superfly

Even if they have a terrible season I'll still trust Stearns. They're entitled to a bad year, it happens. Especially when you lose Grandal, Moose, and others then hit an aggressive year in FA. I honestly don't know what people expect. The blueprint is to build a "good" team every year. If a few players over-perform you're a contender and can buy at the deadline. But we can't expect them to be contenders every single year, that's unrealistic. They could go out and spend $200MM and their roster still wouldn't look as good on paper as other teams, so that's a foolish way to try to compete. Finally, there is no such thing as a Yelich window. One player has nowhere near the impact as a HOF QB or NBA player. In fact, if anything, the window was 2018. When you're the Milwaukee Brewers, that's your shot. They got so close, and it's really tough to get back to that position. I don’t understand the strategy, besides hope. If we aren’t paying for any pitching, then perhaps we should have the bullpen pretty locked down? Rather were hoping on starting pitching as well as hoping on the bullpen. 5 million dollars on Eric Sogard? That’s 5 million of the 10 million I’d rather throw at Dellin Betances and see if that works out and plug holes with “guys.” I have to hope there’s a bigger plan at work and Stearns deserves plenty of leeway, but there is a whole lot of hopes, uncertainties, and mediocrity all over the roster right now.

i feel like i need a shower after reading this signing.

If your team is the Yankees, cubs, Dodgers, RedSox, Astros, Nats, Angels, etc... you can look at things your way, w/o regard for money. Brewers, Rays, Twins, Pirates, Reds, etc.. cannot ever look at any player with no regard for money. It's easy to disregard money when it's not your money they are spending. If we continue to go through life closing off 60% of the league because of money, then we indeed will further put ourselves into the box of “we can never ever spend money on a single player”. I think there was a discount given as speculated, but if the brewers could have gotten Madbum for a similar deal I’d spend it 10/10 times as a GM. He may or may not be an ace anymore, but he sure as heck would have slotted in nicely behind Woodruff. 17 million is not bad for a #2 type starter with a high floor and upside. I’d rather dumpster dive to fit payroll rolling Woodruff and Bumgarner our in a playoff series than dumpster dive in the pitching heap and pray it can hold together through a season. Imo

Why does a rotation need to be filled, in order, from top to bottom? The Brewers lacked a 3 yesterday morning, and they went out and got a guy that performed like one last year for a very affordable rate. Check. Doesn't exclude them from pursuing additional SP help. Because it's Woodruff, and then all a bunch of "flyers" in reality. They may work out fine, they may not. It really amazes me how so many Brewer fans like and get excited about these "cheap" signings, and how they are "great value". Well, for one thing, they are cheap for a reason. Could they be good?? Sure they could be, and that would be fine. But when it doesn't work out, it will be disastrous. Not in terms of money(which to me is irrelevant, results are what matter), but in terms of results. Going on what we know now, and who will be in the rotation, what happens if/when 2 of 3 of Lindblom, Lauer and Anderson don't work out?? You are down to one reliable starter in Woodruff, and no real remedy to fix the disastrous results the other 3 gave you, as the hole they have dug you is likely too deep to get out of, even if it's fairly early. Look what happened last year in going with the 3 young arms to start the year. Burnes was an unmitigated disaster and so was Peralta in the rotation. It took an unprecedented late season run to get into the wild card game and even though the team had other problems, to me, the decision to go with those young guys in the rotation was a big reason they had to make a late season run. The Brewers give themselves such a thin margin for error every year with putting a staff together, sure they may have decent depth if one or two guys go down, but you are just replacing them with another guy that's virtually the same pitcher and one who makes you hold your breath damn near every time he goes out there because you worry about them getting lit up. I guess I don't really understand the organizational philosophy to essentially "ignore" pitching and focus so much on hitting. Yes, I love a team that can put up a lot of runs, that is always fun, but i also dislike having a staff in which you never know what you are going to get on a night in night out basis. One night you might get a gem from one of the castoffs, the next night one of them gets lit up, essentially negating the gem you got the night before. I would like to see them have at least two top end guys who you pretty much know what you are going to get every night. Sure they will have bad nights, everyone does, but you know it's an anomaly as opposed to the norm. Others in this thread have said it..at some point don't you HAVE to take pitching more seriously, and make a splash signing?? Especially with 3 more years of Yelich control. Yes, TOR guys are expensive, I get that, and maybe Mark A would have to raise payroll levels higher then he would like(even though their payroll COULD be higher, he just doesn't want it to be) for 3 years, sometimes you have to take chances to be successful, good business people like Mark A know that. I don’t know why we must always “settle” for mediocre Walmart shopping prices on pitching. It’s almost like people get even more excited about getting a guy for a million dollars than having a guy in the rotation with a proven pedigree. The allure of living in Las Vegas every night with your starting pitching isn’t as much fun to me as it is to some apparently. Oh my god somebody gave Zack Wheeler 118 million, that’s crazy! No it’s not crazy, that’s called paying for proven track record results. That’s why Adrian houser makes minimum salary with a small sample size of similar numbers. Now please feel free to give the lecture on how we have limited money, a small market blah blah blah.

Woodruff is a top of the rotation arm and I think Houser will surprise people this year (if he didn't last year). Everyone just wants the big name. For example, take these two pitchers: Pitcher A 195 IP / 3.96 ERA / 3.48 FIP / 1.259 WHIP / 9.0 K9 / 2.3 BB9 Pitcher B 111 IP / 3.72 ERA / 3.88 FIP / 1.240 WHIP / 9.5 K9 / 3.0 BB9 Pitcher A is Zack Wheeler and he just signed a $118 million contract Pitcher B is Adrian Houser and he will make about $600k this year Stop listening to ESPN and MLB Network. They only talk about the big names and lead you to believe that signing those guys is the only way to build a good rotation. It's not. 111 innings not all of which are starter innings doesn’t mean anything. Houser looks promising but there’s a reason Wheeler got what he did. Teams looking to win now pay up, those in rebuild or cheap take a gamble on the unproven. Otherwise you go into seasons with small sample sizes on Corbin Burnes and have your entire season screwed up. What time will division champ T shirts be for sale?

I don't really intend to get in a tit for tat, but i'm sorry making a wild card game is not "making the playoffs." It's precisely what it says it is contrary to what MLB sells it as...a play in game. Was a fun time until Mr. Butterfinger ruined our actual playoff hopes, but oh well. There's alot of emotion in free agency, and while I like this for a depth signing quite a bit, this rotation is still pretty unacceptable from my personal view. We spent a butt load of capital signing Lorenzo Cain, and spent a butt load of prospect (on paper) capital acquiring Christian Yelich, and if Brent Suter is what we're thinking of trotting out there every 5th day in the back end we wasted a bunch of money IMO. Sign a starter with the talent of a Ryu and you won't hear any more complaining about signings like Brett Anderson or Lindblom.

Brent Suter is not a starting pitcher on any baseball team that has visions of deep playoff runs, let alone World Series.

As a Brewers fan I would love for the Reds to make that trade. Suddenly that pitching staff is not so intimidating when headed by the wildly inconsistent and unreliable Sonny Gray and Trevor Bauer. Which is better than the current state of our pitching staff. lol

I don’t think there’s really a market for Cain that would bring “good” value as we see it. This is quickly becoming an absolutely horrendous signing by David Stearns. The neglect of the pitching staff offseason after offseason and trade deadline after trade deadline makes me ask *** did we even sign Lo for if we weren’t serious about competing? It reeks of a large scale “bring home the hometown guy that everybody wishes we kept” to placate the fans while business as usual continues. I am a big fan of Cain, but quickly getting frustrated watching joker after joker “patch” an inning together as the offense does its job. Can’t wait for Brent Suter and his 62mph fastball to save our season baby. Sell that hope brewers media.

Hope selling quote of all time for every mediocre sports franchise in existence right there! NEXT YEAR!!!

Sure am glad we didn’t get a starter for about the 5th time. Sooner or later if we aspire to be anything better than the Twins organization you gotta get the guy that can carry the rest of your staff. You cannot continue to throw Zach Davies out there as your default #1 starter and expect anything other than .500 or worse ball. I’m not ready to write the season off yet, but why did we even bother going after Cain if we weren’t gonna play with the big boys?

Price of waiting to extend him goes up by the day.

I don't know why its up for debate to sign Middleton anymore. Pay the man market value and move on with life...we know what he is, either fork out the 30 million on him or youre going to be paying -30 million for 3 or 4 garbage rotation players like Ersan. How is this even an issue at this point? It's a no brainer to me. And I am by no means a Middleton apologist, he has his flaws just as much as the next guy with his skill set.

This draft is incredibly important, as is this offseason as a whole. So far so good.... Sweat is increasingly unlikely to be there at 12, and I'm just not willing to give up the fantastic capital we have this year to move up unless Allen or Bosa start falling. I think what yesterday's moves have done is removed the 'need' to pick an Edge at 12, and they can go whereever they'd like. I'd be modestly surprised if 30 (if they stay there) isn't one of the TE's, but I'm increasingly convinced that they may look for value at 12 or trade down with a team looking to move up if a QB falls to there. Gute seems like the type that may go BPA with that pick.... i.e., are you better off taking the 4th Edge off the board, or the best OT/WR/CB/S if guys like Jawaan Taylor, D.K. Metcalf, Greedy Williams are there as one of them is likely to be. After what we spent yesterday on the position I sure hope that isn't the #1 priority at 12.

What a steal on Bledsoe. Also a wow that he was desperate to stay and not hit FA. Finally we've created a basketball culture.

Great game tonight. Playoff basketball is in the air.

I'm on board with either DH in both or none. Thanks for the laugh to those who stomped their feet and say they're no longer going to be fans if the NL switches though, I needed a good laugh this morning.

Sure, that's part of it. Wasn't really making a point about age though. Just pointing out that it's hard to tell when a person with a very slender frame has added too much body fat. People keep saying Khris doesn't look like he's gotten fat at all, and people say the same thing about me, but it's plainly visible if you know what to look for. I've noticed some of the most athletic people can tell right away, whereas weekend warriors and regular people can't. Maybe the fact that this is more of a baseball forum explains why people have trouble discerning the difference, because Khris's body fat and conditioning would hardly make a difference in baseball. Age, excess weight, and conditioning are all factors. Khris is very sluggish and lethargic compared to before his current contract. He's lost a lot of agility. He often gets some of it back towards the end of the season (last year's playoffs for example, or his run at the end of 2016). Combine that with the thin layer of excess fat he's carrying and it paints a clear picture of someone who uses the regular season to get in shape, as opposed to being ready to go at the start of training camp. As for "never hearing anything about", when did anyone ever hear about it with Redd, Bogut, or Jabari? Teams, players, and coaches never talk about this until after the fact. It's frankly embarrassing. Plenty of fans noticed it, but you still never heard about it from anyone but them. I hate to open your eyes, but what team in the NBA worth its salt goes all out every night? They don't play ball until February or March. Only rare exceptions for players do that.

I lovvvvve Cardiac Kemba myself. Would be perfectly happy with him.

Bucks need to let this AD saga pass. For once in our lifetimes we have a well oiled machine for a team...dont go all LeBron on it and blow it up. It's ok to look for moves but this isn't a good one. IMO

I hope we didn't offer anything of material value for AD and it was fake news. I'm not convinced he really is "as good" as advertised...seems more likely to me he is a rich mans version of Kevin Love with the Timberwolves (a giant box score). Other than one good playoff series vs a mediocre Portland team teams he's been on have done nothing.

Let the Bucks (soon) enter the Wesley Matthews and DeAndre Jordan sweepstakes after the Knicks buy them out. What a great time to be a Bucks fan.

Maybe Braun should just mail it in and sit on the pine 162 games, since he can't seem to please anyone these days.

Splash Mountain tho.

I don’t like it. That’s being said an oc job where you won’t call the plays can’t be the most attractive job avaialavle. On record once Monken went to TB, I would have at least looked at John Defillipo. Defillipo is a fraud imo....Reich was the brains behind that operation. Pretty sure he got canned because Zimmer chewed his rear out to balance the offense and then proceeded to ignore him.