Greenleaf1

3 straight heaters on the black, hard to fault Yelich on that one.

Ryan Braun 2018: .200/.237/.400, .205 BABIP, 5.1 BB%, 23.7 K%, 19/50/31% Soft/Medium/Hard Contact Domingo Santana 2018: .246/.319/.262, .356 BABIP, 8.3 BB%, 27.8 K%, 13.3/55.6/31.1% Soft/Medium/Hard Contact Braun's career BABIP is .330 (last year .292). Domingo's is .354 (last year .363). I can see getting upset about Santana. He seems to be hitting it on the ground a lot more this year, which would explain the near disappearance of extra base power even if he's still hitting the ball decently hard still (his soft contact rate is actually below his career rate). Braun seems to be suffering from some bad luck, but his power stroke still seems intact so if he can stay healthy I'm not too worried about his numbers going back up.

If you check out his BABIP and contact rate stats so far this year, you'll find that despite his (now higher than) 150 wRC+ this year he's actually been pretty unlucky. I think Thames' success in April might be evidence that, when healthy and not worn down by the long season, he can rake. Just a question of can he stay healthy for a full season. If he can, he'll probably have the highest OPS on the team.

Reds fans must get mad when we complain about how Billy Hamilton hits too many home runs against us.

Cain's metrics are being brought down by his defense in the early going but I'm guessing that'll get ironed out throughout the year. I think his wRC+ so far this year is like 110 which is pretty close to what you'd expect from him. He hasn't wowed me thus far other than that first series, but I feel like he'll hold up his part of a healthy lineup. Not sure he was ever the guy you wanted a team to rely on offensively though.

Arcia looks like he can't keep the back foot on the ground because the bat is too heavy for his tiny arms. I think he's trying to shift his body to send balls to right field. I'm not mechanics expert, far from it, but it doesn't seem to be working.

Geez, one play and I already have to say something negative about Yelich. Cain probably makes that catch look easy.

It's really ironic looking back on all the times that Tulo was compared to Braun, and people put down Tulo because he couldn't stay healthy.

Since I'm clearly bored enough to be writing all this out, I might as well do a way too early prediction of what our 40-man roster looks like going into the Rule 5 Draft this fall (I'll say I think the roster will be full, I don't see us drafting anyone): PITCHERS 1. JIMMY NELSON 2. CHASE ANDERSON 3. ZACH DAVIES 4. BRANDON WOODRUFF 5. JUNIOR GUERRA 6. CORBIN BURNES 7. FREDDY PERALTA 8. COREY KNEBEL 9. JOSH HADER 10. MATT ALBERS 11. JACOB BARNES 12. JEREMY JEFFRESS 13. DAN JENNINGS 14. TAYLOR WILLIAMS 15. ADRIAN HOUSER 16. JORGE LOPEZ 17. BRENT SUTER 18. JHOULYS CHACIN CATCHERS 19. MANNY PINA 20. JACOB NOTTINGHAM 21. CHRISTIAN BETHANCOURT INFIELD 22. ERIC THAMES 23. JESUS AGUILAR 24. JONATHAN VILLAR 25. MAURICIO DUBON 26. ORLANDO ARCIA 27. TRAVIS SHAW 28. HERNAN PEREZ OUTFIELD 29. CHRISTIAN YELICH 30. RYAN BRAUN 31. LORENZO CAIN 32. DOMINGO SANTANA 33. KEON BROXTON 34. BRETT PHILLIPS ADDED JUST BEFORE DRAFT 35. LUIS ORTIZ 36. CODY PONCE 37. KODI MEDEIROS 38. TROY STOKES JR 39. JAKE GATEWOOD 40. TREY SUPAK There's probably still a fair amount of wiggle room here (Hard to believe all 6 of those outfielders are still here on August 1st, for example, but it's hard to believe they're all here now too so who knows), but this would at least be a roster that allows me to protect all the players I had above the line right now. Obviously there's a LOT of baseball left to play this year, and some of these things just work themselves out on their own. Luckily, Stearns has time to figure this out.

Last bit of thinking on this topic for now: Which players not listed in my first post might play their way onto the roster yet this season, creating further 40-man congestion? Corbin Burnes seems like a near lock for a roster spot by midseason, but a lot of our upper minors guys with much shot to help the Brewers this year are already on the 40-man roster. Christian Bethancourt is a possibility. Once Pina/Vogt are back, Bandy will probably be DFA'd and Nottingham sent back down. If a major injury were to happen to Pina or Vogt and Nottingham is struggling, Bethancourt could get a shot to see if he can stick. As I said before, I think Bubba Derby gets a shot in September (or earlier if a need arises), and despite his success as a starter at CS, I think his only shot to help the big league team is in the bullpen. He could be serviceable in the Drake role of eating up innings in lost games, and maybe pitch his way into higher leverage situations. I thought Tristan Archer had a shot last year but was a little surprised he didn't spend any time in big league camp this spring (at least not that I noticed), so maybe they aren't that high on him.

In looking at the current 40-man roster, these are the players that will be FAs at the end of 2018: - Eric Sogard - Boone Logan ($625K buyout on option) There are a lot of current players who could end up getting DFA'd before becoming free agents but I'll leave those alone for now. We'll see how Logan does this year but Jennings has another year and looks pretty good so far so we'll see how that impacts Logan. Other guys that could be easily DFA'd to make room: - RHP Alec Asher - RHP Oliver Drake - RHP Aaron Wilkerson - C Jett Bandy - 1B Ji-Man Choi or Jesus Aguilar (can't imagine they're both on the 40-man to start 2019) - UTIL Hernan Perez (would be strange to see him make it another year) - OF Keon Broxton (he'll either be forced out with no options next year or someone else will be traded to make room for him. Either way, there should be a space open) Even conservatively here, that leaves 8 or 9 spots open next year to play around with. So even though we have a lot of names to protect this offseason, maybe it won't be as hard as I might've thought to find the room for them.

The list and the line where I stopped adding players are pretty dependent on past performance, but there are a couple guys this year that have made an early impact that could make these decisions a lot harder. Kodi Medeiros got a LOT of praise this Spring and seems like he may have finally taken a step forward with his command. If that's the case, he will definitely need to be protected (if we protected Diplan at a lower level and he hadn't made improvements yet to his command, then Medeiros seems like a lock). Gilbert Lara seems to have made some real improvements to his approach thus far too, and seems to be walking more and driving the ball a LOT more early on this season. If he can sustain these improvements and maybe show enough promise to move up to High A this summer and not look completely lost, then it's going to be a tough decision to figure out what to do with him. Nathan Kirby needs to have a year like Williams had last year: stay healthy, work up your pitch count, look even somewhat like your former self, and they'll probably have to find a way to protect him. Derby seems like one of those guys that if he's going to be protected, he'll be added to the 40-man in September and they'll see what he's got this season (like Wilkerson last year). If he can show some promise, then maybe he gets to keep that spot through the offseason, but I guess I don't see him getting a spot if he doesn't get called up in 2018. Perrin/Pennington/Bickford are just giant question marks for me since none of them have played yet this season. I guess it'd be a bit surprising if none of these 3 needed to be protected, as I would be surprised if all 3 had disappointing seasons, but we'll have to wait and see. I'll give the edge to Perrin since he's already had success at AA.

Likely trade candidates: Obviously, we have a glut of outfielders at the moment. That's not likely to last through to next year with Broxton running out of options and Perez likely getting the squeeze put on him, but that still leaves us with Braun/Yelich/Cain/Santana/Phillips through at least 2021 (minus Braun if we don't pick up his option). That would seemingly leave Stokes on the outside looking in, particularly if Corey Ray's sudden resurgence holds for the rest of the year. Either one of them might look like a good trade piece this summer if they keep raking like they both have been. Gatewood also seems like a potential trade piece due to our pretty solid 1B depth right now, plus Shaw will be at 3rd for a good while yet and Erceg could be ready by next year already too. He's not off to a great start but he probably still has good value in a trade to pick up a solid bench bat or reliever. I'd be surprised if guys still at high or low A that need to be roster protected have much trade value unless they're studs, so I'd be surprised if we were going to move any of those guys. None of the pitchers seem particularly off limits in trade discussions but I'd be surprised to see us trade Ortiz unless it's in a package for a stud ace-type pitcher. Medeiros is getting glowing reviews this spring and his numbers look pretty good to start the year. Ponce seems like he's kinda settling into that potential back of rotation type arm role. There should be some good variety to dangle at the trade deadline to pick up a few pieces if we need to, which would help alleviate the logjam on our 40-man roster moving forward.

Edited my list to add in Herrera since you said he's eligible.

This is going to be an ongoing issue for the Brewers over the next several years. Stearns is going to have to be very smart in how he manages the 40-man roster, making sure there's enough space to protect as many prospects as possible but not loading it up so much with younger guys that we don't have the proper Major League depth. It didn't end up being so hard last year, but here's a list of first time eligible prospects of note who would have to be placed on the 40-man roster this fall or would be eligible for the Rule 5 Draft (Essentially players who were signed/drafted in 2015 if over 18 and 2014 if 18 and under): I did an initial ranking in terms of who I think is most important to protect, and a line where I would cut off who to protect. 1. RHP Luis Ortiz (AA) 2. RHP Cody Ponce (AA) 3. LHP Kodi Medeiros (AA) 4. OF Troy Stokes Jr. (AA) 5. 1B/3B/OF Jake Gatewood (AA) 6. RHP Trey Supak (A+) ---------------------------------------------- 7. LHP Nathan Kirby (A+) 8. RHP Bubba Derby (AAA) 9. RHP Carlos Herrera (A) 10. SS/3B Gilbert Lara (A) 11. RHP Jon Perrin (?) 12. RHP Josh Pennington (?) 13. RHP Phil Bickford (?) 14. RHP Nate Griep (AA) 15. LHP Quintin Torres-Costa (AA) 16. RHP Conor Harber (A+) As you can see, it's a very long list. Some of this is going to work itself out this year, but I don't see a case where they don't want to protect the top 6 on that list (unless they get traded). I have a few other sub-topics to this I want to discuss: 1. Who off this list is likely to be floated at the trade deadline? 2. Which players could play themselves on/off the protected list with a good/bad year? 3. What is the current state of the 40-man roster, and how many spots are there that could be easily vacated? 4. How many players not yet eligible by the end of the season will still most likely take up a spot by the end of the season (think Corbin Burnes). I'll split those thoughts up into separate posts though.

Thames has a 140 wRC+, and .192 BABIP. Dude's been tearing the cover off the ball, getting crazy unlucky, and still 40% better than your average hitter. His walk rate is a little down from last year but still 11.8% which is pretty high. He's also 2-for-6 with 2 BBs and only 1 K against lefties so far this year. Can't wait to him demolish the Reds the next two games. If Thames stays healthy, I think he's going to have a monster season.

For those hoping that we'll finally be at peace as soon as we cut Drake, I have bad news. Alec Asher is a former Oriole righty with reverse splits and generally crappy numbers..... http://www.thinkbluela.com/2018/04/dodgers-claim-rhp-alec-asher-from-orioles/

Looks like several of us were right about that open spot on the 40-man. Brewers claimed Alec Asher and optioned him to AAA. https://www.baseball-reference.com/players/a/asheral01.shtml

The problem is neither Bandy nor Vogt have options remaining, and I doubt they are going to carry three catchers on the 25-man roster. Well in my case they would just cut Bandy and then probably Vogt too if Nottingham was doing well. For this to be true, he'd have to make quite the impression though.

I actually think there's a nonzero chance they cut Bandy once Pina is back. They already have Vogt on the 40-man and Bethancourt probably would be about the same as Bandy but with the added hype of maybe having figured something out this year (although that's heavily dependent on how much you trust spring training stats and Colorado Springs stats thus far). If Nottingham looks halfway decent, maybe give him a chance to play and potentially even steal time away from Pina if he continues to struggle. The only downside of this really is if Nottingham could still use some seasoning time in AAA (which, based on what I've read, seems like the case), he'd be better off getting regular playing time in the minors. Stearns/Counsell seem to take the safe route with prospects which so far has been a bit frustrating (see Lewis Brinson last year, Brandon Woodruff this year), so I'd be a little surprised if they cut Bandy, but barring some serious injuries to multiple players, I don't see Bandy making it to October on the Brewers 40-man roster, and might be best to play the hot hand and see what Nottingham can give you especially with the struggling offense.

No official at bats for Nottingham but 2 nice walks including a nice one off of Raisel Iglesias in which he fouled off a couple tough pitches before finally taking the walk. Hope he starts tomorrow or Wednesday.

I can't think of a good reason why they shouldn't start Nottingham tomorrow. Two pretty nice plate appearances for the kid.

Not sure if you guys have discussed this in here, but with the losses of Tyler Webb and JJ Hoover, our bullpen backup options on the 40-man are kinda thin. Adrian Houser, who I don't believe is even eligible to be recalled yet, is really the only logical guy who could be called up to the bullpen right now if we needed someone. With Logan/Knebel on the DL, Wilkerson injured, and Diplan looking awful in his 3rd go around at A+, Freddy Peralta might actually be the only guy to call on if we needed somebody right away. This is probably easy enough to fix: Move Suter to the bullpen if we needed to make a move and call up Woodruff. There's also a 40-man spot open that doesn't seem like it would be needed for anybody else right now, so maybe you could look down to Nick Ramirez or QTC at AA if you were feeling creative. Luckily I don't think we really need any fresh arms at this point, but just something worth monitoring if we have a couple short starts in a row this week.

He's pitched like 14 innings in the Majors.....seriously what the hell do you want? Pitchers that get outs. It’s not much to ask for. He’s walked three and struck out none in his two innings. Honestly not sure if you're trolling but I guess I'll bite. You have to give new guys more than, like, ZERO time to adjust to the big leagues.

He's pitched like 14 innings in the Majors.....seriously what the hell do you want?