TJseven7

It's great to have a number of guys who look starter capable. Yes, that's worth more, that's great for a team blah blah blah. However, what is BEST for this team? What has this team hung their hat on? The pen. Woodruff Anderson Peralta Lindblom Houser. Burnes and Lauer in AAA. Supak File Small (expect him to move fast this year) seem like the next 3 we can expect to graduate into the rotation. So Anderson ticks off next year and you got possibly 4-5 guys for that spot. GREAT! Who has the most potential, and who the heck is in the pen. It's like an NFL team going... well when it comes to OL tackles are the most valuable spot. Lets get 9 of them. Who plays G and C? Oh.... good question. Lindblom doesn't look like a pen plus guy. Lauer doesn't look like a pen plus guy. Burnes might have the most potential after Woodruff and Peralta. Maybe more than Peralta. So why the heck does Houser fit in the rotation? He looks like a pen plus guy. His upside isn't on the same level as Burnes Peralta Small. We need a bullpen. MKE has never been about the starting rotation. They've had a good group of inning eaters 1-5 and then they end the game. MKE has a ton of options, yet the guy who makes the most sense to bump into the pen is clearly in the starting mix? Burnes in AAA makes sense to me. Lauer out of the rotation seems moronic. Especially since he's displaced by a guy who is his equal at starter, who could be a big boost to the pen. Hader and nope (hope for Knebel) Suter Phelps and no 3rd piece Claudio Black(?) and what? Teams 1 short at every level until Knebel is back and Rasmussen and Small are in the pen down the stretch. All to push Lauer into the minors so we can give Houser a shot at being redundant? Just seems like a lot of developmental value chasing for a team who is trying to win.

https://www.brewcrewball.com/2020/1/11/21058985/milwaukee-brewers-orlando-arcia-statcast-defense-infield-outs-above-average Good article, and how volatile is this new computation? 1 12 -4 sure point towards some swings comparable to pitch framing. We are assigning blame % in this right? Raw numbers making that accurate is insanely tricky. People making that accurate is hard to avoid bias.

I'm holding out hope for Woodruff Anderson Peralta Lindblom Lauer AAA waiting turn 5 Burnes in AAA waiting for someone to drop. I think starting the year as a starter in MLB is just too soon. Houser in the pen, with a few surprising names in the place of guys who also have options. There's also the split contract type deal Lindblom got and the small sample size early look puts him towards the rear. I'm not certain they'd do it, but he could get a Chase Anderson start to the season.

I honestly think his defensive fall off is a perception creation. Fgraphs has him pretty level across his years. Your defense looks worse when you can't hit a lick. Every defensive error is magnified because that's the only positive you have to offer. Well it wasn't just the fans. Counsell himself was very critical of Arcia's defense last year and said it wasn't at an acceptable level. It was the big reason he got benched for Saladino at one point. So I don't think it's solely a misconception or anything. Again, there are no strong metrics to back this up. Maybe they have a whole new level of fancy numbers that no one online computes and that tells a different story, but the numbers we have say its perception.

1. Ethan Small LHP 2. Brice Turang SS 3. Tristen Lutz RF 4. Aaron Ashby LHP 5. Drew Rasmussen RHRP 6. Mario Feliciano C 7. Hedbert Perez OF (the hottest name in all of baseball it seems) 8. Eduardo Garcia SS 9. Luis Medina OF 10. Dylan File RHP 11. Antoine Kelly LHRP 12. Thomas Dillard 1B 13. Max Lazar RHP 14. Trey Supak RHP 15. Carlos Rodriguez CF 16. Bowden Francis RHP 17. Nick Bennett LHP 18. Payton Henry C 19. Corey Ray OF 20. Felix Valerio 2B 21. Jesus Parra 3B 22. Micah Bello OF 23. Alec Bettinger RHP 24. Justin Jarvis RHP 25. Cooper Hummel LF (you are welcome Clancy) HM. Noah Zavolas RHP HM. Je'Von Ward OF (I think 2021 is his year) HM. Caden Lemons RHP (Get Healthy) HM. Joe Gray OF HM. Gabe Holt 2B (only if he can return to 2B) Shout out to Luke Barker RHRP. Win a BP spot!!! (I just like him) If you haven't noticed I like age appropriate athletes who haven't hit a wall in their development yet. I do not think relievers are top 25 worthy unless I see them being special. I believe most MLB relievers are MiLB starters who faltered on their path to develop a starters pitch mix. IE: Bettinger and Francis are more likely to be relievers at the MLB level than Andrews Devin Wahl etc. All in all I really like the MKE farm system even if it's not regarded well by the pundits. There's a lot of lottery ticket type position players and advanced quality arms in this system. You don't need to hit them all, you need to hit a few real well. The athletes they have piled up in the OF is quite absurd. PS: Tell me if I missed something obvious.

I see the tea leaves there. It's better to stretch the starters out in side sessions and simulated games then in ST. They only have enough games to stretch out so many guys in live action. It would seem strange though. He bombed at AA starting and wasn't good in A+ starting. Then seemed useful out of the pen. Soon to be 25, I don't know. Maybe he's simply outside consideration for the MLB pen at this point. That long list doesn't seem to include anyone who is a STARTER other than Brown who might be on thin ice. I mean personally I have more faith in Bickford than Webb pitching in MKE this year. Hintzen was drafted pretty high and as a reliever. Could be a number of things. With Small being 23 and seeing ZERO challenge at RK and A, while being age advanced and a mature developed pitcher in general, I'd be real tempted to throw him into some deep water and see how it goes in AA. He's older than Ashby and he's pitched only 21 innings. Skipping a level is not usual, but he's basically a 23 year old MiLB entering his 1st year. That's not usual either. He's certainly embarrassed the levels he was at last year. 63 outs, 36 of them K'd. I mean a 57% K rate. He's not in MKE by 24 unless they get aggressive pretty soon. Peralta 22 Burnes 23 Woodruff 24. Heck Houser was 22 and Hader was 23. They don't screw around with these arms. They get them to the majors pretty quick. AA AAA with a late season cup of coffee? It really isn't out of the question if they start aggressive. It sounds REAL dumb, but if Peralta and Houser are in the rotation I HATE our pen. Rasmussen Small for the playoffs? It's not insane.

This reminds me of my friend who was pitching into college and walked away because he listed off 5 joints he needed to get fixed if he was going to keep playing. He was a junk baller and still, messed up massively.

I honestly think his defensive fall off is a perception creation. Fgraphs has him pretty level across his years. Your defense looks worse when you can't hit a lick. Every defensive error is magnified because that's the only positive you have to offer.

You think Houser would (or would you want to) want to be bought out until he's 32? Burnes is owned through 29 so it makes sense to add 1 more. Peralta doesn't hit 31 on this deal. I think 30's a pretty serious number for most pitchers. We already control Houser through 30. Burnes through 29 and he's done less than Peralta to this point. Woodruff is already owned though 31, so you'd only be trying to avoid arby. I don't think the MKE risk management collective would have pulled the trigger on this if Peralta wasn't so young.

Honestly, I really hope not. I don't like Lauer out of the pen as much as I like him in the rotation. Pushing him out for Peralta to me says Lauer is in AAA to start the year. Also taking Peralta out of the pen makes it considerably weaker. I expected him to step up in the pen this year and be a 2 IP 3.5 ERA type guy. I'm not sure I feel the same about Lauer in the pen despite the look of his FB (playing up), cutter, curve trio of pitches. Hader Suter is great. Phelps Claudio Black looks like a bunch of barely getting by. Knebel isn't ready and they still need 3 more arms to fill the pen. I still want either Peralta or Houser in the pen. If they aren't in the pen. What are we doing? You put Burnes in as a starter and Lindblom and Lauer go to the pen cuz Anderson isn't headed to the pen, right? What makes that pen make any sesne? Rasmussen immediately? You might go Burnes in the pen is great. BURNES is a starter who has succeeded out of the pen. He needs to pitch as a starter but it's really hard to trust him day 1 at the MLB and at the expense of what guy being bumped? Peralta pushing towards a rotation spot and LAUER being looked at as the outsider makes this really puzzling. People will say it doesn't but they need to look at the pen. That's a strange pen and to make that even more uneasy, the expected leaders in the clubhouse for those spots started bad.

Don't think that's over thinking one bit. They know they need to see what they have in this cluster of arms. They've made mention of having to figure out the pen. Hader Phelps Claudio Black Suter and Lauer (I guess) are leading the way for 6 spots. But 2-3 are completely up in the air and there's a long list of guys pushing for those spots. None of them are promised anything and a few leading candidates didn't start off clean. As for Webb, I think he's old enough, has struggled enough and is surrounded by too many guys who look better than him for them to go back to him as a starter unless this group gets thinned out somehow.

5IP 5K .4 Whip

Still far more balanced. The timing step is the same as all spring. The hands stay higher like the other swings. Wasn't the best swing I've seen from him this spring but it's considerably better than last year. Hit another grounder to 2b today as well. SS to RF, no hard pull, staying back. He could be very useful like this.

This was awhile ago when I thought they would add more pitchers 1st off. AAA: Burnes, Peralta, Supak, Brown, Jankins AA: Bettinger, File, Francis, Rasmussen, Zavalos A+: Ashby, Small, Lazar, Bennett, Castaneda/Sunitsch A: Jarvis, Olson, Kelly, Lindell, Walters, Luna, Lemons if he's ready I think they keep Rasmussen as an opener so they can manage him. Remember Hader started in the minors for all but 2 games where he pitched the 1st 2 innings and then he was in MKE in the pen. Peralta can be swapped with Miller since we didn't add as many arms as I hoped and news on him got pretty interesting. AAA: Burnes, Miller, Supak, Brown, Jankins AA: Bettinger, File, Francis, Small, Rasmussen/Zavalos A+: Ashby, Lazar, Bennett, Castaneda, Sunitsch A: Jarvis, Olson, Kelly, Walters, Luna or Lemons if he's ready I doubt the AA guys get jumped straight into AAA. I think they need to start in AA and A+ and see where things go. Brown is not inspiring a lot of confidence as of late. Supak needs to bounce back. Honestly, Jankins (with limited upside) is probably one of the better AAAA starters they have right now. Even if you bumped Ashby or Small to AA to start the year I think that would put Zavalos as the piggy back with Rasmussen. Let's be frank about it. AAA other than Burnes looks like a collection of guys who found their wall and hit it hard. It's going to be interesting to see how MKE handles that.

Well keep in mind a career BABIP of .288 is quite low. His xAVG in 2017 was only .253. In 2019 it was .232. The xwOBA's are closer than that even. 2017 is an unrealistic expectation because he got better results than his skills. The biggest flaw in his game though is he can't hit a breaking ball to save his life. Early spring training most pitchers are getting their fastballs under control more than throwing the other stuff, probably why he has done so well so far. I hope he breaks out this year but that breakout is going to be something like a .715 OPS if it happens. Not really hoping for much. His HR yesterday was on a sinker or change lower 3rd inner 3rd. He hit it like he knew it was coming.

Yes, head first dive back into 1st base.

Thing is Arcia has gone on binges and every single one is quiet swing oppo driven. He had the binge with 2 strikes, he had a binge to start one year and end another. I know it's the old fashioned saying of hit the ball the other way, let it get deep on you and drive it the other way. They say it to everyone. With a lot of guys that's garbage. They have the power and loft to pull. Arcia's never been that guy and his number jump when he tries to be as basic as possible. That old saying is his only chance. We've seen the defense he can play. He stopped that too but if this dude wants to have a career he needs to get back to his days of plus defense and he needs to be a scrubby hitter who pops the ball the other way. You ask him to increase his launch angle and swing for power and the guys going to hit sub 200. Hit 280, obp 320 and collect your 10-12 HRs. Hit the ball the other way and play defense. He'd get paid pretty well for that. Looked up his swing from the HR today and compared it to swings from 2019. Looks quieter, has a different timing step, not flying his shoulder open as early, hands are staying higher longer. It looks a lot better. Last year it looked incredibly wild though. We'll have to see if this lasts.

Ground out to 2b Ground out to 2b K HR to RF Ground rule double to CF Lines out to RF Ground out to Pitcher Ground out to SS HR to LCF Line drive single to RF 4 of 10, no BB, 1 K. 9 balls in play. 7 to CF to RF, 2 ball left of 2b. Nothing to LF. If he can keep doing that he'll be useful. It's his pull crap that kills him.

Well he's started on a binge. We've seen this before for a month here and there. However, his ST start is making things more interesting. Every hit to this point has gone from LC to RF which is something many have pointed towards him doing when he's succeeding.

Braun has been a 330 obp guy for the last 3 years. Smoak hit 200 and got on base as much. If you aren't putting up north of 350 obp you shouldn't be in front of Yelich. I want Cain in the lead off spot vs LHP and Holt at lead off vs RHP. Yelich 2 and start the parade of Hiura Braun Garcia Smoak Narvaez depending on the matchup. Only time I'd even consider Braun ahead of Yelich is vs LHP. Last year, only 50 players in baseball had an OBP .350 or higher, so less than two on each team. The Brewers had two, Yelich (who can't bat ahead of himself) and Grandal who is no longer on the team. The third highest OBP on the team went to Braun at .343. Cain regaining his form will be the best thing for the offense this season. If that doesn't happen, Braun wouldn't be the worst option for leadoff, nor would a platoon such as the one you mentioned. I get that with Braun but you also have Holt who is coming off b2b 360s and 350 390 vs RHP. Cains career vs LHP is 367. I don't see why you need to push Braun to the 1 hole because there are better options who don't HIT HRs. Like at all.

Everything MKE does in the off season is done to avoid long term risk. They just absorbed the risk on this one. They see a pay-off. They don't take on risk without a ton of upside. I'm pretty confident they have Peralta in the rotation day 1 and they feel his off season work is going to dramatically improve him. You don't just do this stuff. You do this stuff when it becomes clear that if you don't act now, you are going to miss your shot. Good move. They could win this deal before the option years and walk away laughing once they get to the option years. Even as a normal (not Hader) fireman pen arm the price is roughly FAIR for the first 5.

I don't see much eventually to it. You don't make that move unless you see him trending towards being a lot more expensive. MKE avoids risk like the plague. This is added risk, they see a big upside and soon. I'd safely assume he's in the rotation. That has nothing to do with his first 2IP. Has a lot to do with his offseason work and the reports of an improved curveball, an added slider and a velocity increase. If he's throwing harder and has 2.5 pitches instead of 1.5, he's certainly a different guy. He might not be ready to go 6IP right now but he can start and throw 4-5. Put Suter behind him for another 2-3 and that should work out pretty well.

Even though I just pointed to Holt being capable of 1b, I read your post about Holt in the OF and it dawned on me. Vs RHP our only quality 3b is Holt. He is going to be there every single game vs a RHP starter. The only time he could sub into the OF is vs a LHP starter where he's not at his best. It's possible but it doesn't make a lot of sense to play him in the OF vs a LHP starter. Nor does it make any sense to play him in the OF in that situation. The only way Gyorko moves over to 1st is if Urias is at SS pushing Sogard to 3rd. I'll be really disappointed if they have this much split material and don't heavily lean into those platoons. Gamel still doesn't fit. Garcia plays CF acceptably. Gamel plays CF acceptably. Not that Broxton is better but at least he has plus tools we can work in to our benefit.

This is also why I was advocating for an additional OF add. Braun will need 50 games off while also playing half his games at first, Cain and Yelich will both get 15 games off. Garcia won’t play everyday either. That’s not even including injuries. I would much rather have another solid bat that can start 100 games than Gamel personally. But I do agree that at this point, we need to retain Gamel as he is most likely the next guy up in the pecking order. If Yelich starts 140 games (22 off) Cain starts 130 games (32 off) Garcia starts 120 games (42 off) Braun starts 110 games You have 14 surplus OF starts minus every start Braun has a 1b. Gyorko and Holt can also play 1st. Gamel started 66 games last year. His platoon makes it so that all 4 options out hit him vs LHP and RHP. Do you want to start Gamel over Sogard or Urias? I don't want Gamel starting over Gyorko or Holt because they split well.

I don't think it's too rigid if you only use it for 40% of your rotation. We have 3 guys who are very likely to be solidly over 5IP per start. Hopefully between 5.5 and 6. Even 5.5s put stress on the pen. Peralta Houser Lauer are not in that boat quite yet. That adds 1 IP to the BP every 2 starts. The typical RP pitches around 60-70IP per year. But every starter like Houser Peralta adds 16 IP to the pen beyond the 16 IP 5.5s push into the pen. We have 1 guy who we can realistically hope eats 6 per start. It would be wonderful to have 6+ IP guys. We don't, we likely never will. So how do you make up the 96 IP? Shuttle helps. However the BEST way is to do it is to get 3 IP per 5 starts from a pen piece in a way that won't blow their arm out. Suter and if in the pen Lauer can absolutely handle that. I don't honestly care if they are in high or low leverage. You if the starter has a great day, goes 6. Give the ball to Lauer or Suter and trust them to finish the game. If the starts has a bad day, give the ball to Lauer or Suter to knock out 3 innings. You have to alleviate that stress on the pen. I think the last 3 options in the pen need to be better for this to be comfortable but I think we misconstrue our open belief in numbers. If Suter is in position to succeed 1 time through, I don't care the leverage of the situation. Hand him the ball. You don't need to pitch Hader in the 9th because the game is close. If Houser goes 6 strong and its a 1 run game. Hand the ball to Suter and let him pitch to his numbers and finish the game. We say we believe in the numbers of it. Then we panic and feel you need to throw out the numbers of it. Stress on a pen is a real problem. Situational stuff is irrational fear.