RollieTime

Arenado will surely see some type of dip in his offensive numbers. Knowing that, is it really worth giving up good prospects while also needing to shell out $35 million per season? I would say no. If you knew for a fact that you were getting gold glove defense, a guy that will hit .300, and hit 35+ homers, yeah absolutely it could be worth it. But any slip from that performance and you can bank on the Brewers having a tough time fielding a competitive team for the foreseeable future. I would rather split $35 million into two significant upgrades than one guy anyway. While not having 7 years of a massive contract on the books that will absolutely limit our spending for a long long time.

Not too bad of a name I suppose. If they refer to it as AmFam Field, I won’t mind it at all. That’s at least what I will refer to it as. I’m sure a lot of fans will continue to refer to it as Miller Park or call it AmFam Field instead of “American Family Field”. Hopefully the Brewers take that into consideration when making signs for the stadium and trying to sell the name change to the fans.

I’m surprised he received this much on a one year deal. I wonder if you will see Castellanos take a similar route, but ask for something like $20 million for one season.

The next contract has to be a career buyout. I'm thinking it would take $300 million but perhaps throwing a couple more years on your idea would make for a reasonable initial offer: 2027: $31 million 2028: $32 million 2029: $33 million 10/$275 million In related news, the Brewers are not going to offer Yelich a contract. My only argument is that you’re basically paying market value for him in your deal, which wouldn’t make much sense for the Brewers to even look at doing right now. I don’t see any team that is going to give Yelich a deal through his age 40 season at all. He might even have an issue getting a 7 year deal in free agency at 31 and that’s if he maintains his remarkable run the last couple season. He’s also coming off a significant injury and might want to lock in almost $200 million and know where he will be long term. He has also had multiple back injuries. If he wants to make more money now, he will need to give a discount to the Brewers. Him getting an additional $25 million or so the next 3 years that isn’t part of his contract, while adding another $114 million guaranteed or so isn’t too bad of a proposal. I don’t see it as a discount if he’s making $30+ million into his age 36 and 37 seasons in Milwaukee. That looks like paying market value and adding a ton of risk on the backend of the deal. I could maybe see an additional year in the deal I proposed to take him through his age 35 season. But anything beyond that just isn’t wise in my opinion at all. That would already be an 8 year deal as it sits today.

Since we’ve been talking a lot about a Yelich extension, I thought it would be good to bump this thread. This is an extension that I feel like would work for both sides. 7 year contract for $180 million that overrides his 3/$41.5 million remaining. 2020: $18 million 2021: $22 million 2022: $26 million 2023: $27 million 2024: $28 million 2025: $29 million 2026: $30 million He turns his $41.5 million prior to free agency into $66 million, while also locking in an additional 4 years and $114 million. The Brewers lock him up long term, while still keeping 2 years of relatively cheap pay for his production and get a little bit of a discount on the overall value of the deal. This also only goes through his age 34 season, hopefully helping the Brewers avoid a big drop off in production on the back part of the deal.

I know WAR isn’t the end all, be all stat, but I just wanted to point this out. Derek Jeter career WAR: 72.4 Larry Walker career WAR: 72.7 Scott Rolen career WAR: 70.2 People are talking about Jeter being a unanimous pick to join the Hall of Fame while Walker is in his 10th and final season to get elected. Is it maybe just a little bit of Yankees glasses being put on here? Rivera was unanimous and now Jeter might join him as the only 2 guys to receive that honor? Even a guy like Scott Rolen, who is right around 48% with a little over half the ballots known for 2020, while in his 3rd season on the ballot, appears like he is going to fall well short. Does anybody else see an issue with the voting process in general? How are guys like Hank Aaron, Ted Williams, Willie Mays, and Cal Ripken Jr. among others not elected unanimously? I’m not saying Jeter doesn’t deserve to be in because he does. But it’s a shame that others in the past aren’t unanimous when they were as deserving or even more so, than someone like Jeter. I think the Hall of Fame voting process needs to change anyway in that it shouldn’t take someone 8 years of “no” to the Hall of Fame for a guy to all of a sudden, when he hasn’t touched a bat for 13 years, that now, yes, he’s worthy to be in. I think they could reduce it to 3 or 5 years of eligibility to decide who is worthy and who is not. Not trying to derail this at all, but it just kind of grinds my gears that nobody is unanimous, but now it’s time to just elect multiple Yankees players unanimously. There were plenty of as deserving or more deserving players of that honor in the past. Maybe the voters will be more open to selecting players unanimously and I would be fine with that. But if you can’t look at a guy and pretty much think “yup, Hall of Famer”, then that player shouldn’t be in the Hall. And it shouldn’t take that long to get it “right”.

Not really sure where to put this, so I figured I would start a new thread. In the past, the Brewers seemed to like breaking some type of transaction at Brewers On Deck. But recently, in 2018, they announced the Yelich trade and Cain signing I think the day before the On Deck event? And last year, I don’t think they did anything really shortly before, during, or after the event? I wonder if they are breaking away from doing that unless last year was just an outlier. Unless I am just not recollecting the past couple offseasons correctly. But it’ll be interesting to see if they pull something off in the couple days leading up to the event or if they will announce something during the event this year to kick off 2020.

Those 3 combined in 5 years from now would cost about $90 million per season lol.

Thanks for the laugh! Love these!

If teams are hesitant to give Castellanos a long term deal, could the Brewers offer a “prove it” deal to see if his time with the Cubs is him maturing more as a player or if he just had a nice hot stretch? Could he be had at something like 1 year for $17 million or so? I would honestly prefer locking him up on a multi year deal through his prime, pairing a big bat with Yelich for the foreseeable future in the middle of the lineup, but if the offers just aren’t there for him, I would love to add that bat to the lineup for 2020.

I would love to add Strop as a late inning pen option. Our bullpen really is lacking veteran talent so bringing in a guy like Strop to pair with Hader, Suter, Knebel (at some point?), and Claudio among others, would be a very solid addition. With having the other 3-4 spots up for grabs, having a few established guys out there with great late inning stuff that could give us a possible 4 headed monster down the stretch in 2020 would be awesome. If we signed Strop and added another solid arm like McHugh, Kintzler, etc., I will feel very good about our pen.

There’s a prime Aaron Rodgers throw! Big chunk plays and taking shots. That’s what we always used to do multiple times per game back multiple years ago even without getting the defense to jump offsides for a free play. Go back to doing that a few times each game. Helps open everything else up.

Also, and I know I’ve posted on this in the past, STOP with the dang 1 yard out routes!! Not exactly sure why we started doing those throws 10 times per game the last few years, but wow does it seem to barely ever work. You want to put a drive together, score some points, and keep the pressure on the defense? Throw the ball downfield. This front of the 49ers is great, but you can do a 5 step drop and hit a 10 yard slant on your first or second read. You just can’t hold the ball and go to a 3rd or 4th option and expect nobody on the defense to get to you by then. They just need to be quick passes that are out on the first or second read.

Ok, there's a lot to be critical of, but let's not say things we can't take back. They've basically played three bad games all year, and all three were against the best pass rush teams in the league. I was critical of their line earlier this year and years past (maybe not openly on here in the past). I do stand by that statement. Their offensive line really isn’t as good as a lot of people tend to believe. Not sure what numbers people look at to come to the conclusion though about this line being so great. Is it snap to throw time? From him being able to roll out and by time? Is it snap to contact time of a defender getting a hand on him, also by Rodgers avoiding 3 guys and still getting throws off before getting shoved to the turf? I honestly don’t know what stats people look at or what stats are out there to even measure it. But this line is not good. And it’s not been a great line for a number of years.

Same issues for years. Poor offensive line play (not sure how people can dispute this any longer). Not sure how y’all always say they are very good, but those numbers are beyond flawed with whatever you look at. Rodgers is a magician and is always forced to avoid multiple guys on every play and pull off miraculous play after miraculous play. Not saying they all suck. Maybe one or two are decent. But having one very good one and the rest a bunch of garbage is going to result in a garbage offensive line. And that’s what we have. Linebackers. Oh my gosh how slow can you be? That entire aspect of the defense needs to start anew. Bring in some new faces that have a little speed that can effectively cover guys and can flow to the ball properly. We are getting shredded by a team that has a good offensive line and quick backs. Offensive weapons. Get some wide receivers/tight ends that can open up the field and get some separation. A lot of this roster is just too slow, including their offensive personnel, and you’re just not going to win the whole thing with the type of speed we’ve continued to trot out there.

Exactly. Nothing beats a good slab of beef jerky!

This is what I’m going to be watching as well. Astros went from a team that went from striking out the most in the league or close to it, to striking out the absolute least the last few seasons. And that change basically happened overnight. I know they made personnel changes along the way, but it’s something I am going to keep a close eye on. Just look at the Red Sox when they could no longer use that video monitor after the season they won the World Series. They didn’t even make the postseason this past year. Pretty telling in my opinion. Could you explain why the Sox weren't allowed to use the monitor last season? I haven't heard or seen that yet. I agree it seems very telling though. Thanks in advance. After the 2018 season, MLB started mandating league personnel to monitor the video replay room during the game to prevent teams from being able to watch the monitor and decode the signs since it was the only video feed not on a delay. This also brings me around to my own personal opinion that MLB knew this was going on and did nothing about it in terms of doing a proper investigation, handing out suspensions, or making it public until they were forced to by Fiers. Which is disappointing that Manfred tried to just sweep it under the rug. He can’t get out of the commissioner’s chair fast enough.

I agree. More teams will be involved mid season and drive the price up. If teams like the White Sox, Phillies, and Padres are contending (who all have 8+ year postseason droughts), I imagine they will be involved in talks for arguably the best relief pitcher in the game that would be under control for 4 postseason runs. The White Sox and Padres (among others) are two teams I think that will be part of a bidding war midseason for Hader. Even if the Brewers are contending midseason, a Hader trade can come to fruition as long as we have a number of other reliable bullpen arms and receive additional immediate help on the roster wherever that may be midseason.

I didn’t mean it as a strictly late game substitution. That would be a best case scenario with everybody healthy and playing every single day, which won’t happen. They would all get 500+ at bats filling in for injuries and off days. It was more of just an idea on days that Castellanos, Yelich, and Cain all play that he can come in late. Why is it that someone can make a post here now and people take one sentence out of it the whole post and run with it? Sheesh. Not sure why you all skipped over the part about him still getting 500 at bats in my post. If he’s strictly a late game sub, obviously he wouldn’t even sniff 500 at bats. But it was more of an idea of something they can do a few times per month to shore up the defense late on days Garcia isn’t starting and Yelich and Cain are also all starting. Gamel and Grisham got over 450 at bats combined last season. And that was with a full time Braun, Yelich, and Cain in the outfield. If you all think that we couldn’t realistically have 4 outfielders get 500 at bats each then that’s fine. But last year proved otherwise and I stand by what I said. Castellanos would make us better and the at bats will sort itself out. It always does. And Garcia being a good defensive RF, the same position that Castellanos would play with us, late game substituting is a realistic option to do sometimes.

As unlikely as it is, I still hope we find a way to bring Castellanos in. With Cain, Yelich, and Garcia in the outfield with Braun seeing some time in the outfield and at first base, I still feel like there is room for Castellanos on this roster. Injuries will arise, Cain and Yelich will both need 10-15 days off during the season to stay healthy, Braun will start 110 games or so at the most. Garcia will need a few days off as well. It might be a little bit of a crunch this season, but get that big bat locked up now for 5 years (who is still only 27 years old!) that honestly carries much less risk with him than others on the free agent market with playing 148 games or more 5/6 seasons and being so young while hitting free agency. He could be signed to a 6 year deal and that will STILL only take him through his age 33 season. He is one of those value targets that could slot into your 3 or 4 hole for 5+ years while making under $20 million. He could also still mature as a player and improve since he is just entering his prime. I really hope we can bring in Castellanos. Yelich, Cain, Garcia, and Castellanos could all realistically get 500 atbats this season. Braun can get 400 with playing a little time in the outfield, starting 60 games at first, and pinch hitting/DHing. It’s never a bad option to have a good bench of one of Garcia/Braun/Yelich/Castellanos on the bench with guys like Smoak Sogard, or Gyorko to pinch hit as well. The quality and depth of our hitters would be quite impressive up and down the roster. And just for fun and to give it a little bit more of a realistic vibe, Castellanos and Garcia both play right field. Castellanos starts the game and is removed after the 7th or 8th inning or moved to first? Maybe Stearns was planning on Castellanos all along! CF Cain 2B Hiura LF Yelich RF Castellanos/Garcia late game substitution C Narvaez 1B Braun SS Urias 3B Gyorko/Sogard P I could see that lineup hanging with any of the other top lineups in the game. Hopefully Castellanos is still in play for us. With Donaldson off the board, Castellanos could be the next domino to fall. Hopefully it’s to the Brewers. His entire career has been in the upper Midwest as well (Detroit/Chicago). Maybe he is one of those guys that would like to stay in the upper Midwest. Location does play a factor for some players.

This is what I’m going to be watching as well. Astros went from a team that went from striking out the most in the league or close to it, to striking out the absolute least the last few seasons. And that change basically happened overnight. I know they made personnel changes along the way, but it’s something I am going to keep a close eye on. Just look at the Red Sox when they could no longer use that video monitor after the season they won the World Series. They didn’t even make the postseason this past year. Pretty telling in my opinion.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.cbssports.com/mlb/news/jessica-mendoza-mets-adviser-calls-out-whistleblower-mike-fiers-as-carlos-beltrans-future-remains-unclear/amp/ Not sure if this has been posted anywhere or not. But Mendoza sure isn’t helping the Mets’ or her own cause. Calling somebody out that wants to clean up the game for the betterment of the sport? I wonder what shady stuff she is a part of with the Mets for her to have an issue with Fiers.

Considering the train wreck-level results we saw from 3/5ths of the rotation (Burnes, Peralta and Chacin) for a large portion of the season, "dreadful" would likely be an improvement. I'd be extremely surprised if Lindblom, Lauer and Anderson aren't significantly better than those three. What might be tougher is picking up the slack from not having the solid work of Davies, Anderson, Lyles and Gonzalez. The Brewers definitely need to address the lack of solid depth in the starting pitching department for 2020. Hoping for a Taijuan Walker signing and slotting him into the 5 spot in the rotation, kicking Houser to the pen. I think that would be an inexpensive move with upside that would strengthen both the rotation and the bullpen.

Rendon is 29 and received a 7 year deal. Donaldson is already 34 and got a 4 year deal. Rendon’s carries more risk in the injury department because of the length of the contract and a major injury could lead to a much longer wait for the contract to run out, but Donaldson’s carries more risk in the performance department since he is already through his prime years and will surely see some regression at any point while Rendon has at the minimum 3-4 years of his prime still in front of him. Rendon is also a better all around hitter than Donaldson.

Also with people upset about the Twins being able to do this and the Brewers “not” being able to, Stearns just didn’t find it smart to give an already 34 year old almost $100 million. I’m glad he didn’t see the value in it and hand out one of the largest contracts in history for a player that old. The Twins also have the DH and can throw Donaldson on that the last 3 years of the deal if they need to. They have Cruz right now, but his contract is up after this season. In the future, they can throw him in as the DH 2-3 times per week to keep him healthy. The Brewers don’t have that luxury. And giving that large of a contract and “hoping” for the DH to come is pretty risky.