superfly

It would be a typical backloaded or deferred salary contract similar to the one Ramirez signed. If he is willing to play the first year for say $9M then it wouldmake the remaining a 3 yr/$51-56M deal ($17M-18.6M AAV). That adds up to 4years/60-65mil roughly. not 4/80mil as being suggested at 20mil a year. Wheres the other 15mil? Deferred? How many deferrals does Mark A. have to start adding up? As for Shields. Theres a part of me that thinks a Papelbon trade is the kind of move that maybe is designed to make the Cards or Cubs flinch to combat the insurance the Brewers gain at the backend of their Bullpen and sign Shields. Hopefully to a 5yr 110mil deal with loss of draft pick by either of those teams. Ive read of the Cards kicking the tires on upgrading and adding a strong Starter to the Rotation. A Papelbon move to me, might make them commit to doing it. Good long Term for Milw if you ask me. Yes, because the Brewers ALWAYS pose a major threat to the Cardinals. My memory says we get pasted by them in the crunch every single time.

Again, where are you getting the 5ERA from other than from where the sun doesn't shine? He hasn't even had an ERA of 4 in his 10 years in the league, and an ERA over 3 one time. Could it happen? Sure...but there's tons of relievers who are fine into their mid 30's.

I'd like to see Bray Wyatt win the Rumble and then proceed to torment Lesnar all the way to Wrestlemania. He's the closest thing the WWE has to a potential star IMO, and putting him over Lesnar could be a good thing. Sting or the Undertaker would be cool, but there's no lasting impact there, neither is the Rock, Mysterio, or Orton. WWE is really hurting for fresh blood and they better hurry up and find it because once Cena, Orton, etc retire they have literally nothing.

I'm sure you'll have nothing to say if he turns into Hoffman 2.0. Relievers by the very nature of the few innings they pitch just aren't valuable enough to be worth "closer" money. He's a very good pitcher and shouldn't implode at 34 years old but he's also a douche, and I realize that there are people who don't give a damn what a kind of dude a player is (KRod for example) as long as he performs for the team they root for. I'm not one of those types of people, I won't root against a player, but I'm certainly not going to go out and buy his merchandise either. For me this all comes down to the money and what it costs to get him, but I can definitely see where posters who aren't in favor of this are coming from. Spending money just because they can within the budget doesn't make sense from my point of view, and never has. I'd rather spend money on more potential WAR than what even the best relievers will bring in a year. Hoffman was 40 years old when the Brewers acquired him. I don't know if that is a very fair comparison. Eric Gagne might be a little more fair, but once he hurt himself back in 05-06 he was never the same pitcher again. The Brewers saw a decent season in 07 with the Rangers and took the gamble that Gagne was healed & would be back to the same old pitcher...it didn't work out. Papelbon is 34 and has had no real injury history. Doesn't mean it can't happen but he has proven to be very durable.

Where do people get this belief that Papelbon is a gas can? Apparently too much ESPN coverage from when he was with the Red Sox ??? Papelbon has had 1 season in his career where his ERA was over 2.94(2010) and one season over a 1.27 WHIP(2005). His WAR last season was almost THREE on a horrifying Phillies squad, double our current closer KRod. Lifetime ERA 1.0 and WHIP 0.81 in the playoffs. He doesn't give up home runs, and very rarely walks a batter. The guy is tough as nails and a FIERCE competitor. I heard people around here constantly last season saying we aren't tough, and our closer was sketchy. The numbers don't lie, Paps is one of the best in the game, and has been for almost his entire 10 seasons in the bigs. Everybody around here wants Melvin to do something, but then when he does do something everybody freaks out and says he's stupid. "Lind is garbage." "Why are we trading Gallardo?" (some of us) "Papelbon sucks." Doug has two choices if we're going to contend for the playoffs folks, either he pays for Shields (AGAIN, everybody complains and moans about that), or he rolls with what we have in Lohse, Peralta, Garza, Nelson, Fiers, and stocks up on the bullpen so teams aren't scoring late inning runs on us. If Attanasio wants to spend the freakin 9 million of his own dollars on Papelbon, we should want it too! It's not like we aren't going to have ample salary next season to buy players. Broxton is off the books and we will be likely "set" at closer for 2016 already heading into the offseason with Papelbon. Check one thing off our needs list. Complain complain complain...man it must be January around here, talk about the doldrums.

We could always take on Ryan Howard too if people are worried about a couple extra million on Papelbon's salary... LOL

The Giants had an awful bullpen during the regular season last year. Came around for the playoffs a little bit. I'd also argue the Tigers are why we shouldn't make this trade. The Tigers have been stockpiling overpriced guys with "closer experience" (as if that actually means anything) that have all exploded in front of their very eyes. Valverde, Coke (used incorrectly when he struggled), Soria, Nathan, etc. EDIT: I shouldn't say "awful" on the Giants. Depends what you're going by. Fangraphs thinks they weren't good via WAR but strictly by ERA and such they were pretty good. Their FIP was also good so maybe I was wrong on that one. http://www.fangraphs.com/leaders.aspx?pos=all&stats=rel&lg=all&qual=0&type=8&season=2014&month=0&season1=2014&ind=0&team=0,ts&rost=0&age=0&filter=&players=0 The difference is the Giants have a guy by the name of Madison Bumgarner who doesn't even need a bullpen.

Don't forget 30 somethings Randy Wolf and Brayden Looper !!!!

Davis should be playing every single day except rest days at this point. He is the future in the outfield & we need to figure out if he is going to end up a platoon player or a competent starter. Parra also hit alot of leadoff in Arizona I believe, so I conceivably see him hitting leadoff vs RHP for us some.

I still miss Cory Provus, he was the man. Luckily I still get to listen to him over here in Twins land though should I choose to tune into the dumpsterfire.

Who knows if he has anything left, but I'm happy with the signing...he was a TON of fun to watch while he was pitching well. Hopefully he can put it together and be a good LOOGY / left handed pen arm for us this year.

Assuming Beachy has a clean bill of health, what is the downside to trying him out on the cheap by offering him a chance to win a starting spot out of ST? Sure he's oft injured, but he's flashed good stuff when he is healthy, and if he can't win the job no harm done...Fiers will be fine.

Yes please sir, and thank you very much.

At the moment I wouldn't, unless we are trading for Zimmermann. Lohse leaves a clear void and pretty much states we're rebuilding. At that point we might as well deal Gomez or Lucroy too. Could be wrong but I don't think Ramirez has any value at this point of the offseason, he's more of a trade deadline piece.

On the Market - Craig Kimbrell(ATL) and Jonathan Papelbon(PHI) Free Agents - Francisco Rodriguez(MIL), Casey Janssen(TOR), Rafael Soriano(WSH), Matt Albers(HOU), Ronald Belisario(CHW) Those are a few i see right now.

So in other words Shields will be signed in the next 24 hours. DM is very hard to read, so there's just as good a chance he's misleading as there is he's telling the truth.

Melvin sucks at trading...surely you are wrong on your assessment.

Ya I'm going to have to disagree with that bolded portion. #1) CC Sabathia for LaPorta (zero), Rob Bryson (zero), Zach Jackson (total zero), and Brantley (Good player) --> Trade nets Brewers first postseason berth in 26 years #2) Shaun Marcum for Brett Lawrie, who is still unproven. --> Marcum was serviceable (~3.6ERA 1.15WHIP) until injuries did him in. #3) Zack Greinke for Alcides Escobar (meh), Lorenzo Cain (league average OF), Odorizzi (jury still out), and Jeremy Jeffress, who is now back on the team --> Greinke again led the Brewers to the postseason, not far from a World Series #4) Zack Greinke traded for Jean Segura, Hellweg(unproven), Pena(bullpen piece?) --> Jury out on Segura, but we got a young controllable talent who has flashed big upside, and two boom/bust prospects. I'm sure I am missing something, but what would you be disagreeing with?

This ^ will piss me off to no end if he is in the deal or the centerpiece. Basically we're giving away our homegrown "ace" at the age of 28 for a piece of semi-hot garbage who is only 2 years younger? I understand the return may not be great, but i'd rather keep Gallardo and even sign him again next year than get a guy like Tepesch. Thankfully Melvin has a history of getting great deals in trades so hopefully that isn't the case.

Cubbies probably want the end game to be this :: C - Montero / Castillo (platoon) 1B - Rizzo 2B - Baez SS - Castro 3B - Bryant LF - Denorfia/Coghlan (platoon) CF - Fowler RF - Soler

What's bugging me is not knowing what we are getting for Gallardo. I'm not even mad about the Packers...it's just the same thing that happens every year. McCarthy chokes in the clutch. He's living off the legacy of Favre and Rodgers and it's pathetic to watch.

Sherman's busy again today...reporting Dexter Fowler has been traded to the northsiders. Interested to see who they gave up, as this helps their CF situation a fair amount.

Despite his TJ surgery, I kind of hope Martin Perez is part of our prize...well see. would be a nice return if it was.

I hope not.

Kinda laugh at the Ranger fans saying we need to eat salary. If we have to eat salary I see no point in trading Yo...he's our longtime "prized" pitcher and its not even a terrible salary. Melvin usually makes out like a bandit in trades so I think he will probably do well here too.