Now that those pods are in the rear view mirror, I approach 2025 with cleaner and clearer thoughts on the Brewers system as a whole. And, well, as the sleepy part of Brewers spring training begins, I find myself both returning to the 2024 season to watch select innings of players I want more viewings of (it never ends over here) and looking forward to peripheral storylines down the side roads and into the dugouts of the upcoming 2025 season. As per usual, for myself, with all the warranted hype and hoopla for superstar prospects such as INF Jesus Made - and other prospects who find themselves discussed ad nauseum by the prospect community at large - I find myself thinking well beyond these dominant discussions. My baseball thoughts venture into the tall grasses beyond the brighter lights. I think of the players and storylines who may have fallen beyond the broader view. To that end, I simply want to highlight some of the players and stories I am already thinking about as we start seeing the Minor Leaguers head off to their spring trainings in the days and weeks ahead. Without further ado, here a handful of my thoughts that fit that bill.
1) Does RHP KC Hunt really have a knuckle ball he'll be throwing in 2025? Or is this just an off-season novelty? Hunt has been working with the Baseball Performance Center (alongside several other Brewers farmhands). In addition to reports he has really hammered away at his change-up as a primary body of work down there, he apparently has been toying with a low 80's knuckle ball. So, the question is: Is this just fun and games or is this an actual pitch Hunt is going to sprinkle into his already vast repertoire?
2) With the unexpected off-season trade of LHP Mason Molina, I simply want to remind us all of the three college pitchers taken before Molina. There is plenty to be interested in when it comes to RHP Jaron Deberry, RHP John Holobetz, and RHP Chandler Welch. Of the three, we actually saw some affiliated work for RHP Chandler Welch when he pitched 1 2/3 innings versus the Delmarva Shorebirds last September 8th. Welch's breaking ball really stands out - he can essentially use the pitch in any count throwing it a couple different ways and different impacts. In his first professional appearance he struck out a lefty lead-off on three straight pitches. Two high-riding four-seamers followed by an inside swooping ducking breaker for the swinging K. He also showed great mound presence picking off a runner leaving second base early in his first frame of work. There is plenty to be excited about here given he also throws two heaters (at present) and has a gyro slider and a sweeper in addition to the very plus breaking ball. I am chomping at the bit to see how Welch is pitching (most likely in Wisconsin) after one full off-season of developmental work. Holobetz, like Hunt, is working with the Baseball Performance Center and is reportedly touching 97 mph and has the look of a potential fast riser according to their staff. And, it's hard not to be excited to see the analytics darling that Deberry was and is coming out of that very successful Dallas Baptist pitching development outfit and into the Brewers pitching lab. We could have some diamonds in the rough here. Be sure to tune in early and often to see how these young men look when they take the mound.
3) We haven't seen LHP Brandon Knarr, RHP Cameron Wagoner, and RHP Tanner Shears pitch in over a year as each young man has grappled with serious injury and the ongoing recovery processes therein. All three hurlers have given us exciting spurts of impactful mound work in their young careers. BUT, when you miss as much time and competitive developmental innings as they have, it's as if they have to reestablish their professional standing. Will these young men be pitching early in 2025? Are they fully recovered? Can they hit the ground running? It's no secret, Tanner Shears' splitter is one of my favorite pitches in the entire Brewers system. Losing him before the 2024 season started was a massive blow for me personally as a report writer and fan. Given Wagoner's incredible bounce back second half to 2023, losing him before the 2024 season also stung quite a bit. Despite getting a few rehab innings in with the ACL Brewers, we haven't seen a healthy Brandon Knarr pitching since early 2023. That's a long hill to climb to get back to full season ball! I am hoping each young man has the opportunity to begin 2025 fresh and healthy.
4) Will the real INF Eric Brown Jr. please stand up? It's hard to fathom a harder or faster fall from upper-tier prospect heights than the plummet Eric Brown Jr. experienced in 2024. You'll be hard pressed to find EBJ's name even mentioned in prospect rankings at this point. This is understandable on one hand given the very very real offensive struggles at Double-A Biloxi in 2024. It wasn't even a slump, really. It was a player who consistently looked utterly lost in the batters box. On the other hand, I think it is very reasonable to propose this may have simply been a case of an extremely talented player who lost his way and then overcompensated to try to find his paths back to success. Let us not forget the successes EBJ experienced at High-A Wisconsin and in the AFL. This being said, it isn't often you see a player completely change their batting stance and set up more than once in a given season. With EBJ, I saw him tweak his entire batting stance and set up three times in 2024. By season's end, he had gone back to a very traditional stance - a stance I am personally hoping he worked from to create 2025's foundation this off-season. I've touted his underrated defensive acumen since he's been playing innings as a Brewer. However, for EBJ's professional sake he can not afford another season like he had in 2024. Perhaps no other player in the system needs a meaningful start to his 2025 season than this young man. In the very least, if he starts slow, he can't afford that slow start for all that long. I am sending out the prayers to the baseball gods he rediscovers how great he can be. I still believe in this young man's game but my belief means very little in the grand scheme of things.
5) It seems as though the Brewers have created a new pattern over the past four to five seasons of finding Minor League free agent diamonds - free agents who become meaningful contributors at the MLB level. The pitchers dominate in this department (as one might expect) but we've also seen meaningful roles and roster spots filled by OF Blake Perkins, INF Andrew Monasterio, INF Vinny Capra, OF Brewer Hicklen, and INF/OF Isaac Collins. To a man, each and every one of these men was a Minor League free agent signing (in Collins' case, he was a Minor League Rule 5 add - to that, I say "Potatoes. Potatas!"). To celebrate this incredible collective feat, I am going to go out on a limb to preemptively tout an early Minor League free agent signing from this past off-season. The Brewers dipped back into the Rockies free agent pool (of all things) and signed OF Jimmy Herron on November 15th. Primarily a corner outfielder, Herron can also cover in center. Herron is about as ready-made for the coveted MLB next step as they come. He has improved his plate discipline measurably over the past several season. He hits for a little bit of power, has some speed on the base paths, and is known as being an extremely steady player and athlete. At 28 years old, and approaching 29 by mid summer, I would be entirely unsurprised if Herron plays his way onto the 40-Man at some point in time this season. He's a player I will be watching closely in the spring training games and in the early months at Nashville. I see him as very real competition for Brewer Hicklen. May the best man (and player) win.
6) Speaking of sneaking onto the 40-Man roster, will we see yet another step by 1B Ernesto Martinez Jr. in 2025? We've seen immense growth in this young man's game over the past two seasons. He has now become a consistent contributor on a game-by-game basis and that is now the floor of what we expect as fans. Martinez will face Triple-A pitching for the first time in 2025 and he will share 1B duties with veteran Jake Bauers and second-year Sound Wes Clarke. We've been on the EMJ ride since he was a teenager. He is one of the more remarkable stories in the entire system and he is one of the more remarkable personalities. Here's hoping he takes another step in 2025! I still can see a future where EMJ plays first base as a Milwaukee Brewer. I can't help but think that at a certain point in time these one year Minor League deals will need to evolve into something a little sweeter lest EMJ head to other baseball pastures. For the time being, however, I'm simply going to keep enjoying the ride.
7) As Spencer and I touched on at length in our pod series, the middle infield depth at the lower levels is currently a wealth of untapped riches. Who separates themselves in 2024? Do Pena and Made fulfill or exceed their hype stateside? Does Adamczewski return healthy at 2B with his extremely tantalizing bat? Does Daniel Guilarte build off his solid ending to 2024? Who distinguishes themselves in the pack of Tyler Rodriguez, Demetrio Nadal, Luiyin Alastre, Jorge Quintana, Juan Ortuno, Juan Martinez, Kevin Ereu and Moises Polanco? There are many open ended questions in this area of the Brewers farm but that is because the talent pool is so young and so deep.
8) Who will fill out the outfield depth chart in Biloxi? As of today, the only listed outfield on the Shuckers roster is one Adam Hall. We know Dylan O'Rae will get plenty of burn on the CF grass. We know Casey Martin can fill in on the outfield grass despite his glaring inefficiencies at the dish. Will OF Luis Lara get the call up? Is another free agent - <cough> Lamar Sparks is still a free agent - in the cards? If Lara is promoted who gets the nod from Carolina? We know Jheremy Vargas can step into a role at the corner outfield spots for the Timber Rattlers but that isn't an everyday proposition. Given his age and skillset, I would think Yhoswar Garcia gets the first nod for the northbound High-A bus but I've learned nothing is at is seems with the talented Garcia. Regardless, as it stands today the outfield depth in Biloxi is too thin by my eyes.
9) Despite a surprising and unannounced complete absence in the Australian Winter League, the Brewers did have a handful of players compete south of the border in the various winter Leagues in the Western Hemisphere (@Ro Mueller had us all covered and then some over HERE). Can INF Eduardo Garcia and RHP Justin Yeager build off very successful Winter League bodies of work? Can they rest and repair, in the interim, while carrying over much deserved momentum? With Garcia, in particular, that is a fairly lasting question. I think it's fair to say we haven't seen that length of competitive offensive output in Garcia's entire tenure as a Brewer. As a general rule, he has been extremely streaky with a penchant for the swing and miss on off-speed pitches low and away. It's fair to be skeptical of output in a League Garcia may simply find more comfort playing in. However, if he were to use his winter body of work as a catalyst for improved play stateside that could be a completely surprising organizational depth discovery. Can RHP Justin Yeager use his extremely competitive closer work (despite a few late season hiccups, it's very fair to say Yeager's overall output was grand) down south to catapult him into a Triple-A conversation? I personally throw Yeager into that fringe MLB reliever group with RHP's Blake Holub and Ryan Middendorf. Each young man has a bevy of impressive tools. Each young man definitely competes in high leverage scenarios. Yet, I'm consistently wondering if they can take those coveted next steps to enter a call-up discussion. Yeager made the right impressions, regardless, this winter.
10) What happened to INF Ethan Murray in 2024 and where does he go from here? Like EBJ, I would personally toss Ethan Murray into the arbitrary category of 'Most Disspointing 2024 Seasons'. All the bullish momentum created in 2023 was essentially tossed out the dugout with an extremely uninspired overall performance in 2024. I've opined on more than one occasion that it looked as though Murray was playing out of shape or injured as the season came to a close. I just didn't see the same consistent movement and agility I'd come to love in earlier seasons and this was fairly pronounced by season's end. So, was he playing injured or banged up? It's hard to read the tea leaves. Just as Murray was leaving the slumps of April and May with a torrid start to June, he missed over a month and a half due to injury. What we do know is Murray was in good standing within the organization after the 2023 season. That much was certain. However, when you are knee deep in the organizational numbers game you can not afford many seasons like Murray just had lest you go the route of the Sounds Patrick Dorrian who is currently still a free agent after last season's massive slump(s).
These are just some of the many questions I have concerning the greater depth chart of the Brewers system. What questions do you have pertaining to the greater depth of talent across the many levels of Brewers baseball? What players do you find yourself randomly thinking about in these early days of spring training? Let's continue our musing togethers in the comments below. We are less than two months away from the Sounds opening three-game home series versus Jacksonville. Here's hoping 2025 is yet another season where the Brewers, as a whole, continue to defy the odds at the MLB level while the Brewers as a greater system continue validating the industry-wide sentiments their Minor League system is one of the deepest and worthy of accolades.
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