JosephC

I haven't gone through the payroll numbers recently, but I think this probably puts the Brewers up to 115 million. Since the highest they've ever gone is a bit over 120 million, it's probably safe to think that this is the last major move of the offseason. Taking all seven of the projection services listed at Fangraphs and then taking the average, here is McCutchen's 2022 projection- 124 games, 530 plate appearances, 69 runs, 22 home runs, 69 RBIs, 5 stolen bases .239/.342/.437/.779, 109 wRC+, 1.1 WAR

Glad to see the Draft Lottery serving its purpose and preventing MLB teams from tanking (I stole this from The Athletic).

I'd go the opposite. What are the Rockies thinking? They gave the franchise 3B Arenado the huge contract and it took them less than 2 years to realize they didn't want him at that price anymore. Not to mention that since the beginning of the 2018 season, Byrant has really only been about a 3.2 annual WAR player. That's really good, but it's not superstar territory. IMO, he really should be in the area of a 4 year, 85 million dollar type deal...but he'll get a lot more based on his reputation.

I'm surprised by this move, as the defensive metrics pretty much indicate that McCutchen is a complete butcher with the glove. Since Stearns seems to place real value in outfield defense, I can't help but think that McCutchen was signed to be the primary DH.

One more thing, I'd have the #1, #3, #11 and #13 prospects in the Brewer's system having a prospect surplus value of 51.3 million...so that wouldn't really be a competitive offer to what the Braves put up unless the A's happen to like the Brewer's prospects much more than the "expert" opinions out there...which is always a real possibility.

IMO, that is a crazy price paid by the Braves for 2 years of a player. Pache's stock has really fallen, looking at Fangraphs and MLB.com, both he and Langeliers sit at approximately 70 on the top 100 prospects list. Let's do the MLB.com list and put Langeliers at 68 and Pache at 69. On the chart, that's 28.8 and 28.3 million in prospect surplus value respectively. Cusick is a 2021 1st rounder (24th), a solid top 10 organizational prospect and would probably ranks about #200 on a top 300 list (if they went down that far)...10.6 million in surplus value. MLB.com has Estes at #14 in the A's system...that's solid role-player prospect territory...5.5 million in surplus value. Total = 73.2 million in surplus value. Olson is estimated to make 12 million this year and let's guess 16 million for the following season. So the 73.2 million + 28 million = 101.2 million....and if you go 1 WAR = 9 million...he has to be good for 11.2 WAR over the next two seasons to make it a break-even. Since 2020 was only 37% of a season....2019-2021 bWAR = 11.6, 2019-2021 fWAR = 9.7.....average = 10.65 / 2.37 seasons = 4.5 WAR. So by my calculations the Braves paid a price of a 5.6 annual WAR player and based on the last three years they got a 4.5 annual WAR player back. I love Olson, thought he was the perfect fit for the Brewers and would have been willing to overpay on the trade market to get him. But what the Braves paid IMO does not make sense numbers wise and I wouldn't have tried to outbid them when the price-tag got up in this region.

Whatever...... I've been around long enough to have seen dozens (probably hundreds) of politicians drop the anti-trust exemption threat on the NFL, NBA and MLB and everyone knows that is nothing but poo falling out of their mouths. I can even remember at least one congressional committee being formed (think it was in regards to the NFL), and after the big grand-standing announcement, I don't think the public heard another peep about it. Freedman's tweet seems pretty stupid to me. They will not have an international amateur signing system or draft that is not in the CBA. The old system was in the CBA. If they have a draft it will be in the CBA. If they stick with the old system, that will roll from the old CBA into the new CBA. Does Freedman really believe the owners would try to just implement it without putting it in the CBA? Has there been any suggestion of this from a credible source? The entire concept seems completely ridiculous.

It's very reasonable to think that the "advisors" are the ones who greatly oppose this. The numbers I've seen indicate that the top 600 bonuses in the last normal period prior to covid totaled 163.9 million. That number was unlikely to balloon because we are working under a pool system where each team has a cap. In the first draft of a new draft system, the bonuses for the top 600 picks would be 180.5 million. I'm assuming Japanese players would not be included in this since most of them tend to be older already-professional players. If they were to be included, IMO they are the only people who would really lose out in this deal. Other than the advisors who have really benefitted from the kickback system that has been in place for so many years, which makes me think they are the ones (though players) who are really pushing back against this idea. My only concern about this is transparency in the draft order. I don't like lottery systems because, frankly, it seems pretty obvious that the NBA has fixed a couple of them. But if they go with this 6 "pod" rotation, and if the order within the 6 pods is based strictly on the team's records, then I don't have an issue with this change.

If we are going to get technical, a ex-college player who exhausted his eligibility could theoretically go this route as well. I'm not sure how long a MLB team holds the rights on a player they drafted (I imagine several years), but I would imagine the same safeguards would apply in an international draft. Just one year. That's why they have the rule with early picks that if a player is offered a contract at least 40% of the slot value, and that player does not sign, the team gets a compensatory pick in the following draft. The player is also eligible for the following draft but the team that drafted him and did not sign him cannot draft him again.

To go off of this there was a trade in place between the Bears and the Seahawks last year that Carrol killed at the last minute. It was supposedly Mack, 2 1st's, and other picks to Seattle for Wilson and picks. That deal being killed last year I wonder which one would have been better for Seattle? Seattle probably has a top 5 pick this year and another in the 10-15 range with the Bears pick. I think pick wise it would be a wash. Now the players that the Seahawks got back now is that better than Mack? I wouldn't count Seattle's own picks into the equation....not having Wilson in 2021 could have led them to having a top 5 pick in 2022...but they're in the same situation this year so a Wilson-less team maybe gives them a top 5 pick in 2023. So I see that as just being a wash. If one goes by Pro Football Reference's Appoximate Value metric, Mack has been good for 28 AV over the last three seasons (11 in 2019, 14 in 2020 and 3 in 2021), whereas Harris has been good for 23 AV over that same timeframe (9, 5, 9). Harris missed 5 games in 2020, Mack missed 11 games in 2021. Mack is the better player and certainly a more dynamic pass-rusher, but the difference when looking at the overall game probably isn't as great as one would think. And Fant being a former first rounder and good for 600+ yards and 4 TDs per season with a pretty mediocre QB, I don't think it's crazy to suggest that the combination of Harris and Fant and Lock are in the same ballpark value-wise as Mack. Mack is primarily a pass-rusher and hasn't had a 10-sack season since 2018, only appeared in 7 games last season...could be on the downside...maybe or maybe not...we'll see. The big difference to me is that Chicago's first round pick in 2021 was #21 (turned into a higher pick after a trade up), and Denver's first round pick in 2022 is #9....so Seattle is picking 12 spots higher by not taking the Bear's offer. And Seattle got Wilson for that extra year to basically prove (at least cut down on a lot of second-guessing) that it was time to move on. Overall I think Seattle did the right thing by holding onto Wilson and trading him now.

Today - Owners: Implementing a pitch clock will cut 20 minutes off the average game length and will make it a better experience for the fans. 1 year from now - Owners: Average game time was 2:40 which falls short of the 3-hour window that TV has slotted for us. Let's add 30 seconds between every half inning for more commercials so we can make more money. 2 years from now - Players: Hey! You guys are screwing us, we need our cut of that extra commercial money. WWWWAAAAAAHHHHHHH. Meanwhile between now and then another million people completely tune out MLB.

Good for them, I see millions of young fans turning off the UFC and watching the new, action-packed MLB instead.

Sorry folks, looks like I will soon be out. I visited Blu-ray.com more often than here and stopped after the pop-up ads were introduced that covered the bottom of the screen and would creep up the right side of the screen. Looks like the forums at Twins Daily have the same thing. Also will add that I am always a bit weary when a forum gets an update because it always goes to being more user friendly for mobile users and I always look at forums while looking at a PC monitor. This is definitely a whiney complaint but the real purpose of posting this is in hopes that more people will provide the same input and Mr. Beauchamp and company will consider keeping the forum as it is now.

That was a really, really awful article. OIBDA is an accounting standard that is an estimate to show a company's profitability. It is not the actual profit. If this writer was fair and un-biased, he would have also pointed out that the very same report he got his numbers from clearly states the Braves operating income was 20 million. That was the actual profit. Then he should have pointed out that early in the year the Braves were playing in front of empty or reduced crowds so the 20 million would have been higher in a normal, typical season. Then he should have pointed out that the Braves won the World Series so that would have boosted revenues, maybe not enough to off-set the early season attendance loss. How would you get accurate numbers for these, well I'm not asking for actual estimate, just that these factors be pointed out to the readers. Then we could look at all of that...look at the 104 million at one end of the spectrum, look at 20 million at the other end of the spectrum, and then play the "I support the players no, I support the owners" game and try to bend the numbers...and in the end just admit that the Braves profit was 20 million but the OIBDA shows they are a profitable business and will very likely have bigger profits in the future. Forbes has been covering the "Business of Baseball" for over the last decade and are generally thought to do a pretty good job with it. The last time I saw an estimate from them as to how much the average team makes in a year would have been somewhere in the 2018/2019 window and the average was thought to be somewhere around 40 million. Shame on Fangraphs for posting what looks like a pure propaganda piece to me. https://outsider.com/news/entertainment/atlanta-braves-report-massive-2021-revenue-major-bounce-back-pandemic-numbers/

I had little concern about the A's asking for the moon reports, because for a talent like him they will obviously be starting high in the asking price. But I am discouraged that Texas could be seriously interested, because they could easily outbid the Brewers.

This thread, combined with the stadium district thread, just makes me shake my head in disbelief. It blows my mind that so many people seem to have an issue with owners potentially exploiting players, yet have no issue with MLB's strategy of exploiting taxpayers by getting them to carry the huge burden of paying for and then maintaining stadiums (most of which are now built for baseball only, meaning they sit there and do nothing 280 days of the year). The JS recently looked at the population of the five-county area and calculated that the average person paid $342 dollars in taxes for Miller Park. I would agree that the number is questionable, as money comes from people outside of those five counties...but on the other hand, not all the people living in those counties have been spending adults. But the average of $342 could be a fair estimate. So who is the victim here...the MLB owner who easily makes 10's of millions per year...the star player who makes 10's of millions per year...the scrub AAAA player that only gets in a half year of service time and still rakes in 280k plus for that year...or the little old lady in Kenosha who could care less about the Brewers but still gets swindled out of $15 every year so the likes of Burch Smith and his 280k earnings is not exploited in his unique labor market (remarkably, Burch Smith is up to 4+ years of service time). Good thing for Attanasio, Scherzer and Jace Peterson that I am not the supreme dictator, because MLB would be paying for all their own stadium costs overnight and all of these guys would be taking home half of what they take home now (and, by my calculations, every one of them would still be very, very wealthy). And all those poor families of four in Milwaukee would now be able to keep their 15 bucks in their own pocket. Sure it might only be 15 bucks, but they need the 10 bucks more than MLB does.

Due to dwindling office space, there is a good chance I will be a remote worker in the next 12-18 months. If that occurs, I may relocate to Arizona. Maybe I'll go up to Peter Barca and say, "Last year I paid $8000 in state taxes. I'm thinking about moving to Arizona. But how about this, I'll stay in Wisconsin if you give me $6400 now and I'll pay the $8000 in taxes at the end of the year. If I leave you get nothing, if I stay you get $1.25 of revenue for every dollar you gave me at the beginning of the year. That's a win for the average taxpayer."

Technically speaking, I'm not sure the last time I gave Attanasio any free money since I don't live in the five-county area. I used to visit Milwaukee fairly often, but probably haven't been there in the last five years or so. I do feel sorry for the old folks living on fixed incomes in Racine who have no interest in the Brewers but yet have to pay the tax. I'm sure most of them get free stuff from the county to make up for that though, LOL.

You should ask fans in Cleveland, Montreal, Seattle, Oakland, San Diego, Houston, etc how it feels to be without a major professional sports team. Besides the Packers, they are our #1 most popular pro sports team. Yes, the Bucks have had a nice run in recent years...but even about 6 years ago if you asked people their favorite basketball team most would have stated the Badgers or Marquette. The Bucks had limited appeal and many were indifferent to them leaving. The Brewers have had a very nice run of sustained success in the last 15 years and they have an outstanding owner that has stated he wants the franchise in Milwaukee left to his kids to run. Losing them would have a huge impact on the city, the region, and the state. It would be an economic and psychological disaster for the area. The $200-300 you spent in taxes for Miller Park in the last 25 years is amazingly cheap. The priority needs to be to keep AmFam Field a state of the art facility that works for the city, the state, and the ball club. It's a wonderful place to watch a game. Maybe fans, but what about the rest of the general public that doesn't give a hoot about watching other people play sports? I very much doubt that the majority of people in San Diego are crying because they lost the Chargers, considering they had a referendum regarding stadium funding and the measure was crushed with only 42% of the people voting yes. As far as Seattle. I remember all the hand-wringing that was going on with the Bucks potentially moving to Seattle and the economic devastation that would follow. I couldn't help but think that the city of Seattle didn't fall into the Pacific after the SuperSonics left town. It seems that Seattle has done just fine without them. I oppose any public money going to these major sports leagues for the simple reason that they are now taking in billions every year and they don't need the public's help. It's as simple as that. At the very minimum, there should be public referendums on these issues so that the people have a say in the matter.

In my case, that would be correct. I'd rather have them leave the state prior to giving them any more tax money.

I can still remember back in the late 1990's when Miller Park was being sold to the general public. The short version was it would be a 300 million dollar project, with 150 million coming from the public and the other 150 million coming the Brewers, naming rights, etc. Originally, they said the sales tax would likely end in 2014. They didn't stop collecting the tax until 2020. By the time it ended, they had collected 609 million dollars, over four times the amount they had originally told the public. If our elected officials hand Attanasio more money, they are even more stupid than I think they are, which is saying a lot. How much revenue does MLB take in annually? Not one more penny from Wisconsin taxpayers. Not a single one.

I see the MLBTradeValue site has bumped him from the +6.5 million he was at in October up to +9.6 million currently. The 2022 projections at Fangraphs have a high value of +3.5 WAR to a low value of +1.5 WAR. Pretty significant variation. Average of the 7 projections is +2.4 WAR. I think his surplus value should be at least +20 million. I wouldn't normally be all the interested based on the Brewer's current roster construction, but like Jeff McNeil, you have to give it serious consideration if the numbers say it's a real bargain price. I'm pretty curious as to what the Rays will be asking.

I had posted the following on Meadows back in October- I can't figure out MLBTradeValue's number on Austin Meadows. Over the last 3 years he's averaged 2.1 bWAR/fWAR per season. MLB Trade Rumors has him with a 4.3 arbitration estimate for next year. MLBTradeValue has him as having a surplus value of +6.5 million. So let's say he earns 4.3 + 6.0 + 7.25 in his three years of arbitration (obviously won't be tearing it up and earning much higher salaries with such a low surplus value). So that's 4.3 + 6.0 + 7.25 in money then plus another +6.5 in surplus value = 24.05 million / 9 million per win = 2.7 wins total over 3 seasons. So they are valuing him as an annual 0.9 WAR player as a 26 year old who, so far, has been more than twice as good as that. I think their number on him is way low. I'd put his surplus value number in the high 20's. I do think the one very legitimate argument that pushes his value down is that he has proven to be a terrible right fielder and is probably limited to left field from this point forward. He's a bad fit for Milwaukee as he probably is a left fielder exclusively and the Brewers have one of those locked in for the next 7 years. Doesn't help that Stearns seems to place value on outfield defense. But Meadows has been a .256/.334/.493/.828 hitter since the start of 2019. Hard for me to see him playing down to the level of a sub 1 WAR player over the next 3 seasons. Maybe they are expecting an Andrew Benintendi type falloff in terms of value, but Benintendi just had a solid season for the Royals (2.4 bWAR, 2.1 fWAR).

Rosario is maybe worth a one year deal for a team in the Brewer's situation, but there is no way I'd go on a multi-year deal with him. Since the beginning of 2019 his OBP is just .305, and he'll be in his age 30 season next year. I have an admitted bias against low OBP players, so that's pretty much enough information right there to make me skeptical. But to look further in the numbers, at Fangraphs, the projections have him from being anywhere from a 1.7 to 0.8 WAR player in 2022, the average of 7 different estimates comes out to 1.25 WAR. So over the two years he probably projects somewhere between 2 and 2.5 WAR total for those two seasons. I just don't think the Brewers are a team in a position to spend 8-9% of their payroll to get a player that OBP's somewhere around .305 and is worth a bit over 1 WAR. We have to give guys like Taylor the opportunity and hopefully he can do better.

Wow, the Josh Bell thing has come around again. I honestly think that if the Nationals called and offered up Bell for someone like Bubba Derby, that Stearns would decline. Bell has 5.053 years of service time. So convert the 53 days into a percentage and he has 5.31 seasons. Then subtract out the service time gained but not played in 2020 (which amounts to 63% of a season), and Bell has played 4.68 MLB seasons. During that time he has been a 6.0 bWAR player and 4.8 fWAR player. So he is someone in the area of a 1.0 - 1.3 WAR player. Bell is projected to make 10 million in arbitration in 2022. So if you are a big market team and see 1 WAR = 9 million, Bell would have a surplus value of < 2 million if the team's metrics matched bWAR which has the higher WAR value on Bell. If you are a small market team and figure you can only spend 5 - 6 million per WAR, then Bell is a negative value player. Defense and baserunning matter, and Bell is a trainwreck in both of those areas. He awful defense is well documented. Last year in Baseball Prospectus' baserunning metrics, Bell ranked #780 out of 808 players. Bell has also been pretty inconsistent with the bat as well. Over the last four seasons his OPS has gone from .768 - .936 - .669 - .823. I would agree that the .669 from the COVID season could definitely be an outlier. But the last time Josh Bell's name was seriously thrown around by Brewer fans was a couple years ago when he was coming off his best OPS season of .936. The splits from that season show that he has an incredible 1.239 OPS in May, which resulting in a 1.024 OPS in the first half but only a .780 OPS in the second half. If the Brewers were a 180 million dollar payroll team and figured to have 75 million to play with, Bell might be worth a 10 million investment. But considering the Brewers likely are under 120 million in 2022 and probably have less than 15 million to play with, I don't see Stearns giving what could be 2/3rds of the money they have left to a guy who they just might have a negative surplus value number with the calculations they use.