ZBTMP

Thanks Colby for the information on Smith. It seems a reasonable probability he is at least 3 win 1st basemen. While the high school left handers and Baz are probably far less certain. But WAR is only relative to a “replacement” player not who you are actually replacing. We only need (1) 1st basemen. We need 5 starting pitchers. Jaren Kendall seems to match the profile of outfielders with 2 first names. Yup that’s the best insight I can provide on that one. I had crossed Beck off as a possibility. Competition aside, I gotta believe someone is going to fall for the tools prior to us. Any reasonable below slots guys at 9 that would allow us to be more aggressive at 34 and 46?

I'm not sure but what he did for the first month of this year was not for real, it was heavily BABIP influenced. Even if you regress his BABIP to a projected .300, his stash line is an impressive .263/.378/~.500. I don't know that a 13.7% walk rate and a .250+ iso are for real, but its not all just luck. I wrote him off as a 4th outfielder at best a long time ago, but I'm leaning toward I was wrong. Still makes me think perhaps our development system was further behind than our scouting. Arnett, Cody Adams, Frederickson, Kentrail Davis, Heckathorn, Jungmann, Bradley, Coulter, Roache.... Ok maybe not.

How many homeruns do you think Smith is going to hit in his prime? Olerud topped out at 24. He was exceptional at plate discipline, walking more than striking out in his career. But in the era of big velocity, high K rates, and hyper shifting; Im not sure you can bet on any amateur to be able to duplicate that profile. Maybe he does have historic pitch recognition skills or more power potential but Im a skeptic at 9.

On Pavin Smith...Taking a defensively limited player in the top 10 who you don’t think will have a .200+ ISO is a bit of a tough sale for me. Eric Hosmer is the other comparison I’ve heard there and I think Id rather gamble on a pitcher. Maybe Im just biased by Matt Laporta’s MLB failure.

What’s Lopez’s date that 2023 becomes team control? Mid-may sometime I presume, but not sure how many days are needed to offset his September call-up in 2015. While the diminishing walk rate to start the year is a nice touch, its time to challenge him with MLB hitters whether in the rotation or bullpen.

A week ago Santana’s wRC was 130 with a BABIP at .259. I will admit that his inability to elevate the ball has been a disturbing. He had a terrible week, but he is still 24 with a 107 wRC in his 200 PAs. Aguilar had a nice spring, but I fail to see how he offers more present production or long term upside to the organization. You complain about lack of present production in one sentence, than you want Perez whose breakout year was an 89 wRC at a position that averages 106. Santana is 1.5 years younger, and has never failed to outhit Perez including so far this year.

This just isn’t true. Of the top 20 fWAR position players in 2016, only 3 were J2 signings (Altuve, Beltre, and Cano). Of the top 20 fWAR pitchers in 2016, only 2 were J2 signings (Cueto, Quintana). The best ball players in the world are still made right here in the ol’ US of A. In general, I think Brewer fans are more willing to give ownership the benefit of the doubt because they have shown willingness to spend on a competitive product. From 2007-2015, the Brewers never fielded a payroll in the bottom 10 despite being definitively the smallest market in the game. The Brewers chose to not to be restricted in the new CBA's level playing field. (They may have also miscalculated thinking they were in line for a potential high draft choice with the MLB team current position in the competitive cycle when a draft appeared to be the direction). Its too early to know if that was the right strategy.

Making decisions exclusively based off of projections is silly. Ignoring projections in decision making is incompetence. Now they may have better inputs than publicly available systems, but I guarantee you every team has some projection system they utilize in decision making. Now projection systems are just a forecast and can be wrong (hi Ramon Flores…). Despite notorious inaccuracy, Im guessing you still utilize weather forecast to plan because it is the best data we have. I agree that you still need to look up at the clouds as the day goes on. Since most of the other factors in this case are a wash between Garza and Milone (longterm upside, performance in previous season, etc.) its make logical sense to utilize projections that can take a large data set of historical equivalents. That being said, I also cited advanced stats of xFIP and SIERA showing that Milone hasn’t pitched terribly just unlucky by random events so far. I still don’t like Milone and haven’t since Maas reported the Brewers were dining him, but Milone now has a 12:1 K:BB ratio with 2 starts being against the best team in the world. Anyway you look at it that is encouraging The best argument I’ve heard for Garza over Milone is Milone makes people uncomfortable. I don’t know what about Garza being 2 years removed from competing with Lohse for the league ERA title and another year further on the downside of his career with troubling drops in secondary metrics instills comfort. We shall see what the Stearn & co decide to do, but they’ve made decisions in past showing they have some affinity toward Milone. I haven’t seen that for Garza.

Truer words never spoken. I the meantime, how about a CF platoon of Phillips and Perez and Broxton back to AAA and Kirk to oblivion? It doesn’t seem wise to replace the guy who is striking out 45% of the time vs. MLB pitching with the guy who is striking out 40% of the time vs AAA pitching yet..... those 13 at bats aside.

There is something weird about Garza going out for multiple rehab starts a week removed from a full spring training. Milone’s SEIRA is 4.14. His xFIP is 3.93. His PECOTA and ZIPs projections are over ½ run better than Garza. I know he sucks but I see zero evidence that Garza will be better. There is a possibility Garza outpitches him going forward, but I don’t think it is likely. Im just arguing the Brewers should play probability and that means Milone between the 2. We will have more data tomorrow night that may change my opinion.

If given the choice between Milone and Garza, If Milone pitches decently tomorrow against the Cubs, the Brewers should stick with Milone. While my preference is still Wilkerson or Barbosa (I guess they want him as a pen option) or even Espino and Suter, but between the 2, every projection has Milone as the better pitcher. Zips: Garza 5.04 ERA 4.75 FIP / Milone 4.79 ERA 4.6 FIP Steamer: Garza 4.90 ERA 4.72 FIP / Milone 4.29 ERA 4.25 FIP Pecota: Garza 4.80 ERA / Milone 4.19 ERA Milone has at least not walked hitters so far. I’ve seen nothing out of Garza that indicates he has anything left in the tank. Let him pitch out of the bullpen if you want the depth. But that also bring up who are they sending down. Despite his unimpressive start, I have far more faith in Marinez being a contributor this season than Garza.

Fine, regressed or stagnated. The point is the Brewers player development instructors cannot really point to them and say they are doing their jobs. Sure we have plenty of room for improvement on the scouting side this decade, but the Brewers need to be striving to have the best development system in baseball and based on the evidence I have seen, the output isn’t close to that.

Brinson , Isan Diaz didn't regress Brinson's K:BB ratios is 9:1 since he joined the Brewers organization. Thats not exactly progression. Its great that he's teed off in Colorado Springs but he needs some refinement to succeed at the MLB level that we have yet to see. Diaz was coming off the best OPS as a teenager in the pioneer league in nearly a decade (Billy Butler). Striking out a quarter of his at bats in A ball is troubling. Certainly he has enough positives to outweigh contact concerns at this point, but its not like those blossomed under the Brewers watch.

It’s early, but Dubon without an extra base hit is incredibly disappointing. It seems like every hitter we acquire right now, they immediately regress. Outside of Arcia’s great 2015, hard to find a success story where a hitter broke out since Khris Davis in our development system (C’mon Gatewood!). I know that developing baseball players is volatile, but at some point doesn’t there need to some indications that we are doing this right?

The sample sizes are far from meaningful, but the Domingo breakout watch should be on high alert. Santana is missing less and swinging less at pitches outside the zone so far this season. I have confidence that Santana will not maintain a 0.154 BABIP all season.

24 year old LH reliever Paul Fry was DFA by the Mariners. The last 3 seasons he has ran the following strikeout rates against LH batters: A+:40% AA: 51% AAA:32.3% He has allowed 1 home run the last 2 seasons. The downside is he allows too many free passes and a suspiciously high BABIP at every level. With the current lack of lefty bullpen options, and none that can generate strikeouts, might be worth a claim.

Apparently, we now have a full time Asian scout in former #1 overall pick Byran Bullington so at least we can now have a scouting presence at his games!

With the new CBA the Brewers will have a larger bonus pool than large market teams (except for Arizona who despite a 9 figure annual TV contract and the 13th largest media market are eligible for the same competitive balance compensation as us ) so theoretically they can offer a larger bonus. I doubt international free agents care too much about a geographic location as they do $ and relationship with them and their trainer. With 11 teams restricted and a larger bonus pool, the hope is the Brewers have a nice haul this signing period. If they don't, you should be disappointed. There is no guarantee Luis Robert will be declared a free agent before the next international signing period, but the 7 figure OF talents that the Brewers are already linked to in the next period may be a better use of resources anyway.

The new CBA's bonus pool caps are hard so it is no longer an option.

Not even disagreeing with your original point that there is handful of higher revenue teams dominate the success with international amateurs, just answering the original questions. However, Vlad Jr. is the composite #38 prospect in baseball which fangraphs has put a value of 38 million on; Lara, Pierre, and Mallen aren't in the same discussion.

I’m just going to drop these here in an effort to shameless plug my preferred option to avoid more Milone at this point…. Carry on.

I have defended the Brewers in the past assuming their decision to stay within bonus pools was at least recently influenced by not being restricted when the playing fields leveled in the latest CBA. We shall see if it pays dividends. If the Brewers don't have a decent haul close to their allotment this season, I will be disappointed. Scouting 14 year olds is hard though. And factor in some nefarious trainers in the mix, it gets even more challenging. We shall see what happens with the 6 figure guys they have signed the last couple classes. If I have a criticism at this point; knowing the volatility associated, I wish the Brewers would target pitching more. It seems like every player they are associated with is a position player Off the top of my head Robert Osuna, Vlad Jr. have worked out pretty well so far for the Blue Jays Bruce Rondon, Jose Iglesias maybe; ok the Tigers havent had much success Obviously Sano and Max Kepler seemed to work out ok for Minnesota. Seattle got its franchise player in King Felix. Freddy Peralta is probably a better prospect than anything we've signed since Arcia. Arcia and Wily Peralta (and Miguel Diaz, maybe ) is still something.

I know when the Brewers signed Aoki, it was negotiated for his team control to be less than 6 years. Can someone explain to me what, if any, restrictions exist in this regard? I'm guessing if possible, some team will offer him a 1-year deal that will allow him to hit the open market after a season if possible... Even with a 20 millions posting fee, seems like that would even have surplus value at this point. I'd suspect that the Brewers already have a couple of 7 figure commitments to the players mentioned in the international thread that would limit their bonus pool.

Remember when we gave Mark Reynolds 430 PAs and he hit .196. and an OPS below .700? Ugh

It turns out it was a competition and that Jungmann won. And a more proven option (Jared Hughes with a career sub 3 ERA) became available. Nothing dishonest at all. Had they told Stephen Kohlscheen he was in a competition, that would have been dishonest, but he made it to the final cut. He was competing for a spot.