Few thoughts:
1. I’m stunned by the trade. I doubt anyone here can say otherwise.
2. Really like Durbin and I think he’s a winning player.
3. I am not qualified to judge the trade at this point because I’m digesting it and it’s not like I’ve got a recent scouting report on either pitcher we got.
4. I’m not going to blindly defend the move or hate the move.
5. Having said that, my view is these trades don’t just fall into the Brewers’ lap haphazardly. Arnold has a big team behind him and they are using advanced tools and I’m positive they’ve got very good thoughts on every reasonable asset in any organization.
6. But it’s way more than that. They’ve got every guy rated on how they like his metrics, how they think they can develop him, etc. These things aren’t perfectly simple either. Sproat isn’t a perfect Brewer target at some level (flatness of his fastball, spin rate, etc). But they’ve undoubtedly got a deep analysis on him. There are probabilities, etc. This isn’t Branch Rickey in 1953 making a trade at a bar and puttting on his reading glasses to understand who he is getting.
7. Harrison was obviously highly regarded and, like the Brett Baty’s and Coby Mayo’s and endless other guys, you would have thought we could never get him a year or two ago. For the investment guys, it kind of reminds me of a stock that gaps up and then you don’t buy it until it retraces to support. I think that’s exactly where we got Harrison.
8. Bottom line, the Brewers make trades holistically and in complementary fashion. They got Jett in one trade and moved Durbin in another.
9. Now we are looking at young pitching arms like Mis, Sproat, Harrison, and Priester. All very controllable. Henderson, Gasser, Crow, Patrick. That’s how they stay competitive.
10. I think this trade is a precursor to another. I tossed out Henderson plus one of Wilken or Adams. I’d really like to see some pop added to the lineup after those four Dodger games where everyone tanked together.