JosephC

I don't see Grandal or Moustakas bringing back huge returns. Attanasio and Stearns always seem to want to be in the mix, which means if they sell, it probably won't happen until the last minute. So a team trading for Grandal or Moustakas will only have them for two months. And both of them make pretty good money which pushes down their surplus value. Plus the rule changes, so now a team trading for them cannot factor getting a comp pick as part of the value they are receiving. Even if Grandal and/or Moustakas are valued at rock solid 3.6 WAR players, trading for 2 months is only getting about 1.2 WAR. So a team is getting 10.8 million in value. Including the mutual option buyout, Grandal will still be getting about 7.5 million in salary. With Moustakas the payout will be about 5.3 million. I definitely think the Brewers would get considerably more than the straight surplus value numbers indicate Grandal and Moustakas' values are. But I'd doubt if the price gets much over a back end "top ten organizational prospect" plus another prospect in the 20-30 range of a team's top prospect list.

Boyd is on track for a 5.85 bWAR/fWAR season and Davies is on track for a 2.9 bWAR/fWAR season. So Davies is roughly half what Boyd is, just looking at one season's value. Add in Davies puny strikeout rate, and his value doesn't exactly play up on the market (see Dallas Keuchel). Just as a side note, it would be interesting to see if Detroit would actually desire Davies to backfill the spot opened by Boyd's departure. Maybe Boyd for Davies/Turang/Lutz/Ashby. I don't think there is any possibility of this, but it's kind of fun to just start plugging in names to see what crazy possibilities might be out there. And even though, but just about every measure, Boyd would be an upgrade over Davies...I'm still not sure if adding Boyd really helps the Brewers all that much if you end up deleting one of the team's more reliable starters in the same deal (along with including 3 of the team's ten best prospects).

Nelson has passed five years of service time and now cannot be optioned without his permission. Would be interesting to see if would accept a minor league assignment. I think 99.999% of players would refuse the reassignment, but I'm not so sure with Nelson. He probably know that he is headed for MiLB regardless is he is in the Brewers, Marlins or Orioles organization...I can't even see a really bad club wanting to continue to rehab him on a major league roster, not with as bad as he has pitched so far. He might think it's best to continue to work on the routine he has established with the Brewer's medical/coaching staff. I don't think it's out of the question that he actually might accept a reassignment to AAA. Chase Anderson is also past five years of service time. My guess is that he would refuse to be sent down and would take his chances on getting an MLB job with a bad team in need of pitching.

When Zduriencik was doing the drafts under Melvin, the Brewers were very respected for the quality of their drafts. Certainly there were busts like LaPorta, but there were plenty of hits in there too. And not only with high first rounders like Fielder and Braun, but also with some later picks like Gallardo, Lucroy, Brantley and Cain. Then Seid took over and history has shown that there was a dramatic dropoff in the talent the Brewers got out of the draft. Almost all the first rounders were busts: Arnett, Covey (did not sign), Jungmann, Bradley (comp pick for Covey), Coutler, Roche, Haniger (the one hit). The Brewers did get some real good players in later rounds in Seid's first two seasons. 2009 = Khris Davis, Scooter Gennett, Michael Fiers. 2010 = Jimmy Nelson, Tyler Thornburg. There were some hits after that but they were few and far in-between (Woodruff, Haniger and still a couple too early to tell like Yamamoto). Nonetheless, I'd say the first ten years (or so) under Melvin was pretty good and it really only dried up the last three years he was in charge. And it needs to be noted that the final season is still, IMO, too early to tell. Woodruff appears like he will be, at least, a solid middle of the rotation starter but could end up being way better than that. Yamamoto is off to a hot start and could turn out to be a nothing but could end up being way better than that. Monte Harrison is back in the top 100 and currently has a .378 OBP and .870 OPS in AAA, could be a bust but still has star talent and could be a real good one. It's still possible that three top talents could be in this group and we probably shouldn't completely write of Medeiros and Stokes just yet. Lots of the lack of homegrown talent on the roster can be attributed to trades. The following players could still be with Milwaukee. Khris Davis = traded, Stearns obviously wanted to "up" the outfield defense Scooter Gennett = Stearns one big blunder IMO Mike Fiers = TRADED BY MELVIN in a deal where the Brewers got a plus-plus return Tyler Thronburg = traded in a deal where the Brewers got a plus-plus return Mitch Haniger = TRADED BY MELVIN, trace the line of this one and it ended up with Davies as a Brewers, but this was probably not the best deal for Milwaukee Then add Yamamoto and Harrison, another Stearns deal where he got a plus-plus-plus return That's probably a good 5-7 major leaguers subtracted from the roster.

If I'm in Stearns chair, this would be the first trade I'd officially try and make this season. I'd be giving the Giants a call today and starting with Will Smith...but my real target would be Sam Dyson. I'd put Dyson's trade value in the 4 million surplus value range, so it's not crazy to think the Brewers might be able to land him for a couple fringe prospects. He's not spectacular and could earn 7 million next year, which could easily motivate the Giants to dump him for the first offer they get. Thing that really sells me on Dyson is that he's been so solid for the last 4+ years outside of the terrible start to the 2017 season which resulted in the Rangers dumping him. Also love the ground ball rates he's posted throughout his career, I think there is a very good chance that his stuff plays up when pitching in Miller Park in a juiced ball year. 2016 = 2.43 ERA, 3.45 xFIP, 65.2% GB 2017 = 6.09 ERA, 4.96 xFIP, 63.0% GB 2018 = 2.69 ERA, 3.61 xFIP, 61.3% GB 2019 = 2.91 ERA, 3.20 xFIP, 58.6% GB Note that even though the 58.6% GB rate seems like a "dropping" number when compared to the same number from earlier seasons, the 58.6% GB rate ranks 16th best out of 379 MLB pitchers that have thrown at least 20 innings this year, so he is still getting ground balls at a top rate. And I wouldn't back off trying to get Smith or Watson in as part of this deal if the price was right. But Dyson would be target number one. Just like the combination of performance, fit and likely low price in terms of prospects that would need to be surrendered.

While Boyd seems to have blossomed into a very good pitcher, I really wouldn't be interested in trading for him based on the history. 4.74 xFIP in 2016, 5.01 xFIP in 2017, 4.72 xFIP in 2018. But I don't see any "luck stat" which is helping Boyd's performance this year, he is boasting a 6+ K/BB ratio and almost every peripheral I can find supports the idea that he is pitching at a "very good to great" level this year. About the only thing to knock him on is that he's surrendered 1.3 HR/9, but that number doesn't seem that out of line when playing with a juiced baseball. Pro-rate what he's done so far this year over a full season, and he's a 5.85 bWAR/fWAR player. He's never pitched like this before, so let's add this number to the previous two years and take the average of 2017-2019, and he comes out as a 3.2 bWAR/fWAR player. So let's say Boyd is a 3.2 bWAR/fWAR player, which is probably a pretty fair number. That would make him a 1.7 WAR value for the rest of this year, 3.2 WAR for 2020 and 2021, and then let's knock off 0.5 WAR for age decline (will be his age 31 season) and assess him as a 2.7 WAR player for 2022. That makes him worth 10.8 WAR over the remainder of his team controlled years. I've gone back and checked the numbers for some former Super Two pitchers. The one that sticks out the most is Bauer, but Boyd hasn't posted the ERAs that Bauer has. Maybe the best comparable in terms of overall effectiveness would be Stroman, so I've taken Stroman's salaries and adjusted them up a bit to account for inflation. When doing so I came up with 1.4 million for the remainder of this year, 4.25 million in 2020, 7.25 million in 2021 and 9 million in 2022. Total salary would be 21.9 million. So 10.8 WAR * 9 million = 97.2 million - 21.9 million = 75.3 million in surplus value. Turang has emerged as the second best Brewer prospect and I would put a prospect surplus value on him at 20.9 million. Ray I would put at 17.1 million (and probably dropping fast). Lutz...Fangraphs still has him really high but outside of that...still pretty average OBP and OPS in MiLB this season (may be playing at a level higher than he should be?)...I'd guess the average MLB club would put a surplus value on him at around 10 million. Dubon = 6.3 million. Zack Brown...despite the poor statistics this year...I'd still guess 8 million on him. Ashby & Feliciano...making strong runs at top 300 status...currently both at 5.5 million but with a bullet. So just doing the numbers, I don't see Boyd as a possibility without Hiura. On the flip side, if I was Detroit, I'd be super motivated to move him. Tigers have seemed to take another step backward this season. MiLB pitching looks pretty good for them. And I'd still be thinking about Michael Fulmer. They had the chance to probably get a real good return for him but held and now he has no value at all. But one has to take the numbers into consideration to make sure value is achieved. I would be very motivated to sell Boyd and would go well below the surplus value number of 75, but would have a real issue with dropping that number below 60. Even at that discount, Brewers would have to surrender Turang (20.9), Ray (17.1), Lutz (10), Brown (8) OR Dubon (6.3) and Ashby (5.5) OR Feliciano (5.5) to hit the 60 million in prospect surplus value plateau...and that would be with the Tigers selling low IMO. So could it be done without Hiura...maybe. But if getting it done without Hiura is a long shot, and even if possible, is likely going to clean out the #2-#9 range of the farm system.

The Sonny Gray/twitter trade talk between Stearns/Anderson/Schroeder was pretty entertaining. Like how Stearns said the Gray trade was never real close, and how the Lucroy/Mejia trade..."that one was a little closer." At one point I thought he was going to bring up HighHeat19.

I figured the "safe date" for Hiura missing Super Two status as June 24. Real good chance he will get brought up before the next series. Will also guess that Jesus is safe because he's out of options and Shaw is the guy who will be sent down.

I would be extremely surprised if there was just one MLB team that didn't do surplus value calculations, using their own set of metrics, as guidelines for all types of player transactions...starting with trades. If I was a GM and was considering an offer, the first thing I would do is put it through the analytics department and have them give me the mathematical evaluation on if the deal was fair. I'm not saying that I would make or break deals 100% of the time based on a number, but I sure would use it as a guideline to tell me if the deal had value or not. I'd go as far as saying that if there was a team out there that wasn't using their analytics department for this purpose, then I'd question the value that their analytics department had to their franchise. Trades can be a pretty big deal.

I agree with trwi7, if a deal is limited to minor leaguers than it's Hiura or nothing. I'd go as far as saying that if Stearns was to make a call, he better have one of these four names, Yelich, Hiura, Hader, Woodruff, pop out of his mouth within the first five sentences or else he's just wasting his time.

As much as I'm looking forward to seeing Hiura in a few days, I'll be about 10 times happier to see Gonzalez back on the hill. I don't think there would be any statistical backing for this, but it sure seemed like the pitching staff got a little better when he was available and has gone steadily downhill since he went on the DL.

I wouldn't mind dealing Grandal. As much as I'd hate to lose his bat, and it would be a big blow, I do think Pina is a much better defensive catcher. But I wouldn't trade Grandal for prospects, only for a starting pitching upgrade that could help the team down the stretch. I've looked through the league and couldn't find what would look like a decent match. Teams that aren't good wouldn't be interested in trading for a rental piece, and good clubs that could use an upgrade in catcher offense (San Diego, Tampa Bay) don't have a short-term pitcher that really fits the bill. Brewers are going through a rough stretch right now, but I think they get back on track in pretty short order and I see Hiura being back up in another few days to give them another boost. I don't see them as being sellers. To get to that point, they'd probably have to go into something like a horrible 7-23 stretch, and I think there are enough good players on this roster to avoid that.

But do the Brewers want Braun playing significant innings at 1B?

After watching Shaw last night, I think Aguilar's 25-man roster spot may be safe and Shaw is a pretty good candidate to be optioned. Just totally unexpected that a player could be an everyday guy for two seasons and slash .258/.347/.497/.844 and go into his age 29 season and completely lose it at the plate. I figured the latest date that Hiura would lose Super Two status would be June 24, but it's just a rough calculation and the date might already have passed. I fully expect Keston to be back within the next week and right now would have to think that Shaw, not Aguilar, will be the odd man out.

On the board I used, modified from Point of Pittsburgh prospect surplus value estimates, I'd have a 26 million dollar hitting prospect at being equivalent to the #73 player on the top 100 list. Lutz is still at the tail end of Fangraphs top 100, but I don't get the idea that he is regarded nearly that high by most other "evaluators," and...right or wrong...from that I'll conclude that most MLB front offices don't view him that highly either. I have 10 million being roughly equivalent to the #240 hitter on the average top 300 list (if it existed). The 240 number comes from, in an average MLB system, I'd guess Lutz would rank about #8 on the average list. I'd still rank Dubon as a top 300 player but would put him right near the end of that list. My best guess on his prospect surplus value would be 6.3 million.

If I'm Cleveland, I wouldn't be a seller at all. They are 3 over .500, and only 1.5 games back in the wild card. Everyone assumes that the Yankees/Rays/Red Sox are playoff locks, but I wouldn't make that assumption if I were the Indians. They still only have one major issue IMO, and that is their offensive output from the outfield is awful. If that starting pitching gets healthy and back in the swing of things, the potential is there to have a really dominant pitching staff. But there should be some cheap outfield options on the trade market like Melky Cabrera who just look really average on paper but could definitely provide a good boost. Two years later and I still think Domingo Santana could be an ideal fit for them. I'd be open to dealing Brad Hand, but I'd want a MLB outfielder with some offensive ability back as part of the deal. Ben Gamel might be a fit, but in a deal for a guy like Brad Hand, he'd probably have to be the third piece in the deal. But any deals for Cleveland would either be a buy or a retool, and not a strict sell. Cleveland could be sellers this off-season if they approach Lindor and he says "10 years, 350 million absolute minimum," then they would have to entertain trading him and might decide to do a tear down at that point. But 3 games over and 1.5 games out with some of those pitchers coming back from injury, I think they are in a pretty good spot to make a couple minor outfielder deals and see what happens over the rest of this season.

Rooting hard for both Chacin and Aguilar tonight.

Nelson is going to get to keep his rotation spot because Anderson is about to lose his.

It looks like they have it on BRef if you scroll down to Player Advanced Fielding... https://www.baseball-reference.com/leagues/MLB/2019-specialpos_c-fielding.shtml Thanks. Holy crap, can talk about small sample sizes all we want but the difference between Grandal and Pina is pretty staggering. I kind of suspected that Pina would be better but never to that extent. I almost have to wonder if those numbers are correct? If this continues then Pina should be catching a lot more and Grandal can get more time at 1B. The eyeball test told me pretty early in the year that Baseball Prospectus catching metrics were garbage and I haven't seen anything recently to make me think otherwise.

I take it that Catcher's ERA is a stat that is no longer tracked because I can't find 2019 numbers anywhere.

The ship may have already sailed with Aguilar. I had the safe day for Hiura's Super Two ineligibility as June 24. But we should be very close to that deadline, no doubt the Brewers have someone in the front office calculating service days for all players and may have already concluded that the Super Two date could be a few days before June 24. Unless the Brewers are convinced that Hiura needs more work defensively (-30.4 UZR/150 indicates that's a real possibility), I expect Hiura to be called up during the next week. So if nobody gets hurt, who else would lose their 25-man roster spot other than Aguilar? And even if Aguilar has a good 4 or 5 days, will that be enough to save his job? The Brewers could elect to go with a 12 man pitching staff, but with pitching staff problems and the way Counsell uses the bullpen, it's pretty unlikely they go with 12 pitchers for any more than a game or two. Certainly starting to look like Aguilar may need another player to get hurt to save his spot on the 25-man roster. Either that or hope the Brewers are really uncomfortable with Hiura's defense. Have to think the Orioles are watching this situation pretty closely. Would have to be a pretty easy decision for them to pluck a 600k player off waivers and just bump Mancini back to a corner outfield spot while giving Jesus a solid 3 month audition for their first base job.

Maybe cheap in prospect return, but the 5.5 million the Brewers would have ended up paying Encarnacion this year would very likely have eaten up a big chunk of money the Brewers could use to pay pitching acquisitions instead. And then the 5 million buyout next year, on top of a 2.25 mutual option buyout for Grandal and 3 million dollar mutual option buyout for Moustakas...puts the Brewers over 10 million dollars of dead money for 2020. This would have been a luxury move the Brewers really didn't need to make. Brewers sit 6th in the NL in runs per game, 12th in starter's ERA and 10th in bullpen ERA. If Stearns is making financial and prospect investments, it sure looks like those investments need to happen on the mound.

The Rays paid the Mariners 5 million dollars as part of the three-way deal that ended up with Encarnacion moving from Cleveland to Seattle. Note that the Rays paid the Mariners 5 million dollars, not the Rays are paying Encarnacion's 5 million buyout. Based on what's been reported, Seattle has that money. Encarnacion has a 20 million salary this year and a 5 million buyout (20 million salary) next year. Mariners had played 73 games, 45% of the season, so Encarnacion has roughly 11 million yet to earn. It's being reported that the Mariners are going to pick up roughly half of Encarnacion's remaining 2019 salary. So I'm assuming the Mariners are going to pay Encarnacion 5.5 million for the remainder of this season, and the Yankees will pay Encarnacion 5.5 million for the remainder of this season and likely pay the 5 million buyout for next season unless they can find a way to fit him in. So if what's being reported is accurate, this cost the Yankees 10.5 million dollars and Juan Then.

The Mariners originally signed Then and traded him (with J.P. Sears) to the Yankees for Nick Rumbelow.

Over the last year plus, covering 90 innings, he has 5.10 ERA, 1.50 WHIP and a 5.53 FIP. I just don't think a contending team can give him a major league deal and a 25 man roster spot. Would be interesting as a minor league signing. Teams like the Orioles, Royals, Marlins could give him a major league minimum deal, but do they want to waste innings on him, get him turned around and then sign with someone else this off-season? Bad teams might just want to roll with their own players and evaluate who they can move forward with and who they need to replace. So if all the bad teams pass on him, he'd be interesting as a minor league signing. No way he could go on the Brewers 25 man roster. Anytime the FIP gets to 5.53 over a good number of innings, that's pretty much a MLB deal-breaker for me. There is just no way you can look at him right now and definitively say, "he's a better pitcher than Jacob Barnes."