JosephC

I really thought Bracey's 32+ kickoff return average from last year would at least have gotten him on the field for some more kick return opportunities this year...but I guess not. Speaking of special teams, can we go to Dean Engram's punt returns? Granted, he isn't a complete disaster back there like he was last year, but his 4.0 yard per return average...is he really the best guy Wisconsin has for that job? Last year it took them forever to finally put his butt on the bench and stick Jack Dunn out there and it was completely obvious that Dunn was far better at it. Markus Allen, another guy they were really talking up in bowl practices last year and fall practice this year. Can't really fault the coaching staff on this one because the guy has been seeing the field. Sure seems like he was given an opportunity. Looks like the other schools that recruited him were Pittsburgh, Michigan State and Georgia Tech. Have to wonder if any of them will want him now since it looks like he is no better than #4 on a Wisconsin depth chart after 1.5 years in the program. Last year's version of this, Devin Chandler, wound up at Virginia but is not on their two-deep. Have to wonder if he is injured, couldn't find anything about that after doing a quick internet search? But have to wonder if most of these guys are better staying put where at least they can accumulate experience in the system which may help them see the field more in the future.

The only thing that prevents me from declaring Mertz to be a one-man trainwreck is the fresh memories of Alex Hornibrook who was somehow even worse. Mertz is really just that bad. In addition to the horrible interception early in the game, Michigan State stone-handed defenders dropped what would have been two more critical late-game interceptions. I'd definitely take Joel Stave over Mertz. Stave was a known worker and his teammates liked him and had confidence in him. Who in their right mind would trust Mertz to take a team anywhere with many of the late-game performances he has? Mertz completed 9 out of his first 10 yesterday, then from early-mid third quarter to the end of the game finished 5 out of 13 for 56 yards with a couple ugly dropped interceptions. Early last year I was all for the idea that the supporting cast is weak, but after watching this guy start nearly 30 games, it is completely obvious at this point that Mertz is below average Big 10 starting QB material who has more than good enough physical skills but can't read a defense, makes too many boneheaded decisions, and is a big and complete total zero when it comes to elevating the performance of the people around him. Time for Leonhard to start giving Myles Burkett some series during the ballgames and see if he can provide a spark. Worst thing that could happen is Mertz jumps into the transfer portal, which I would consider a blessing to Badger fans at this point. To think that Chryst just handed this guy the starting QB job...pretty much explains why Chryst is unemployed.

Have to admit, IF the values for Burnes and Woodruff are accurate at the Baseball Trade Values site, I would be looking to trade Burnes this off-season. I just don't think small-market teams are in the position to hold top players until free agency and then lose them for a draft pick...a draft pick that the Brewers front office sees as having Alex Claudio value. Still think the best long-term plan for the Brewers would have been to trade Hader last off-season, then trade either Burnes or Woodruff this off-season and then trade the other next off-season. Yes, hindsight is 20/20 but it sure looks like they held Hader 1/2 season too long (Hader fans could easily argue the other way...that Hader should still be on the team). Also have to start wondering about Peralta. He lacks ideal pitcher size and has now had back-to-back seasons with DL stints due to the right shoulder. He has only exceeded 85 major league innings in one season and hasn't gotten to 150 once.

U.S. Chess Championship and U.S Women's Chess Championship start in St. Louis on October 5. Wisconsin native Awonder Liang is one of the participants. Awonder was born in Madison, raised in Middleton, and the 19 year old is currently attending the University of Chicago (latest info I have indicates he is leaning towards computer science). He has no shot of winning this event, especially considering he's primarily a student these days, but we can always hope for a good showing.

Saw this on madison.com this morning and came over to post it. Glad to see that someone had already posted this updated info. Still a big thumbs down to McIntosh. Never liked the idea of firing a coach this early in the season. Last year the Badgers started 1-3 and rebounded to have a nice season. Just the general impression from watching Badger football over the last 30 years, it seems the team plays better as the year goes on more times than not. Chryst had been the head coach here for 8 years but I don't really know how much stock one can put in the virus season considering what was going on with the roster on a week to week basis. If you just look at the final records from Chryst's 6 full seasons, the average was a 10-3 mark. McIntosh is setting the bar really, really high if he says this is not good enough, especially since it's not like the Badgers finished last year at 7-6 or something like that. He can talk about championships, but I can only assume he is limiting that to Big 10 West championships because if he thinks a new coach will lead them to outrunning Ohio State, then he is off his rocker. I mean, that has to be the expectation going forward now...10+ win seasons...correct? That said, I do think there is some valid criticism that can be thrown at Chryst. I don't know what has happened with recruiting, but it has definitely slipped the last few years. Just look at the defense this year. Is there any plus-players in that front seven other than Benton and Herbig? Njongmeta has shown some flashes. I think the overall talent there is not to UW standards, unless there are a couple diamond-in-the-rough that aren't playing (but should be playing). And can you imagine what this DB group would look like without all the transfers? And the offensive skill positions last year....can you imagine if Allen wouldn't have been an immediate hit and the Mellusi transfer (not that Mellusi is very good). Sure, Allen definitely counts but UW could have been in a position where Brady Schipper was getting 20 carries a game if not. Nobody in their right mind expects Wisconsin to ever match Alabama in terms of talent, but I definitely think the talent over the last couple of years has been notably sub-par by UW standards. I also question if Chryst has gotten away from player the best player at the best spot. If Coan wouldn't have gotten dumped, I'm pretty confident in saying he would have been a better option than Mertz last year. I don't know how much confidence I say this with now, but I have to wonder if Burkett might be a better choice at QB going forward. I guess time will tell on that one. Beach was terrible at the beginning of last year, but as his foot got better, the played better and better as the year went on and by year's end was playing a pretty good LT and the OL had shown much improvement. Now I have no issues with starting this year with Nelson at LT because the potential is there. But when Nelson got knocked out, it sure seemed like the most logical thing to do was put Beach back at LT instead of putting Logan Brown in there, because Logan Brown just isn't very good (despite all the bogus stars). Well, we'll see what happens going forward. I am very skeptical that UW will be all that much better unless they make some really major changes other than the coach (starting with the admissions department).

At least now I won't feel guilty about saying no when UW asks me for a donation. ESPN is reporting that Chryst is getting an 11 million dollar payment out the University of Wisconsin Foundation. Here is a link to the Why Give? page from the University of Wisconsin Foundation's website- https://www.supportuw.org/why-give/ So everything on that page seems to be about maintaining a quality and affordable education system. I wonder how paying eight figures to a football coach who isn't even going to be coaching fits into that? So the athletic department couldn't eat this money with the 10's of millions of revenue they bring in every year? Hopefully the faculty will raise all sorts of hell now that this news is public. Chris McIntosh sucks. I was very happy when he got the AD job, but I'm bitterly disappointed with him now.

Cheating would involve some type of transmitter, where a second individual gets the opponent's move, plugs it into a chess engine to get the best move for player one, and then relays that move to player one. Gone are the days of Bobby Fischer crushing the world's best chess computer program. The best players in the world don't stand a chance against modern chess engines. Security is tight enough these days where wearing an earpiece isn't going to work...a player doing that would be sure to get caught. After Carlsen dropped out, they put a delay on the broadcast although I don't think that would work. For example, player one could be transmitting the opponent's moves to a second individual and signals could get sent back and forth using Morse code...just an example of how it could happen. Niemann is pretty much screwed now. Ian Nepomniachtchi asked for extra security after Niemann was a late invite and was pretty much ignored and it doesn't sound like other top players were happy about that. So, as was expected, there are multiple top players that had a problem with Niemann even prior to this tournament. So he is now screwed. If you are running a big money tournament, do you invite Niemann and run the risk of having other top super grandmasters decline? I wouldn't be surprised if Niemann has a real tough time finding his way into top tournaments now.

They could all give it a rest. I had occasionally watched Rozman's videos of daily recaps from various tournaments, but he has gone so click-bait on the subject that I have pretty much ignored everything he's posted for the last ~10 days. Feingold's content isn't really up my alley, but there are many segments that get pulled out of his streams and posted on it's own, often with good insight, but how many times can he keep repeating the same opinion over and over when it comes to Carlsen and Niemann? Nakamura is probably the best guy to get some real insight from as he is Super Grandmaster "status" and still playing in the highest level tournaments, and even his takes on the subject have quickly grown old.

Big prediction time. The people who don't like baseball now and find it boring will still not like baseball and find it boring even after all of these rule changes.

Tatis...what a moron. He obviously didn't get the playbook on how to properly handle this situation. #1 - Get all lawyer'ed up #2 - Find some completely innocent nobody to scapegoat #3 - Parade around telling everyone how innocent you are

Somewhere on the first page of this thread somebody posted a tweet that indicates that Lamet was included so the Padres could stay under the luxury tax threshold. After adding Soto, Cots Baseball Contracts has the Padres just 314k over the threshold, and while their calculations have historically been pretty good, it's reasonable to think they may be 500k off and the Padres are barely under the threshold. So it's perfectly reasonable to think the 1.7 million the Brewers take on with the Lamet contract really does keep the Padres under the threshold. IMO the bad look is more among the Brewer fans who thought Milwaukee would get an absolute haul for Hader. Now the package is a rental reliever, 2 prospects who likely rank as back end top 300 prospects (certainly nowhere near top 100), and in order to get that they also have to take on a contract they didn't want. Not much of a return at all.

Matt Bush makes even the biggest drunks in Wisconsin look like mere lightweights- https://www.draysbay.com/2011/3/19/2059081/matt-bush-the-road-to-recovery And just think, the article was written a full year before he got that third DUI when he ran over the 72 year old on a motorcycle and the subsequent prison sentence.

Ruiz sprint speed at Baseball Savant is 29.9 ft/sec which is tied for 8th best in the MLB. He's interesting because his hitting got seemingly consistent poor reviews prior to this season, but then he made changes and actually hit in the minors this season, then got called up and didn't hit...although it was a small number of plate appearances. Also posted negative DRS and UZR/150 in the field which was surprising when reading the scouting report. What can you say?.....look like a typical boom-or-bust "athlete" type prospect. I think BA's putting him at #8 on the Padre's list...which means he's a back end Top 300 prospect list when looking at all of baseball is a pretty reasonable and fair evaluation. I looked at some youtube videos to check out Gasser's delivery, because knowing he was a lefty and, considering the Stearns factor...I just figured if the Brewers wanted him then he must have some type of funky delivery. But nope, looked pretty "standard" as far as that goes. There is the pause in the delivery which I don't think affects MLB quality hitters at all. Again, back end Top 300 prospect in all of baseball seems pretty fair for him too. Fair to say that when just looking at 2022, the value between Hader and Rogers is a wash? I think you could argue that. A better performance over 2 months for Hader could very well be offset by the fact that Rogers makes less money, making the surplus value difference between the two a complete wash. As crazy as it sounds before actually looking at the number, Lamet could be on the hot seat. He was a Super Two in his second year of arbitration, making 4.775 million this year and projecting to over 5 million next year...currently sits with a 9.49 ERA/5.07 FIP/4.64 xFIP makes him look like a solid non-tender candidate. On the plus side, he also has a 4.17 SIERA which very well could be the number that Stearns looks at and may save Lamet. But it does seem like he'll have to up his game quite a bit to guarantee he's offered arbitration for 2023. So if 2022 Hader and 2022 Rogers is considered a wash...it's a couple back end Top 300 prospect plus a big question mark in Lamet for 1 year of Hader.

Soto was likely grinning from ear-to-ear when he heard 440 million dollars, and then Scott Boras declined the offer. The only way Soto signs a long-term deal prior to free agency is if he changes representation.

It's why, probably for the first time in 30 years, I haven't watched any baseball this season and don't plan on jumping in later in the year. Just had it with the latest CBA and the way MLB treats small market fans. If you are perfectly content with being about the 7th best team every year with little chance of getting higher, then have fun. The ironic part of it is that I have no problem sitting and watching a 100-loss team, I've done it many times in the past, and will admit that some of those bad teams can be pretty fun to watch if they have the right personalities on the team. But I'm just done with MLB treating small market fans like they are some type of second class citizen. What is really maddening is that everyone involved in MLB keeps talking about how they are falling behind the other sports in terms of fan interest, and the one thing that sticks out regarding baseball versus those other leagues is that the other leagues have systems in place that put all the teams on a fairly level playing field. And there is just no debate that the systems in those other leagues have been an overwhelming success. Can't wait until Attanasio starts crying for more money, because we will immediately get the governor, Milwaukee mayor and county exec (doesn't matter who they are), dropping the "Milwaukee is a major league city" quotes all over us. Well, it really doesn't feel that way. B-Leaguers is probably more appropriate.

I really like the Meadows pickup by the Tigers and wish the Brewers would have been in on that price. Lots of people down on Meadows, and yeah, over the last two years he has only been at .228/.311/.440/.751. But he is still only going into his age 28 season and is a lifetime .333 OBP/.822 OPS hitter. Good for 6.3 bWAR and 6.0 fWAR over the last three years, and since 2020 was only 37% of a season, that still puts him at an annual 2.6 WAR player. That park in Tampa definitely favors the pitchers, but the home/road splits has not been that dramatic for Meadows, so I'm not sure if moving him out of there proves to be a great benefit like it seems to have been with Adames. Unlike Meadows, lots of people are high on Isaac Paredes. But while Paredes was always considered a good prospect, he was never considered a great prospect. He currently sits at a miserable .215/.290/.302/.592 in 193 major league plate appearances. He can play multiple infield positions, but looking at the scouting reports it sounds like he only has a chance to become an average fielding third baseman and is likely, at best, a below average fielder at 2B or SS. ...and a comp B pick. Well, Stearns traded a comp A pick for Alex Claudio so it's pretty unlikely the Brewers would place prime value on a comp B pick. I'm guessing in terms of value the Brewers would put a comp B pick on a player in the #20-#25 range on an organizational top prospects list. Would the Tigers place more value on a comp B pick? Probably, but likely not all that much more. But I also would really like Meadows because he'd put another lefty bat on the roster. The Brewer roster construction, and questions with so many of the lefty bats, really kind of has me wondering. Currently there are seven lefty bats on the 40-man roster. Two are Corey Ray and Brett Sullivan. I know Sullivan now has a chance to make the opening day roster, but I'm betting if he does that it won't be for long because I think the Brewers will make a move to bring in a more experienced catcher. So that leaves the team with 5 lefty bats. Wong = No problem with him, a pretty safe bet to be a solid top of the order hitter. Narvaez = Last season was a year of extremes but when 2022 ends he will likely be in the top half of the league in terms of hitting catchers. No problem there. Yelich = Still can get on base but a SLG of under .400 in his last 722 plate appearances could mean that if he isn't hitting leadoff, he might be a 7-9 hitter in the lineup (assuming Counsell and the Brewers like the best hitter in the #2 spot, which it sure seems they do if you've been watching them the last few years). Tellez = Lifetime .307 OBP player that ended up getting traded because there is a history of him having stretches where he has trouble getting on-base (had a .272 OBP in 151 plate appearances in 2021 when the Jays made the trade). I'm as convinced with him as I was convinced with Vogelbach a year ago (which means I'm not). Peterson = Turned the offense around in 2020 and will be a good offensive player going forward? I have my doubts. Will be going into age 32 season and has a career .230/.322/.336/.658 slash line. Want a pretty incredible number, Peterson is actually over 5 years of service time (even if you subtract out the service time that he was credited with in 2020 when only a partial season was played), and in those 5 years he has totaled a fWAR of 0.4. Amazing that he stuck around into 2021, but he certainly ranks pretty high on Counsell's versatile infielder grit factor chart. I'm as convinced with him as I was convinced with Eric Sogard a few years ago (which means I'm not). So I would have really liked to see the Brewers pick up Meadows. It seems like Detroit got him for a bargain price and I think he would have fit nicely on the Brewer's roster. Time will tell if the doubters on him are correct, the offensive numbers have certainly dropped the last couple of years, but I look at his age and his full MLB history, and he still seems like a nice roster addition.

I remember when he was a very hot name on this forum just a few years back. And it seems immediately after he gained that reputation, the bottom fell out. Over the last three seasons he has a 5.52 ERA, 5.02 FIP, 78 ERA+, 1.78 K/BB. Maybe foreseeable as during his peak years in 2017-2018, he had a 3.90 ERA but the FIP lagged way behind at 4.68. Have to wonder if the Marlins got any reasonable offer for him after 2018, or if the mediocre peripherals always had the rest of the league a bit doubtful.

The Cardinals have already said that Pujols will primarily be the DH against LHP and they will try to get him some other at-bats here and there. I almost fell off my chair when I saw it, but Pujols did beat up lefty pitchers in 2021 to the tune of .294/.336/.603/.939. But he was also bad versus lefties in 2020 (.665 OPS), but was pretty good in 2019 (.830 OPS). Not to get off-topic, but as a person who has been watching baseball for 45+ years now, it just seems really odd that a team has space on the roster for a righty-that-can-hit-lefties to platoon at DH. Can't say I'm a fan of the 26 man roster, stuff like this makes me wish they still played with 25.

Baseball Prospectus catcher defense rankings from 2021- #4 = Omar Narvaez #11 = Kyle Higashioka #31 = Ben Rortvedt Fangraphs own projections in the article have the Yankee catchers posting a miserable .277 OBP in 2022, and yet the Yankees catcher group ranks in the top half of the league (#14).

Here are the top 10 television market in the US- NY, LA, Chicago, Philly, Dallas, San Fran, Boston, Atlanta, Washington, Houston 9 of the last 10 World Series winners have come from those markets. Kansas City in 2015 is the only exception. Go back 18 years, and 15 of the 18 World Series winners have come from those markets. KC and 2 World Series wins by the Cardinals. Here are the bottom five markets- Milwaukee, Cincy, KC, San Diego, Baltimore Outside of the 2 World Series appearances by KC, the last time one of the bottom 5 market teams even went to a World Series was San Diego back in 1998. So yep, these five teams have combined for a grand total of 2 World Series appearances in the last 23 years and that is completely represented by KC in back-to-back seasons.

The Braves had offered 5 years, 140 million, 28 million per year. Freeman came back with proposals of either 5 years, 165 million (33 million per season) or 6 years, 175 million (29.1 million). After Atlanta traded for Olson, Freeman pretty much immediately agrees to a 6 year, 162 million deal (27 million) with the Dodgers. We now know what the top of the market was for Freeman....6 years at 27 million per season. Braves were at 5 years, 28 million. If Freeman really wanted to remain a Brave, there was more middle ground to work there instead of coming back with a 5 year, 165 million per season counter-proposal which was far, far better deal than what the top of the market really was (Dodgers ended up giving him 3 million less and got an extra year). But if one follows the timeline, the Dodgers having serious interest in Freeman reports popped up just over a week ago, and I think the Braves probably got into the mindset of "we aren't getting into a bidding war with the biggest spenders in baseball" and just decided to move on.

Correa hired Boras and it's very likely Scotty put a minimum $300 million price-tag on him for a long-term deal. Reports were the Tigers offered him 10 years, 275 million and were rejected. The Astros are reported to have offered 5 years, 160 million and were rejected. So 275 million didn't get it done, and 32 million per year for 5 years could not get it done. So now it looks like Boras has scared off pretty much everybody. That's why some are mentioning a one year deal where Correa can jump back into the market and try again next year. And since a similar situation, on a smaller scale, happened with Grandal going to the Brewers, the Brewers are being thrown into the speculation.

If I were to put the list together, I'd put the As, Reds and Pirates as the 28-30 group and then have the Brewers in the next group.

Kind of the "common thought" around this is that the smallest markets probably see 1 WAR being in the 5 to 5.5 million range. Take the midpoint of that and do the math: 8.5 million / 5.25 million = 1.6 WAR...probably a decent bet that Stearns is expecting that type of production from McCutchen. And I think chances are pretty decent that McCutchen winds up right around there unless something unexpected happens like he's forced to play a whole bunch in CF and RF and poor defensive numbers pull the overall WAR way down.

In the market, 21 million per season seems like a real bargain price for Olson. However, we have to remember that Olson still had two years of arbitration left that probably would have earned him about 28 million. So if one takes those 2 years and 28 million out of the deal, it leaves 6 years and 140 million left. So I'm primarily looking at this as a Matt Olson extension at 23.3 million per year from age 30-35 seasons. Versus Freddie Freeman at 27 million per year from age 32-37 seasons. Over the last three seasons- Olson - .257/.354/.522/.876, 1465 PA, 89 HR, 244 RBI, 134 wRC+, 11.6 bWAR, 9.7 fWAR Freeman - .304/.402/.544/.946, 1411 PA, 82 HR, 257 RBI, 144 wRC+, 11.7 bWAR, 11.7 fWAR It's an interesting debate. No doubt that Freeman is a better offensive player, almost solely on his ability to reach base on a much more consistent basis than Olson. If you look at bWAR over the last three years, the two players are equally as valuable. If you look at fWAR (and adjust for 2020 only being 37% of a full season), Freeman is worth 0.8-0.9 WAR more per season. Then, on the flip side, the Braves have Olson for two additional seasons and when the deals end Olson would still be two years younger after his 8 seasons than Freeman will be after his six seasons....and Olson is also the cheaper player. Other thing to note is that over the last three years, the Braves home park ranks as the 8th best hitters park while the A's home park ranks 26th according to Baseball Savant. So that may have been a disadvantage for Olson (but very hard to believe it cost him .050 in OBP). Seems like a coin flip situation to me.