JosephC

Take that Bryce Harper and Scott Boras!

McCalvy's latest prediction: Rotation: Chacin, Davies, Anderson, Woodruff, Burnes Bullpen: Knebel, Hader, Claudio, Albers, Guerra, Barnes, Petricka, Williams https://www.mlb.com/brewers/news/projecting-the-brewers-opening-day-roster

I've been hearing for the last 25 years how the game moves to slow and there is too much dead time and the game is losing young fans but in the last 25 years it doesn't seem like attendance has dropped all that much, teams are not getting smaller TV contracts than they had in the past, owners are not losing money and players are not playing for peanuts. Baseball just isn't an action game and baseball's front office just needs to come to grips with that. And shortening games is unlikely change the financial dynamics of the game anyway. Baseball has too much dead time? What about the big gorilla of American sports....football. There are about 160 plays per game at an average of 5 seconds each which totals 800 seconds which is 13 minutes and 20 seconds spread out over 3 hours and 15 minutes. When it comes down to it, there is no significant difference in the dead time of baseball versus football. The difference is that when the play is occurring in football there are 22 guys running around at once and a few of those 22 are going to get run over by somebody on most of those plays. In baseball, on most plays nothing really significant happens, and the only time there is a bunch of movement all over the field is if a guy hits one down the line or in a gap. Let's just say that I have my doubts that the 15 year old kid who really didn't pay much attention to baseball before is now really interested in baseball because (A) pitchers have to face a three batter minimum and (B) now the games will end up being a whole 4 minutes shorter because of these new rules that will make the game so much more exciting.

Boras is not Kimbrel's agent unless there has been a recent switch. Kimbrel's agent is named Dave Meter.

HA! I've been thinking that for days, and usually, the mods catch and correct this kind of stuff in the thread titles... Glad I'm not the only one this has bothered... +1 here too I'm really surprised Kimbrel isn't signed. There must be a huge divide between what he thinks he is worth & what teams are willing to pay, both in terms of AAV & years. Two weeks ago there was a report which said Kimbrel is still seeking a 5-6 year deal for 80-100 million dollars.

Did they insert some type of agreement where 40 man roster players get a free month of MLB service time due to the new September roster rules? Because if they didn't, the MLBPA just agreed to a deal that could potentially cost 360 players a full month of MLB service time every year. Maybe this was the "trade" for the additional roster spot. Although I feel the additional roster spot was something the league wanted to do anywhere, although I find it completely unnecessary...especially if they limit the amount of pitchers a team can carry.

Stearns picked the wrong guy then because righties feasted on Claudio last year and Claudio's three year splits against righties isn't any better than Jennings.

So does this mean, that if the Brewers have a 2 weeks stretch with 4 off-days and decide to go with 14 hitters and 12 pitchers, that Milwaukee can then reclassify Hernan Perez as a pitcher? And if Hernan is then a pitcher, do we now have rules that indicate he can no longer play IF/OF for those games where he is listed as pitcher on the roster?

So Jeffress walks out to the mound in September to start an inning after having not pitched in the last six days. He throws four pitches to the first batter and walks him. Of those four pitchers, three were fastballs and the highest velocity for any of those fastballs is 84 MPH. Counsell goes to the umpire and they walk out to the mound and Jeffress says he feels fine. Should Counsell have the option of removing Jeffress in this situation? Umpire is standing right there and hears Jeffress saying that he feels fine.

If I was Counsell, and wanted to use Claudio for just one batter, I'd tell him to pitch to that batter and when the at-bat was done then walk around the mound and claim to be having a dizzy spell or something like that so I could take him out of the ballgame. Then after this same scenario happens 6 times in 6 weeks, then we can see what MLB will do about it. Do the Brewers get fined? Does MLB then institute another rule that if a pitcher doesn't pitch to a required number of batters then he is ineligible to play in the next few games (three, maybe?). Since 30 out of 30 MLB managers like having the option of using a one batter specialist, does that mean all teams will have pitchers who suffer injuries after pitching to one batter and the new rule will, in effect, just be ignored (like pitchers using pine tar)? Hopefully what I outlined above won't happen until the world's eyes are on baseball. Example, it gets to the seventh game of the World Series and a meaningless, irrelevant team like Milwaukee has a pitcher fake injury in the 8th inning and it obviously helps them knock off the all-important New York Yankees. Baseball writers wouldn't stop whining about this for at least two decades and MLB is sitting there with egg on their face. But hey, make stupid rules, then be willing to look stupid and face the consequences. Also think putting a maximum amount of certain position on a roster (13 pitchers) is another dumb rule. If a team has 26 rosters spots, they should be able to use them in whatever manner they want to win the most games. If MLB is so scared of too many pitchers, then why add another roster spot? Don't mind having one, hard trade deadline. But I think July 31 is too early. Would have rather seen them put this date at August 15 or even a bit later. Trades and player movement is fun for the fans. Although numerous blockbusters don't occur in August because of the waiver rules, it's still an opportunity for teams to make moves and fans can speculate on possible moves. This makes August a really long month IMO. And from the perspective of a team that does not have all that great of a history, I think the 28 man roster in September is another bad idea. Frankly, if the team you root for is bad, it is still interesting to stick through September when you can watch many rookies see their first MLB action. Was just having 40 players eligible a bad idea? Maybe. But I think a far better solution would have been to have a 25 man "active roster" that is "fixed" on August 31, then be able to call up however many of the rest of the 40-man roster players a team desired...and from there the team plays with the fixed 25 and then the manager can insert and remove 7 more players daily so each game a team has a max of 32. I've never really cared for the whining that the old rules make the rosters too unbalanced. Teams that think they get the worst end of this deal have been playing under these rules for decades and had months to prepare to improve the overall depth on their 40-man roster. Personally, I think the 28 number is too small and just gives the fans of teams that have struggled all the more reason to just turn off the TV in September.

If the Amos deal is 21 million over the first two seasons....I'd guess that would be something like a 10 million dollar signing bonus, 4 million in year one made up of a combination of base salary and roster bonuses, and 7 million in year two made up of a combination of base salary and roster bonuses. So pro-rating that signing bonus over 4 years, Amos cap hit in 2019 would be 6.5 million. Just illustrating that the majority of year one "actual money" is put into a signing bonus that gets spread out over the length of the contract. Amos is getting 9.25 million per year on average, but his year one cap number will probably only be about 70% (or even less) of the average value. That likely goes for all of the free agents the Packers may sign. The Packers might already be up to 45 million in average annual values on these players, but there is a really good chance the 2019 cap numbers on these players will only be in the range of 27 to 31 million when they are all added up. I always thought Billy Turner was a really mediocre player. Will be interested to hear McGinn's take on him. Really like all the other moves the Packers have made. Seems to have opened the door up for a Noah Fant pick at #12.

NFL players have this all screwed up. Free agency doesn't even begin until tomorrow, and it seems like half of them already have deals lined up. Technically, they weren't even supposed to have contact with other teams until yesterday...how can these deals get done so fast? How can they make sure they are getting the best deal? Scott Boras clearly needs to get involved here! Get good offers. Turn them down and wait for a better offer. Wait until well into spring training/training camp if necessary. If you don't get the desired price-tag, then cry about collusion and stingey owners. The NFL really needs Scott Boras to make their off-season more interesting!!

Love the Amos signing and like the Smith signing as well. Feel pretty comfortable with Smith as one would have to assume Milt Hendrickson gave him the thumbs up. OLB and S are still primary need areas, although these signings give the Packers a little more flexibility in the draft. Prior to these signings, it sure felt like the Packers needed to address both of these positions within the first two rounds. Now it makes it a bit easier to draft a TE, ILB, OG earlier if a good one is available.

So I'm trying to get caught up in what the Packers did today. The only thing that I could find is that they expressed interest in Malik Jackson, but Jackson already signed with the Eagles. Any more rumors/news out there that I missed?

Anthony Barr to the Jets.

If Barr signed with the Packers, would it be to play OLB or ILB? McGinn, who has an opinion I really trust, thought the Packers ILB play was worse than the OLB play in 2018. Really hard to argue as neither unit was anywhere near a strength. For as much as Martinez can clean up in the running game, the guy cannot cover anyone and he doesn't get very good depth on his drops into pass coverage. I can appreciate that Morrison brought a little thump but he brought little else and is already gone. Burks was bad, bad, bad in pretty much everything he did at the beginning of the year and hardly instilled any confidence that he might actually be a good player. I'd still rate the positions of need in the following order: OLB, S, TE, ILB...but the more I look around, the more I could see justifying ILB as a greater need. Barr just might be the ideal fit because if he craps out at OLB he likely could slide into ILB and be the most athletic guy the Packers have had there in a long, long, long, long, long time.

That is the number I'd be shooting for now if I was his agent. But I also think that might even be a stretch. I'd like to see the Brewers offer him a 1 year, 4 million dollar deal (but only if he is willing to pitch some innings out of the bullpen) and see if that would be the winning bid. An offer like that should at least be competitive.

That's terrible. And in a market where, at absolute best, Maldonado would rank no higher than the 3rd best catcher. Many would argue that Suzuki should also be rated higher but at least that could be debated. And if one wanted to expand the list of available catchers to trade opportunities, then Realmuto was out there too. Again, Boras gets an A++++++ for getting a team to dump 330 million into a player who has been a 3.1 bWAR/fWAR player over the last three seasons. Pretty remarkable work there. But he gets an F for what he did to Maldonado.

Interesting note. Martin Maldonado, still a free agent, received a 2 year contract offer from the Astros at the beginning of free agency and that offer was turned down. Scott Boras was the agent involved. Maldonado fired Scott Boras a few days ago and now is represented by Dan Lozano.

Keuchel and it's not even close. Paying 15+ million dollars to a guy who projects to around 60 innings and would want to pitch in only one rigid, specific bullpen role is a terrible investment.

www.criterion.com Criterion is having a 24 hour flash sale currently going on their website. Ends at noon, eastern time, tomorrow. Free shipping for orders over $50. Only applies to in-stock titles, no backorders or pre-orders for titles that haven't been released yet. I am pretty bummed out because I wanted to get the Eclipse Set 17: Nikkatsu Noir, but that one is sold out. It was #1 on my want list for this sale. That is certainly not a title I would have suspected they'd run out of. I ended up getting- Berlin Alexanderplatz Blu-ray The Killers (Ernest Hemingway double-feature) Blu-ray Ugetsu Blu-ray

The Brewers should ask Gonzalez if he would be open to pitching out of the bullpen and, if so, he would be a great insurance addition. With Suter down, there are only two lefties on the 40-man roster which is a concern. Only lefty pitcher who was a non-roster invitee is Angel Perdomo who is a 24 year old that hasn't pitched above A ball and is scheduled to begin the season in Biloxi. With Torres-Costa down with injury, the other top ranking lefties (in terms of proximity to MLB) in the system are Brad Kuntz and Cameron Roegner. When it comes to lefty pitching, the Brewers only have Hader and Claudio and little else for 2019. Plan would be to begin the season with Gonzalez in the rotation. He could stay there all year if he's pitching well and both Hader and Claudio are healthy. But if either of the relievers would go down with injury, it would be nice if the Brewers had the option to move Gonzalez to the bullpen. The big question is how Gonzalez would adjust since he's been a starter for so long. But over the last three years, lefties slashed .213/.271/.304/.575 and righties have slashed .252/.331/.402/.733 off Gonzalez. His background as a starter indicates he could be used as a multi-inning reliever, and the splits against lefties indicates he would be a good candidate to send out there against a tough left-handed bat later in the game. Two years ago I probably would have said just save the money and if the Brewers need a lefty then go out and get one at the deadline. But with the way Counsell uses a bullpen, how long could the Brewers go with only one lefty reliever if Hader or Claudio ended up with a bulky elbow two weeks into the season? If Hader and Claudio both stay healthy the whole year, then I don't think the lefty aspect of the pitching staff is a concern at all. But if either of them get hurt, especially early, it could cause some trouble. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think the only lefties still out there that are even worth mentioning are Keuchel, Gonzalez and Jorge De La Rosa. De La Rosa did have a very respectable season in 2018, but he is much older (turns 38 in about a month) and IMO is a significant downgrade from Gonzalez. It all comes down to if Gonzalez would be willing to pitch out of the bullpen. If so, I wouldn't mind seeing the Brewers sign him to a one-year deal.

So the latest Keuchel updates at MLB Trade Rumors- -Astros haven't been engaged with Keuchel in recent weeks -Phillies only interested in a very short-term deal -Twins unlikely to sign him to anything more than a one-year deal -Braves don't think their pitching injuries are significant enough to pursue Kuechel https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2019/03/dallas-keuchel-rumors-astros-braves-phillies-twins-craig-kimbrel.html

The USA is completely off-the-rails with the trial by media nonsense. Here's a novel idea, how about letting a judge pass judgement in an actual court of law? Hard for me to believe that anything in the video would qualify as anything above the lowest assault charge. When, and if, this gets to a judge, it looks like it would result in a very modest fine and nothing more assuming Baer has a clean criminal record. Does MLB really need to get involved in this? Should all employers jump into action every time an employee gets charged with a simple misdemeanor? Baer has already served a larger punishment then what he is going to get from the courts or from MLB. A big-wig like that will worry more about the public humiliation he and his family have already endured rather than any fine that the courts and/or MLB will impose.

Can't say the market short-changed him in any way at all. 45 million per season for 3 years 42 million per season for 4 years 25.83 million per season for 12 years 25.39 million per season for 13 years If he goes short term he gets the highest average annual value contract in the history of the sport by a pretty good margin. If he goes long term he gets the highest amount of dollars in the history of the sport, by a pretty good margin. No surprise that Boras went for the biggest overall dollar amount because that's been his method of operation. Not bad money for a guy that has only been a 3.1 bWAR/fWAR per season player over the last three years. I've been critical so far about Boras' handling of Keuchel...time will tell if I am wrong on that one. But there is no question that Boras did an A++++ job here considering Harper's recent history which is solid but certainly not super-star level.