Jopal78

Generally speaking - I would agree 100% with what you are saying. I do think the Brewers would have to be literally blown away with an offer if they were to even entertain trading Hader right now. Especially considering that we are in a win-now mode. However, I also wouldn't rule it out completely. The fact is - relievers are the most volatile position in all of baseball year to year, and we already started to see a few warts with Hader this past season giving up the home run ball at a high clip. And, just look what we got for Thornburg a few years ago when we traded him to the Red Sox, and he wasn't even half the pitcher that Hader is today. So, if a team like the Dodgers gets really desperate this winter and approaches DS with a Lux/Ruiz or Lux/Gonsolin/Rios offer (where we could plug 2-3 holes at the MLB level with quality players), wouldn't you have to consider moving Hader in that situation. Then, go out and use some of that money saved to bring back Pomeranz and maybe another reliever? Honestly, I'm sure they'd think about it but the answer would be no. Why? Lux will probably be a good player, but what is anyone's guess if: the 2020 Brewers + Lux - Hader > 2019 Brewers. The other prospects are even more up in the air as to their ability to be quality players in the short run. I also think, since the Dodgers are one of the teams the Brewers are competing against, a trade where the Dodgers net a valuable major league asset from their competitor without giving up anything from their currently loaded roster, isn't a trade a competing GM is likely going to make.

The actual voter records are somewhat interesting: 1st Place Votes from writers covering the NL Central: 5 out of 10 (which includes both Milwaukee Votes. Milwaukee is the ONLY NL city without two voting members of the BBWAA. Tom Verducci's vote was assigned as the 2nd from Milwaukee. Counsell got more first place votes from the writers for NL East teams and NL West teams than from the writers for the NL Central teams. Maybe they're more familiar and therefore less impressed, maybe its just homer-ism. Despite living in Chicago, I've never heard of Eugene McIntosh or The Bigs Media which is apparently who he writes for. McIntosh gave his first place vote to Dave Roberts; one of only two first place votes coming from outside the Los Angeles Market.

I feel inclined to bring this up every time there is a trade proposed for Hader. Milwaukee is in the middle of a contending window. Hader is their best overall pitcher, with no replacement on the roster. It just isn't logical to trade their best overall pitcher, and especially not for 'prospects' when the team has the expectation of contending. I'm sure the Brewers would trade him if bowled with an offer, but what are the chances, for example, of the Padres offering Chris Paddack and Dinelson Lamet for Hader.... zip.

He can't stay healthy. As a bench player/DH for the Rangers he missed a month in the middle of the year with a groin strain. He came back in mid-July and about a month later suffered a low back injury, and then strained a hamstring rehabbing the back injury resulting in him missing the final month of the year. Even at 2-4 million per year, he won't cut it in the NL and it would be like throwing money away.

Grandal took the one year deal with the Brewers over a multi-year guarantee because it was the highest AAV. He made 18.25 million in 2019, why would he take a pay cut now? SEcond, a team like the Brewers doesn't have a lot of payroll flexibility to gamble on Alex Wood. I would assume he's ruled out based on medicals unless his market totally fails to develop and he could be signed to a short term deal.

Yes it is true, Boston has blown past the luxury tax threshold and probably would like to shed payroll. What is also true is that they won 84 games last year. By comparison the Cubs won 84 games last year. You can bet that Boston is not looking to tear their operation down and rebuild. I think as others have alluded to, the most likely scenario is they package some of the bad contracts they have with some of their expendable players. They're not going to trade Bogaerts or JD Martinez because that prevents them winning both in the short run and long run.

I don’t think it is quite as ridiculous as you are implying. If you want to quibble with the Burnes/Turang part of the package, I completely understand (swap out for Peralta, Grisham, etc.), but I don’t think Keston Hiura as a centerpiece to a deal for Bogaerts is ridiculous at all. The Red Sox project to exceed the Luxury Tax threshold for a third year in row. Every year they exceed the tax their financial penalty becomes increasingly steep. Their penalties from this past season totaled more than $13 million. It has seemingly been made clear at this point that one of Bloom’s directives is to get the team’s payroll back under control. Another concept being floated by many (including Ken Rosenthal) is that the Red Sox are willing to package some of their more attractive trade chips with a bloated contract such as David Price, Nate Eovaldi, or to a lesser extent Dustin Pedroia. Their farm system is pretty barren, so in order to pull off that type of maneuver it would likely require a veteran star such as Bogaerts or Betts. Unfortunately for the Brewers that type of move seems less feasible. The main problem with your idea I s the Red Sox aren’t going into a rebuild; and your trade doesn’t make them better in the short run it makes them substantially worse because Bogaerts is a superior player to Hiura, and a win now team doesn’t have much use for Turang or Burnes). I think you hit the nail on the head that they may Try to unload a heavier contract by including a good player but as you point out such a deal rules the Brewers out because they are a team with limited payroll

Bloom would probably get fired if he took such a talent light package from Milwaukee for one of the better players in the game. Hiura was a rookie with nice power but doesn’t play defense at all and strikes out every third at bat. Burnes was so bad the Brewers had to reacquire Jordan Lyles to replace him then banished him to the minors, and Turang is at least 2-3 years away from the majors. This trade is only plausible when viewed through the darkest of Brewers colored glasses.

--Cole Hamels With that quote made to an MLB writer, I hope Stearns has Hamels near the top of his list. It is not very often that quality starting pitchers are willing to take a short term commitment. While he didn't pitch very well following his oblique injury, his numbers in 2019 (1.39 WHIP, 4.09 FIP and 9.1 K:9) would have topped all the Brewers regular starters but for Woodruff. A 3.0 WAR starting pitcher last year in Chicago would also have placed him right behind Woodruff. Hamels on a one year deal still would be a better option than Lyles, Gio etc.

What I don't understand how this trade makes the Brewers a better team. It actually kind of makes another NL competitor substantially stronger. First of all, the only reason Seager would be available in a trade is the fact the Dodgers already have adequate replacements in house (Kike Hernandez, Chris Taylor), and Seager has trouble staying healthy and is a free agent after 2021. Secondly, by trading Josh Hader to the Dodgers, their bullpen would be transformed into an elite shut down unit with Pedro Baez, Yimi Garcia, Jansen, and Hader not to mention quality low leverage arms like Joe Kelly and Dylan Floro and potentially Ross Stripling and Julio Urias. Under a Seager for Hader swap, the Brewers get an All-Star short stop to plug into their lineup which would help in terms of runs scored, but only for two years. Hader is under team control for 4 more years. Secondly, the Brewers do not have a high leverage bullpen arm to plug into Hader's spot, therefore weakening their bullpen. Third, this move would also ADD payroll to the Brewers in the short run (and conversely somewhat ease the Dodgers payroll crunch) as Corey Seager is estimated to make 7.1 million in arbitration in 2020 while Hader is not estimated to top 5 million. I think the idea of trading for prospects and watching young players bloom is cool too; but the Dodgers would take this trade in a heartbeat and laugh all the way to the NLCS or WS.

July was the time...now is the next best time. We need a haul of youngsters. Since 2018 the Brewers have won more games (185) than all but two other NL teams (LAD 198 and ATL 187). Being a Brewers fan, I've never really seen one before but based on their record since '18 this has all the looks of a team being in the midst of what is typically referred to as a 'window for contending'. It makes zero sense to suggest trading your best overall pitcher during a 'window for contending' especially with multiple years of team control remaining. Secondly, talent costs money. Teams with more limited payrolls face some tough choices as their roster is laden with talented players and only so much pay to go around. That is why they moved on from Anderson and Thames, two quality major league players. From a team budgetary perspective its too bad Hader struck it rich a season early, but it cannot comes a surprise to the team brass that they will have to pay him a load of cash for his services going forward.

Unless he's willing to play in 2020 for $4 million dollars, I wouldn't touch Kendrick. Players with 14 years in the big leagues who obliterate career marks at ages 33, 34, 35 seem ripe to quickly lose whatever it was they found late in their career. As for Thames, I suppose the 7.5 million he would have made in 2020 wasn't so much of a bargain for Milwaukee when they could likely get equally similar players Edwin Encarnacion, Kole Calhoun, etc. for less.

Exactly! Chase Anderson is getting 9.3 million dollars minimum (8.5 million salary in 2020, 350 k trade bonus and at a minimum 500k buyout of 2021 option. That is substantially more than he reasonably could’ve expected had the Brewers declined his option. Additionally that he goes into the Toronto rotation and will be leaned on to put up innings is likely a better situation than shifting between the pen and rotation and getting pulled after 4 innings. In addition, not only do they avoid paying a million dollars to drop Anderson they actually got something in return. A nice trade for Milwaukee

Braun has 12 starts at first base in his career and all of them came over the first 50 games in 2018. If Braun was truly a viable option at first base I suppose they would have played him there since May 25, 2018 instead of the likes of: Brad Miller, Hernan Perez, Eric Kratz, Tyler Austin, Yasmani Grandal and Jacob Nottingham. Hard to fathom on Thames, unless they think they can get him back at a lower price.

The Brewers were able to sign Lorenzo Cain because they gave the 32 year old player a five year contract. The Brewers were able to sign Randy Wolf because they gave the 33 year old player a three year contract. The Brewers were able to sign Kyle Lohse because they gave the 34 year old player a three year contract. The Brewers were able to sign Matt Garza because they gave the 30 year old player a four year contract. If my memory serves these contracts all contain extra year beyond what the 'pundits' suggested they would get. Like wise, I'm sure Grandal will have half a dozen offers in the 3 year/60 million dollar tier. He will likely sign with the first team to give him a 4 year contract with an AAV of 20 million per season. I think the Brewers could sign Grandal to a 4 year contract and back load the earnings to something like: 15 million in 2020, 18 million in 2021, 23 million in 2022, and 24 million in 2023. Under such a format, they'd retain Grandal for a lower price in 2020 than in 2019 allowing them more flexibility for next year's team. Then when Braun's contact ends after 2020, they'd still save money in the aggregate because there would be a step down from Braun's 21 million to Grandal's 18. Then they have zero guaranteed contracts on the books for 2023 and even if Yelich resigns they've carried two 20+ million dollar salaries before. The biggest question remains is it wise to give a 4 year contract to a 31 year old catcher

Its interesting, they only wore the regular "home" uniform with the white top and white pants 19 times in 2019. They wore either the Blue "Milwaukee" jersey, or the Blue "Brewers" jersey 38 times.

Castro Ks 1/3 of his ABs and has made $8M the last two years. If he takes a cut it will be in the $6M - $7M range. Either is too much to pay for a backup catcher when pitching is desperately needed. Imo d'Arnaud would be a much better and much cheaper option IF Grandal leaves. d'Arnaud was designated for assignment by the Mets on April 28th, the Brewers had a crack at him then as a potential upgrade over Pina and passed. The Mets released d'Arnaud in May which allowed any team to sign him to a contract for a prorated veterans minimum, he ended up signing with the Dodgers and going to the minor league club before being called up. Certainly a player is going to accept a major league job before going to the minors, meaning the Brewers could have replaced Pina with d'Arnaud in May of 2019 and chose not too. After Pina went down with an injury, the Dodgers sold 'Arnaud to the Rays, where he played in their minor leagues beore being called up. With Tampa he put up decent numbers across 350 at bats. The guy has been around the league for 7 years and was readily available three times since the start of the 2019 season. The fact the Brewers passed on him three times when they had a chance to improve their catching depth at little to no cost suggests its very unlikely they view him as an improvement over the catchers on their roster. Furthermore, d'Arnaud is always hurt. He has missed games with injuries in 2014 (concussion and bone chips) 2015 (broken hand) 2016 (hyper-extended elbow and shoulder strain) 2017 (wrist injury) 2018 (torn UCL). He might be ok as NRI player but to suggest anything more is a substantial overpay on a player with a lot to prove.

Esptein must be a hard guy to please/work for. Ross is his 4th manager in 8 years at the helm in Chicago. Ross received a three year contract however, Epstein's deal only runs through 2021. This means after the 2021 season when Bryant, Rizzo, Schwarber and Baez all hit free agency Epstein likely rides off into the sunset. A new GM most likely brings in a new manager for 2022, so absent a deep title run, Ross is likely a stop gap manager for the Cubs as the Epstein regime concludes and new leadership emerges. Keep in mind the Cubs are owned by the TD Ameritrade folks. With that background, and having been beyond the luxury tax threshold in 2019 I don't see them infusing a bunch of cash into the team payroll. I think it is likely they'll shuffle the roster a bit and maybe trade one of their horses not named Rizzo or Bryant for some younger/cheaper talent.

A perfect time to forge a new identity, having played playoff baseball two years in a row, and having one of the biggest stars in the game on the roster. When they went to the current uniforms in 2000, I thought they were among the most boring in the game. The type face on the logo looked boring even when it was new, and the subtle nod to Miller Brewing Company made the whole look feel cheap. Plus, only Tampa and Milwaukee have primary road uniforms which state the team name instead of the city. On top of that they had the ugly gold alternate jerseys, and they inexplicably play in a Braves uniform once a year, why not wear a White Sox uniform they played in Milwaukee too for a spell. Bernie Brewer too looks like he was churned out by a cut rate graphic design firm at the 11th hour. In an era where there is a graphic designer in every office park in America, I hope the team comes up with a crisp new look instead of a hodge podge of stuff like they wear now. Its probably too much to hope they can re-design Bernie Brewer to look either more like a historic Germanic Brewer or scrap Bernie all together and go back to the much more original Barrel Man as the mascot.

Tyler Austin in his career against left handed pitching has a slash line of: .253/.345/.539 I wouldn't necessarily call Kyle Gibson 'below average'. His 2019 numbers are nearly identical to Jordan Lyles as well as their career numbers. Which, of course, means Jordan Lyles is likely going to be seeking a bigger payday than the chicken feed people assume he can be resigned for. Further, Travis Shaw's numbers from 2017-2018 are too good for the team to simply give up on him. Likewise his trade value is not going to be strong coming off a poor season. He such an enigma I could see him being non-tendered, but if not he'll be on the team and playing regularly if only to rebuild his value. With the rule changes where pitchers have to throw to at least 3 batters or finish the half inning, I'd imagine they will shuttle more relief pitchers to and from AAA than carry 8 on their roster

A guess, but also attempting to be somewhat realistic: C Omar Navarez 1B Thames 2B Hiura 3B Moustakas SS Arcia LF Braun CF Cain RF Yelich UTIL Tyler Austin UTIL Travis Shaw UTIL Spangenberg UTIL Gamel UTIL Grisham C Pina SP Woodruff SP Davies SP Houser SP Kyle Gibson SP Jimmy Nelson RP Hader RP Knebel RP Claudio RP Pomeranz RP Guerra RP Black RP Suter Having given it some thought, I doubt the Brewers pick up the club option on Chase Anderson. In the 8-10 million dollar range there are better starting pitching options available. I know the Brewers liked Kyle Gibson in the past, and they will need a veteran pitcher to round out the rotation. I put Nelson in there because what the Brewers already invested in him, and that last appearance in Colorado where he was commanding his pitches and topping out 94-95 MPH. Realistically, the #5 spot could also be a permutation of Burnes, Faria, Peralta. I don't think there is a chance the Brewers re-sign Grandal so I put Navarez at catcher. He's 27, and a bat first catcher with three years of control remaining. I assume Seattle is going to go into a full rebuild, so Navarez won't come cheap but should be available. Austin has always hit LHP, so I like him as a platoon partner for Thames or a corner OFer against LHP when Braun or Cain needs a day off. I think they'll try to resign Pomeranz to have that 1-2-3 punch out of the bullpen (Hader, Knebel, Pomeranz), but with the way RF pitching goes in free agency I think they will have to a top of the market price 3/20mil to be resigned. As for Moustakas, I assume his preference is to stay with the Brewers if the financials are fair, so 3/39 million for Moustakas. In 2019 the Brewers paid Grandal (18.25 million) Moustakas (10) Chacin (6.75) Gonzalez (3), take that 38 million and add the money saved on Anderson's option (7.5 after buy out) comes out of 45.5 2020: Gibson (11 million) Moustakas (13 million) Pomeranz 6.7, that's 30 some million dollars which leaves plenty of room for their arbitration eligible players

There isn't really a need to trade Braun anyways. Over the course of his career if he has been healthy enough to accumulate 500 at bats, he has usually delivered an OPS of at least .850-ish. So, there is definitely still some juice left in his bat if they can keep him healthy with days off and late inning defensive replacements.

As much as I hope they resign all three of Grandal, Moustakas and Pomeranz such moves would likely add: 20 million per year for Grandal, 10 million for Moustakas, and 5-6 million for Pomeranz. That's 35-36 million per year. At those prices they probably only resign one of those players and its a fair bet all three leave for different clubs.

How does Jackson's contract supercede major league rules regarding FA? Jackson isn't even eligible for arbitration until 2022. i'm going to guess that he had some leverage in playing overseas for a number of years, just as eric thames had in negotiating his contract with the brewers (i.e. thames can declare free agency next year even though he won't have six years of major league service). Thames's contract contains a provision where the Brewers agreed they will not tender him a contract after 2020 despite their being arbitration eligibility, which will result in Thames becoming a free agent following 2020. Jackson isn't arbitration eligible so maybe he obtained a contract provision where the Brewers forgo their right to renew his contract and must release him. However, it seems kind of risky from a player's financial standpoint when they finish the season on a 25 man roster to have such an out clause.

Jonathon Papelbon got 6.25 million first first time through arbitration, and Trevor Rosenthal got 5.6 million his first time. I'd figure Hader probably aims for around 6 and the team offers 5 million