sveumrules

& they got almost nine WAR for that $210M, so only like $24M per win.

Pretty crazy that the Cubs were hot (13-5 in their last 18) coming into their series against the cold DBacks (3-7 in their last 10), yet Chicago’s still lost the first three games scoring a total of four runs. It’s almost enough to make me believe baseball is gonna baseball and trying to extrapolate small samples of hotness or coldness is of limited utility since the switch can flip at any time with little forewarning.

I was responding to your statement that Counsell hasn’t made a good decision in awhile. Thats why I asked how long is awhile and then provided the teams record over the last couple months where they’ve been among the half dozen best teams in MLB.

How long is awhile? The last eight games where we went 4-4? Before that they won nine in a row. Their 20-12 record since August is 6th best in MLB as is their 34-23 record since July.

Nice, like him better than any of the options that were already on the 40 man. Didn't even realize we had an empty spot this late in the season.

98 games pre-Frelick 86 wRC+ | 4.16 R/G 40 games with Frelick 94 wRC+ | 4.98 R/G 107 games pre-SantanCanha 87 wRC+ | 4.15 R/G 31 games with SantanCanha 93 wRC+ | 5.26 R/G Wherever CC puts them in the lineup, the additions of Sal SantanCanha have definitely given the offense a boost the last thirty forty games.

I think the larger takeaway is that the anticipation surrounding the trade deadline is typically way bigger than its actual impact when the dust is settled. Sure, there are the occasional big move all in superstar trade deadlines like SD in 2022, or Chapman to Cubs, or CC back in 2008, but those are the exceptions not the rule. There’s just as many cases like ATL in 21 replacing Acuna with three mid tier OFs who got hot at the right time, or nondescript guys like Steve Pearce with BOS in 18, or Cody Ross with SFG in 10 where the small sample is the real star of the show. The majority of deadline moves are contenders trying to patch holes without sacrificing their future, because at the end of the day all you’re really acquiring in most cases is a couple months of an average-ish player for reinforcements. Here is a list of every player traded last deadline along with their production post deadline… HITTERS Andrus (191 PA | 119 wRC+ | 2.0 WAR) Reese (108 PA | 145 wRC+ | 1.3 WAR) BetCrt (151 PA | 101 wRC+ | 1.2 WAR) Siri (178 PA | 93 wRC+ | 1.2 WAR) Soto (228 PA | 130 wRC+ | 0.9 WAR) BenTen (131 PA | 111 wRC+ | 0.8 WAR) Marsh (138 PA | 114 wRC+ | 0.6 WAR) Drury (183 PA | 105 wRC+ | 0.3 WAR) Peralta (180 PA | 91 wRC+ | 0.2 WAR) Bell (210 PA | 79 wRC+ | -0.5 WAR) [waiver claim Andrus, two catchers and a glove first CF provided more value than Soto. 2nd best big bat Bell tanked.] STARTERS Quintana (62 IP | 52 ERA- | 2.1 WAR) Mntgmry (63 IP | 80 ERA- | 1.4 WAR) Castillo (65 IP | 86 ERA- | 1.2 WAR) Thor (52 IP | 105 ERA- | 0.7 WAR) Mahle (16 IP | 115 ERA- | 0.2 WAR) Odorizzi (46 IP | 127 ERA- | 0.0 WAR) Montas (39 IP | 165 ERA- | -0.5 WAR) [washed Quintana provided more value than prime Castillo] RELIEVERS Iglesias (26 IP | 8 ERA- | 1.4 WAR) Martin (24 IP | 37 ERA- | 1.1 WAR) Bass (25 IP | 45 ERA- | 0.9 WAR) Rbrtsn (23 IP | 66 ERA- | 0.6 WAR) Pop (19 IP | 49 ERA- | 0.5 WAR) Stratton (22 IP | 72 ERA- | 0.3 WAR) Fulmer (24 IP | 97 ERA- | 0.3 WAR) Effross (12 IP | 55 ERA- | 0.3 WAR) Lopez (22 IP | 114 ERA- | 0.0 WAR) Bush (23 IP | 106 ERA- | -0.4 WAR) Rogers (23 IP | 135 ERA- | -0.6 WAR) Hader (16 IP | 189 ERA- | -0.9 WAR) [“best” reliever traded at deadline pitched the worst]

Stroman and Seiya Suzuki were two offseasons ago, Dansby Swanson was their big signing this past offseason along with Taillon. That’s like $400M in long term signings the last two offseasons to kick start the rebuild. I’m not sure if the Brewers have even given out $400M in free agent contracts in their entire history. Lohse, Aramis, Soup, Garza and Cain are only like $240M combined.

From his usage this year, the Brewers clearly don’t view Toro as anything more than a deep insurance policy or he would have gotten more than 21 PAs with the MLB club. Donaldson has 8 PAs at Nashville, but he’s probably got the best shot of actually getting the call at some point based on name/history alone, Hiura is blocked from PT by Santana, Canha, Contreras, and Rowdy who is barely playing as is. Which prospect would you add to the 40 man and MLB club early? Black? His bat has cooled majorly since getting to AAA and his glove is a liability. Gasser? So he can pitch an inning or two sporadically out of the bullpen in blowouts instead of continuing to make regularly scheduled starts for Nashville? These are all such marginal differences around the edges and at the very backend of the roster (24 of 28 useful MLB players is a pretty good ratio) that’s it’s hard for me to see how it constitutes any kind of 40 man roster construction mess. One of the major reasons the Brewers are where they are at this point even with guys like Willy, Rowdy, Winker, Urias, Taylor, Anderson and various rookies struggling throughout the year, plus Woody being hurt most of the season is because nondescript 40 man depth like Monasterio, Miller, Perkins, Rea, Teheran, Payamps. Peguero, Wilson and Megill have all stepped up and made major contributions at various points.

Obviously lots of time left, but the way teams are currently clumped up it looks like loser of the NLC is going to end up as WC2 playing Philly while the NLC winner will be playing one of the four #6 Seed contenders. Byes ATL (90-47) LAD (84-53) #3/4/5 Seeds MIL (77-61) PHI (76-62) CHI (75-64) #6 Seed CIN (73-68) MIA (71-67) ARI (71-68) SFG (70-69)

There is no good in having him around after tonight, so they will likely option him out and call up somebody else just like they’ve been doing with the last couple bullpen spots all year. Williams, Payamps, Milner, Peguero, Wilson, Uribe, Megill is a pretty formidable Top 7 and a big reason why the Brewers bullpen has been at or near the top of the WPA leaderboard all season long. Chafin would be the last man in the bullpen if it weren’t September. Andrews only had the bonus spot to begin with because Houser, Ashby, Mejia and Teheran are hurt. Plus whatever is going on with Lauer. Looks like Julio, Small and JBB all pitched at Nashville tonight so maybe Eric gets the call back up. Only other pitcher on the 40 man is Junk.

Over the last month the top nine position players have 70+ PA each. After that it is Caratini (32), Wiemer (32), Tellez (24), Anderson (16), Miller (3). They’re barely using the 13th or 14th position player on the roster, I don’t see how a 15th would have much opportunity to add value. Sure, the 14th pitcher might suck so bad that you might have to use the 13th pitcher anyway, but if the 14th pitcher wasn’t even on the roster you’d have to use the 13th pitcher no matter what. I’d rather roll the dice on saving the bullpen an inning here or there over the last month than carry an extra position player that will never see the field.

Meatloaf said two out of three ain’t bad, so he really would’ve been impressed by three out of four affiliate SPs surrendering zero earned runs tonight… Jesus Rivero (5 IP | 5 H | 0 BB | 4 K) TJ Shook (6 IP | 1 H | 1 BB | 3 K) Julio Teheran (5 IP | 1 H | 3 BB | 3 K)

Last 30 days the Brewers bullpen is 8-3. Only three teams bullpens (Rays, Mariners & Nationals) have been credited with more wins. Only four teams bullpens (Braves, Dodgers, Astros & Cardinals) have lost fewer games. Their Win Probability Added of +0.81 is 9th last 30 days (vs 1st on the season as a whole), so they haven’t been as lockdown as earlier in the season, but it also hasn’t really cost them in terms of wins and losses. Brewers bullpen last 30 days ERA of 3.38 ranks 7th and FIP of 3.76 ranks 8th vs seasonal marks of 3.73 ERA (10th) and 4.12 FIP (13th) so they’ve been better at both raw run prevention and via peripherals over the last month.

Sounds have tacked on a few more runs, now up 6-2 bottom of eight. Greg Allen (2-4, SBx2), Abraham Toro (2-4, 2B), Jahmai Jones (0-1, BBx3), Chris Roller (1-3, BB) and Cam Devanney (2-3, 2B, BB) have joined the aforementioned Tyler Black with busy days in the box and on the bases. Josh Donaldson is 1-4 with an RBI and 2 K as he leads off bottom of eight with a pop out to third base.

Andrews is the very last guy in the expanded September bullpen, and has an option. The Brewers just traded for two players, SantanCanha, that play Keston’s positions plus Contreras to rotate through DH when he isn’t catching. And Rowdy. There is nowhere for Hiura to play.

Took a long time for GameDay to update on the Sparks at bat, so figured it had to be some wild sequence of events. Then Chourio was already on second by the time it finally refreshed.

Lamar Sparks triple clears the bases for Biloxi, then he scores on a throwing error. Chourio doubles, steals third,

Outside of Jadher Areinamo, most of the Latino Mudcats have pretty straight forward nombres. But hombre, I’m not even sure where to start with Jhostynxon on Salem.

Win Probability Added takes the game context of each plate appearance into account. By that measure the Brewers bullpen is 1st in MLB at +7.43 vs the Cubs in 15th at +1.44. There’s obviously a lot of factors playing into that, like what happens in the 5th/6th/7th to hopefully get to the 8th with a lead. There’s also each teams difference in run distribution. As a lower scoring team, the Brewers bullpen has had more opportunity to add or subtract WPA in close games (27-13 in one run games vs 19-18 for the Cubs), where the Cubs have had more blowouts as a high scoring team (29-17 in 5+ run games vs 13-14 for the Brewers). From here we can also see the Brewers have had 69 games decided by 2 to 4 runs vs only 55 such games for the Cubs. Another context based stat for relievers are shutdowns/meltdowns which is just any appearance resulting in 0.06 WPA in either direction. Brewers relievers are at 141 SD (3rd most in MLB) and 60 MD (fewest in MLB). Cubs relievers are at 108 SD (23rd) and 63 MD (3rd fewest), which also illustrates the “opportunity” gap Brewers relievers have had to add or subtract WPA by pitching in more close games. By average Leverage Index Brewers relievers are at 1.09 (8th) vs 0.92 (29th) for the Cubs. Or there’s always the original context based stats, wins and losses, where Brewers relievers are 31-20 vs 23-24 for the Cubs.

Was looking at some reliever leaderboards over at FanGraphs and noticed Erceg popping up here and there. Definitely having a season of extremes, rankings are among 172 relievers with at least 40 IP so far… THE GOOD 0.20 HR/9 (3rd) THE PRETTY GOOD 47.5 GB% (53rd) | 3.44 FIP (58th) | 26.2 K% (77th) THE NOT SO GOOD 5.56 ERA (162nd) | 13.8 BB% (164th) | .378 BABIP (167th) xFIP (4.58), SIERA (4.30) and xERA (3.93) all think he isn’t quite as bad the raw ERA, but that his elite HR prevention is likely unsustainable over larger samples so also not quite as good as the FIP either. That .378 BABIP seemed insane to me so I checked the five Brewers relievers with at least 40 IP and the highest BABIP was Peguero at .267 which ranks 53rd.

I think William’s got a lot stronger case for NL MVP then the raw numbers (and likely final vote tally will) bear out. Mookie and Acuna are the favorites, and it’s easy to see why, they are the best players on the best teams with 7.7 and 6.8 fWAR, respectively. But take Mookie off the Dodgers and they still have another legit MVP candidate in Freddie (6,8 fWAR), and two players in Will Smith (3.8) and James Outman (3.6) that are equally impactful as the Brewers’ second best player, Yelich (3.7). Even without Mookie they’d have like a six game division lead. Its even more pronounced with Acuna as the Braves have four other Top 20-ish guys in the NL with Olson (4.5), Murphy (4.5), Riley (4.0) and Albies (3.3). Even without Acuna they’d still have like a seven game division lead. Take Contreras off the Brewers though, and we’d be looking up at the Cubs for the division instead of the other way around. I’m not saying Contreras should take home the trophy, just that he should probably finish closer to 5th than 10th.

Both are definitely intriguing with some good statistical indicators, but as guys like Edwin Jimenez, Alexander Cornielle and Stiven Cruz have shown this year, it’s a long road from DSL success to even getting good results in Wisco. Should have a better idea once they come over stateside and we can get a better read on their stuff with more consistent video and reports.

They've also given 1,268 plate appearances to first year players Wiemer, Turang, Monasterio, Perkins and Frelick, getting a solid 3.5 combined fWAR in return. Sure, their collective offense hasn't been great (-35.5 total batting runs), but they've run the bases (+7.3 BSR) and fielded their positions (+20.5 DEF) well enough to each have provided positive overall value during their rookie seasons. BRef has them contributing even more value at 4.4 combined WAR with a breakdown of -36 BAT | +3 BSR | +35 DEF.

Chris Roller has presumably got to be some kind of defensive whiz in CF. 30th round pick by the Dodgers back in 2017 out of a community college, has never really hit, yet here we are six years later and dude has made it all the way to AAA playing the overwhelming majority of his innings in CF.