jackailius

I really hope we pass on Shields and rather go after Zimmerman next year. It will be more annually and a longer contract but I think Zimmerman is the real deal and worth going $190 for 7. With the contracts we currently have and with the controllable talent superfly mentioned I don't think it would be too difficult to make it happen and be competitive most years. I don't think we should resign Gomez, especially if Taylor looks like he will be ready but Lucroy as it gets closer to the end of his current contract, i could see extending depending on how he is holding up. Peralta might get pricey in his arb years as will Lucroy if you resign him but otherwise I honestly think we could be competitive and need very little FA signings going forward for several years.

I can completely understand the concerns. I think pitching in general and relief pitching in general can be a very volatile area but given the fact that it sure appears that DM and MA are in it to win it this year, I guess I can't think of a better option than Papelbon. I am just trying to gauge what would be a fair trade/way to make happen. While you can point to decrease velocity, you can do the same with KRod. I also look at the fact that we just paid $3M for a shaky lefty. I understand maybe not liking some of how Pap does in interviews but I really believe a lot of that has to do with his competitive nature which is something I think the Brewers could really use. There were times the past few years when I would get frustrated watching the brewers because they all seemed lackadaisical. Sure they wanted to win but it sure didn't seem like they had the fortitude to make it happen or had anyone who really stood up and took the reins. I would really like to have a few more players who are really passionate and will work to win. Maybe I'm wrong but that's the way I feel about it. I think that a team like the Brewers are always going to have things break there way. I mean for this season to work out, which it really could, we need Segura to come back at least to someone 2013 levels, Braun to come close to his better years, ARAM to stay healthy, Gomez and Lucroy not to fall off last years production, Lind to be able to play decently at 1st, Fiers not to regress, Peralta continue to improve, Lohse not to have age catch up to him, BP arms have good years, not down ones, RRR utilize players appropriately (this includes getting everyone-ie-ARAM rest often enough early to be able to make the push down the stretch). That is a lot that needs to break there way, it can happen and I think it is what happened for the Royals last year. The potential is there and I think having Pap is one more way to solidify that possibility and has the highest possible upside of those available. Could it fall apart, sure, but so could a lot of other areas. All the Brewers can do is position themselves as best as possible.

With Cotts on board, we need to move one off of our 40 man and if we pick up either Krod or Pap we would need to lose another. All things equal I would rather have 2 yrs of Pap than 1 year of Krod. Obviously all things aren’t equal but that said I was trying to think of ways to make this work. I love to speculate on possibilities. Do you think that if the Brewers told the Phils that if they sent Pap + $7M ($5M in 15/$2M in 2016) to the crew the Phils could pick 3 from the list below but 2 of the 3 have to come from the top 9 (they are 40 man roster spots)? I see all these folks as being nice fringe guys that it would be nice to have but we really could do without but they are also guys who could turn into role players for the Phils on the cheap for the next several years. Thoughts? Blazek Hall Hellweg Henderson Kintzler Strong Clark Rivera Schafer Reed Pena Wren Morris Delmonico Ramirez Magnifico

I don't know, I think that with there play towards the playoffs that keeping the starting rotation as is should be what happens rather than trading a piece off. You could start giving Nelson a start or two off in July and August so he can be fresh when the roster expands and then do the same for your starting five in the majors or work a 6 man rotation so that going into the playoffs everyone is fairly fresh... of course that is if there are no injuries (I'm looking at you Garza and Estrada) that require Nelson to be plugged in anyways. You can never have too much pitching, especially when we get to the playoffs. That said it would be nice to be able to snap your fingers and have a big hitting lefty appear on the team.

Some of my thoughts: 1. Retool development process of our young players- take a look at other organization that seem to churn out productive players and what they are doing- ie Cardinals and Rays 2. Don't sign anyone to lose our #12 pick 3. Start either looking to trade our major league pieces that have value to begin rebuilding for the future or sign a couple high risk/high reward guys on flyers who may be coming off injuries or off years ie Johan Santana. As it stands if they do nothing they will consistantly be mediocre. Never do too much during the season but always finish middle of the pack so they don't get a high pick and always stand to lose their pick if making a big freeagent pickup. Some of the high risk high rewards signings may flame out but if you get a couple and one or two make it, hey you got a chance at striking gold. 4. Have no regression of those who stepped up last year 5. Stay healthy and have no major injuries to key players

I could very easily see the Brewers being in the mix and I think the Brewers could offer him exactly what he wants. We have the flexibility with our young staff to pencil him in as a starter. I would be happy if the Brewers do a major league deal with a low base- say $4M with huge incentives based on innings pitched, ERA, wins etc. The hope is that Santana gets to those incentives because if he does it means a healthy season with strong numbers from someone who was an elite lefty- something that the brewers rotation sorely is missing. From the Brewers side a rotation of Gallardo, Lohse, Santana, Peralta and Estrada/Thornberg would be great with Nelson, Hellweg, Fiers, etc waiting in the wings if/when an injury occurs. Seems like it could be a real win/win. With the young pitching we have, now is the time to take some flyers like this because we have minor league options on so many of these arms and have them at the ready as fill ins when their are injuries.

Its funny this thread came up because just last night I was looking at the speadsheet that lists all the players and salaries for next year and looking how/where they would impove. Its tough because I don't see the Brewers making any big splashes in trades. At best I would say a salary dump of Weeks. I like the idea of trading him to the Royals, possibly in a package with a couple of younger players or with Aoki to help minimize the cash we are sending. I think if we could get out from under ARams contract that would be ideal but I don't anticipate that happening. I have an incling that if we are able to unload Weeks' contract that DM will look at a pitcher who has had success in the past but has either struggled or was hurt recently that we can get at a reasonable one year rate with incentives. I'm thinking of players like Lincecum, Halladay or Johnson. I also could see them bringing Hart back because he is a fan favorite but I believe it will have to be at an extremely team friendly contract (ie $5M) and releasing Axford and then resigning at a lower contract- ie $2m plus bonuses that were suggested above. I could see the justification coming of looking at a rotation where maybe Gallardo is rested and hoping to be back to form, Lohse and someone like Halladay as a top three in the rotation coupled with the hopes that Peralta starts to become more consistant through maturation and then throw in Estrada, Nelson etc into the rotation as a #5. I see DM maybe looking at the fact that even with a QO to these players from there current teams he would be losing a second round pick rather than a first round pick as a positive and with the general win now philosophy of the organization I could see this as plausible if they can do it on a reasonable base salary with a lot of incentives for the player on a one year deal. 2014 lineup 1. Segura SS 2. Gomez CF 3. Braun LF 4. Ramirez 3B 5. Lucroy C 6. Hart/Gamel 1B (depending on if they bring back Hart) 7 Scooter 2b 8 Davis/Gindl/Schafer RF (whoever looks best in spring training Bench some combination of the following Maldanado, Bianchi, Gindl/Davis, Bettencourt (oh yeah how can you not have Uni B:) ), Gamel/Fransisco Starting Pitching 1. Lohse 2. Halladay 3. Gallardo 4. Peralta 5. Estrada Bullpen some combination of: Thornberg, Wooten, Henderson, Gorzelany, Beldenhop, Axman, Kintzler (possibly Narveson who i think will be back on a minor league deal, other possiblities are Veras and Hand)

Hello all, Well I'm getting differing opinions from the sponsor depending on who i talk to. I guess it would be wise to anticipate 1000 as the production run if you are purchasing. I do have a couple extras but I won't be selling them. I may end up trading them for other bobbleheads I need though.

The sponsor stated they only had 500. I guess its possible the team has half but that wasn't how it worked last year. I can reverify with them for clarification.

Hello all, I just wanted to give you a heads up that if you collect bobbleheads and go for the non-Brewer Affiliates, the Eau Claire Express of the Northwoods League had a Uecker mini bobble giveaway a few days ago. I talked to someone in the sponsors marketing department and she stated this year we only had 500 made. Just wanted to give all my friends here a heads up if you want one keep an eye out because they may dry up quick.

So would you have stand pat, not get him and roll out without him for the year? I don't remember a ton of other viable options at that point from a trade standpoint. The wheels may have fallen off at the end but what else do you do. I don't want to be the Royals either who always tend to stand pat for the most part and its always next year for them when there talent graduates and then they compete but next year never comes.

Again I'm not disagreeing and why I said that building organically needs to be more the priority but when you get to the point where you feel you can realistically go for it you do trade from what should be your surplus of what those who aren't contending are going to want (prospects) for those who can shore up the one or two holes that you may have. I think the real big issue isn't trading prospects for needs, its the lack of quality prospects in the first place to limit the holes you need to fill. Its great saying Lawrie could have been traded for a young pitcher we could control but it would basically be a prospect for a prospect so no hole is filled at the ML level for either team. I think the real thing it goes back to is scouting and development. At some point every team needs to trade to fill gaps and typically what the team in contention is looking for is someone known and reliable becuase they are in the playoff hunt and believe they got a shot and the other team is building and want a prospect. If they aren't out of contention they probably are not trading someone reliable, dependable and experienced because they are going to want that as well. I do agree in principle that we will implode if our mantra every 2 to 3 years is we need to fill hole a and be and to do so we will trade 5 or 6 of the top prospects in our organization. But back to the point of better scouting and development, if we are doing it and locking our talent early, we shouldn't have as many holes and when we do need to trade the talent across the board for us is higher so what we lose nets us more with less affect on our overall system.

While I agree to a point with the we traded it all away to win now, who did we really trade away that could have been a cornerstone for the future? Maybe we could have got more for Lawrie but look back before his late season collaps Marcum was a big part, especially early in the season for the success that lead us to the playoffs. The Grienke trade, I don't know, Escobar, Cain and Odarizzi are all ok to pretty good but I'm not sold on any of them being franchise cornerstones and after riding Grienke to the playoffs we basically netted back what we lost from a talent standpoint as far as my eyes can tell. Sabathia I still think we got the better end of as there was noone in that trade looking back that is a difference maker. I don't know if I agree with clasifying Fielder as a future HOFer. I do wish we could have kept him but for me they made the right move walking away and I don't beleive,even early in his career, the Brewers could have locked up his FA years. I do think the Brewers need to try to lock up their - look like stars/solid players in the making earlier in their careers so the price is reasonable and if one or two flame out it isn't so painful ala Ricky and to a point Hart. From my standpoint I turn a raised eyebrow to our scouting, drafting and development. If you look at what Theo is doing in Chicago with the international draft it is brilliant. If we could have done that we would be great in a couple years from international draft side. My concern is next year other teams are going to see how Theo abused the system this year, pay the penalties and drive up prices. I also think that we really need to be scouting international free agents better. We hit paydirt with Aoki but we have to take more chances out there and at least have scouts around the world taking a hard look because just drafting is going to be slow, especially with restrictions on spending etc there. I think especially going forward relying on FAs, especially impact players, is going to be more and more difficult and expensive for teams to get, especially small market teams like ours so we really need to cultivate the minor league. While I don't think any of the trades we made was really all that detrimental the fact that we traded away our BEST prospects in these deals and average in the majors is about all the recieving team has seen out of them speaks volumes about where we are at from scouting to development. On the positive, if we can turn around the scouting and drafting, we do have some pretty important holes filled with talent already for several years before replacement is needed- ie CF, SS, C and I think if Braun can even produce at 90% of what he has in the past several (PEDs) years going forward he is still a cornerstone. Obviously pitching is something to focus on for us because servicable 1st basemen and OFers typically can be found more prevelantly and cheaper on the FA market if a hole there needs to be filled. Just my .02

nevermind.

Well, kind of looks like they got a Grienke sized return for Garza.

I really hope we actually catch a break and Ramirez does come back healthy and goes on a mini tear and warning track power's trade option comes to fruition but I fear monty hit this one on the head.

Good call brewcrewdude. I guess it was a little wishful thinking especially with ethier included. With Castellanos I guess i'm hoping they get a little nervous about his effectiveness to transition from 3rd to of and are looking for a more seasoned and , known commodity for their playoff run. I think Aoki could transition alright to LF. They may also look at the possibilities of having Aoki leadoff infront of Fielder and Cabrera. Of course this all is "the stars align" situations but other than Ethier I actually think there would be a chance for the rest of the packages to work out.

boy i'd love to see that trade with Arizona. I just wonder if they are in a position to add that much to their payroll between Aramis and Gallardo and to that point if they are interested in something along those lines and would be willing to give up Bradley, could we sweeten the pot by adding cash back to help pay for the increase in payroll over the next couple years and get Davidson which would free up our need to trade with Detroit for Castellanos.

Ideal trades: Diamondback Trade Gallardo and Henderson for Skaggs Dodgers Trade Aram, Weeks and Axford for Ethier, Lee, Pederson, Seeger This would offset some of the Dodgers expenses of taking on ARAM and Weeks by taking Ethier contract and hopefully allow us to get the 3 top prospects in there organization. Tigers Aoki, Gonzalez and KRod for Castellanos and Crosby Mets Ethier, random pitching prospect + $15M for Familia and Cecchini? The Mets one I’m not sure about. They just seem like a team that could really use a cornerstone outfielder and have the revenue to field a larger contract but I’m just not sure we could flip without cash for upside prospects because of the Jason Bay debacle. Next year would look like: 1B Hart/Morris/Halton/Gamel 2B Scooter SS Segura 3B Castellanos C Lucroy LF Braun CF Gomez RF Schafer SP 1 Lohse 2. Skaags 3. Peralta 4&5. Lee/Familla/Hellweg/Nelson/Estrada/Thornberg/Hand/Crosby/Burgos You then have the rest who don’t make the rotation as possibles for the bullpen and can also add folks like Jungmann, Bradley, Fiers, Pena etc to that list of bp arms to go with Badenhop, Gorzelanny and Kinzler Our Bench would be something like: Gamel/Gindl/ Maldanado/Biachi There would of course be room in payroll if you want to add that impact player or two to go with the youth of the team and 2014 would probably be rough as many of these players would take their lumps learning the league and some will strike out but introducing them all will give you a chance to really evaluate folks like Schafer and Scooter to see if they are going to stick as everyday players or is that an area you try to spend some money on. By 2015 we could really truly be back in the thick of things and by 2016 you start seeing some of the others come up and may see a move like Segura to 2nd. The possibilities become endless and boy what a turn around it could be and we could go from worst farms to one of the better farms. I would … How realistic do you consider any/all these trades and our outlook moving forward? Just trying to add more debate to the group.

And depending on who we are able to trade off, a $5 to $10 M Hart might be looked at as a good idea from the front office because if we get rid of Ramirez, Gallardo, Aoki, possibly Lohse and with any luck Weeks, there will be a lot of casual fans who will appreciate seeing a known Brewer out on the field. From a strictly dollars and sense, long term planning and logistics it may not make sense but from a bigger picture, cheeks in the seats/fan standpoint it may be best.

I agree but considering they are working into outfield play in the minors because he is blocked at his natural position, the fact they are in need of relievers and maybe outfield upgrade with a leadoff lefthanded ability with huge on base numbers ahead of cabrera and fielder with a very low salary for this year and next I'd say they might buy on the idea. I also agree that I'd throw ax and krod in the deal but i do think we could broach the subject of adding soemone like crosby as well.

Do you think Detroit would want an upgrade over Dirks? Maybe Aoki and Ax or KRod for Castellanos, Crosby and a lower level + prospect?

Either list could be very accurate. I could see Henderson possibly taking K-Rods spot though. Only because of the cost/controlability he has for the team recieving him. I think that Melvin may think that they could very easily retain KRod next year for a reasonable price as our closer and is concevably as reliable as Henderson/Axford and the Brewers may get more from the recieving team in a trade for Henderson. I think Ax man is more for a cost savings on the brewers end.

I don't know as if the Yankees align well with us because of what they have to offer. I would also think that possibly the Tigers could fit within the top 5/6 with their need for relief pitching and possibly an outfielder. I would be thrilled to go Aoki, KRod and Ax for Castellano and Porcello maybe?

I completely agree with the fact that if healthy and the stars align next year could be great. I think it will be tough for them not to at least field offers for ARAM though because they will need some salary relief with his contract, at least if they are going to look to fill other holes. I don't think their attendance will be enough to afford keeping all the pieces together. There are ways to work around that type of trade I guess but who fills in at closer? While several of our young pitchers may strike and have great careers, I think it is more realistic that several start the way Peralta has with games that are incredible and some that are miserable to watch, you then have to look at your bullpen and have a pretty good string of long relievers. I can't see them paying Ax next year. That $5M will be a savings that will close to cover the increase in ARAM that you are looking for but now you have a hole. Are you thinking about bringing Krod back? If not there is another hole. I don't know how far you want to stretch the "young arms" we have as far as relying on them for these critical situations. I agree, if Hart, ARAM and Braun were all healthy at the beginning of the year they could have made up for many of the sluggish starts that we got from our pitching staff but I still think that you have to at least entertain the idea of trading ARAM, Yo, Aoki, our relievers, especially Ax and lord please let someone take a flyer on Weeks with his hot streak. RobertR, I can see and agree in context with everything you are saying but for arguments sake, ideally who would you trade, if anyone on our roster and if you trade them what do you realistically see as our 25 man roster for next year?