monty57

Short answer, in this case, is yes. If you are asking if we will be able to replace Grandal and Moose.. then probably no, but they were free agents. If we are talking about the non-tender pool (which we are) then the production we are replacing is Guerra, Claudio, Shaw, etc... and yes, I believe we can find those type players out there. Agree. We could sign a superstar, but I think it's more likely that we'll try to make up for losing Grandal by being average/above-average at positions where we were below average last year. OF: Braun will be Braun, Yelich will be Yelich, and we hope to get a bounceback from a healthy Cain. Gamel is a fine backup. IF: Pina and Nottingham/Freitas should bring league-average production, but this is an obvious offensive downgrade from last season. Stearns picked up Urias to be an upgrade at SS, and we should get a full year of Hiura instead of suffering through Shaw's 2019 production for half a season. 1B & 3B are big question marks that will have to be addressed. SP: We need help here, and I expect that's where some money will be spent. We have three "locks" (although nothing is a lock with Stearns) in Woodruff, Houser, and Lauer, but let's face it... none of these guys is a sure thing. I'd love to see us get someone we could slot in ahead of Woodruff. Ideally, I'd like a #1 and a veteran "innings eater," which would take pressure off the young guys and the bullpen. RP: Hopefully Knebel is back at 100%, and Hader can go back to the role he played in 2018, where he's much more valuable. I also hope that Suter can be a multi-inning reliever rather than a starter, which would help the pen a lot. They have some roles to fill, but a healthy Knebel will make our pen a strength. Mous was good for 3.2 WAR last year, but some of that was at 2B, which should be somewhat offset by a full year of Hiura. Shaw/Mous at 3B is a little easier to overcome, as Shaw brought -0.9 WAR last year and half of Mous would be 1.6, totaling 0.7 WAR to be replaced. Thames brought 1.6 WAR, while Aguilar (-0.1) and Austin (0.1) offset each other for 0 WAR value. If a full year of Hiura offsets what Mous did at 2B last year, we should be able to adequately replace our 1B/3B production from 2019, even if we don't land one of the star players. Any additions to the rotation would be welcome, and depending on what we do with 1B/3B could be what makes us a better team in 2020 than we were in 2019. It's not easy, but it's early and it will be interesting (and fun) to see how Stearns puts the pieces together.

Teams need a utility IF who can play solid defense at SS, and get some starts when people need rest or get hurt. Arcia fits that, and he is still young and could "find it" and be worth much more than that. If they had non-tendered him, they would have had to find a veteran utility guy who would cost just as much as Arcia, so this move makes sense.

Some of the players lost will hurt, but most of the players lost were getting expensive and didn't provide much value above simply putting a "replacement level" guy out there for league minimum. Aguilar -0.3 WAR Arcia -0.1 WAR (still on team, but could be relegated to utility "utility guy") Austin 0.1 WAR Perez -0.1 WAR Saladino -0.5 WAR Shaw -0.9 WAR Thames 1.6 WAR (I'm surprised we let him go) Albers -0.2 WAR Anderson 1.8 WAR (like Thames, moved for salary reasons) Claudio 0.6 WAR (new rule makes him less valuable) Guerra 1.3 WAR Jeffress -0.4 WAR Nelson -0.5 WAR Grisham 0.7 WAR & Davies 2.6 WAR were traded, so we got value back for them. The ones that hurt the most are Mous, Grandal & Pomeranz. These guys were all free agents, so we didn't have any claim over them. They signed big deals elsewhere. We have a lot of money (at least for by Brewer standards) to fill some holes with quality. I'm excited to see who we bring in. As shown above, many of the holes were created by dropping someone with negative "WAR value" last year so simply getting a positive-value guy there would be an upgrade. Really, they were bigger "holes" when we had a negative WAR guy making seven figures at the position. Cutting that guy and replacing him with a league-minimum zero WAR guy improves production and saves money to upgrade elsewhere. Our current depth chart has Braun starting at LF and 1B, and has Suter and Burnes as both starters and relievers. I guarantee those things won't happen. Stearns will make a lot of moves between now and Spring Training. Attanasio is going to want a team with realistic playoff chances. Enjoy this, it's fun.

That depends on whether you are looking at a player's value based on what he will do on the field, or his value on an open market. In the stock market, with millions of buyers and sellers, there are always companies trading for less than the company is probably worth based on valuations. These can be summed up with the generic term "Market inefficiencies." There are lots of reasons for this, and long-term investors (like Warren Buffet) have made a fortune looking for these deals. In baseball, there is only a market of 30 teams, so there are going to be a lot of inefficiencies as GM's put more emphasis on certain types of players over others, or simply because there is a greater demand for or supply of certain types of players at a given time. Like the stock market, there will be bids for every ask. If everyone wants that player (high demand), the bids go up, and the "market value" of the player will go up, even though he's the same player, so his "actual value" (how good he is, along with his contract) remains the same. With a limited amount of capital, as well as a limited amount of roster space, when the price of some players goes up, there are usually players who end up with a lower value than they "should." In my humble opinion, this was the underlying theme of Moneyball... rate players and look for market inefficiencies to find players trading for under what you think they are worth. Urias will not be a better or worse player based on what he's traded for, but this trade shows that his "market value" is probably less than previously thought. As Brewer fans, we have to hope that his real value continues to rise.

Not disagreeing with the premise of your post, but Ray was added to the 40-man. He's talented and the Brewers haven't given up on him. Per Cots, Merrifield has a remaining contract of 4 years / $16.25M with a 2023 option. That's pretty cheap for a good player, so they'd be giving up quite a bit on the hopes that Ray "finds it" after a down year last year.

It's an open market. Every team in baseball had the opportunity to sign Grandal, and the White Sox offer was the one he chose (so theoretically the largest offer). Of course we'll miss his production, but it doesn't make it a "value deal" when it was the highest price anyone would pay. Just because a player was a Brewer in 2019 doesn't mean that we have first right of refusal on his next contract. The Sox made him an offer and he accepted it. We don't know much more than that. Maybe he would have taken a move to Chicago even if the Brewers matched the offer. Maybe we matched several offers and the Sox just kept raising their bid. All we know is the end result, and not all the decisions made to get there. I agree that it will take a lot to make up for lost production, but free agency means that players will sometimes leave. Stearns made the conscious decision to trade Anderson and not exercise Thames' option. Those are decisions of which we can argue the merit. Stearns doesn't have any more say in where Grandal and Moose end up than any other GM in baseball, so we can't say "we should have signed him" any more for them than we can for every other free agent on the market. Since he is gone and we still want to be a contender next year, I hope that from a relative value standpoint the drop-off in moving from Grandal to Pina will be offset by an upgrade from our current worst starting pitcher to a good starting pitcher, and maybe an upgrade from what Arcia has done the last couple seasons to an above-average SS. There are a lot of moving parts in constructing a baseball team, so for instance the "WAR lost" from Thames could be made up for league minimum by moving Braun to first and letting Grisham start in the OF, freeing up Thames salary to "buy more WAR" at another position. I still think that the Brewers want to upgrade starting pitching this offseason, and with the rules changes I think that would be a smart move. It's early in the offseason, and if we're sitting here in February with the same roster we have today, I'll share in the pessimism some posters are currently feeling. Until then, it looks like we have a decent amount of freed up cash to fill a few holes on the roster, and I'll remain excited to see how Stearns plays it.

Every free agent on the market is being "lost" by the team they played for in 2019. It doesn't mean that every team losing a free agent is cheap or poorly run, it's just the way the system works. Just last season, Grandal was "lost" by the Dodgers when the Brewers signed him. The Dodgers aren't cheap or poorly run, and the Brewers certainly aren't the rich team in that comparison. The Dodgers just made the decision that they were better off letting Grandal walk, even when they were the only team in baseball that wouldn't lose a draft pick by signing him. The Brewers have only made the playoffs six times in their existence. Two of those have been in the past two seasons. I don't get the pessimism about how the team is being run. They are being run better now than they have ever been. It sucks that MLB allows some teams to have a significant financial advantage over other teams, but they do. If you want to complain, I'd suggest complaining about how the MLB set things up, don't complain about a front office that is actually doing a pretty good job of winning even when they are put at a competitive disadvantage. I get wanting to see the Brewers win the World Series. We all want to see that. In baseball, the team needs to be set up to make the playoffs. Once there, anything can happen. The Nationals just proved that. Stearns & Co. have done a good job putting together a playoff-caliber team. Attanasio wants to win just as much as any of us, and I believe he is going to do everything he can to get to his third straight playoffs (which the Brewers have never done). Stearns has money to play with and the team has some holes to fill. I'm excited to see what he'll do this offseason.

Not exercising Thames' option had to be a cost-cutting move to spend the $ elsewhere, so I don't think we're going to spend much on a first baseman. Braun is a sunk cost, so it makes a lot of sense to put him at 1B for his final season as a Brewer. If Shaw is back, he makes a good LH backup option/bat-off-the-bench. This also allows them to start Grisham at league minimum, again to spend the money elsewhere. I think they'll be in on Moose, as he shouldn't be overly expensive, seems to like it in Milwaukee, and hasn't been able to sign a long-term deal in the past so would probably take a short-term deal. This should leave them plenty of money to go after a starting pitcher, which should be an even greater need now that they can't call up as many people for September bullpen duty like they have the last two years.

Then kindly explain how you expect to fill all of those holes with limited resources? Limited resources? The payroll is sitting at where $90 million give or take? That's peanuts for a team that drew nearly 3 million. I think they have at least $40 million in payroll room for 2020, perhaps as much as $50 million. It's 2020, baseball revenues are up considerably from what they were when the Brewers couldn't afford to keep Fielder. If there was no luxury tax, the big revenue teams would all have payrolls over 300 million and still be making money. The Brewers revenue is in the middle of the division, considerably less than Cubs and Cards but tens of millions more than the Reds and Bucs. "Limited resources" simply means that there is a limit to their resources. Limited resources chasing after limited goods is the basis of economics. I don't think anyone means it as a jab at the Brewers, it's just a way of saying that no one can have everything they want. The Brewers have less overall resources than many other teams, but they have shed a lot of salary, so they have room to make moves. The question is simply how are they going to spend their limited resources. I have a feeling that Attanasio wants to do something big. Thames and Anderson weren't that expensive for their production, so there's a reason they're freeing up that salary. Things could change if prices get out of control, but I think he'd like to sign an ace pitcher. That's just a guess. "Something big" could also mean making big offers to Grandal and Moose, but my uneducated guess is that he'll try to sign one of the big starting pitchers. As to Moose and Grandal, they both signed the deals they did last offseason with the thought of testing the market this offseason. They both had big years, which helped both them and the Brewers. The Brewers made the playoffs, and the players probably earned themselves raises for the future. Neither one is going to sign a quick deal with the Brewers just because they played there last year. They've earned the right to sign the biggest deal they can sign. We'll just have to see how the offseason plays out, as Moose has tried the market twice and hasn't had any suitors, so he could be someone who once again signs a short-term deal late in the offseason. I think that of the two, Grandal is the one who is more likely to end up with a big deal in a big market, Moose seems the more likely to be there at the end of the offseason re-signing for a year or two with the Brewers. Bottom line is, we have some money and are certainly not going to sit back and do nothing. I'm excited to see how the Brewers attack this offseason.

This could be a good value pick-up. Not that long ago, everyone wanted pitchers who kept the ball on the ground. Now everyone wants guys with high K rates, so you can pick up groundball pitchers for nothing. Throughout his career, 2/3 to 3/4 of the batters Yardley has faced have hit the ball on the ground. Not a bad pitcher for a HR park like Miller/AmFam.

I assume if the player plans, they "reside" in a tax friendly state. That way they are only paying Wis tax on the 81 home games and then whatever the state tax is where they play away games. I would assume that works. I believe it's where they earn their income, so WI would get taxes on the income made for the 81 games played there (plus home playoffs). Every other state in which he played would get income for the games played there, and the neutral state in which he resides would get taxes for income made while there, which may include a pro-rated portion of his ancillary revenues (shoe deal, commercials, etc.) but not for his baseball salary. I could be wrong on this, I'm not a CPA. Regardless, I agree with the previous poster who said that Pomeranz pitched himself out of Milwaukee's price range. We have a lot of holes to fill, and I don't think that him - at the contract he'll probably receive - is going to be the best use of their funds.

With the Brewers declining Thames' option, that was the first thing I thought when I saw the -13.2. With Grisham and Gamel on the roster and no viable 1B alternatives, it makes sense to move Braun to 1B for his last season as a Brewer. If they're going to do that, I hope they've already told him and he's already practicing, and I hope that they just let him play first and don't bounce him around. Yelich, Cain, Grisham/Gamel in the OF with Braun at 1B leaves one less hole to fill via free agency or trade this offseason and frees up some cash to upgrade elsewhere. I don't look forward to the right side of the infield defense of Huira and Braun, but it might be out best alternative. Heck, if he puts all of his offseason into practicing first base, maybe he'll only be really bad and not historically awful.

Grandal, Moustakas, and now Thames are free agents, so they should be looked at the same as all other free agents. I know we have an affinity for them because they played here, but they're going to test the market like everyone else, and the Brewers need to do the same. If they are indeed the best fit to help the team to the playoffs next year, then Stearns should make an offer. If someone else is a better fit, then go with the someone else. Stearns can't focus on what he's going to do with Grandal and Moustakas. Unless they're going to give him some super deal because they love the Brewers, he needs to treat them like every other free agent on the market. To topic, it will be interesting to see what's going to happen at first base. They have the option of putting Braun there, opening playing time for Grisham. Otherwise, they don't have a "sure thing" in their system, so if Braun's not the answer, I hope Stearns can find a cheap productive player. I don't imagine they're going to use their free cash to "go big" on a first baseman and it's really nice to get offensive production from your first baseman. To start 2018, we had Thames, Aguilar and Choi. Now we have a question mark.

Kind of surprised they're letting Thames walk. They did have a higher-than-expected payroll last year, and we do have to pay a decent chunk of money for Moose and Grandal's opt-out incentives, so it will be interesting to see what happens. It's possible they went over payroll last year after the 2017 run, and they may bring it back a little this season. If that's the case, with all of our arby raises we could be under-whelmed with this offseason. On the other hand, if there is a chance to get a "game changer," Attanasio has always been willing to free up some extra cash. Without the ability to bring up a busload of relievers in September this season, I could see them pushing hard for a legitimate starting pitcher. While I could see them dropping opening day payroll, I can't imagine that Attanasio will sit back too much after back-to-back playoff seasons. He'll want to improve. I'm interested to see some of the other moves that should be coming. If we let some other guys (like Shaw) go, then I'd have to think Stearns/Attanasio are freeing up cash and aiming for a big signing or two.

https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2019/11/brewers-josh-hader-super-two-cutoff-arbitration.html Super Two cutoff point is the lowest ever, and Josh Hader will be eligible for arby MLBTraderumors expects he'll get substantially more than the $3.65M Knebel received when he was Super Two.

http://m.mlb.com/glossary/transactions/26th-man

From MLB.com: Impending rule changes that will go into effect at the start of the 2020 season Beginning in 2020, the roster size from Opening Day through Aug. 31 (and during the postseason) will increase from 25 to 26, with the minimum number of players on the roster increasing from 24 to 25, and roster sizes for doubleheaders increasing from 26 to 27. The minimum number of days a player will need to remain in the Minors after being optioned will increase from 10 to 15, with the same exceptions in play. The 40-man active roster for September will be eliminated. From Sept. 1 through the end of the regular season, all clubs must carry 28 players. Furthermore, the number of pitchers a club can carry on the active roster will be capped (maximum number TBD). To adhere to that rule, clubs will have to designate each player as either a pitcher or a position player prior to each player's first day on the active roster for a given season. That designation cannot change for the remainder of the season. Position players will not be allowed to pitch except in the following scenarios: • They are designated as a "Two-Way Player." A player can only qualify for this designation if he accrues at least 20 Major League innings pitched and at least 20 Major League games started as a position player or designated hitter (with at least three plate appearances in each of those games) in the current or prior season. • A game goes into extra innings. • A player's team is losing or winning by more than six runs when he enters as a pitcher.

This is my concern with signing Grandal to a 3-4 year deal. We can't afford many contracts where we're paying big money (for the Brewers) for "okay" play. Braun is nearing the end of his deal. He's been "okay" the past couple seasons, but I think most fans will be glad to see the money freed up for better use. Now we have Cain, who looks like he'll be "okay" for the next few seasons after signing the biggest deal in franchise history. I don't want us to continually have 30-50% of our roster locked up into a few players who are "okay." Grandal was a great pick up on essentially a one-year deal. I don't want a 33-34 year old Grandal making a decent percentage of team payroll and under-performing. Unless you can get him on another short-term deal, I'd probably pass. Pina/Nottingham/Frietas should be able to give us around league average results next year. Meanwhile, third base, shortstop, and especially pitching could use an upgrade. The rules are changing, so we won't be able to bring up as many pitchers next September to play the way they have the past two years. We need quality over quantity going forward, so it's probably time to spend some resources to acquire pitching.

Hader, Anderson and Guerra give them at least three multi-inning guys in the pen. This means that on days when Hader isn't available, we will still have guys ready to go multiple innings when needed. I never liked the old "long man" concept where a washed up starter would take up a roster space to do mop up duty when a starter got shelled early. I love the Brewer concept of having multiple multi-inning guys so that there will always be a decent option to go a few innings when a starter can't go 6+. Even though they might be unheralded, Anderson and Guerra can play very important roles on this year's team. Of course, I hope that Woodruff, Peralta, and Burnes all play up to their potential, meaning we won't have a big need for relievers to come in in the 4th or 5th inning, but it is nice to have the multi-inning guys there nonetheless.

The Brewers will probably go with Peralta in the rotation and Woodruff in the pen, but I would like to see one of them in the AAA rotation to stay stretched out as a starter to replace the first guy who gets injured. I guess Nelson's timetable will probably play a role as to whether or not this might be important. If they think he'll be ready a couple of weeks into the season, it wouldn't be as important to have a good "insurance policy" ready in AAA. I am torn on Woodruff. I'd like to see him get a chance to start, but it is nice that we have so much excess pitching talent that a guy with his potential may not be able to make the cut. For much of the Brewers' existence he would be slated as our #1 or #2 at this point. Essentially, if he's in the pen it's because he fell behind Burnes and Peralta on the depth charts.

I think it's because his comments were something to the effect that there's no pain or discomfort but his "body just isn't right". We can't know for sure but given his workload last year, his performance as his workload approached extremely rare levels, and his start to the spring, it sure supports the theory that he wore out his arm last year. I get why people would say we don't know for sure, but I don't get how anyone can deny that the evidence strongly supports it. Someone accused me of having an agenda, but I think it's pretty clear that the people who still refuse to even entertain the possibility despite all the circumstantial evidence are the ones with the agenda. I'm sure most of them are the same people who supported JJ pitching over and over again against LAD despite all the signs that he was falling apart, and the same people who often complained that they didn't use Hader enough and finally forced an exasperated CC to say "look, he can't pitch 90 games, okay?" My biggest concern with the new wave of thinking about pitching is how relievers will hold up with the extra workload as starting pitchers are taken out after two times through the order. Games are still nine innings, so if starters pitch less there will necessarily be a lot more relievers with 70+ outings, many of them multi-inning outings. This could very likely shorten the useful lifespan of your relievers. Since there is always a shortage of consistent relievers, if it becomes evident that overuse is shortening the careers of relievers, I think that negative could outweigh the benefit of pulling starters out early. But, only time will tell.

In that note, a LH batter who struggles against LH pitching must not be a MLB hitter. Maybe they should eliminate pinch hitters as well. I think baseball should be about pitting your best guy against their best guy. Let teams place their defenders wherever they want, put in the pitchers and hitters they want, and see who wins out in the end.

I'm glad for the strong opening to spring. Hopefully some team will give the Brewers a "lottery ticket" prospect for him rather than waiting for him to hit the waiver wire at the end of Spring Training. He'd have to be an upgrade at backup catcher for some team... right? I'd say it's possible they trade Pina, but that would leave a big question mark going into 2020 with Nottingham being the only catcher on the roster. Barring injury, Kratz will probably be on another team's MLB roster to start this season.

That depends on whether he thinks he'll be able to sign a 3-year / $30M contract when he's 36 in ten years. He's guaranteeing himself $30M more dollars with this deal, regardless of health or performance.

Interleague play began in 1997. In the initial years, it was fairly even, with the NL having a better interleague record four of the first seven years. Starting in 2003, the AL began a string of 14 straight winning years, with that streak finally being broken last year. Overall, the AL has a 3,032-2,732 record over the NL. After the initial years of getting used to interleague play, the AL has dominated, showing that they have a decided advantage over their NL counterparts. Combine that with pitchers getting hurt doing something other than pitching, and I can't understand why NL owners haven't added the DH years ago. To me, saying that pitchers should have to hit "because they're baseball players" is like saying the quarterback and left tackle should have to switch positions every few downs. The strategy of watching pitchers hit is akin to the strategy of watching Aaron Rodgers trying to block Mack, and it's crazy to see someone getting hurt watching him do something he has no business doing. The Brewers missing the playoffs in 2017 largely because they had multiple pitchers hurt swinging the bat or running the bases was the straw that broke this camel's back. Bring on the DH and let's see talented players doing what they're best at doing.