Brock Beauchamp

I've been kinda down on Mitchell, maybe unfairly. First, his defense gives him a high floor and it's easy to see him becoming, at worst, a fourth/fifth outfielder that can play center very well. That's valuable in itself. Second, I was recently listening to MKE Tailgate's minor league report and the guest mentioned that Mitchell's swing decision peripherals aren't aligned with his results (ie. he looks worse than he has been). He's not chasing a ridiculous number of pitches and he's not missing a ton of pitches, the sequencing is just killing him. I haven't had a chance to dig into this yet but plan to do so.

Considering what the Brewers gave up for Contreras, if they can improve his framing a bit and get anything over a 110 wRC+ for several years, that's a big win for them. It turns catcher from a problematic roster spot to a well above average roster spot.

I find it interesting that Arnold seems very much in charge of the organization's baseball operations but he's still the general manager and not POBO. I suspect this will get sorted out at some point but honestly, I thought it'd already be sorted by now. It's bloody hard to run an MLB organization and losing one executive official (POBO and GM versus only a GM right now) seems like it'd be a strain on an organization over the long term.

I used Burnes in BTV because I think their value for Woodruff is pretty broken. It's fair value based on BTV but I just don't see the Twins doing this for logistical reasons. First, they'd lose Miranda - a staple of the lineup going forward - and I'm not sure they're ready to trade Lee. Which is a good illustration of how difficult it is to make a trade in MLB. Both teams could improve in the short-term (Twins) and mid-term (Brewers) but I don't see either team being willing to make the trade for personnel reasons. Woodruff makes the Twins better but not a lot better. The floor they'd be replacing with Woodruff might already be something around a 1.5-2 WAR starter.

I agree that I'd target Woodruff first and foremost but ultimately, it comes down to dollars and performance. While slightly favoring a Woody extension, I'd ultimately extend the player who is willing to sign for the dollars and years that most closely align with their projected performance.

Willy's on-base skills are really the only thing that scares me about him but they're pretty damned scary. I tend to be of the camp "don't care what's on the farm" when it comes to shortstops and centerfielders. You can literally never have too many of either and the failure rate on both is exceptional. Many become decent players but MLB tends to expose enough chinks in a player's armor that they easily become unplayable at a premium position. Maybe they don't hit enough. Their routes are a little sloppy. Their arm isn't strong enough. We've all seen it a hundred times, a guy rockets through the system as a SS only to play 40 MLB games there and moving to second base or a utility role. It's easy to fall down the defensive ladder and incredibly hard to climb up it. If I can reasonably keep what I know is a proven MLB starter at short or center, I'm usually not going to let pieces on the farm influence my attempts to keep that player. You can always move one of those players to second/third and make your defensive alignment even better should both prove to be capable at the more premium position. I'm not saying they need to keep Adames at all costs but it'd be a big mistake not to legitimately try.

I don't see how the two actions are related, though. If Chourio signs a deal, he'll be paid - at most - a few millions bucks a year for 3-ish years and then increasing from there. By the time Chourio is making real money, Yelich is off the books or close to it.

BTW just want to tag @Smichaelis9 so he can see the glory of Frelick's slide in photo form.

Let's be real here, though. The Brewers gain an entire year of prime service time by keeping him down for three weeks. Baseball needs to change its rules about service time but I absolutely understand why teams do what they do under the current rules.

It's probably fine if you run him out once a week in RF if he's hitting. More than twice a week and you're asking for trouble.

Really nice first entry! I can't wait to see what you have in store for us next. Do you plan to mainly tackle MiLB or will you examine the big league club as well? Oh, and you can embed tables on this site. It's faster to do and displays more nicely. Here's a primer on it:

I find the catching situation in baseball really interesting as a whole. Did the Cards downgrade from Molina to Contreras in hopes of some form of robotic umpiring taking over during that contract? Does Milwaukee have the same hopes for his younger brother? Or do the Brewers think they can shore up William's defense? With the future of catching kinda up in the air right now, how teams are approaching the situation is really interesting to follow.

That trade was pure black magic and elevated my opinion of Arnold significantly.

Hah! We actually just bought the site. I'm def not a Cubs fan. I'll manage the community but we purchased it because Matt Trueblood is a Cubs fan and we wanted to give him a platform. We purchased this site because I'm a Brewers fan, we're purchasing that site because Matt's a Cubs fan. Right now I'm just getting acquainted with that group. They're a wild bunch, for sure.

I'd like to address this. As a fan of multiple teams and a member of multiple communities, I hear this said about literally every manager in baseball. Which kinda makes the statement impossible. As for Hiura, that's a pretty big complaint I have about both the front office and Counsell. I don't know who is responsible for throwing Hiura out there against LHP but it's super aggravating.

Oh man, I disagree. I think Counsell is a very good manager who manages the team as is required over 162. He runs a tight clubhouse, And baseball is a game where you can argue 55/45 decisions all day long with neither side being satisfied at the end because process doesn't correlate well with results over that data sample.

Thank you! I posted all of these back-to-back and that was lost in the shuffle of posting several pieces at once.

So my deep dive analysis is:

Here are his 2022 Statcast numbers. Brutal. A .375+ WOBA on three of his pitches. To put that into context, in 2022 Kyle Schwarber had a .375 xwOBA. Wilson threw about 900 pitches last year that made the average hitter look like Kyle Schwarber. Year Pitch Type # # RHB # LHB % MPH PA AB H 1B 2B 3B HR SO BBE BA XBA SLG XSLG WOBA XWOBA EV LA Spin Ext. Whiff% PutAway% 2022 Sinker 593 402 191 32.5 92.1 179 160 49 38 9 0 2 21 141 .306 .296 .400 .407 .342 .341 91.2 5 1958 6.5 11.7 16.9 2022 4-Seam Fastball 438 117 321 24.0 92.7 114 99 30 18 7 0 5 24 77 .303 .278 .525 .498 .384 .370 91.7 21 2034 6.5 22.2 16.7 2022 Slider 290 228 62 15.9 83.4 77 75 18 10 4 0 4 13 63 .240 .314 .453 .530 .297 .364 88.4 17 2160 6.6 20.7 17.8 2022 Changeup 270 72 198 14.8 85.1 82 73 22 12 6 1 3 10 64 .301 .310 .534 .499 .386 .387 92.9 5 1467 6.5 18.8 13.9 2022 Curveball 234 111 123 12.8 77.2 56 53 13 4 3 0 6 11 43 .245 .245 .642 .519 .378 .334 86.1 18 2307 6.5 20.4 18.3

I wrote up the Wilson acquisition and the first thing that jumped out at me was how many pitches he threw and how badly most of them graded out. It will be interesting to see how the Brewers change his approach and try to accentuate his strengths. I'd be shocked if one of their first moves wasn't to axe a couple of his way-below-average pitches. It baffles me why the Pirates didn't do it last year, seems like a ripe opportunity for Milwaukee.

Nope, PM it to me, please!

If you're predicting a Woodruff Cy Young Award, maybe the Brewers should think about extending him over Adames... 😛

You can nearly set your watch to it.

A long winter may still be covering Wisconsin, but for the first time in months, the crack of wooden bats filled television sets around the state, marking the return of Brewers baseball. Image courtesy of Brock Beauchamp As we approach Brewer Fanatic’s first birthday on March 13th, we saw hundreds of users contribute to the site over our first offseason, writing thousands of posts. Let’s look at the off-season's most popular users, posts, and blogs. But before we do that, here is an explanation: a couple of times per year, we thank our great users by awarding prizes for the most popular user-generated content on Brewer Fanatic. Want to throw your hat into the ring for a future prize? Register and join the community today! Now let’s run through some numbers. From the time the Astros hoisted a trophy (ick) until the day before the first spring training game, Brewer Fanatic saw the following: 76 new users registered on the site The site had 280 individuals contribute content across the news, forums, blogs, and video sections Users started 487 unique topics to discuss the Brewers Those topics contained 14,777 posts Users handed out 6,990 reactions to others’ posts During the offseason, the most prolific poster was @Brewcrew82. Thanks for all the contributions, Brewcrew! The second most prolific poster was our very own @sveumrules! Thanks for all the great content and moderation work you do for the site! Now on to the prizes… Most Popular Post We were all rocked by the news of the William Contreras trade. First, it came out of nowhere. Second, the details seemed incomplete because… Esteury Ruiz for a young All-Star catcher? That’s it? As we all sat and waited for the other shoe to drop (i.e., The Brewers throwing in a second prospect), we learned that GM Matt Arnold did the opposite. He demanded more in return than Contreras alone, as @Robocaller points out in the most popular post of the offseason, that took real chutzpah. Well done, Robocaller, and for your contribution, you’ll receive this 1979 Paul Molitor autographed Topps card! Honorary Mention Our second most popular post of the offseason is fun, and I’m thrilled to bring it to everyone’s attention again. Recently, a new user from South Korea joined Brewer Fanatic and explained how they became a Brewers fan on the back of his “forever hero,” Ben Sheets. The thread is a great read, and welcome to the board, @Shin Wook Lee! We’re glad to have you aboard and look forward to future posts! Most Popular User Blog Entry Can Robert Gasser make the Opening Day roster? While it’s probably unlikely to happen, @Steven Ohlrogge posed the question in this brief blog entry. And isn’t that one of the best things about the transition from late winter into spring? You know it’s late February when we’re putting undue thought into the eighth man in the bullpen and whether a dark horse candidate will emerge. For your efforts, Steve here’s a limited edition Brewers Spring Training bobblehead to put on your shelf and count down the days until the Brewers face the Cubs in Wrigley on March 30th. Honorary Mention It’s hard to mention the Brewer Fanatic user blogs without mentioning @CheeseheadInQC. Coming in as the second most popular blog entry of the offseason, their entry breaking down three players and stats to watch this year in the minor leagues is an excellent read. Huge props to Cheesehead for their continued coverage of the minors in our blog section! Thanks again to all 280 of you who visited the site during a relatively slow-moving Brewers offseason and kept the site lively and informative. The community always has been and always will be the core of this website, and I cannot wait to see what you all have in store for us in 2023! GO, CREW! View full article