monty57

Attanasio has done a lot for the Brewers. My biggest complaint has always been that when he decides to go for it, he has a hard time letting a rookie play. He would far rather pay money to get a "name" then put his faith in a young, "unproven" talent. We'll have Phillips on the bench this year getting a couple hundred PAs and Hader throwing 60-70 innings from the bullpen, while Woodruff will be traded or sent back to the minors. We had the best farm we've had in a long time, and apparently none of these guys were good enough to crack the starting lineup now that we're "trying to win." They're either traded, left in the minors, or relegated to part-time duty. I'm excited to see what other moves are coming, and to see how the Brewers do this year, but we will not be able to compete very long if we don't let our good prospects get significant roles on the MLB team that will allow them to reach their full potential.

Late to the party here. We now have our OF set for years, so if this trade was what we wanted, it made sense to highlight it with two good upper minors OF prospects, allowing us to keep most of our pitching prospects. These moves get us looking more and more like a playoff roster for the foreseeable future. There is no way after making these moves that Stearns is going to stand pat and allow Villar/Sogard/Perez to be our opening day 2B, and I expect further addition(s) to the pitching staff. There are more moves to be made, and at the end of it, we should have a much improved roster at the MLB level, will have a payroll in the $100M range, and will still have a pretty good farm. The last time we made a big splash, we were obviously looking at a 1-2 year "window" before things fell apart (Greinke and Marcum for two years, one year left on Fielder). I do not at all have that feeling about these moves. I'm worried about Cain's contract going through his age 36 season, but I think we could be good for a long time. At the very least, it will be nice to see an offense that isn't setting strikeout records. We should be a much more consistent offense which will be refereshing.

Can you give me some insight into what fish you will be catching and whether or not that will surpass the expectations going into the weekend?

I like having Dubon in the minors and hope he can take the next step forward, but trading away Arcia and playing Dubon would be a big step backward that would negate positive gains elsewhere. If we were to trade Arcia, bringing back someone like Castro would probably be part of the deal. That said, I think that among the 3,000 things Stearns is doing right now, he should be working on an extension for Arcia, not working on a trade sending him out of town.

I have always worried about signing FAs in their 30's to longer-term deals that take them into their mid-to-late 30's. I've expressed concern that I think Stearns will sign some 30-something FA's this offseason (Cain, Darvish/Arrieta/Cobb). It could help us make the playoffs, but could lead to a large portion of our payroll going to several over-the-hill players in a couple of years. That would hurt even further if we gutted the farm too much in trades. I am interested to see how Stearns plays the remainder of this offseason, but I have some worries if it includes (as I think it will) trading off MLB ready youngsters and signing older vets. I have also commented since the beginning of the offseason that I hope the Cubs have to spend big money to fill the holes created when they lost some players to free agency (Arrieta, Lackey, Davis). I was bummed when they got cheaper fixes in guys like Chatwood, but they're still one pitcher short of a full rotation, and they are still probably worse "on paper" right now than they were to start last year. To get back to 2017 opening day talent level, they need to find a replacement for Arrieta, and that probably means signing either Arrieta or Darvish. Meanwhile, their arby raises are going to be huge over the next few seasons. They have plenty of money, but will probably not want to go too far over the luxury tax limit for extended periods, so they're going to be somewhat limited in future years if they have to sign Darvish or Arrieta this offseason. There would be a riot among Cub fans if Bryant left as a free agent, so adding $25M or so in payroll for Darvish while keeping room for paying Bryant when they have to could tie their hands a bit in next year's huge FA class. At the very least, signing one of the big names in next year's class could push them far enough over the luxury tax that they will drop draft positions and have to pay huge amounts of luxury tax. I don't think they want to go there. Arrieta and Darvish are the top guys on the market this year, but they are 31 and are not elite. Since they are the top guys on the market, they want to get paid as if they are elite. The only thing that piqued my excitement when I heard the Brewers made an offer was that it was probably because the slow FA market got Stearns thinking he could get them on a team-friendly deal. If it's not a team-friendly deal, I'd rather they go to the Cubs than the Brewers as they will likely not live up to whatever contract they sign.

Epstein was asked early in the offseason, and he said that signing either of Arrieta/Darvish wasn't their first choice. I thought that was probably because arby raises in the coming years are going to get really expensive and they have nothing left on the farm to supplement the MLB roster. If they do indeed sign Darvish, it either means that the price difference between him and guys like Cobb was less than expected, or that something went wrong with some of their other plans. Either way, I think that signing Darvish will make it difficult for the Cubs to stay under the luxury tax threshold and give them less room to operate in coming years. At the start of the offseason, I hoped that the Brewers would not sign one of Arrieta/Darvish, and that the Cubs would sign one of them, so I'd have to say this news is good news if it happens.

Thanks, this was a good listen. The human aspect of pro sports is heavily overshadowed in the public eye by the monetary aspect. These are kids who are thrown into a cutthroat arena, and from my limited experience agents help players with a lot more than just how much money they make. Your interview showed the relationship you have with Jeremy, and that's great. I know a couple professional athletes, and the only advice I gave them when they asked about choosing an agent was that any experienced agent should know what they're doing, so what was important is that they choose someone they feel comfortable with personally. It's good to see Jeremy has that.

I'd be very hesitant to do this deal if it included Arcia. I'd rather roll with Brinson/Phillips and Arcia all at league minimum than give up Arcia to get Yelich.

Note that while I posted my guess of what I think Stearns is looking at doing, I'm generally against signing guys in their 30's to multi-year deals. While I'm very intrigued to see what is going to happen, at the same time I'm scared at the prospect of having multiple 30-somethings taking up a decent chunk of our payroll for the next several seasons. I think the reasoning is that monetary prices have come down for older free agents, while trade value of good MLB-ready prospects is at an all-time high. If we get enough for guys like Brinson and Santana and get good enough deals on older FA's, then it could make sense. Stearns has spent a career looking for young, controllable talent, so if he's thinking about trading some of that away, he must be getting blown away with offers.

This whole thing is intriguing, and really only makes any sense if there are a lot of moving parts. Braun is our LF for the next 3-4 years. He's not going anywhere, so put an "X" there. Brinson and maybe Phillips go to Miami to get Yelich, locking up RF for the next five seasons. Cain gets signed, locking up CF for the next 4 seasons. Our OF is then more "proven," but also older and more expensive. That would seemingly get made up by trading away Santana for a team-controlled SP and/or 2B, and that would hopefully be a serious upgrade (with a lot of team control) in an area(s) of need. If we get a 2B, then we probably look to trade at least one of Villar/Perez/Sogard, even if that just gets us some teen-aged "lottery chips." If we get a SP, especially if we also sign a FA, then we potentially look to trade Woodruff as we would have a full MLB staff with guys like Burns and Ortiz getting ready to make the move to the majors. I don't know if this will work out, and it's something I wouldn't have imagined a couple of weeks ago, but it could turn us into a legitimate playoff contender for the next half-decade with just the guys on the MLB roster, while maintaining a lot of talent in the lower minors who will be ready to step up in the next couple of seasons, hopefully extending this out so it's not a "window," but a sustainably good team. Of course, the concern (if all of this does come together) is that we could have a lot of money in a few seasons going to guys in their mid-30's (Braun, Cain, Darvish/Arrieta/Cobb) and that could blow up on us. The hope would probably be that some of our remaining minor leaguers would be able to step in over the next few seasons to bring down the payroll and fill in if some of the older guys are declining. Of course, if Stearns is doing all of this now, he will not sit on his hands in the future, so anything I can dream up now will look completely different 12-24 months from now.

I agree. The Mish write-up Mass Haas posted said the Brewers were the first offer the Marlins considered to be serious. If that is the case, they won't sit on it too long, as Stearns could rescind the offer at any time, leaving the Marlins with a disgruntled outfielder and 14 offers they don't consider serious.

I think the deal may include both Brinson and Phillips as well. The Marlins would get two good MLB-ready prospects, we'd get Yelich for RF, sign Cain for CF and trade Santana for pitching/2B. Not the plan I would've thought of going into the offseason, but it kind of looks like that may be the way we're leaning as Stearns has been looking at all kinds of proven outfielders when we already have a glut of outfielders and need help elsewhere. He'd be taking advantage of having surplus cash while other teams don't, and taking advantage of a market that may be undervaluing free agents while highly valuing "team control" through pre-arby/arby years.

From a player acquisition standpoint, free agents are paid for in money while players under team control are acquired via trade. What is interesting with this offseason is that the value of team control has gotten so high relative to the monetary cost of free agents that Stearns seems to be considering trading away guys with team control (Brinson, Santana, Phillips, Shaw, maybe even a SP if we sign Darvish) and then paying free agent prices to fill the spots. Baseball isn't a completely free market (there are very few truly free markets in the world), but It is still a market. Like any market, prices will rise and they will fall. If the trade value of Brinson and Phillips gets extremely high while the free agent value of someone like Cain gets abnormally low, it may make sense to trade the youngsters and sign the vet. This will be a pretty shocking development if it happens, but I love that Stearns seems to always be looking at the current market inefficiencies and does not at all care to follow the current trend. I think in the not-too-distant future teams will be studying what Stearns has done in order to try to better build their own teams.

Obviously big spending teams have a decided advantage, but one flaw here is that a lot of big contracts are swapped from losing teams to winning teams at the trade deadline. A team taking on some big money rentals could add tens of millions to their payroll while deducting that same amount of money from other teams who are out of the playoffs. That could be enough to bump a team up or down a bracket, and teams with playoff hopes will often be willing to expand their maximum payroll at the deadline due to the hopes of making that up with the extra revenue from the playoffs. In those examples you speak of, that means that the middle/large market team is already in the playoff hunt...further agreeing with the suggestion of big markets having an advantage. Also, teams like Detroit were in the top 10 and dropped into the middle bracket most likely when they made some trades, so it can also potentially cancel out over time. No, a small market team could substantially add to its payroll at trade deadline if they are in the hunt. The Brewers could have easily added more money last July and that may have got them to the playoffs. I don't know where $124M puts a team, but that was the Astros' opening day payroll, while their ending payroll was $140M, which was rank #19 (lower end of the middle tier above). I'd guess that most playoff teams, whether big market or small, add payroll at trade deadline, and that payroll is fully deducted from non-playoff teams. There is certainly an advantage to big market teams. I'm just pointing out that I noticed a flaw in the numbers as presented. I don't know how meaningful it is, just that it's there.

I agree with your first sentence. Not so much with the second paragraph. It is the teams that can reach the $197M luxury threshold that the rule is trying to affect. By making those teams think twice about spending more, it theoretically will lessen the gap between big markets and smaller markets. Plus, if the big markets aren't spending to buy every free agent, the contracts will lower (hence this entire thread) to the point that other teams may be able to afford guys they wouldn't have been able to afford in the past. You state that it hurts everyone, while I would argue that it hurts the player who is receiving less than they may have otherwise received, but it helps the teams who sign the player to a lower value contract. As long as the league allows teams to have their own TV deals, there will not be a "good" answer as there will always be financial disparity. This tougher luxury tax does seem to be having some effect at lessening the gap between "Haves" and "have-nots," which is what it was intended to do.

Obviously big spending teams have a decided advantage, but one flaw here is that a lot of big contracts are swapped from losing teams to winning teams at the trade deadline. A team taking on some big money rentals could add tens of millions to their payroll while deducting that same amount of money from other teams who are out of the playoffs. That could be enough to bump a team up or down a bracket, and teams with playoff hopes will often be willing to expand their maximum payroll at the deadline due to the hopes of making that up with the extra revenue from the playoffs.

Just like teams saw the Royals win and all of a sudden started paying more for relief pitchers, teams have seen the last few World Series won by teams that focus on building a strong farm and developing a roster around cheap, young talent, so teams are starting to realize the value of cheap, young talent. If the 2018 World Series is won by a team that pays a bunch of 35-year-olds $20M each, then maybe people will start believing that is a good strategy. But since the "Steroid Era" is gone and data from that era isn't being used to make rational decisions, teams are realizing that once guys hit their mid-30's, they are generally better off watching the game than playing in it, and very few guys in their mid-30's are worth eight figure salaries. My ideal world would have MLB acting as one business instead of 30 individual businesses. All revenue would be shared equally, and players would be on a free market from day one. Owners could decide where to allocate their money. They could spend a ton signing young kids, they could spend a ton of money on vets, or they could decide to pocket more then other owners. Well run teams would win instead of well financed teams having a big advantage. But, as long as teams in big markets can sign TV deals worth ten times the Brewers' TV deal, there needs to be something in place to keep the game competitive. The arbitration / pre-arby setup is a horrible deal for the players, but it allows teams like the Brewers to compete. It's just too bad that they haven't utilized this a lot more during their existence.

I don't know if that's true. A baseball player can spend much of his 20's in the minors, come to the majors for six years through his prime and not get offered a big deal after "team control" is over. He'll make more than a "normal person," but not nearly as much as a NBA or NFL guy will get in his initial contract after being drafted. Actually, the way baseball is set up if teams stop giving dumb deals to older guys who have no chance of living up to them, then I think the union has painted the players into a bad position. Only the guys who are brought up in their early 20's and therefore hit free agency before their "prime" years will have a chance at getting paid anywhere near what everyday players in other sports make.

The stricter luxury tax (stiffer financial penalties and losing draft position) seems to be having an effect much like a salary cap. Teams will be willing to go over the cap for a time, but not for an extended period, and not by enough to lose draft position. Huge market teams are already near the "cap," so they have to put the brakes on spending until some contracts come off the books. Then, they will have to determine which players are worth a large portion of their budget. We also need to remember that arby numbers are getting a lot bigger, so a team like the Cubs has to hold back on spending now in order to be able to stay under the cap as their players move into/through arby. I think this will make baseball more competitive, but the Brewers' max payroll is still only around half of the luxury tax level, so they'll still be at a disadvantage. As to collusion, I don't believe it. Teams still want to win, but they're getting smarter with their money. It's not smart to offer guys huge money contracts that take them into years well beyond their useful playing life. It's much smarter to load up on guys who will play roles on the roster for league minimum. Harper will get a lot of money, but why pay Chris Carter $11M when you can get Aguilar for $500,000, or sign Arrieta to take up 20% of your payroll during his decline years when you can get Chacin much cheaper?

The luxury tax penalties just got a lot stiffer. That made the big spending teams have to stop spending, and that alone has a big effect on free agent spending. Also, owners are starting to treat their teams like a business and not an expensive toy. That means listening to the numbers guys and making decisions based on those numbers and not on emotion. Pre-arby guys get around $500,000, so a veteran player would have to be a lot better than a young player in order to justify the difference in pay. Since humans don't age well, paying an older player that much more money than a younger player just doesn't make sense unless that older player is really good. Guys like Arrieta and Darvish just aren't good enough to justify giving them a huge, long-term deal at their age, and generally the "second tier" waits until the top guys get signed before they will sign in order to maximize their pay. Superstars will still get paid. Guys who get to the majors young so they hit free agency when they still have some prime years left will get paid. But since teams have budgets, when some players make more, others will have to make less than they expect.

This should put them right around the $160M mark for payroll. My uneducated guess at the beginning of the offseason is that they would try to stick around the $170M level in order to be able to account for future arby increases going forward. They still need another starter, so I'd guess they sign Cobb and that will be the end of their offseason.

I don't think that's too telling. If they were looking at major trade, it'd hit the rumor mills, but reporters probably aren't calling their sources asking if they're hearing any rumors about a Broxton-for-low-level-minor-leaguers trade.

This is good to hear. It will be interesting to see what they do with the rotation. We have three spots locked with Anderson, Davies and Chacin. Woodruff seems to be pretty much a lock for the fourth slot.You never know what will happen with injuries, but if we're only going into the season figuring we'll only need a starter for a month or two, you'd think they're going to go with someone in-house. My guess is Suter or Hader start the season in the rotation and then move to the bullpen when Nelson is ready.

I think Stearns will do with Broxton what he did with Lind, which is to trade him for young prospects. I'm fine with that, as he seems to be pretty good at finding good talent at a young age. Also, I think Broxton should have more trade value than Lind, so maybe he gets four teenagers instead of three :-) I know the Giants' farm is pretty barren, but if they have some talented 17-19 year olds at the Rookie/A-ball levels, we could probably strike a deal that could make sense for both sides.

Only if they put money away to offset the liability. "Realizing an expense" just means writing it off for tax purposes, and putting an item as a liability on the balance sheet doesn't mean there is a corresponding asset to counter it. If it did, Illinois wouldn't be in bad financial shape at all. The money will have to be paid, so it will have to come from somewhere. Therefore those funds will not be able to be used to pay for additional players at that time. That could be now, or that could be in the future, but at some point unfunded liabilities have to be funded, and that means you can't use the money elsewhere.