the remainder of his contract and if that happens his yearly WAR probably tops out, on average, in the area of 3.5 per season. At an average salary nearing 30 million per season over the next 10 seasons, I think he probably does have surplus value but it would likely be pretty minimal.

Votto would likely demand that 2024 be turned into a player option. So any trade talk involving him would have to assume the 20 million in 2024 would be guaranteed. From 2015-2017, the average Votto WAR between Fangraphs and Baseball Reference is 6.3. It's actually higher just looking at 2017 (6.85). Assuming Votto posts the following WAR through the remainder of his contract: 2018 = 6.3 2019 = 6.3 2020 = 5.8 2021 = 5.3 2022 = 4.3 2023 = 3.3 2024 = 1.8 Fair numbers? If you think so it means his total value would be approximately 358.56 million, then subtract out the 170 he's due to make from 2018-2024 and the surplus value is +188 million. That is such a ridiculous number that it's unlikely that the Reds would even demand that much if they were looking to trade him. In terms of Brewer prospects it's the equivalent of Lewis Brinson and Corey Ray and Isan Diaz and Josh Hader and Keston Hiura and Luis Ortiz and Brandon Woodruff and Brett Phillips. While it would be totally unreasonable for the Reds to expect any major league team to give up that in terms of prospects, it does indicate that there is no way the Reds would give up Votto for Thames and a couple of lottery tickets as a salary dump. It's a total guess, but I would estimate the Reds would probably look for approximately 120 million in surplus value if the were going to trade Votto. I don't see a Votto to Milwaukee swap happening without Brinson being involved. The numbers just wouldn't make sense. Thames is a 1.4 WAR player projected forward, that puts his surplus value at approximately 22-23 million. As unlikely as a Votto to Milwaukee trade is, if it would happen I would expect it to look something like: Brewers get: Joey Votto Reds get: Eric Thames, Lewis Brinson, Lewis Ortiz, Monte Harrison, Jake Gatewood And by the numbers, that would be the Reds trading him away at about a 33% discount to account for diminished performance due to injury risk.