brewerfan82

I really doubt this. If the Dodgers needing DeLeon for September was the only thing that kept him from being a Brewer, I'm sure the Brewers would have gladly sent Garza and a few million dollars to the Dodgers to fill the spot and complete the deal. I don't think there is any way a deal of this magnitude falls apart solely on the basis of the Dodgers needing 4 September starts out of a guy who had never pitched at the MLB level before. You could be right, however, at the time they only had a 1.5 game lead in the division and 3.5 games in the wildcard with 29 games to go (incl. 6 against the Giants). They could have viewed those potential 4-5 starts as critical. Your point about including Garza is a good point, however, it also sounded like from some reports that they simply ran out of time to make the deal. If the Brewers insisted on DeLeon, but the Dodgers resisted, resisted, and then requested Garza late in talks, it could have complicated things enough that they couldn't figure out how to round things out in time. Not saying you're wrong, I just think there's no real way for us to pull many conclusions from the limited (and conflicting) reports we've heard about that non-deal and from the inactivity so far this offseason (which I'm guessing many teams were waiting on the CBA and non-tender deadline to evaluate their situations and make any moves).

Has there been a study that shows how much a weaker schedule actually inflates a team's win total over a season? I understand it would affect it, but I would guess that, in general, the better team has a better record regardless of strength of schedule most of the time.

I think the Dodgers would value adding Guerra to any deal that involves them losing pitching depth for next year (even if it's a McCarthy type). So maybe Braun/Guerra for Puig/McCarthy/Bellinger/Top 15-20 would be a closer starting point for possible discussions. Puig's and Braun's perceived actual trade values are so scattered it's hard to tell what each team would see as a fair trade, but that seems to address some needs for both teams. Dodgers upgrade outfield and starting rotation, rid a possible headache, and while they don't save much payroll, it's spent on better production. The Brewers get a top prospect (or two) and a wildcard in Puig that could turn into a big asset if he demonstrates his potential. Even a healthy, productive McCarthy is a possible attractive trade deadline piece. Having Guerra involved may necessitate involving another decent prospect or two to even it out, but I would guess it'd have to be someone further from the bigs.

Nice gamble for a rebuilding team with no other options. I guess Stearns is putting alot of stock in his KBO numbers and sees more upside possibility in him than Carter. Also nice to get the lefty stick. KBO numbers the past 3 years: [pre]Year Age G PA AB R HR RBI SB CS BB SO BA OBP SLG OPS 2014 27 125 514 443 95 37 121 11 2 58 99 .343 .422 .688 1.111 2015 28 142 595 472 130 47 140 40 8 103 91 .381 .497 .790 1.288 2016 29 121 525 432 117 40 118 13 4 74 103 .317 .425 .676 1.101[/pre]

Do you know for a fact that neither of his friends knew how to drive a boat? I am actually curious as I never read that. If he had someone sober behind the wheel I find it hard to be upset with him. He may have been giving directions minutes before the crash...or maybe seconds. I am not sure which. Your opinion that it is his fault no matter the circumstance is confusing to me. Yes it was reported neither had much, if any, experience driving boats. I saw it in quite a few articles. I would have to find one of the article when I have time. Allowing someone to drive your boat when they have no experience puts a lot of blame on yourself. Even more so if they aren't licensed to do so and it's required. And do you know they weren't licensed? There's a lot of reading between the lines going on here. I agree that *depending on the circumstances* there's a good chance a lot of the fault is probably on Fernandez, but when you're talking about someone that lost their life at such a young age, it seems a bit cold to jump on them and push their guilt so hard when you're only going on the tidbits of information provided by the media. No one here was on that boat, no one will ever know for sure what exactly happened. The guy did some amazing things in his short life and brought joy to many people. It sounds like he may have made some bad decisions his last night here, but I doubt he did so with malintent. Let him rest in peace.

I would be okay with a trade that included Guerra if the return was right. I wouldn't be surprised if the Brewers were pushing for a return at the waiver deadline that included Puig, McCarthy, and DeLeon+, but the Dodgers needed a pitcher back for depth if they lost DeLeon. At the waiver deadline Guerra wouldn't have been available, so that could heave held things up at the time, but would be possible to discuss further this offseason. That said, if the Brewers are dealing a prime player in Braun (who's contract is offset some by taking on McCarthy) and an effective, inexpensive, and controlled (albeit older) pitcher in Guerra, the last piece in the return should be a pretty solid prospect as well. Otherwise, you're basically swapping about 9 years worth of two guys who have shown success at the major league level in Braun and Guerra for about 9 years worth of two very talented, but not as proven (or at least not as consistently proven) players in Puig and DeLeon. So the level of prospect added to the end of that return could really make the deal. Then again, the value of almost every player included in that deal is so disputed and scattered depending on who you talk to, who knows what's close to what Stearns and the Dodgers' GM consider a fair trade.

I'll one up that. Same situation except the pitcher throws a swing and a miss strike three, but the catcher whiffs on on the catch and a Bad News Bears series of bad throws allows the runner to go all the way around the bases for the game winning run.

Is that why he got 40 ABs in the minors vs 17 ABs in the majors with us after the trade? I like the pickup and am interested in seeing how he develops, but he was a secondary piece in a trade of a reliever. I don't think there are any strong indicators that he's being pushed to be our everyday catcher in 2017. Especially at a position that usually splits a lot of time anyways, I think being the right-handed side of a platoon may be a good way to ease him into the majors and put him in a situation to be successful early on.

My problem with this is that our payroll is going to be so low I don't think Garza's salary is holding up spending money on anything that could benefit the team. For instance, if we see an opportunity to obtain an international player for x amount, I don't see the front office or Attanasio blocking the deal just because Garza's salary is still on the books. We have a ton of financial flexibility right now. Garza's not going to prohibit the team from making any new financial commitments that make good baseball sense, so you might as well hold onto him and try to get some value back that's a tangible improvement to the system.

I agree that there's no reason to believe he "had to be in play" either. Maybe it's just a pet peave of mine, but to me, speaking in definites comes off as arrogant and condescending to those who may disagree with your *opinion*. I still don't see how it's "common sense" about the situation. I know you think if DeLeon was offered in a deal that the Brewers would have agreed to it, but that's ignoring that there may have been other parameters to the deal offered (ie. Brewers needing to add another player, the Brewers taking on more money than they thought was worth it, etc.) that make it less obvious to accept just because one single piece of it happens to be something they want. I also agree we'd be lucky to get a DeLeon in the deal and therefore it's probably a safe bet for you to keep saying it's not possible, but that has more to do with the fact that he's arguably their best prospect and therefore is one of the least likely players they would be willing to give up. That has nothing to do with "the deal didn't get done" therefore "DeLeon was never a possibility".

One thing is for sure DeLeon was never offered. Could he have been talked about and in the end not offered because of all the injuries? More than possible, but the fact they waited until September to call him up makes me question how much confidence they had in him helping. If they thought Jose DeLeon could help them so much why did it take them so long to promote him? Even then Braun>DeLeon going down the stretch. The theory of keeping him due to injuries is valid and possible, but I am leaning towards that not being the case. How can you possibly say that? What if the Dodgers said, "Alright, you can have DeLeon, but we need another piece back then for some depth/insurance on our team. How about Guerra?" If that deal was offered with 5 minutes to go, it's quite likely the Brewers would want to make some further adjustments to the deal to make that work and simply ran out of time. None of us know how this went down and beyond Braun and Puig, it's all speculation whether certain other players may have been involved as well. Edit: Guerra is likely a bad example as I doubt he passed through waivers to be eligible for a trade, but insert another player there and the point still stands.

I believe you meant Tommy Hanson, not Hunter.

This is just horrible. Such a great talent and such a young person. Thoughts to his loved ones. http://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2016/09/jose-fernandez-dies-in-boating-accident.html

I'm with ya on that I think Braun has value (at least if he's traded sooner than later and if the Crew kicks in some money or takes on a bad contract), however, to be fair, New York covered $2.5m of Beltran's deal in that trade leaving Texas only on the hook for $2.5m for the remainder of Beltran's contract. There's a huge gap between that $2.5m and the $76m that a team would be on the hook for with Braun.

Ted Williams had OPS over 1.000 through age 39. Not comparing Braun to the Spendid Splinter, but Braun's certainly been an elite hitter and had he not had the PED stuff, he'd have HOF credentials. He's worth taking a risk that he'll be productive through age 36 or 37. "Taking a risk" is the key phrase here. I don't think people are worried that he won't be productive at all, just not at the level that warrants his contract. You admit there is risk involved and the small study I did above demonstrates that the risk increases with every year that he plays moving forward. His peers at his age averaged an 11% drop in OPS+ and a 35% drop in WAR from their age 32 season to their age 33 season. And even more startling, a 26% drop in OPS+ and a 72% drop in WAR from their age 32 season to their age 36 season. The Brewers aren't going to be competitive the next two years. And even if the rebuild is successful and they're competing 3 or 4 years from now, his least risky years are going to be wasted on a rebuilding team while we're holding onto him in hopes that the rebuild is successful and he is still an all-star player for, at most, two of his riskiest years. On the other hand, if we're going to trade him, his value is only going to decline from here on out. Other GM's know players tend to decline as they age and that Ted Williams (or even Larry Walker) is an exception to that rule. They're trading for him for the next two years when he's much more likely to still be playing at a high level, not the last two years of his contract. That makes him much more valuable to another team than to the Brewers, but only if he's traded now. Waiting only risks losing any value he has completely. All that said, obviously if you can't get any legit prospects back for him, the Brewers don't have a financial reason they have to move him. But I highly doubt his value to other teams gets any higher than it is this offseason and I also don't believe the chance of the rebuild succeeding fast enough combined with the chance of Braun being highly productive long enough to contribute to the next competitive team is good enough to hold onto him for that reason. There will be a very small overlap, if any overlap at all, of those two factors which minimizes his potential value to us. Throw on top of that his ability to block *any* trade starting next year, and this offseason is the time to deal him.

Decided to do a very simple, small study to see what some similar players to Braun have done in their 30's. Using Baseball-Reference.com I grabbed 10 players similar to Braun. Larry Walker, Lance Berkman, Matt Holiday, Carlos Lee, Raul Mondesi and Jeff Bagwell were on Braun's most similar through age 31 list. I don't think it changed the outcome much, but I left off players that played well before 2000 (Dick Allen, Wally Berger, Ted Kluszewski, and Hal Trosky) as even with standardized stats, I didn't think they'd be as comparable. I re-filled those spots with players listed similar to Walker (Guerrero and Edmonds) and Berkman (Giles and Alou). I think this was, albeit still a small sample size, a decently comparable list of players to Braun. Again, this didn't affect the outcome much, but since Mondesi was out of the game after his age 34 season, I filled his remaining OPS+ stats with 100's and WAR's with 0's, to quasi-represent his replacement player. Logistics aside, here were the results: It'd be cool to do this with a much larger sample size, but I thought it was interesting and seems to demonstrate pretty well why GM's aren't going to value Braun as if he'll continue to produce at his current level over the next 4 years. I also thought it was interesting to note that players' WAR's dropped more drastically than their OPS+'s, likely a result of degrading defense and less playing time due to injuries as they aged. Anyways, there's a good chance he'll still be an above average player throughout his contract, however, if teams want to get him during his peak, all-star level years, they'll likely want him sooner than later and that's going to be reflected in the offers that opposing GM's are willing to agree upon as he ages further.

Not necessarily. Braun can be market value (or even better) and worth his contract, but if a team's budget doesn't have room to add $20m per year, then they can't risk claiming him and the Brewers handing him over at full price. For instance, I can think a vacation in a raffle is worth $10,000, but that doesn't mean I can place a bid for that and risk actually winning it if I don't actually have the money to pay for it. I would venture to believe most teams have a budget for the year and leave some wiggle room for in season acquisitions, but $20mil (or even $10 mil for half a season) may take a lot of teams out of the running. That said, once Braun passed through waivers, a team like the Dodgers were able to then send Puig through waivers and have the possibility of working out a trade that would help offset those costs. That may not have been possible for them if they had claimed Braun outright when he was first put through the waiver process, thus ending any chance of obtaining him at all.

See Chris Carter. Controllable proven premier power bat dropped by the Astros for nothing, signed to a $2.5m contract. He's Davis, but one year in the future. Not saying they're not nice pieces to have on your team, but they're nothing to get worked up about either.

Where's Nelson? I don't think you have to worry too much about next year's rotation. Other than Nelson and Davies, I don't care who's in the rotation and I think they're both locks at this point. Garza and Guerra (and even McCarthy) are either gone or around for another half season to gain/solidify value for a trade. Peralta may be a bounce back candidate at this point, but he also could just be thrown into the pen to see how he does there. Anderson's just a guy. He could be a throw in in another trade (or does he actually have options left as well?). But point being, Nelson and Davies will have their spots and I don't think it will hurt any of the prospects to spend more time in the minors, so the rest will sort itself out. It's going to be another rebuilding year, so a rotation of Davies, Nelson, and three of Guerra/Peralta/Garza/Anderson/McCarthy is fine for the first half of the season.

Exactly, the point of acquiring as much controllable talent as possible is realizing that not all players pan out. When you acquire 36 players in one year, some of them are going to flop. Overall, he's done a great job. That said, Nottingham was playing AA as a 21 year old last season, three years younger than the league average (of the 45 players to play for Biloxi, only Javier Betancourt and Luis Ortiz were younger). If we drafted him out of college he probably would have been splitting time in Rookie/A-ball this year. I wouldn't write him off just yet.

I think we disagree on a couple things: 1.) That him being on the roster for a couple months next year will block another player in a way that will hurt their development or affect the way we can assess that player in some way, and 2.) That he has no chance of bringing back a decent prospect if he finishes the season strong and plays well the first couple months of next season. 1.) As outlined a few posts above, I don't think he's going to cause any problems finding a spot in the current rotation and I don't think any of our prospects had performed so well that they can't wait a couple months to be called up next year. 2.) If he finishes the year with a 4.00-ish ERA and starts the year even better next season, with his history outside of last season (which will be two years away at that point) and his remaining salary (about $6m for the remainder of '17 and $5m for '18), I think he definitely is valuable to a contending team and has a chance to bring back a nice nugget for the farm system. Not Lucroy or Gomez type of return, but possibly along the lines of what we got for Lind, Hill or even Segura. At this point in the rebuild I probably wouldn't go out of my way to grab a $8-9m/year bounce back pitcher in hopes to flip him (unless they were included in a deal that included another prospect ala Segura for Diaz/Hill), but we already have him and I'd rather take a chance at turning him into an okay prospect than to just dump him for salary relief.

I think the difference between those that want to deal him right away and those who think you can wait is the presumed value you'd get for him this offseason. If you can get a legit prospect for Garza in the offseason, then yes, do it in a heartbeat. I just don't think he's going to bring that back after a nice half season that followed a horrible full season and a half season long injury. If you can't get a decent prospect for him, then you might as well hold onto him for another half season since we don't need to shed his salary and you're not losing any value on him even if he does plummet again.

I don't think there's any rush to move him. We have 5 rotation spots on the major league club. Between those spots, the minors, injuries, offseason trades, bad performance, etc., anyone we want to have a trial on the major league level next year we'll find an opportunity for. Right now, I think we have 6 guys that you figure are "default" MLB rotation possibilities due to experience: Nelson, Davies, Anderson, Guerra, Peralta, and Garza. Davies is really the only one I for sure don't move (23 yo, not a free agent til '22). Nelson is close, but he's getting a little older (27), hasn't been overly dominant this year (4.36 ERA, 1.522 WHIP) and I wouldn't turn down a deal if someone wanted to overpay for a pitcher. Anderson is an okay filler piece, but not someone we need to hold onto for the future and may be a throw in for another deal (much like he was last offseason). Peralta probably has no value to anyone and only has 2 years of control left. He has the talent to turn it around, but he may be best in the bullpen at this point (especially if it frees up a space for someone else we want in the rotation). Guerra may be attractive to another team with his performance this year. He has a bit of team control, but he's also older (31) and has a pretty good chance of dropping off before we're competitive again. If we're going to trade someone this offseason, I would think it'd be him. As for the minor league options, Colorado Springs makes it hard to evaluate the pitchers in the minors, but no one has forced their hand yet to move them into the major league rotation to start the year. So I don't think it hurts starting any of those guys in the farm and moving them up later as needs necessitate. So I think at least one of those guys will either be moved to the bullpen or to another team, which leaves a spot for Garza to regain more value in. If a couple are moved you can try a Suter or Hader in the rotation, but otherwise Garza can help block them (and their clock) for a half season. In the end, if someone offers something you like for Garza this offseason, you take it, otherwise I'd wait til next trade deadline. I just don't see a need to move him right away if you don't get something useful.

http://www.spotrac.com/mlb/milwaukee-brewers/matt-garza-856/ He'd have to miss 130 days in a single season on the DL for it to drop to $1 million, so I believe it will be a $5 million option. That should still be pretty valuable if he can show he's quasi-effective. That said, I think even with a strong finish and paying some of his contract, a return would be negligible this off-season. So unless the front office thinks he's blocking someone they want in the rotation to start the year, it's probably best to hold onto him until next year's trade deadline. If he can finish this year with an ERA close to 4.00 and have a couple strong, sub-4.00 ERA months to start next season, he may re-instill enough confidence in another team to pony up something more interesting for him. At that point, his salary for half a season will be manageable and if he finishes the year strong they can pick up his option for a very reasonable amount. Even then, I think you're still hoping for a package similar to what we got for Lind in return for him. But who knows, pitchers are so valuable for contending teams and crazy things happen when there aren't many options to upgrade and they feel they're one solid pitcher away. But that will only happen at the deadline, I don't think a teams will feel the same pressure during the off-season.

The 2014 World Series Champion Giants' top lefty homerun hitters were Belt (12), Sandoval (11 as a lefty), and Crawford (10). That's actually pretty comparable to the 2016 Brewers' Nieuwenhuis (13), Gennett (10), Villar (8 as a lefty). If you add the top three "lefty sluggers" for each team together you get the following: 2016 Brewer Lefty "Sluggers": 1109 ABs, 61 2Bs, 4 3Bs, 31 HRs, 133 BBs, 326 SOs, 17 SBs, .255/.335/.401/.736 2014 Giant Lefty "Sluggers": 1102 ABs, 48 2Bs, 12 3Bs, 33 HRs, 105 BBs, 247 SOs, 4 SBs, .271/.335/.426/.761 The Giants come out slightly ahead, but that's mainly from a few more singles (ie. not necessarily the power numbers). If you take away the 16 extra singles they have over the Brewers, you get an even more comparable .257/.321/.412/.733 line from them. Anyways, I actually agree that lefty balance is a nice thing to have, but I was interested in looking into your "challenge" and found the Giants pretty quickly and more-so just found it an interesting comparison. However, I also agree that that's a very, down-the-road, concern that we shouldn't be worried about just yet.