Platoon Power

Their trade value is equal to what they are as players (other bottom of the roster types). Perkins has a slight bit of value because he's cheap and controllable where a team with a need for a soft side of a platoon might be willing to offer a reliever similar to Easton McGee. I'd rather keep Perkins just incase something happened to either Mitchell or Lockridge. He serves a purpose and there's others I'd cut from the 40 man if I needed to create room.

Any interest in Michael Kopech? I'd love to sign him to a minor league deal with an early opt out date. I know our bullpen is crowded but we could use another RHP and I'm intrigued with what our pitching lab could do with him.

Assuming health, there's not many battles for the 13 positional player roster spots. The only open spot I see is the soft side of the CF platoon opposite Garrett Mitchell. Perkins is an amazing defender but Lockridge might have even a higher ceiling with his 80 grade speed which can cover more ground. Grok told me that Lockridge posted a .269/.321/.462/.783 vs LHP line with the Brewers which compares favorably to the .271/.352/.438/.789 vs LHP line that Perkins put up a year ago. I'll take the contrarian route and go with the superior speed & defense over the switch hitter. Either way the difference is negligible. I'd divide half the starts vs RHP between Vaughn and Bauers unless Vaughn goes crazy like he did in July & September. This is more of a credit to Bauer's bat emerging than it's necessarily a shot at Vaughn. Even though the .250/.320/.375/695 line that Vaughn had in August is still fresh in my mind. The left side of the infield will be a giant pile of yuck for a few weeks. If you plug your nose and close your eyes you can wish Ortiz, Rengifo & Hamilton play like they did in 2024. I'm worried about Rengifo's wrist injury being the reason he fell off the cliff so I'm not banking on him being anything more than the soft side of a platoon at 3B until Jett is ready. If we get anything more than that from Rengifo then we're cooking with gas. Once Jet arrives, I'm fully preparing for a Hamilton / Ortiz platoon until Made *hopefully* arrives later this year. I think those 2 can cobble together close to league average production with elite defense when Ortiz plays and elite speed when Hamilton plays. I just don't think Ortiz should be in the batters box as long as a RHP is on the mound unless something dramatically changes with his approach. VS RHP C William Contreras 1B Andrew Vaughn / Jake Bauers 2B Brice Turang SS Joey Ortiz 3B David Hamilton LF Jackson Chourio CF Garrett Mitchell RF Sal Frelick DH Christian Yelich Bench C Gary Sanchez 1B/OF Jake Bauers / 1B Andrew Vaughn IF Luis Rengifo OF Brandon Lockridge VS LHP C Gary Sanchez 1B Andrew Vaughn 2B Brice Turang SS Joey Ortiz 3B Luis Rengifo LF Jackson Chourio CF Brandon Lockridge RF Sal Frelick DH William Contreras Bench OF/DH Christian Yelich OF Garrett Mitchell IF David Hamilton 1B/OF Jake Bauers

What I think the rotation will be - Woodruff, Priester, Misiorowski, Patrick & Harrison What I'd like to see the rotation be - Woodruff, Priester, Misiorwoski, Harrison & Zerpa I've been intrigued with the idea of trying Zerpa out as a starter since the move was announced. I remember what the Rays did with Drew Rasmussen and see a potential solution for our unbalanced bullpen. There's also added bonuses with retaining our depth and having the potential to maximize our return for Collins & Mears. If Zerpa can't cut it as a starter then you send him back to the pen. I just like the idea of turning a reliever and a utility player into a potential #3 starter. That's a big win from a value standpoint which you can use in future trades. Anyone know how long Harrison, Sproat & Henderson need to stay down in the minors to maintain an extra year of control? That might determine how I feel about starting Harrison in the rotation over Patrick to start the year.

#1. Garrett Mitchell stays healthy, plays great defense and posts an .800 OPS vs RHP #2. Jett Williams ends up with nearly identical numbers to Caleb Durbin a year ago but does so between SS & CF. His versatility creates a unique platoon between Garrett Mitchell & Joey Ortiz with Jett playing SS against RHP and CF against LHP. #3. Jesus Made destroys AA & AAA pitching and forces his way to Milwaukee a few weeks before the deadline. He takes the 3B job and runs with it. #4. Brock Wilken makes the postseason roster and starts at DH when we face LHP #5. With a loaded roster & farm system, the only move we make at the deadline is trading bottom of the roster players like Luis Rengifo & Rob Zastryzny for a low level prospect(s). #6. Our top 13 pitchers all post an ERA+ over 100 and we finish with the best team ERA in the entire league. #7. We win the World Series with the deepest roster we've ever had in Milwaukee!

Matt Arnold wanted to turn Freddy into 2 quality pitchers and it took 3 trades to do so. Along the way, he added some insurance for Joey Ortiz with a LH hitting infielder and reinforced the bullpen with 2 LH relievers when we run into Shohei, Freeman and Tucker on the Dodgers. Collins and Durbin were tradeable because we needed to clear a path for players with a higher prospect pedigree. OF Isaac Collins --> OF Garrett Mitchell RP Nick Mears --> RP Angel Zerpa SP Freddy Peralta --> SP Kyle Harrison & SP Brandon Sproat IF Caleb Durbin --> IF Jett Williams LR Tobias Myers --> LR Shane Drohan IF Andruw Monasterio --> IF David Hamilton UT Anthony Siegler --> UT Luis Rengifo C Danny Jansen --> Gary Sanchez It's a lot of chairs being rearranged but I believe we increased our ceiling while adding several years of control. The Hamilton / Rengifo platoon isn't very exciting but that duo is infinitely better than the Dunn / Capra platoon we were forced to watch last year. I'll suffer through those two for a few weeks until we guarantee an extra year of team control over Jett.

Didn't the Brewers move Travis Shaw to 2B after we traded for Moustakas? That's more drastic than this idea when you consider Shaw / Moustakas hadn't played 2B in years prior to that deal. This sounds like the type of creative move the Brewers would do and why they value versatility so much. I believe the sudden interest in left fielders is because Matt Arnold has a vision of using Isaac Collins like he used Ben Zobrist when he was on the Rays. Is the defensive downgrade going from Ortiz -> Turang and Turang -> Collins that significant that it would outweigh replacing Ortiz's bat with someone like Kwan or O'Hearn's? Color me skeptical with how lost Ortiz has looked once again.

Add me to the Willi Castro bandwagon but count me out of Ryan O'Hearn. We already have our Jake Bauer replacement. I'm not sending Andrew Vaughn down when Rhys returns from the IL.

I'm close to Aiden Arnett's family and I'm hearing the Brewers are showing quite a bit of interest in him. He's on their radar for one of their picks round 11 and after.

The Brewers do 1 thing great offensively as a team - They get on base. The league average OBP is something like .316 and everyone of our regulars minus Jackson Chourio and Joey Ortiz are well above that mark.

Mark says he's scheduled a bullpen with one of Boras' unsigned clients. Spencer Turnbull or Joe Kelly anyone?

Slade Caldwell is a guy that sticks out to me. All things equal, the Brewers would prefer to draft a college bat, but I don't see anyone who can stick up the middle with a plus hit tool who also hits left handed.

75 wins.

Sounds like the plot for a movie where the owner is trying to finish dead last so she can move the team to Miami.

This move tells me the Brewers aren't trading Adames and are only expecting to carry Monasterio as the lone backup infielder. If your other bench players are a backup catcher, Wiemer/Mitchell and Bauers then you need an emergency infielder to come from your outfield.