sveumrules

Carter was an early 2nd (#32) after putting up 15.4 PPG / 4.8 RPG / 5.2 APG / 2.8 SPG on 430/391/821 shooting splits over his junior/senior seasons, both of which saw West Virginia advance to the Sweet 16 before losing to a pair of #1 seeds. Hepburn doesn’t have quite that level of production at 10.6 PPG / 3.1 RPG / 3.3 APG / 1.8 SPG on 395/371/716 shooting splits over his last two years. I think he’d need a huge tournament run this year, or to come back for his senior season and take a leap in production to approach Carter’s draft position.

Looks like Middleton is expected to play Sunday. With three B2Bs over the final 15 games that should give him ten to twelve games to get back up to speed before the playoffs barring further setbacks. Currently half a game ahead of the Cavs at #3 and 3.5 up on the Knicks for the #4 seed. Staying at #2/#3 would delay any potential Celtics match up to the ECF. Boston looks like an unbeatable juggernaut, but if we can keep everybody healthy I still think the Bucks have the best chance of anybody in the East to slay that dragon.

Always fun to read too much into the first minor league spring training lineups but Eduardo Garcia, center fielder, is a new look.

Especially considering the downfall was already two months deep by the time Hader was dealt and Josh was also a pretty big contributing factor to said downfall... 04/07/22 to 05/30/22 Team: 32-18 Hader: 16.2 IP | 0.00 ERA 05/31/22 to 07/29/22 Team: 24-26 Hader: 17.1 IP | 8.31 ERA 07/30/22 to 10/05/22 Team: 30-32 Rogers (MIL): 23.0 IP | 5.48 ERA Hader (SDP): 16.0 IP | 7.31 ERA

Looks like Davis has cleared waivers. Since his $6.9M salary was awarded at a hearing and not agreed upon twixt both parties prior to, he is only guaranteed $1.11M from the Giants. Another reason its in guys best interests to come to an agreement with the club before going in front of the panel.

My guess is that the regular IF alignment to open the season will be Ortiz at 3B, Adames at SS, Turang at 2B and Rhys at 1B. Monasterio in for Turang vs LHP at 3B with Ortiz sliding to 2B. Black waiting in the wings at Nashville with Wilken a dark horse for later in the season. Still think Sal is mostly getting reps at 3B just to increase his versatility and open up different lineup combos. Maybe he ends up there like once a week which would shake out to a couple dozen games or so.

-38 DRS | -7 OAA in 2240 career innings at 3B and -9 DRS | -11 OAA over only 665 innings in LF. Dude is pretty brutal afield. His metrics are fine at 1B (0 DRS | +2 OAA) but it’s also only 287 innings spread over seven calendar years, so huge grain of salt required. He’s better than Bauers, no doubt, but also $5.5M more expensive and would require some kind of prospect going back to SF. Guess it comes down to how much room there is in the budget and who the Giants would want in return.

Yes, the Brewers appear OK with Wes Clarke being the #2 catcher for a single exhibition game where he might catch a couple innings. That’s a long way from them being OK with him catching 50-60 games that matter in a regular season.

Who could have ever predicted that a guy coming off an ACL, who looked like a doubtful SS (+1 DRS | -4 OAA in 502 innings, mostly in 2021) but a plus 2B (+16 DRS | +8 OAA in 1346 innings) before the injury, would then return from that injury and struggle at SS? Internet commenters. Only SS I’d be offering is Turang, wouldn’t bail them out with Adames unless they really overpaid.

Author must not be a fan of the projections either if they think the Nationals (64.6 projected wins at FG | 58.2 projected wins at BPro) belong in a tier with the Pirates (77.7 | 72.6) and Brewers (80.8 | 79.7). NL essentially has three tiers this year with ATL/LAD at the top, WAS/COL at the bottom and the other 11 teams more or less in the middle projected between 78-85 wins with the exception of PECOTA being low on the Pirates.

Believe it is streaming only through MLB.

FanGraphs list dropped today. Haven’t had a chance to read the whole thing but glancing at the rankings looks like they are lower on Tyler Black, Carlos Rodriguez and Mike Boeve relative to consensus but higher on Josh Knoth and Jorge Quintana. System Overview reads… This is a pretty deep system, though some of my biases as an evaluator/scout/analyst are probably to thank for that, as I tend to gravitate towards the same kind of hitters Milwaukee does: contact-driven little guys at up-the-middle positions. While it has plus depth from top to bottom, the depth in the impact tier (40+ FV tier and above) is closer to average and maybe even a little bit below. Keep in mind that Milwaukee has traded away eight prospects during the offseason (most of them fringy); this list would probably be a few names deeper if not for that. There is a nice mix of short-term and potential long-term impact in this system, and I think that’s true even though I’m bearish on Tyler Black and want to see a little more from Brock Wilken before I move him into the top 100. The Brewers have a few transactional patterns aside from just their preference for the little hit tool guys. They pick a ton of junior college or small school players, especially pitchers, and develop them. This list is populated with guys like that for the third straight year, and there are some 2023 draftees (like Jason Woodward and Ryan Birchard) who might show similar improvement in the coming season. Milwaukee’s international scouting operation tends to do well in Venezuela more often than in other places (three of the top six players in the system are from there), but the Brewers’ top two 2024 signees were from the Dominican Republic, and they’ve signed several pitchers from Nicaragua in the last couple of years. The Corbin Burnes trade (DL Hall would be ranked somewhere in the Wilken-Josh Knoth range were he eligible for the list) was the second seller-postured blockbuster the Brewers have made during the last three seasons, with the Josh Hader deal being the other. In both instances they got back multiple prospects, but aside from Joey Ortiz fitting their contact-oriented tendencies, the types of players they’ve gotten in those deals have run the gamut. It seems that periodic trades like this are part of the way Brewers ownership is inclined to operate given their market size.

Welcome to the site!!

First post in the thread mentioned Clevinger’s off field issues. Main difference twixt the two seems to be that MLB didn’t think whatever Clevinger did warranted a suspension vs Bauer getting 324 games and what appears to be an unofficial blacklisting.

Had a ten pack with my folks in the ADA section of Club Level last year and they were perfect for easy access. Walk in right off the hallway in Club Level so there are no stairs to go up and down, and then the seats are padded folding chairs so there is a little more room to move around and get comfortable, plus no getting up and down when others in the row need to leave like normal seats. Most of the games it was just us and a few other people in the section so it was pretty spread out and chill.

Welcome to the site!

Jay Jaffe looks at free agency's biggest gainers and losers over at FanGraphs today with the Brewers coming in 10th in spending at $77.3M (which doesn't include Chourio's extension) and 7th in Net Projected WAR (4.8)

You may believe projections suck, but they are certainly not worth nothing. Teams literally pay money to third parties to provide them with external projections. They hire numerous analysts to better calibrate their own internal projections. Does this mean they are unassailable? Of course not. But even for all their shortcomings they have much smaller error bars and inherently less bias than any one human's opinion.

It’s not naysaying Mitchell to point out that his 119 wRC+ over 141 MLB PAs is very likely unsustainable with a 38.3 K% and .441 BABIP under the hood. It’s just math. A .350 BABIP is pretty much the ceiling over any meaningful sample. Among 226 batters with at least 1,000 PA since 2021 only Brandon Marsh (.384), JD Davis (.351) and Freeman (,.351) have cleared that bar. Hit King Luis Arraez is at .340. Objective one is just stay healthy. Of course a guy’s performance will be volatile with only 187 games and 732 PAs spread out across five levels and three years. After that the K rate needs to come down at least a dozen points. If both of those things happen, we should be in business.

Williams workload is fine and perfectly in line with other closers. Here’s the dozen guys with at least 30 saves last years sorted by save opportunities with their corresponding innings pitched… Clase (56 SVO, 72.1 IP) Doval (47 SVO, 67.2 IP) Bednar (42 SVO, 67.1 IP) Diaz (40 SVO, 67.1 IP) Romano (40 SVO, 59 IP) Williams (40 SVO, 58.2 IP) Bautista (39 SVO, 61 IP) Sewald (39 SVO, 60.2 IP) Hader (38 SVO, 58.1 IP) Pressley (37 SVO, 65.1 IP) Iglesias (37 SVO, 55.2 IP) Estevez (35 SVO, 62.1 IP)

Not too far off from what FanGraphs depth charts has… Peralta (163 IP) Miley (133) Junis (125) Rea (113) Gasser (106) Hall (86) Ross (69) Ashby (49) Rodriguez (25) Junk (9) That rotation comes in at 12.0 projected WAR which ties them for 16th in the rankings with (drumroll please) the Baltimore Orioles. FG depth charts also have Ashby (44 IP) Junk (31) Ross (28) Hall (24) Rea (14) Gasser (12) Junis (10) projected for some relief innings. Here is how the Brewers rotations have fared in both FIP based WAR and runs allowed based WAR over their last six full seasons… 2017 12.7 fWAR (9th) 14.2 rWAR (8th) 2018 8.3 fWAR (20th) 11.2 rWAR (15th) 2019 8.5 fWAR (20th) 9.9 rWAR (16th) Cumulative 2017-19 SP: 29.5 fWAR (18th) 35.2 rWAR (13th) RP: +13.75 WPA (7th) Runs Scored: 2,255 (15th) position player wRC+: 103 (15th) position player WAR: 74.3 (9th) DRS: +140 DRS (5th) Base Running: +16.7 (10th) Team Wins: 271 (7th) 2021 20.3 fWAR (2nd) 22.3 rWAR (2nd) 2022 12.4 fWAR (13th) 13.0 rWAR (13th) 2023 11.2 fWAR (12th) 15.8 rWAR (4th) Cumulative 2021-23 SP: 43.9 fWAR (3rd) 51.1 rWAR (3rd) RP: +19.31 WPA (3rd) Runs Scored: 2,191 (13th) position player wRC+: 98 (17th) position player WAR: 62.0 (12th) DRS: +147 DRS (1st) Base Running: +14.7 (9th) Team Wins: 273 (5th) Lots of interesting takeaways comparing the similarities and differences in how the 17-19 iteration got to their 271 wins versus how the 21-23 iteration got to their 273. Constants are that excellent defense has helped the pitchers outperform their peripherals for over half a decade to one degree or another. That same defense combined with above average base running has helped the position players rank 9th and 12th in WAR over those three year stretches while only ranking 13th to 17th in runs scored and position player wRC+. For as fickle as relievers are, Brewers bullpens have pretty consistently been nails. 17-19 offense got a season and a half of MVP Yelich to boost their wRC+ over 100, 21-23 rotation got one full season of dominance from Burnes, Woody, and Freddy all together to anchor their rankings. Winding back around to the 2024 rotation, as a fan of both Eef Barzelay (“I love the unknown”) and Neil Halstead (“give me something new”) I’ll echo the sentiments of Kirsten Dunst and say Bring. It. On.

The comp for Wes Clarke is Garrett Cooper with the ability to emergency catch. Its not a perfect comp since they are different builds and Cooper’s profile is more hit over power with a 107 AVG+ vs a 100 ISO+ since becoming a regular in 2019 whereas Clarke is 3TO slugger profile. But bottom line is Wes will need to be able to walk and power his way to at least a 110 wRC+ (Cooper’s career mark, Branyan is 111 career for a more 3TO look) to have any shot of sticking around MLB in any meaningful capacity.

Charlie Greene and staff were able to coach up Narvaez, Contreras and Caratini on framing… Narvaez 16-19: -22.3 FRM 20-22: +20.2 FRM Contreras 20-22: -6.3 FRM 2023: +14.4 FRM Caratini 17-21: -5.0 FRM 22-23: +10.1 FRM Their CS% didn’t see quite the same level of improvement… Narvaez 16-19: 52/251 = 20.7 CS% 20-22: 47/218 = 21.6 CS% Contreras 20-22: 16/71 = 22.5 CS% 2023: 16/93 = 17.2 CS% Caratini 17-21: 30/142 = 21.1 CS% 22-23: 22/106 = 20.8 CS%

Wes Clarke at AA: 4 CS / 35 SB = 10.3 CS% Gary Sanchez at AA: 68 CS / 110 SB = 38.2 CS% Gary Sanchez in MLB: 98 CS / 257 SB = 27.6 CS% Clarke’s biggest impediment to potentially catching at the MLB level is he hasn’t been able to throw any one out two levels down in AA. The one tool Sanchez has always had in his tool box behind the plate is a strong arm. That’s a pretty notable difference.

Guess the Red Sox weren’t that impressed with their first hand look. Kind of interesting since both Urias deals were for a single pitcher. Mariners sent over Isaiah Campbell, a 26 year old reliever who threw 28 MLB innings last year. His 2.83 ERA was pretty nice, but the peripherals weren’t quite as pretty with a 3.32 FIP, 3.80 SIERA, 3.87 xERA and 4.15 xFIP. He’s projected between a 4.21 and 4.37 ERA by the various publicly available systems for 2024. Obviously a higher floor than Blalock having reached MLB already, but Bradley has the edge in upside being three years younger with better scouting reports and a chance to start still.