tmwiese55

One thing to factor in for MKE though could be the likelihood of a DH in the NL by the last few years of Braun's deal. Timing could work out just when they need it.

I agree with several recent posts stating if you're not getting the top prospects then just hold him.

With how Lucroy is playing Stearn should absolutely be holding out for a top notch package. He doesn't need to be in any rush to trade him, now if it was next year at this time it's different. But he can just hold that over every team's head that he doesn't have to do it by this deadline. Really the same goes with Braun, if not given a clearly strong package he just doesn't have to do it any time soon. From what we can tell as fans, Stearns is doing exactly as we'd like him to be doing, definitely listening and communicating with teams but he's on the better side of the bargaining table and doesn't need to cave. This is basic negotiating, ask for way too much early on (since we're not close to this year's deadline and still both guys are under contract) and go from there.

As someone else said they seem to play hard every night and haven't been blown out too often. Which is all I was really hoping for going into the season. Be competitive but chances are you'll still lose 90+. Turns out they've won 6-7 more than they should have, can chalk it up to small sample and expect for it to be made up for (likely in this tough stretch) later in the season. So I'm not going to complain about winning, especially since a good underdog story is always good fun. But yea I'm not going to lose any sleep if they get beat down on this trip to California.

I don't see any way they chase the playoffs this year. I think they'll kind of treat it like the Twins did recently when they were somehow in the playoff race but knew it was a fluke and they had no shot at a title so didn't chase it and stayed the rebuild course. Maybe Houston should have done the same instead of the Gomez and Kazmir trades too. It would make it harder to trade Lucroy and obviously you get a lower pick in the draft, but if that lower pick is on the back of young guys doing well, that's a good thing generally for the future. I think it would just kick the Lucroy trade to the offseason instead of the deadline, but I wouldn't call it chasing the playoffs.

Take a look at what happened with Sharapova if you automatically think all these people are dirty dirty lying cheaters.

[sarcasm]Yea smart move would have been to win the appeal and the come out and admit it[/sarcasm]. Also, the thing lost in him bashing the collection guy is that the collection guy did do his job horribly.

But they really can't do real steroids anymore. They're using products that are available over the counter to every joe schmo. Read up a bit on what the recent people were busted for, Byrd specifically laid it all out there.

I remember when we played the Reds a few weeks ago they were talking about Adam Duvall's kind of breakout season for Cinncy. He came over in a trade with SF last year for Mike Leake. BA said something along the lines of how he was blocked in SF's outfield so he was expendable and I thought who they have at LF and I think they start Gregor Palanco who is bad. Then I looked at one listing of top prospects for teams and they didn't have any OFs near their top. I'm sure BA was just BSing to fill air and didn't really know but after I looked it up I thought Braun would fit and we all know Giants fans love left fielders with a PED history.

This thinking is the result of the way MLB and media handled all this. Like I said earlier, they have the most advanced and strictest testing in any sport, yet people believe everyone is cheating but can mask it. It's as if people forget that during the boom of steroid use there was literally no testing at all, that's why it went so oveboard. But now with the most advanced and strictest testing they're still able to do it, just doesn't seem logical to me. But that's what the media wants you to think so they can keep getting clicks and views every time someone gets caught.

The biggest reason HRs jumped is that the fences were drastically moved in from the early years of baseball. If I recall the old Yankee Stadium when Ruth played had a 490 ft centerfield and Fenway's center was originally 488 ft.

Team is 22-23 in games not started by Peralta (4-8 in his 12 starts). Still only 4.5 out of the WC.

Very well said. And besides the media, MLB itself has perpetuated it by going so wild west in trying to catch people. The way the whole Miami scandal was investigated was very shady. It's like MLB wanted more negative attention for themselves. Even if MLB does actually care about a clean game they need it to appear that they are doing something about it because they let things get out of control in the first place. Yes, that's for sure why they've done it and I get the logic. I just don't think it was the right move to keep this negative story around even longer. You already instilled the strictest testing, now let the attention get back to the game instead of that dominating the news.

One word: Pitching. you can have all the All-star position players but if you don't have pitching you don't have much.

Very well said. And besides the media, MLB itself has perpetuated it by going so wild west in trying to catch people. The way the whole Miami scandal was investigated was very shady. It's like MLB wanted more negative attention for themselves.

I am sure you are right. I for one couldn't care less about PED's and I personally think certain PED's should be allowed to be used. If I pay money to go to the game I would rather see a healthy Braun playing instead of Elian Herrera. I liken PED's to Tommy John surgery. Players can't take certain substances but are allowed to replace tendons from a different part of their body? That seems odd to me, but I know I am in the minority on that. I agree with this. The media blows PEDs in baseball out of proportion and now there's takes out there like this acting like it's a huge huge problem ruining the game. Are you aware baseball already has the strictest testing in all of sports, including the Olympics? There's suspensions in the NFL all the time and no one cares, NBA basically has a joke of a testing program and no testing in the playoffs. The fact that only a handful of people each year are getting caught is a actually a sign of how miniscule it is now. And if I recall the batch of suspensions a few weeks back was on account of some kind of labeling type screw up where a certain supplement they were taking was supposed to be ok but it wasn't, not out of trying to massively cheat. I won't deny the points in this thread about the glory days of steroids and how much those guys bulked up. But right now with this testing policy that simply isn't happening anymore, they're not taking massive pure testosterone steroids to tack on muscle. Many times they're taking supplements that can be bought legally over the counter and common people use with their workouts and sometimes they take the wrong one. And when they are deliberately cheating like the Braun/Arod Miami scandal they were taking such a minuscule amount that they were passing the tests and they're basically using it as a recovery than as a muscle builder to tack on mass.

Only 4.5 out of the wild card and 3 behind STL.

Agreed. And I apologize in advance, as this has become a circular debate, so I'm repeating myself. If you're a GM, do you give up a couple top prospects who may not be able to play during the pennant run and/or playoffs? Or accept the fact he's a ticking time bomb ready to miss a huge stretch of games at any given moment? It's a very real concern, and any team will have a hard time giving up a couple top prospects and committing to big salary for multiple years with his injury risk. And I do agree his salary is fair, and not a big deal for the big market teams. But it's still a big contract if he's not playing. Let me be clear. This doesn't mean a deal CAN'T get done. GMs and Owners are people, and they make emotional decisions in the heat of a pennant chase. And anyone would love to have Braun in their line-up. All I'm saying is his injuries are a real issue. As for his legacy, yes, of course he cares. But he may feel winning a WS or two would be a better legacy than playing his entire career in Milwaukee. Also, he will never be viewed as a Yount by many fans even if he does. Besides the PED thing, he just doesn't come off as a down to earth guy. He may be the nicest guy in the world, I don't know, but perception is reality for fans. He will never be Yount and he almost certainly wont be a Brewer when they develop a WS team. If he can go to a contender, that is his best bet to change the career narrative. PEDS are very much still a part of the game, as we just saw with Byrd. I would guess PEDs are less a part of baseball than any of the 3 major sports. The media just obsesses about it in baseball.

Plush nails it. Yes, of course you could trade without paying anything. The argument is simply that you can increase your return if you pay some of it. I don't see why it's a hard idea to grasp. If the extra they're willing to give us in a trade isn't worth then don't pay it, that's the whole negotiation. I agree with WTP though, I don't see the need to force a trade so I'd want an overwhelming package and if getting that package means chipping in 20mil then so be it. If it's a so-so package that you're not even sure you'd want to do it, I'd just walk away or offer to chip in money in order to get the package to be enough to do it.

Yea I'd love to find a way to get Noel from them. Seems to be the type of C i think fits well with this core. Maybe Vaughn and our #10. Anything involving Monroe/MCW would need to involve a 3rd team IMO. They won't want MCW back and Monroe is an overlap with Okafor.

If they trade him I have no problem chipping in a bit of money or taking back a year or two of bad salary if it means going from an OK package of prospects to a great package. Or essentially an upgrade from a good prospect (say a Phillips type) to a great almost can't miss type (like a Bryant or Seager). When you're payroll is under 50 mil the money doesn't matter.

They only make themselves look like fools and hurt their own team. That's punishment right there or your onw team can bench a guy like this, or when Andruw Jones was yanked mid inning one time for showboating when he was like 18. I don't see why the opposing team should need to drill him with a baseball or punch him for it. BTW-didn't Vogelsong just get his eyeball broken by a pitch to the face? Of course it wasn't on purpose, but that's the risk you run or on simple broken fingers/hands/wrists etc.

Right, he could totally pull a Segura and be terrible in the second half. But we're up to 300 ABs now, the longer it goes on the better. But let's say he ends this season around 275/345 with a bunch of SBs and the same mediocre defense he's been playing, at that point you have a pretty solid sample size. I'd be pretty comfortable with him at one of the other IF spots available next to Arcia.

Throwing around the "Y" word?! C'mon now. Villar looks like Ozzie Smith compared to Yuni B. Villar, from all accounts, is much better at 2B, 3B, LF, RF than SS, but the fact that he is playing a fairly decent SS proves his value (to me at least) as a future "Supersub"/Utility player or a starting 2B/3B who can give you a game or 2 at SS when Arcia needs a day off. Yuni B's extremely below average level of range at SS/2B is a poor comparison. He was a replacement level defensive 3B and fairly competent at 1B (though he couldn't hit well enough to be a MLB 1B) I'm not trying to beat up Villar, but the idea that he has been even adequate in the field at SS is wrong. He is near the low end of MLB SS in RZR, UZR, UZR/150 and in Fangraphs and Baseball Prospectus' total defense ratings. Hey, I hope he works his way into a piece worth playing or able to bring something back in trade, but I'm not sold on him yet. It's just way too early. If he keeps hitting like he has, then I think he becomes a nice utility piece, but his shortcomings in the field preclude him from being an everyday player/foundation piece for the team. You have to remember we'd be looking at him at 3B and 2B, not as a SS. You can use those defensive metrics all you want but eye test I'd say he looks fine as in 'not good, not awful.' And when you say it's early on his hitting stats, it's early on these defensive metrics too and historically defensive ones are the most unpredictable and fickle. Yea, it's early and I expect some regression but we'll see how the rest of the year goes. crossing my fingers.

Weeks also got hurt, multiple times. Not to sound like the Weeks defender here but if he didn't sustain the injuries he did, he was one of the best second basemen in all of baseball. Yea, hindsight what I wrote probably came down harder on Weeks than intended. Point is the same, it was exactly the deal many on here want, they just got unlucky that at the end he was untradeable