JosephC

Actually, scratch the whole thing. Just going through more numbers and noticed a 3.24 ERA at home and a 4.90 ERA on the road from 2017-2019, which is enough to get me to abandon the whole idea. Still having trouble finding pitchers I like in this market (both free agent and trade).

Reports are that he's unhappy with the Dodgers because he signed a long-term deal with huge incentives for starts and innings pitched and the Dodgers have flipped him in and out of the rotation even though his stats have been good since joining the team (3.87 ERA, 3.71 FIP, 1.15 WHIP, 3.6 BB/K ratio). He's averaged 147 1/3 innings per season even with the moves to the bullpen, but would likely be a solid 180 innings pitched per season guy if left in the rotation. He's 31 years old and will turn 32 prior to the start of next season. Normally I would just say that the Dodgers won't be trading him, but it sounds like Maeda is really unhappy, knows his situation with the Dodgers won't improve and really wants out. So the Dodgers would be carrying an unhappy player throughout the season, and at the same time all the Japanese prospects see that Maeda gave the Dodgers a good deal to sign with them and now aren't giving him innings and may not want to trade him. I think the Dodgers probably deal him if Maeda pushes the issue. His contract makes it very difficult to estimate what his surplus value would be. From Cots: contract runs for 4 more seasons 3 million base salary per season 0.150 million bonus for being on opening day roster 1 million dollars if/when reached 15 starts, another 1 million for 20 starts, another 1.5 million when reaching 25 starts, another 1.5 million when reaching 30 starts, another 1.5 million when reaching 32 starts (can total up to 6.5 million per season) 0.250 million for each innings pitched threshold reached: 90, 100, 110, 120, 130, 140, 150, 160, 170, 180, 190 and then 0.750 million if he gets to 200 innings pitched (can total up to 3.5 million per season) So if the guy gets stuck in the bullpen for the whole season, he earns 3.15 million dollars. If he does what Zach Davies did last year (31 starts, 159 2/3 innings pitched), he earns 9.9 million dollars. Over the last three years he's been a 2.0 bWAR/fWAR player. Pro-rating his inning up to 180 innings pitched (assuming he is a full-time starter for a new team), would elevate him to a 2.4 WAR player. If one uses the rule of thumb of subtracting -0.5 WAR per season due to age, it means he's be good for 4.6 WAR over the remainder of his contract (I'd be willing to gamble that he will exceed that number). 4.6 WAR * 9 million per WAR = 41.4 million in total value. So if he does about what Davies did last year, he'd earn 39.6 million which would literally put his surplus value at one fringe prospect. Obviously the Dodgers would expect more than one fringe prospect for Maeda. The incentives in the contract make it almost impossible to come up with a solid surplus value, but we can probably conclude that asking for a top 100 prospect would be unreasonable from the Dodgers end. I just find him interesting because out of that "third tier" of free agent pitchers (Hamels, Gibson, Teheran), I like Maeda as much as any of those guys, and if he does hit Zach Davies starts/innings pitched number, he likely ends up making about the same as those other guys (probably a few million less than Hamels, few million more than Teheran, about the same as Gibson). His deal does run 4 seasons...but even if he's really bad at the end, then the cost is only 3.15 million per season. The one knock on him is that he's bad against lefty hitters but his number against them are hardly disastrous (they've slashed .261/.331/.450/.781 off Maeda from 2017-2019). If that truly is his greatest weakness, I wouldn't be that concerned since he rates very highly against righties (.193/.248/.346/.595). I find him interesting enough where I'd be giving the Dodgers a call if I were Stearns. I wouldn't be dealing any of the top 6 or 7 out of the system for him, but would be interested if they happened to like a couple of the guys in the...say...#9 to #20 range.

LOL, I'd put the Badger's chances of making the playoffs more around 2.5%. Would only give them about a 5% chance of beating Ohio State...and the Minnesota game is looking like it will probably be a toss-up so cut the 5% in half. 2.5%.

It's a pitiful proposal for the Royals. The fatal flaw is the idea that the Royals would be desperate to dump Perez but they are not. He is loved by the fan base and is well regarded by the organization. They have run a 140 million payroll in the past, could easily operate at the 100 million level and are currently projected to sit at 76 million for 2020 so there is zero motivation for them to discount Merrifield in order to move Perez's salary. If Merrifield hits the market there would be at least 10 teams that would make offers that would more than double the value of the Brewers offer in this proposal.

What a pitiful effort by the defense. Great job by the offense and special teams, but this defense seems like a shell of what it was just a few weeks ago. The back eight definitely is not nearly as fast as I thought they were, and Jim Leonhard may come up with some elaborate blitz schemes but he has been totally over-matched when the QB provides a legit running threat. This team is not nearly as good as I thought they could be. Schedule-maker ended up doing the Badgers a pretty big favor by stacking all those home games early in the schedule.

Non-pitchers should go back to 15 days too. Hopefully this will be the first of a bunch of dumb Manfred moves that will be undone.

Big game today. Badgers need to step up and show that they can convincingly win a Big 10 game against an inferior opponents on the road.

Not to mention that Maurkice Pouncey clearly kicked Garrett in the head when he was on the ground. Helmet or no helmet, that can easily result in an aggravated battery charge which is a second degree felony. Since there was no injury it's unlikely that the charge would be that serious, but the same would apply to Garrett not injuring Rudolph. Have to admit that why stuff like this shocks the world is still a mystery to me. These guys are trained from about the age of 8 to try and beat the snot out of each other. By now most of them have a good, solid 15+ year history of getting hit in the head repeatedly. The NFL can hand out suspensions and sport fans can spew all the outrage they want, but I've just come to accept that when society combines testosterone and jelly brains together that there will normally be one or two of these blow-up situations that happen every year. I don't think this is why I've stopped watching the NFL (I've watched about 4 of the Packer games so far this year and that is it), but maybe it's played a subconscious role?

Yoshitomo Tsutsugo might be posted.. he can play 1B.. don't know too much about him.. https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2019/10/japanese-slugger-yoshitomo-tsutsugo-to-be-posted.html Here is his B-R page: https://www.baseball-reference.com/register/player.fcgi?id=tsutsu000yos Mostly played outfield, significant experience at 1B and 3B, but none recent. VERY nice OBP skills and power... bats left-handed, which could be very beneficial in Miller Park. I'd go for that. Yoshitomo Tsutsugo is reported to be much more of a left fielder than an infielder. A brief mention at Fangraphs gives the impression that he'd probably be just awful if asked to see significant time in the infield, but I have a feeling that will be the case with Braun as well. Kiley McDaniel (Fangraphs) guessed a 2 year, 16 million dollar deal while the Crowdsource went with 4 years, 40 million. It will be interesting to see the contract he gets. But if one just takes the average of the above estimates, it comes out to 3 years, 28 million. If that's the contract he gets, the player will get 28 million and the Japanese team would get 5.525 million, so it ends up costing the MLB team 33.525 for three years of Tsutsugo. If it stays as a 16 million dollar deal, the MLB club would have to compenstate the Japanese club an additional 3.2 million dollars. Sounds like Tsutsugo will cost a MLB somewhere between 9-12 million dollars per season after the fee is added in. Kind of wish we kept Thames considering how cold I've grown on the free agent pitchers in this market.

I completely disagree with this when looking at the players involved. 3-year averages for each player- Grandal = 31 years old = 544 plate appearances, .244/.349/.464/.813, 25 HR/68 RBI, considered to be a good+ defensive catcher, 3.7 bWAR/fWAR Hamels = 35 years old = 160 inning pitched, 3.92 ERA, 4.41 FIP, 1.28 WHIP, 2.2 bWAR/fWAR Ryu = 32 years old = 131 innings pitched, 2.71 ERA, 3.61 FIP, 1.12 WHIP, 2.6 bWAR/fWAR Keuchel = 31 years old = 154 innings pitched, 3.48 ERA, 3.97 FIP, 1.27 WHIP, 2.6 bWAR/fWAR Moustakas = 31 years old = 606 plate appearances, .259/.319/.498/.817, 34 HR/89 RBI, average defensively, 2.2 bWAR/fWAR Pineda = 30 years old = (using 2016-2019 since he missed all of 2018) 139 innings pitched, 4.44 ERA, 4.07 FIP, 1.27 WHIP, 1.9 bWAR/fWAR Roark = 33 years old = 176 innings pitched, 4.46 ERA, 4.35 FIP, 1.34 WHIP, 2.0 bWAR/fWAR Gibson = 32 years old = 172 innings pitched, 4.44 ERA, 4.39 FIP, 1.42 WHIP, 1.8 bWAR/fWAR Frazier = 33 years old = 516 plate appearances, .226/.326/.421/.748, 22 HR/67 RBI, average defensively, 2.1 bWAR/fWAR Cabrera = 34 years old = 549 plate appearances, .267/.336/.445/.781, 18 HR/75 RBI, defensive metrics all over the board - say average defense, 1.2 bWAR/fWAR Ryu could easily prove to be a bigger contributor than Grandal if he would stay healthy. But in the 7 years since coming to MLB, he's averaged 18 starts and 105 2/3 innings per season (note that in his first season he pitched 30 starts and 192 innings). There is just too much of an injury risk when talking about a big contract. I really wanted to move away from Moustakas and invest that money in pitching. But when looking at the numbers, I couldn't get away from the thought that Moustakas is the way to go. We can look at comparable WAR figures, but when it's "old-schooled" we are picking between a 34 HR/89 RBI guy or a pitcher that is probably going to post an ERA right around 4.50 with a WHIP of 1.30 plus. I'll gladly give Moustakas the money and instead troll the bottom of the pitching market to try and find a 4.50 ERA by that route. For some reason I was really hot on the idea of getting Gibson, and I've seen a couple of projections that put him at right around a 3 WAR player for next year, but when looking through all the numbers I just can't figure out what makes him so attractive. The one thing that does stick out is that maybe he's had some bad luck with home runs, but that wouldn't appear to make him a good fit for Miller Park. I'd just stick with Moustakas.

Top priority for me is to get Grandal re-signed. Priority number two was to find a "third-tier" free agent starter to add to the rotation. Top tier is Cole and Strasburg and they will go for more the Brewers can afford. Tier #2 is Wheeler and Bumgarner but I don't think they fit money-wise after committing 17+ million per season to Grandal. But when looking at tier 3...there just isn't much there I like. I still wouldn't rule out trying to make a trade for Robbie Ray, but apparently the Diamondbacks asking price for him at last year's deadline was sky-high, and now they are thinner in the rotation after having moved Grienke. And now there isn't much left in the Brewers minor league system to make deals either. So when looking at free agent pitchers, I just had to look back at Moustakas and figure who would be the most likely to provide the best value to the Brewers? Mike Moustakas, Jake Odorizzi, Kyle Gibson? For me the answer was easily Moustakas. I always worry that his OBP will fall off a cliff, but he's been so solid for Milwaukee that he just doesn't seem to be near the gamble that all those pitchers would be. So here is where I am at: Would go ahead and make that Chase Anderson trade. It would be different if I felt that Counsell had some confidence in him, but Counsell always pulls him so fast that I would rather go in the different direction...even with the shortage of pitching. I would have kept Eric Thames. Just don't see replacing his production for any less money. And with the pitching as it will be under this plan, this offense is going to have to out-bomb the other offenses. Not my preferred style, but rather what the situation dictates. I would not offer arbitration to Travis Shaw and Jimmy Nelson. Yasmani Grandal = 4 year, 70 million offer (4 years at 17 million each with a 5th year for 17 million or a 2 million buyout, so a guaranteed 70 million) Mike Moustakas = 2 year, 25 million offer Would also be planning on pursuing Jung Ho Kang as a split-contract candidate. If the payroll cap is at 130 million to start the year, then I still have about 14.5 million to make moves (assuming Grandal and Moustakas accept those contract offers). I think a few of those starting pitchers will end up having to settle for 1 year, 5-6 million type deals and I'd like to pick up two of them if possible. I just didn't feel comfortable projecting those guys now because I have no clue as to who those guys would be.

Wow, there are people out there that still think Cam Newton is a plus NFL QB? In the four years prior to the Panthers big 2015 season, Cam Newton had a QB rating of 85.4, a 1.52 TD/INT ratio and the Panthers were 30-31-1 in games he started. In the four years after the Panthers big 2015 season, Cam Newton has a QB rating of 82.6, a 1.48 TD/INT ratio and the Panthers are 23-23 in games he started. As a Packer fan, I'd absolutely love to see the Bears trade for Cam Newton.

That's a real shame. The guy was an absolute stud when he was at Michigan State.

I thought Hiura's footwork was poor and his judgement on those "in-between hops" was just awful. There were a couple times that he looked so unsure whether to come in or back up that I thought he was going to fall over. Weeks was a rather bad second baseman but IMO he was way ahead of where Hiura is now. I thought Weeks actually did a pretty good job when having to play balls to his left, in the hole between first and second. But any moderately difficult play to his right, you could forget about getting an out on that play.

Brewers have 6 more years of Hiura. I think it would be an awful trade for Milwaukee. Hiura doesn't have enough of an MLB track record to do a WAR calculation, but putting him on the top prospects list and he'd have to be no worse than top 15 after his MLB showing. I'd put the his surplus value at a minimum of 78.7 million, and that's the low end. Average Lindor bWAR/fWAR over the last 3 years is just a shade under 6. So 12 WAR for 2 years * 9 million per WAR = 108 million in total value - 16.7 million salary in 2020 (estimated) - 24 million in salary in 2021 (estimated) = 67.3 million in surplus value. I have Hiura alone having about approximately 10 million more in surplus value than Lindor.

I could see the Dodgers moving major resources to pick up a reliever like Hader but it would be under their terms. That's not to say they would try to low ball the Brewers (like the Yankees would), but they would likely deal from positional excess and take certain players off the board. If I'm the Dodgers, I'd have zero interest in dealing Lux and Seager....and if I decided to deal Seager like they might then it would only be for bigger fish than a relief pitcher. We can point to a couple post-season games, but the Dodgers will also be well aware that their bullpen had the #1 ERA in the NL last season and I don't see them having major knee-jerk reactions based on a couple games when 162 games shows they had a good bullpen. If I'm the Dodgers and I'm looking to deal for Hader, this is my assessment and what my highest offer would likely be: Dodgers get: LHP-Josh Hader (roughly 55 million in surplus value) Brewers get: C-Keibert Ruiz (MLB.com has him as #33 prospect but I'd slot him lower...approximately #50....surplus value = 38.9 million) RHP-Tony Gonsolin (#200 pitcher....surplus value = 10.6 million) 1B-Edwin Rios (solid role player prospect....surplus value = 5.5 million) I'd submit a list of my top 30 prospects that are off the board, Brewers have their pick of the remaining fringe players...surplus value = 2.2 million) Total value of package = 57.2 million

This has been a pretty interesting thread with valid points made by both sides. Has there been one credible report that the Dodgers are interested in Hader, or is that just BrewerFan speculation? I did a quick internet search and couldn't find anything that suggests the Dodgers have an interest in trading for Hader.

12 months ago I was 100% skeptical that Braun would ever play 1B again because, frankly, the metrics from his brief time there a couple years ago weren't good (-19.0 UZR/150) and the Brewers didn't seem to have much interest in getting him work at 1B in spring training last year. But Braun's performance in LF was so bad that the Brewers are probably resigned to the fact that he's now a defensive black hole no matter where they put him. I also like the idea of getting Yelich back in LF. For all the talk about Grisham being LF only, he sure passed the eye-ball test in RF when I was watching (outside of one unfortunate play at the end). DRS had him at +3 (in only 112 innings) and UZR/150 had him at an eye-popping +28.0. Sure...too few innings to really mean anything...but if you want to move Yelich to left and play Grisham/Gamel in right...the numbers sure back up doing that.

Can't blame Stearns for losing Choi in the roster crunch, but it sure would be nice to have him now. Looking back at the return for Ji-man makes me want to puke. Always liked Ji-Man and, yep, it sucked that we couldn't find a way to keep him.

I don't think the pass-catching aspect is a surprise at all. It was a given the TE situation was going to be pretty bad unless a one-year wonder, third-round pick really over-achieved, and you have to figure that is a long shot. And as far as WR, you have problems when Geronimo Allison was projected to be the team's #2 receiver. Valdes-Scantling may have the upside, but right now he's a one-dimensional deep threat who contributes next to nothing underneath because his hands aren't very good and his route-running is sloppy. What Packer fans should be worried about is the completely mediocre defense. I made an Excel spreadsheet of the three major categories (average yards per run play against, average yards per pass play against, takeaways), team at #1 gets 32 points, team at #2 gets 31 points on down the line. Takeaways are handled as such...4 teams are tied for 6th so each of those teams gets 25.5 points. I will acknowledge that this system isn't perfect right now because a few teams have played less games, so one less game for them to generate takeaways. Still, I think this is a pretty solid means to get an overall picture of defensive performance so far. Packers are #20. That is with a pretty respected coordinator. And still only #20 which isn't that good when one looks at the resources they've thrown into that group. Za'Darius Smith, Preston Smith, Adrian Amos. Rashan Gary, Darnell Savage, Jaire Alexander, Josh Jackson. And the defense was rotten a couple years back but the cupboard wasn't completely bare when the new GM took over (Kenny Clark, Blake Martinez). To make 7 significant investments in the defense over the last two off-seasons, and have it perform at this level is very disappointing. The only real plus in this defense is the takeaways, but when they get in the playoffs they will be facing better QBs each week and those guys are much less prone to give the ball away. I always include takeaways when putting together a spreadsheet like this, but if you delete that column and just use average yards given up per pass play and run play, the ranking tumbles all the way down to #27. That's poor and not a good reflection on the new GM at all. And IMO they have to play with these guys on defense the next couple years and get better, because certainly this coming off-season the resources have to go to the offensive side of the ball (WR, TE, OT). It's gotten to the point where they just can't ignore that side of the ball anymore.

I'd have interest in the all the guys that are in the same tier as Wheeler, but I think all those guys will end up going for more money then they are really worth. I'm having a hard time finding a pitcher that I like and think would be a good fit at the right price. Keuchel maybe...those ugly peripherals but the ground ball rate could play up in Miller Park. Still, not really all that excited about him either. The more and more I look, the more and more I'd like to see the Brewers make a bigger offer to Grandal. Not really finding all that much in free agency that excites me.

A writer at The Athletic thinks that MLB should expand to a 5 man umpiring crew, where the 5th umpire will be in a booth where he would set the top and bottom of the strike zone for each hitter. That's the best idea I've heard so far. Those 5th umpires will not be "specialists." They would be part of a normal crew of umpires, and so every umpire would get this job every 5th day. I like the aspect that we would all be aware of who is setting the zone and the transparency and accountability that comes with it.

So much to comment on here. Yelich's defense fell off a bit last year and it's not encouraging to see him tagged with a -6.6 this year. If Cain bounced back and OBP's .348, IMO he's a more valuable player than a 2.8 WAR would indicate. It's very likely that the Brewers will lose either Grandal and/or Moustakas, and as such the offense figures to take a bit of a step backwards (maybe, maybe not). But it would be tough to lose either of those guys and then have Hiura only OPS .825. That's a good number, but I'm hoping and expecting more from him. I'd also guess there are being very generous crediting him with a -3.6 Def because his defense is far worse than that. Frankly, I think Hiura's defense is so bad that he's really nothing but an above-average second baseman if he OPS's .825. But I'm expecting the OPS to be .875 minimum and easily could be well over .900 again, which makes the poor defense much easier to live with. Travis Shaw has to be about the hardest projection in all of MLB. Interesting to see them projecting Arcia as a .308 OBP player with + defense. A 1.0 WAR player is nothing to write home about, but I think most Brewer fans would be happy with Arcia if he could achieve that in 2020.

I like both Avila and Castro better than d'Arnaud. Both are left-handed bats that fit better with Pina. Both have better 3-year and career OBP's than d'Arnaud. d'Arnaud previously had good defensive statistics prior to 2019 (Baseball Prospectus), but really fell off last year. I suspect that might be due to noise in the system as his reputation is pretty good. But on the other hand, both Avila and Castro have ranked in the top 30 of the catcher metrics in each of the last two seasons. d'Arnaud's injury history is what really steers me away from him. It also looks like he will be the highest paid of the three, and frankly if the Brewers cannot afford Grandal then I would rather go cheap with a catcher to pair with Pina. About the only advantage that I can see with d'Arnaud is that he is two years younger than the other guys although he will be 31 when next season starts. Late bloomers always pop up and maybe d'Arnaud will be that guy, although I doubt it.

Contract guesses are finally starting to come in. Looks like Castellanos is right in the 4 year, 58-64 million dollar territory. Way too rich for my blood considering the defense is such a major negative. We'll see what he ends up getting as many estimates have missed way high the last couple of years.