monty57

Monty, the June ERA for the Brewers was 5.37. With tonight's result I think July will be around 5.6. The Brewers have posted losing records in both months. To then conclude that the productivity of the offense is what will determine the team's destiny makes no sense. Okay, let me clarify. I know the pitching is bad, but basically #'s 2-5 in the rotation have been almost interchangable. One outing they'll go six innings, giving up 2 runs and the next outing they'll give up 7. One pitcher, even if it's Halladay, won't fix that. He will help, but we'll still have bad pitching. The problem is that when we give up 4 runs, we only score 2. We only seem to score a lot of runs when we give up 10+. Yes, our pitching is bad. Not surprisingly, the downfall really began around the time Bush got beaned in the arm and Parra struggled to throw strikes. Since Parra has come back, Suppan has gotten hurt. For some reason, Looper likes close games. If the offense only scores 3, he'll keep the other team down. If the offense scores a lot, he makes sure the opposing team gets back in the game. Unfortunately, he's the only pitcher our offense seems to score runs for. So I ask, who does Halladay replace? It won't be Yo, but simply replacing one dead arm will still leave three question marks in the rotation at least until Bush and Suppan come back fully healthy. Now, that said, if our offense gets it together, we will win many of the games we've been losing. I don't have time now to go back through game logs, but we've surrendered a lot of 10+ run games, which will have a big negative effect on ERA, especially when you're only looking at two months data. Assume we lose those games, so take those numbers out, and we've got a lot of winnable games we lost simply due to the fact that we didn't score many runs. I'm really a proponent of selling now, but as I said I understand why they didn't sell. I just think picking up Halladay would not have gotten them to the playoffs. Then, he'd become a free agent after the season (his contract allows him to do that), and we'd be a much, much worse team next year without much hope of getting better, as we would have traded away the pieces that will keep us in playoff contention for the next 6-8 years. Even with this belief, I was still optimistic enough to believe that if somehow Hardy, Hart and Cameron all got hot, and Fielder, Braun, Lopez, Counsell and McGehee remained hot, they could sneak into the playoffs, even with the pitching staff occasionally giving up 10+ run outings. Then Hart went and got hurt, and it looks like we won't have Bush or Suppan back for a good part of August. Now we'll be stuck with Hall seeing significant playing time in RF to try to boost his trade value. I'm for this, as it's a move for next year, but you can't get half pregnant. If you're willing on carting out Hall and giving us another black hole in our offense, why not go all out and trade some of our FAs to be (Cameron, Hoffman, Counsell, Kendall) to try to land solid pieces for the future? In addition to "trying to boost Hall's value," we'd also be able to see if Gerut has enough in the tank to be our CF next season. Cameron and Hoffman could be Type A FA's, so we should be able to get good talent back, as the receiving team should get a early draft picks when they're gone.

This seems like the perfect excuse for Melvin / Mark A. to become sellers (assuming they get guys through waivers). From a PR standpoint, it would have been tough to convince everyone that you were doing the right thing before all of the injuries. Now, a statement like "We really had a good team put together, and were trying to make the playoffs for a second straight year, but key injuries to Weeks, Suppan, McClung, Bush and Hart made us realize that our best course of action was to get good value out of the guys we would have lost after the season anyway," should be enough to convince even the casual fan that they made an attempt, but all of these injuries will make it really tough for the Brewers to remain competitive. I wish he'd have stayed longer at AAA, but since he's up I think that Hall should get as many ABs as possible in an attempt to showcase him for a trade. Teams know he can play 3B, SS, 2B, CF, LF and now RF. If he can put together a good month, maybe they'll get something for him, and more importantly, lose his salary so that we can hopefully bring in some pitching and sign our key young players.

I didn't see the bit you're talking about, but from your post, I think I agree with Nate. Kirkjen has to know that Melvin publicly stated that he wasn't moving Gamel or Escobar, and if you look at most of the trades made, they included lots of young pitchers going to the selling team. The Brewers don't have that. I'd agree with him that teh Brewers can't keep giving up prospects like they did for CC, but you are correct that he was wrong if he said the farm's depleted. I also agree with you that if Mark A thought a trade would put us over the edge he would have ponied up the cash to do it, and that one pitcher would not make all the difference, so it was better to do nothing than to give up our future for something that wouldn't even get us to the playoffs this season.

Yeah, it's hard for me to give up just yet as well. The Cubs have really been hurt by injuries this season, and with plenty of head-to-head games left v. STL & CHN, this race is far from actually being over. Good point, IIRC, our September schedule is loaded with games against the Cubs and Cards. If we can stay in it until then (when we hopefully will have our full staff back), we could make up a lot of games in the last month. Edit: Of course, we'll have to be able to hold onto 7-1 leads agasint the one of the worst teams in baseball for that to make any difference (said as we gave up said lead against the Padres)

The way I see it, if the Brewers' offense picks up, they could make the playoffs without any big moves being made. If the offense doesn't pick up, they will not make the playoffs even with a big move being made. So, the only thing I didn't want to see was a big move that cost us a significant part of our future. I'm surprised by how many people seem to forget how important our top prospects are to our team. I'm really glad that Melvin didn't trade Braun a few years ago, when they could have used help, or Fielder/Hardy when Sheets and Ohka got hurt a few years ago and they needed a pitcher. We'd be in really bad shape if we'd have traded this "player who's too fat to play first base and will wear out quickly" and our "all field, no bat shortstop coming off an injury" for a one-year rental of a starting pitcher. Why would it be a good idea now to trade our top prospects for a rental? I'm a Brewers fan now, and I'll still be a Brewers fan in the future. Picking up one pitcher won't do that much to help us get into the playoffs this year. Trading Gamel, Escobar and others will significantly hurt our chances of making the playoffs in the future. The risk isn't worth the reward. I understand the desire to sell right now, and have even been a proponent of it, as we have some players with which we could probably put together a deal for young pitching (Hardy+ for Bucholz; Cameron+ for young Yankee pitcher) that could help us into the future. That said, I figured we'd probably go the route we seem to be going (standing pat with what we have). If the team gets it together, we could still make a run at the playoffs, especially if Bush and Suppan can get healthy quickly, and Parra keeps his head on straight. The team needs to keep a competitive team on the field for ticket sales, as many Brewers fans are finally coming back after being disenfranchised at the end of the Selig era. Selling off now could seriously hamper ticket sales next year. Finally, at the end of the season, we should get draft picks for Hoffman, Lopez and Cameron. On topic for the thread, I don't see anything wrong with the move, although I, too understand why people are saying "anyone but Claudio." We need a major league pitcher right now, and we gave up virtually nothing to get one. Personally, I'm surprised Rottino wasn't let go after the draft to make room for all of the players. I think everyone on the board will agree that we will need to make a big push at landing a solid starter in the offseason, and I'm still in the camp that believes some package containing JJ Hardy will land us that pitcher.

In the article, it mentions that Hall asked for a trade last season when he lost the starting job, and he said he heard there were rumors that other teams were looking at him. It sounds to me like he's going to AAA to showcase himself for a trade. No one will block him, so he'll be tradeable well after the July 31 deadline.

This would lead to the mammoth signing bonuses NFL players get, and also to players sitting out the season to re-negotiate their contracts. I used to grumble about the guaranteed contracts in MLB, but in real life a contract's a contract, and both sides that sign it should live up to it. Signing more incentive-laden contracts would be an alternative, but every team in baseball would have to do it, and that would lead to the goofy collusion rule.

Ding, Ding, Ding!! But there just was nobody available is the same argument you'll here concerning #1 or #2 type pitchers. That, or it's too cold or...free agents don't come to Milwaukee....or point to one rumoured argument that C.C. was offered 100M, but he turned it down. I think that one of the worst signings (Suppan) actually had a net benefit of helping make us a team free agents looked at. It's not nearly to the extent of Reggie White for the Packers, but Suppan was a sought after FA that chose Milwaukee, and in the recent years, we've slowly felt the ice melt around free agents' feelings towards becoming a Brewer. I agree with you that this should no longer be an arguement against FA signings anymore. As far as the "rumored argument that CC was offered 100M," Melvin himself said the offer was out there. He didn't verify the number, but he did verify the offer. It did, to some extent, hamstring us from making an offer to any other FAs until CC had formally accepted the Yankees' offer, which could be why we had to settle on Looper. To Doug's credit, he tried to sign Randy Johnson, who chose to play on the West Coast, closer to his home and he apparently approached Lowe, who didn't want to play in Milwaukee. People argue that another GM will take us back into the days of pre-Melvin. For me, it's more of a worry than an arguement. We had some bad GMs, and now things are so much better than they were, that I'd hate to rock the boat simply to rock the boat. It's possible we'd find someone better, but Melvin's done a good job and there is a good chance any replacement wouldn't be as good, and could be much worse. I would argue that most of the detractors think Melvin has done a fine job overall, and are speculating that he won't do a good job in the future, which to me seems a little illogical. Well, what exactly is going to be the arguments when it's 2012, the crop of minor league talent doesn't blossom as expected, the wave of great hitters (minus Braun) are too expensive to keep and our window is gone. Without any change in attitude towards pitching, this team wins around 72 games in 2009, 2010, 2011 and we'll be right back to the pre-Melvin days. It's been great what's he's done, but it's time for him to adapt and change to the ecomony of the Brewers today (85M) and change in the way other GM's are building successful ballclubs if he wants to get over the top. I think the theory with the young pitchers is that since they are at risk of injury/flameout, we should stockpile so many of them that some of them have to work out. We have quite a few pitchers from rookie ball to Brevard County that even if some of them flame out or become injured, some of them have to pan out. If they put together three full squads of above average pitchers in the low minors and none of them make it to the bigs, then we absolutely need a complete overhaul of our entire management, including medical staff and every minor league coach and instructor. I'd prefer to assume that the probable is going to happen rather than making a rash decision (like firing a good GM) based on an improbable occurance. As far as the hitters becoming too expensive, I've touched on this in previous posts, but I think Gamel and Escobar need to be given Braun-type contracts. In my opinion, it's a shame that the trend of offering these long term deals to pre-arby players came a year or two too late for our "first wave" of talented hitters. Fortunately, Melvin & Co. have done a fine job of filling up the minors with position players to take over for most every hitter we'll lose, with the pronounced exception of Prince Fielder. I would love to see them lock him up for a few extra years, but I don't think the economics of baseball and the presence of Scott Boras will allow for that to happen. If the goal is to be status-quo, just good enough for 75 win team and hope to god it continues to draw 2.75M fans, then Melvin is your man. Again, we have a good farm system and talent at the major league level. I'd actually lilke to see us sell, but if we play out the year with the current roster, we're better then we've been playing lately, and should end up with 85 or so wins. Match that with our recent years: 2008 - 90 wins 2007 - 83 wins 2006 - 75 wins 2005 - 81 wins 2004 - 67 wins 2003 - 68 wins 2002 - 56 wins 2001 - 68 wins and I think Melvin has turned us from a bottom dweller into at least a perennial .500 or better team with a shot at the playoffs in most years. Our incoming talent suggests that we can be as good or better in the coming years than we have been in the recent years, especially if he makes some wise moves in the near future. First, trade Hardy+ for a good, young starter to make us a better contender next year and into the future. Second, if at all possible, sign Fielder for a couple more years (easier said than done). If he will not sign, he unfortunately will probably need to be traded for a boatload of young talent this offseason, or for a little less talent the following offseason. Third, lock up Yo, Gamel and Escobar so they will be around as the next group of young talent comes through. Fourth, continue to lock up top prospects while they are pre-arby. Finally, continue to stockpile high draft picks to keep the minor leagues chock full of talent.

Good post adam, and I too hope our organization learns from all of its mistakes (and its successes, too). One point on Suppan's contract; many posters who were against the Suppan signing at the time were against it because it would likely mean that we wouldn't have money to re-sign Sheets when his contract was up. They were right. However, if we hadn't signed the deal we did, would we have signed Sheets to and extension, and now be stuck paying Sheets $17-18MM to sit home and nurse an elbow that may never be the same? Don't get me wrong, I wish we had $12-14MM to find a replacement for Suppan next season rather than paying him to pitch, but I understand why the deal was done at the time, and it's possible we'd be in worse shape as a franchise if we hadn't done the deal. Hopefully, the young pitchers coming up will allow us to not have to overpay for "average-ish" pitchers on the FA market in the future.

Our rise to contender wasn't due to brilliant Beane-esk moves Such as drafting three pitchers that amazingly never got hurt and all managed to acheive their full potential for the years they were with Oakland, and then filling the roster with players who shot steroids to become elite players (Giambi, Tejada). I say that half jokingly, as I understand that Beane is a good GM, but he has got lucky at some points, and has made bad moves just like any GM. The fact that his MVP players (and likely others) who played a big part in his winning seasons were steroid users probably didn't hurt his teams' performance. You're not listening to what we are saying. It's not about 2009 (the next two months) anymore. It's about 2010, 2011, 2012...his proven track record of failing to acquire any pitching. Good starting pitchers, whether acquired through FA (see CC & Lowe's recent contracts) or trade are the most expensive commodities on the market right now. Going back to Beane, think Moneyball... it's about valuation, stockpile what's cheap and trade it away when it becomes expensive. Don't trade cheap commodities for expensive ones. In today's market, apparently a very good (if not superstar) shortstop (JJ Hardy) won't net an unproven AAA pitcher (Buchholtz). It looks to me like Melvin has tried to get the pitching we all want, but it's too expensive, so he's going at it another way. He's signing players that will net him draft picks, and he's using a large number of those draft picks to stockpile pitching. Next year, if we don't firesale this season, we could have three first round picks (ours, one for Hoffman, one for Cameron if they are Type A), and three sandwich picks (Hoffman, Cameron, Lopez). That should help keep young pitchers coming into the system. We have next year to worry about, when our rotation will consist of Yo, Bush, Parra, Suppan and someone to replace Looper. As I've said, I think Hardy will be traded for this pitcher. We then should have a good crop of yong pitchers who are now in the low minors, but should be getting about ready to step in when Suppan and Bush are gone the following year. After that, we could have a surplus of pitchers, which would be a great luxury, similar to where Tampa Bay is sitting right now. We should also have position talent to go along with these pitchers, as all of our current roster except Fielder (and Braun, who's signed) seem to have a replacement in waiting in the minor leagues. I'm with you that it's not about this year. We came in with an adequate rotation, but no depth, and were at the top of the division until Bush got hurt and Parra forgot how to throw strikes, at which point we didn't have anyone to replace them. Depth at SP was our obvious weakness coming into the season. Bush is out for at least a few more weeks, the Cubs are playing like they were expected to, and St. Louis is selling the farm to win this year, so I think it's about time to start looking to the future, and I would not be at all disappointed if Melvin started selling right now. Hoffman and Cameron could net a decent return. If JJ won't get Buchholz by himself, maybe JJ & Hoffman could get Buchholz and a decent minor leaguer. I would guess that we probably won't sell, which in my mind is a small knock against Melvin, but we are still technically in contention, so I wouldn't blame him too much. As far as the future, I'm not as worried as some of you. We need to fill one hole in the rotation next year, and unless a LOT of young pitchers completely flame out, or we do something stupid like trading away all of our talent in a futile attempt to win this season, we have the talent to be a playoff contender for a long time. The team that has been a playoff contender for the last few years was mostly built by Melvin and his staff, and the solid minor league rosters that will keep us in playoff contention for the foreseeable future were built by Melvin and his staff. He's done a good job.

This as judged by his whopping 4.2 IP in Philadelphia and 2.2 IP this year with the Brewers?

If last offseason truly was an anomoly, then he could probably sign a multi-year deal. I'd guess a lot of players (Adam Dunn, Braden Looper, Trevor Hoffman, Pat Burrell) thought they'd get more than they eventually signed for last offseason. Things seem to be turning around in the economy, and if the market (for players, not the stock market) is somewhat closer to normal then he'll have to decide which is better: 1) Take the sure $4-5MM one-year deal, ride the bench and watch your stock plummet, leading to a much lower contract the following season 2) Reject arby, and become a free agent, where you should be able to sign a multi-year deal with much more than $4-5MM guaranteed. As with everything, there's risk. By offering arby, the Brewers risk having him around another year for $4-5MM. By rejecting arby, Lopez risks the FA market remaining soft, where he may not get the multi-year deal he likely wants. From the Brewers' standpoint, I would think the risk is minimal. On one side, you get a sandwich pick, on the other, you get a good player on a reasonable one-year deal. From Lopez's standpoint, the risk is somewhat greater, but so is the reward - take the guaranteed money for one year or reject that and either get a lot more guaranteed money in a long-term deal or slightly less guaranteed money in a one-year deal if the market is still soft.

It begs the question, who of the current core major leaguers would you have had Melvin sign long term? I started asking for a long-term deal on Prince after his rookie year, but that was before those type of deals were done. I would have liked to have seen them lock Hardy up as well. Even if we were planning on trading him, his trade value would be higher now if he was under control for three more years instead of one. Hart was offered, and it's looking like it was good he rejected. Weeks has been too sporadic since day 1 (probably because he was rushed to the majors), so I wouldn't have offered him a deal, and still would be hesitant to offer an extension, even though he looked very good in his limited PT this year. I don't knock Melvin for not signing these guys, as the "Braun-style" contracts were unheard of until recently (Braun was one of the first). I just hope he locks our next crop of stars up quickly. Looking forward, I hope Yo is signed soon, as our biggest need now and always is SP, and he'll start getting really expensive if we wait too much longer. If Gamel and Escobar are everything they're purported to be, they should be talked to next year (assuming Hardy is gone and Escobar and Gamel are both starting). Then we've got Yo, Braun, Gamel and Escobar to build on. As other prospects rise through the system (Lawrie, A/A+ pitchers as they hit the majors), they should also be approached as necessary. Because of the "cheap" years, an 8 year deal to someone in their rookie/sophomore season is relatively inexpensive. I think Braun is 8 years, $40MM. There is risk, so these contracts should only be doled out to "can't miss" prospects. For instance, even with Parra's "stuff," and our need for SP, he's probably too much of a risk of flame-out to offer a long-term deal to. Even with "can't miss" prospects that have made the majors, you will still have some that miss, but it is mitigated somewhat in that they have at least made it to the majors, and have a season under their belt. By locking these guys up you gain payroll certainty, and get your cornerstone players for eight years instead of six. Plus, if the player is really panning out, you could always re-negotiate the contract and get him for a few more years for a little more money.

It's not going to be the move that pushes us into the playoffs, but it could improve the team, and probably more importantly, if he is allowed to pitch, it will allow us to see if Swindle is a capable LH option out of the 'pen. He seems to have proven that he can get minor leaguers out, but it would be nice to have two inexpensive bullpen lefties (along with Stetter) set for the next 5-6 years.

My biggest issue with Melvin isn't even the pitching, it's the year to year way he's managed the contracts with the majority of our players. I want him to identify who his core players are and extend them as far as possible, which extends our competitive window as far as possible. I've beat that to death in a couple of other posts in the thread though but I just wanted to be clear about my position. I agree, and have also harped on this for a long time. However, I don't think the trend of signing pre-arby guys began until recently (Braun, Longoria, Tulo). Once someone like Prince gets to arby, it's much harder to sign them long term, as (A) they're now millionaires. When someone's a rookie making $400,000, three years is an awful long time for them to wait to get a $million contract. A lot can happen in that time. (B) the contract is much more expensive. When averaging something over 6-8 years, one or two years of $400k brings the average down substantially It sounds like Melvin definitely approached Hart and Prince for an extension, and probably Hardy as well, but it was probably too far along in their careers before he made the offer. I really hope he locks up Yo ASAP and approaches Gamel, Escobar and future top prospects early in their careers. I know there's added risk to doing this, but locking up the core of your talent for 7-8 years and building around that makes a lot of sense.

Let's see if Macha will use him this time. What did he get 1/3 of an inning in two weeks the last time he was up?

Lopez is 29, and nearing the end of his window to get decent money in a multi-year deal. Barring something completely unforeseen, I can't see him accepting a role as a backup as a result of that. If he accepts arby, he does so with the full knowledge that weeks is our 2B, Hardy or Escobar is our SS, and Gamel or MaGehee is our 3B. That's pretty much my take on it. Last year's uncertainty about the economy kept most teams from spending money, but it's not likely to be that extreme this offseason. Lopez should be able to get a multi-year deal from someone. If Lopez accepts arby, he gets $4-5MM and is stuck in a bench role, meaning he would have almost no chance of getting a decent deal after next season. He could accept, but it would seem like a bad move for him career-wise. If he does accept, he's a great backup. We paid Counsell around $4MM last season, and Graffanino around that a couple years ago. Hall will probably be DFA'd after this season, so having another utility guy along with McGehee wouldn't be the end of the world.

I can't believe Macha would have any confidence in Villy as a starter at this point. I can't either. I think Macha's way of "getting his point across" to Melvin is to put players in a role in which they cannot possibly succeed, forcing Melvin to trade for a better player. Case in point, batting Kendall leadoff and only giving Gamel sporadic ABs, forcing Melvin to get Lopez. Notice that Macha made that comment in an article about the Brewers possibly trading for a pitcher.

I know the timelines get a bit cloudy though from time to time. More like in a fog. It's especially bad, since I lived in Beloit and watched those guys play there. With your reminder, I do recall that Taylor made the decision to start re-building from the farm up, and was run out of town largely due to Hammonds. He'll go down in Brewers lore in the same breath as Bando, but he really helped start the turnaround. That said, Melvin still didn't inherit a great situation, and I think he has to be given a lot of credit as to where we are today. I stand by the "person at top getting credit or blame for those under him" statement, even though he didn't initially hire Jack Z.

It's pretty hard to fire a GM that took us from a 56 win team in 2002 to a 90 win team in 2008. I'd agree if that GM was able to sustain that 90 win mark -- or get reasonably close to it. Six years is a pretty long time to reach the 90 win mark, if you can sustain it for a few seasons, that is awesome, if you hit it once, and then end up with < 80 wins the following season, it really is nothing special. Six years isn't that long when you consider that Melvin inherited a bad major league team with a terrible farm system. He first addressed the farm system, returning it to respectability, which has led us to becoming a playoff-caliber team for the past few seasons, and likely into the foreseeable future. There have been some really good posts throughout this lengthy thread, and I've enjoyed reading both sides of the debate. While I'm usually the one argueing against using aggregates vs. specific cases, I think when judging a GM, you have to use everything he's done as a whole piece of work, and not get bogged down by every single move. In truth, whether he won or lost a specific trade doesn't matter nearly as much as if he has achieved his goals. In a relatively short period of time, he turned a laughing stock of a major league franchise into a winning franchise. No team makes the playoffs every year, even if they have a $200MM salary, and only one team wins the World Series in any given year, so getting upset that we haven't made it to the World Series yet is probably a bit premature. TheCrew, excellent posts, and I agree with your line of thought. I called for Melvin to lock up Fielder and others several years ago, and took some knocks for it. Then, locking up players started to become a trend in MLB, but it came a season or two too late for our "first crop" of young talent. I really hope they continue to lock up our young studs (Yo, Gamel, Escobar, etc) the way they did Brauns. As far as pitching, it would seem that Melvin could have found someone to fill out the rotation better then he has, but I think that young pitchers are the most sought after commodity in baseball at this point. They can be found, but unless a GM is a complete idiot (Kazmir for Victor Zambrano), they are very expensive to acquire. Delmon Young was a #1 overall draft pick, so Garza wasn't picked up for nothing. We could probably have traded Prince or Braun for a #1 starter, but then where would our offense be? The best way to get good, young starters is to draft them and bring them up through the system, and as has been noted, this has been our organizational weakness for a while. Some of this is on Melvin, but much of it is simply bad luck of having nearly every good pitcher in the system end up with serious injuries. I think (purely a guess) that Melvin has tried unsuccessfully to land a young stud starter, but hasn't been able to land a deal. Therefore, he's picked up players that netted us additional draft picks, and he's used a lot of these high picks on starting pitchers. Sure, some of them won't pan out, but if you stockpile enough arms, some of them will make it. I mentioned this in another thread, but next year's staff will consist of Yo, Parra, Bush, Suppan and someone to replace Looper. I believe Hardy will be traded for a pitcher. Whether it will happen this week (Hardy and others - maybe even Hoffman - for Buchholtz or someone else) or this offseason is up in the air, but I don't expect to see Hardy in a Brewers' uniform next year. Then we will have Bush and Suppan gone the following season, which should be about when some of our young pitchers are getting ready for a call-up. Bottom line for me is that we are 1000x better now than we were when Melvin took over this franchise. We have a solid core of talent both in the majors and coming up through the system that should keep us good for a long time. Like anyone, some of Melvin's moves have turned out better than others, but as a whole, the net positive has far outweighted the negative. For what he's built from basically scratch, the thought of firing him had not entered my mind until this thread. On a final note, yes, Jack Z was good for the Brewers. Melvin hired him. No one looks at a good CEO and says, "Yeah the company's extremely profitable, but it's only because his Shipping Manager was good." The person at the top gets the benefit of taking credit for good work done by those he hired, just as he takes the blame for bad work done by those he hired. It seems that other than team manager, Melvin has done a good job at hiring staff.

Good call. I'm much more comfortable when DiFelice comes in (when used correctly and not allowed to throw to good lefties) then I ever was when Turnbow came in, even when Turnbow was "good." Pitchers who lack control seem to lose you as many games as they'll win you. They either look unbelievably good when they're throwing strikes or unbelievably bad when they're not. It would seem to be much easier on a manager when you know what you're going to get when you put a pitcher in.

For whatever it's worth, Perez and Todd (the rumor I heard somewhere) were the #3 and 4 prospects in the Cardinals system this offseason according to Baseball America. So the Cardinals have now traded their #1, 3 & 4 prospects (and others) to win this year. I'd have to guess that they're planning on locking up Holliday long-term, but they could still be hurting in the future with a mid-market budget and no farm system. The Brewers are in fourth place right now, and it looks like they'll be without Bush until at least mid-August. I'm generally an optimistic person, but I think it may be time to see what kind of return we can get for Cameron, Hoffman, Counsell, Kendall and anyone else who's a FA at the end of the year. Cameron and Hoffman could be Type A FAs, so they should net at least 1st round talent in a trade. Trading Kendall for anything would allow Salome to come up and get his feet wet so he's more prepared for starting duty next year.

We always seem to get the guy with the good fastball and no control. I'll be happy when I see that we've picked up a reliever with good control. The only two I can think of that fit this bill are Hoffman and Riske.

They can re-sign Holliday after the season, but it will be a market offer. No different than before the trade. Probably true, but they won't have to give up a 1st round pick. I don't know anything about the prospects they gave up, but if Wallace is indeed headed for 1B, he is blocked by Pujols. Holliday helps them win the central this year and won't cost them a draft pick if they re-sign him or nets them a 1st rounder and a sammy if he leaves. There's an element of risk involved, and they may well have lost out on the deal, but this definitely increases their chances of winning this season, and with their core, they should still be good for the next few seasons if they can re-sign him. If you buy a stock thats trading at $50 for $100 you overpaid no matter if that stock soard up to $125 or crashes to $12 in 3 years. But that $50 trade would be on the market by matching bid & ask prices. If there were no market (NYSE, AMEX, etc), and stocks were simply done via private transactions based on firms' analysts, as is the case in baseball, prices of stocks would have a much wider variance. Stock analysts disagree all the time on a stock's target price. Fangraphs is simply one "analyst." The problem is that there is a growing school of people who see one way of valuation to be the only possible school of thought, take that as gospel, and assume that anyone who chooses a different valuation tool is an idiot. I don't know who will win the trade in the long run, but it does seemingly make the Cards pretty likely to make the playoffs this season, and makes the Brewers' chances much slimmer. Right now, the best move for the Brewers would probably be to stand pat and see how they do with their current roster. At this point, I'd rather see them shop Cameron, Hoffman, Counsell, Kendall and anyone else on the final year of their contract, then have them trade away any of our future to try to keep up with the Cards, Cubs and the surprising Astros, who will probably make a big move of their own in the next week.

lcbj68c, Signing an elite FA and then going young could be an option. However, players only stay at league minimum for three years, and then the good ones start getting more expensive through arbitration. To sign a player like CC, or even Lowe last offseason required a long term deal. One elite pitcher can push a good team over the top, but standing alone doesn't do much. The Brewers are likely a $70MM-$90MM payroll team (I know that's a wide range, but I'd think $90MM is the "special case when they're going for it mid-season."). Putting $20+MM into one player eats up a lot of that payroll for 5-7 years, so there won't be much chance of adding anyone around him, and probably means trading away some good players early in the arbitration process to keep under budget. Plus, there's always the possibility that the one player the team is banking their entire future around gets hurt or underperforms, severely crippling their franchise for 5-7 years (ouch!). The closest to this the Brewers have come is probably Higuera. I agree that we don't want to have the highest paid player on our team be our fifth starter, and hopefully our young pitchers in Rookie/A/A+ will allow us the ability to not have to overpay for mediocrity in the FA market for years to come. Until they're here, I'd probably like to take our chances on one-year deals like the one for Looper, which has worked so far for Looper and Hoffman, but not so much with Gagne, or by trading a highly tradeable, but redundant piece, such as JJ Hardy for a good-and-still-cheap pitcher this offseason. Hopefully, we only have one more offseason to worry about this (fingers crossed while knocking on wood).