monty57

Many folks on this site advocate for it, but this is about the only sort of place it comes up -- and obviously it comes up a lot, as some posters are convinced that Braun (most especially) moving there is an inevitability and that it should happen sooner than later. But I have a hard time as seeing it as anything other than a group-think phenomenon that just spirals on itself. I agree, and I was never a proponent of moving Braun to 1B. The only reason I mention it now is that Lind should be traded since he's going into his final contract year, the Brewers are in rebuild mode, and he should bring back a decent return as a proven LH power bat coming off a healthy season. That would leave 1B up for grabs. Santana has been thrown into CF, but he's really a corner OF, so do we continue to play him out of position in one of the most important defensive positions in order to give Rogers playing time, or do we move him or Braun to first base? Plus, Phillips is very likely to take over in CF at some point next year, knocking Santana out of center, and if someone is going to change from OF to 1B, I would rather have that happen in the offseason when they have a chance to practice the new position rather than trying to learn on the fly mid-season. Additionally, as FVBrewer mentioned, we still have a bunch of OFs in the minors. I don't know if Braun would be a good first baseman, or even if he would be willing to make the move, but he could be a long term answer at first, where we don't have a lot of prospects, opening up the corner OF for Davis and Santana (for now), and our other corner OF prospects in the future. Of course, this could also be settled if Braun or Davis is traded this offseason.

Would Lind be worthy of a QO? If so, then his value in trade now is much more than it would be mid-season, as the team trading for him would have the opportunity to offer a QO if they get him before the season starts. Regardless, I think Lind is the obvious choice to trade this offseason. The less obvious choices are Lucroy, Davis, and Braun. To topic of the thread, whether Rogers will get the 1B job will in large part depend on if Davis or Braun are traded. We could go with Rogers at first and Santana in CF, but we really have pretty shoddy defense all around with that lineup. Getting a real CF could really help our pitching staff. Since Santana will be in the opening day lineup, that would either require trading Davis or Braun, or moving Braun or Santana to first (keeping Rogers on the bench). Can we just get this whole playoff/World Series thing out of the way so we can get to what should be an interesting offseason :-)

I agree a 100% with you my friend, I am a Thompson disciple myself. Just noting that the Cubs strategy of taking strictly bats with their first round picks since Theo and Jed took over probably won't cut it for us because the only way we were are going to get bona fide ace prospects is with either drafting them with our 1st pick or apply a really great draft strategy to acquiring and developing pitching ala the Mets and the Rays of a couple years ago. What's "hot" changes all the time. This season seems to have shown that teams are putting less value on prospects, even top prospects, than they have in the recent past. If this continues, I think it's possible (not easy, but possible) to land a young prospect who could become a top-of-the-rotation starter by trading a good, proven player. I guess what I'm saying is that the market trends may be lining up nicely with the Brewers' rebuild :-)

Unless they build a new stadium or move to a bigger market, the Brewers have pretty much maxed out their revenue streams (Mark A did a good job with that), and their TV deals don't really jump off the page like the new deals for big markets, so if in five years a $20M annual salary is not in the top 100 players, the Brewers are really in trouble. If this is the case, hopefully Stearns will be able to run the Brewers like Friedman ran the Rays, because they sure wouldn't be able to build the team through free agency.

You need to dig up the 2015 Optimism thread. It's been a while since it was used. After the trades we made this season, the possibility of getting a top five draft pick, and a new GM who will hopefully continue what has been as good a start to a rebuild as we could have hoped, I'm as optimistic about the franchise as I have been in years.

Nope, only until 2020. That's what I get for trusting my memory and not referencing Cot's :-)

I pretty much agree with you tmwiese. I don't think they were planning on trading him, and I'd guess that this surgery will be healed up by next season. But if they did have thoughts about shopping him this offseason, those are probably gone now as other teams will want more assurance that he's healthy (aka they'll want to see him play). I disagree about the contract being fine with 3-4 more decent years. He's under contract for eight more seasons, and we're paying him for (I believe) 15 more seasons. We should be in decent shape payroll-wise for the next few years, but right about the time we're hoping to start to shine again will be when Braun is likely to be showing signs of age while eating up a large portion of the payroll. He could very well be the reason we may have to make a decision between (for example) extending either Phillips or Arcia instead of keeping both of them. He will probably be a Brewer for the long-haul and I will cheer him on, but I'd bet that this contract will not end well, and in a few years people will wish we were out from under that contract.

That was my first thought when I heard about this. He's had a good season, and the Tulo trade gave me hope that they could trade him before age starts taking its toll. This pretty much ends that. I can't imagine another team would take the risk of trading for him until he once again proves himself after the surgery.

Just to clarify, Stearns worked with Houston for 35 months and, other than his time as Asst Director, Baseball Operations Arizona Fall League, he worked at least 14 months at each job along the way. If you are curious about his complete work history, you can view his LinkedInaccount or his Houston Astro's bio. The question I would ask is this: Why should someone who is qualified to move to a new (and presumably better) job stay at his current one just so he can "pay his dues"? I think that's becoming more prevalent in society as a whole. Sticking with one company for your whole career is not nearly as common as it was in the past, largely because the raises you will get with that one company generally can't compete with what another company in need of your services will offer. Sticking around waiting for your boss to retire so you can get his/her job is a lot slower than finding another company that has the job open. Nowadays, changing companies can mean that you are in demand and it can be the quickest way to "climb the ladder." Of course, it can also mean that you are a workplace cancer and companies can't wait to get rid of you. I'll put enough faith in Attanasio to believe Stearns is in the former camp and not the latter.

That's probably the most undervalued (and important) commodity in all of baseball. Whatever mix of "scout vs SABR" you're using, if your plan is to find undervalued players, you'd better have good people and systems in place for assigning value. I am still awed by the fact that teams spend hundreds of millions on players, and even managers, but they pay a relative pittance to the guys who are charged with valuing the players and putting a winning team together. A player can help or hurt a team for a short period, while a GM (and his staff) can build a build a dynasty or destroy a franchise.

Between the trades we made this season, a potential top 5 pick in next year's draft, and the opportunity to trade away guys like Lind and Lucroy, we should really have an infusion of young talent that could make for a bright future. C'mon Stearns. You're set up... knock this out of the park.

"Analytical thinking," or "Moneyball" isn't about putting a pathetic team on the field and building with high draft picks. It happens that many new GMs have come on board at the point the team needs to be rebuilt (like the Brewers are doing now), so they have used the draft to get talent, but that's probably more coincidence than strategy. Modern analysis in baseball is about finding value. Sell off what everyone is overvaluing and stockpile what is undervalued. Human nature often leads to herd-like thinking, and everyone pushing for what worked yesterday. Value-seekers will try to "feed the beast" by offering up what everyone is scraping for and getting paid well for it. This really emulates the Graham & Dodd methodology of investing (Ben Graham is the guy who taught Warren Buffett). The final printing of his "The Intelligent Investor" was in 1943, so it's really an old school way of thinking, it's just new to the baseball world. Don't worry, just as in the stock market, buying value and sticking to the "boring old plan" will never be something everyone will embrace. Even when it's shown to work, it's too sexy to chase after what's hot. Time will tell, but I like the route Attanasio is attempting. Hopefully he picked a good one, and hopefully Melvin will be around to help him on the "here's how to talk to this GM" stuff, and Stearns will be free to build the team.

Agree. We should have a low opening day MLB payroll next year, and I would far rather see them pay extra to get some potential stars in the draft rather than overpaying in free agency at the MLB level. Additionally, I believe the international signing money is also dependent on how you finish, meaning that we would have a lot more money to spend in the international market with a worse finish this season.

No. First of all, "nearly every thread" is a gross exaggeration, as far as I can tell. I'm not going to bring race up gratuitously -- I've made it my internal rule not to be the first to bring it up in any conversation -- but I'm going to respond to points about race if I want to, where it's relevant to baseball. If you don't like that line of discussion, you can ignore it, but you don't get to shut it down because it annoys or offends you. If it gets gratuitous, or out of the boundaries of baseball discussion, the mods can and (I assume) will shut it down. There are a lot of meaningful things going on in the world. I come here to get away from that and discuss baseball. It is why the community here has made a point of keeping politics out of discussions. I am not offended by discussions about race, I just know that they get heated and really do not need to be included in a discussion about baseball unless you just want to be a "race baiter," trying to get people riled up. (I guess the internet term would be "Troll.") No one is going to solve racism by discussing it here, nor are they going to change anyone else's mind, they're just going to get people upset. I've been coming here for over a decade, and don't remember any discussions about race until recently, when it seems to be happening fairly often. As I said, we can go virtually anywhere on the internet and there will be a discussion about race, I'd just like to come here to get away from the serious issues going on "out there." As to the "you don't get to shut it down because it annoys or offends you" BS, you're acting like a child, and I think you're better than that.

Could we please stop putting racism discussions into nearly every thread? I love this site and don't want it to turn into a constant racism discussion. If I want that discussion there's basically every other site on the internet I can go to read that.

I think your points 2,3,4 can be directly related to coaching or at least, a lack of organizational focus. Players made really awful decisions on the field at the start of the season. Roenicke's penchant for bunting out of potential big innings was also infuriating. The bolded part is where I was going. I really hope the new regime starts some kind of "you can't advance in our system unless you ____." Insert your favorite trait into the blank (walk 1 in 10 PAs, play good defense, steal bases at a certain % rate, show control on the mound, etc). By the time the players are major leaguers, it's probably too late to change them, and in today's world the players have more clout than the coaches. If you want to have certain traits in your players, you have to draft the right players and train them at the early levels when they will listen. We have some good talent at the low levels of the system, and should add more if we get high picks in the next couple of drafts, so we need to have a good system in place to mold them into the type of MLB players we want. Which brings us to topic of the thread, of course it matters where you draft. That's the whole purpose of how the draft is set up. It's not an exact science, but if it didn't matter, then why have the draft in the first place. I get that people are skeptical of the way the Brewers have drafted in the past, but in that case we should change the guys drafting (which occurred, and it now appears we're drafting better). I'm no expert on the matter, but it looks to me like we currently have two guys (Arcia and Phillips) who have a decent shot at being stars, a number of guys who could be decent MLB players, and a bunch of guys who have a good shot at contributing at the MLB level. That's much better than we were a couple of years ago, when we didn't seem to have any star power in the system, but it can always get better. Getting a top 5 pick would seem to have a lot better chance of adding that star power than getting the 10-15 pick. I get both sides of this. It's hard to root for "your team" to lose, but it would help the future of the franchise if they did.

It's clear to me Roenicke and his coaches did a terrible job preparing this team. Then they must have done a bang up job preparing them for last season. I just think this team is (or at least was prior to the trades) composed to be streaky: 1) They are mainly free swingers and rely heavily on the long ball 2) They steal/take extra bases, but run into a lot of outs 3) They often give the other team "extra outs" with below par defense 4) They swing out of their shoes with runners in scoring position I could go on, but I can't blame "lack of Spring Training preparation" to account for the fact that since 2012 the Brewers have been prone to extreme hot and cold streaks.

This is called being a professional. He didn't storm up to the front office and make a scene. He did the chain of command approach because he is frustrated with the situation and probably himself as well. Had he stormed up there, all people would be talking about is how big of a jerk he is and would hate him. I commend him for being a bigger person and taking the appropriate steps in this matter. Sure he's sucked this year, but this is one area you can't knock him on. This is professional sports, where players get promoted/demoted all the times... often with far less "leash" than the Brewers have given Garza. If he wanted to "be a professional," he should have knocked on Counsell's door (not Melvin's) and had a civil discussion about how he can best help the team. He should then have thanked Counsell for guaranteeing him a spot in the 2016 rotation instead of making him earn it.

Agree. I think Lind will be traded in the offseason and one of Santana or Braun will be moved to first. Santana seems like he should be a decent OF, but that big frame would be a nice target at 1B. Leave Davis in LF where is bad defense does the least harm, and let some warm body fill in at CF until Phillips is ready. Since he is going to knock Santana out of CF anyhow, I would rather have the good player (Braun or Santana) make the position change in the offseason rather than mid-season.

So yes, if the only players you add to your farm for about a decade come from the draft, while you routinely trade from the farm to add to the MLB roster, then making moves like the Garza signing became "necessary," as long as you are still trying to extend your "window."

The only reason I'd want Garza pitching in the rotation next year is under hopes that he could rebuild some trade value. Otherwise, I'd much rather give the rotation spot to one of the younger guys. It stinks for the Brewers, as they either have to use a roster spot on him and pay him to pitch, or cut him and pay him to pitch for someone else. With his refusal to pitch, it would be nice if they could somehow not have to waste a 25-man roster spot on him. It doesn't matter now, since it's September, but it could matter next year if they want to make him a reliever and he refuses. He shouldn't be rewarded for that behavior by essentially being able to force the team to cut him so he can be signed (and paid) elsewhere while still getting paid by the Brewers. I'm all for both sides being obligated to the contract, but if he refuses to play, he is not living up to his side of the deal, so the Brewers should be able to opt out of the contract, thereby forcing Garza to either pitch out of the bullpen or give up the money still owed on the contract. It's the MLB. Players get demoted or moved to the bench all the time. They normally don't get a full season of terrible play to get things together. Garza needs to shut his mouth, accept his role, and work hard to try to regain a spot in the rotation. He should also call his agent and thank him for finding an owner gullible enough to get him an extra year on his contract. He may lose some money with the Brewers' move here, but he'd probably be out of baseball making nothing a year earlier without his agent's direct line to Attanasio.

I know these types of trades will never be popular, but I love them. The ability to trade away good, "proven" MLB guys with limited team control for multiple talented but unproven prospects with six years of cheap team control each is a tool teams like the Brewers need to take advantage of if they want to remain relevant. By the time Gomez is signing his monster contract that the Brewers wouldn't be able to touch, hopefully Santana will have proven himself worthy of a pre-arby extension that is well within the Brewers' budget and will keep him with the team for a long time. And he's not even supposed to be the Crown Jewel of this trade... at the same time the above is happening, Phillips will be receiving his Rookie of the Year award :-) And yes, hopefully 5-7 years from now, Santana will have played well enough that we can have the conversation of how many good prospects we will receive for him in trade. Such is the life of a small market team in today's baseball.

They were playing so bad earlier this season that you knew they were going to play better. I'm just glad they waited until after they made some trades for the future before they got hot. I'm also glad that it's the young guys who are performing well, and the hot streak isn't because Lohse finally remembered how to pitch. I understand the sentiment behind this thread, and I hope they don't end up with the 13th pick or something like that, but I am glad to see the young guys playing well. I still think they should trade away K-Rod and Lind this offseason, and I hope this hot streak doesn't lead Brewer management to sign another aging vet to a four-year deal that we're begging to get out of in a couple of years, but I hope this shows the "casual fan" that it is fun to cheer for talented young guys whose names you might not have known a year ago. I've second-guessed a lot of Brewer management's decisions over the past few years, but I can't cheer for the Brewer players, especially the young ones, to play poorly.

I always think of Carlos Marmol when people bring up using the best reliever in tight situations. He was dominant early in his career, and became the guy the manager used in tight situations. The problem became that every game (even blowouts) had tight situations, so the manager couldn't seem to give him any rest. Even once he became the closer, he was still brought in for non-save situations. From 2008 to 2011, he had 82, 79, 77, and 75 appearances, sometimes for multiple innings. Not surprisingly, he became far less effective, and I'm surprised his arm didn't fall off. Managers should be smart enough not to do this, but when they are in a situation of "win or get fired," as all managers are, it is tough not to abuse someone like this. Maybe limiting your best guy to save situations (and next best guy in 8th inning, etc) isn't the ideal way to use him, but at least it helps monitor things to keep him fresh. Plus, as danzig noted, how does anyone know the best situation. Using him in a bases loaded situation in the 6th one day means he isn't available later that game, and may mean he isn't available in a one-run 9th inning the next day. There probably isn't a perfect way to manage a bullpen, but most times managers have tried some type of committee approach it hasn't worked, so I'm fine allowing one guy to get some accolades for being called the closer. edit: to the K. Loe reference, that was just poor management altogether. He obviously should have only been used against RH batters, preferably coming in with runners on, as he got righties to ground out regularly. He never should have been used against lefties, so he never should have been given an "8th inning guy" role, where he came in no matter who was due up to bat.

Unfortunately, the success we're currently having could hamper our rebuild. We're now sitting with the 7th overall pick in the draft, and there are eight other sub-.500 teams just waiting for us to catch them. I wouldn't be surprised if we once again end up out of the top ten draft spots due to a meaningless late-season hot streak.