Jason Wang

Image courtesy of © Geoff Burke-Imagn Images Honorable Mentions Caleb Durbin 60 AB, .283/.389/.400, 17 H, 4 2B, 1 HR, 8 RBI, 9 BB, 3 SB If you haven’t been keeping up recently, Durbin has absolutely turned things around at the plate. After a .561 OPS in May, he posted a .795 OPS in June, a .789 OPS in July, and has stayed hot. He hasn’t gotten any taller, but he has begun pulling the ball in the air, maximizing carry on the ball to compensate for his lack of natural pop. Even with a smaller frame, a perfect barrel from him can still send a pitch 410 feet to center field. His profile embodies what seems to be the Brewers’ guiding offensive principle this year: put the ball in play and see what happens. With a strikeout rate of just 9.3% (98th percentile), that’s exactly what he’s doing. Furthermore, he has a squared up rate of 32.8% (93rd percentile), meaning that he’s making the most out of his swings despite his slow bat speed. Statistical Nugget: Durbin has an OPS of .941 in full counts this season. Isaac Collins 78 AB, .321/.411/.436, 25 H, 3 2B, 2 HR, 11 RBI, 11 BB, 4 SB Collins has quickly become one of the team’s most valuable position players. Far from a marquee prospect or superstar, he started the season coming off the bench but has made himself into an integral starter, getting the lion’s share of playing time in left field while Christian Yelich has been spending more time as a designated hitter. In his first full season, he has managed to post a 127 OPS+, which leads all qualified hitters. There are a lot of parallels between Collins and Durbin. Like Durbin, he struggled at the start of the year, posting a .545 OPS in May before turning it on. He also shares the same power weaknesses and has instead made his money by pulling the ball in the air at an elite rate, but that’s where the similarities end. Collins isn’t quite as good at making contact but maintains a tight strike zone with a chase rate of 19.4% (94th percentile) and has a great walk rate of 12.9% (90th percentile). He has much better bat speed but has struggled to square up the ball as frequently as Durbin, meaning there could still be some juice left to access in that swing of his. Statistical Nugget: This season, Collins has an OPS of .798 after falling behind 0-1 and a .904 OPS after reaching 1-1. Andrew Vaughn 52 AB, .365/.426/.731, 19 H, 4 2B, 5 HR, 21 RBI, 7 BB, 0 SB At the risk of jinxing what has been a magical run for Milwaukee’s interim first baseman, Vaughn has been one of the best hitters in baseball since donning a Brewers uniform. Prior to joining the team, he had a 47 OPS+ with the White Sox over 193 plate appearances. As a Brewer, he has a 211 OPS+ over 81 plate appearances. The way that he has been playing, he’s the power bat Milwaukee has been missing for quite some time. His unexpected success has been a major part of the team’s recent stretch of dominance but one must wonder whether a player with a career OPS+ of 100 over more than 2,500 plate appearances is truly capable of sustaining this offensive outburst. If not, then the team will at least have to hold until Rhys Hoskins returns from the injured list at some point next month. If he truly has turned over a new leaf, then the questions surrounding the health and abilities of Hoskins will become moot as Vaughn will likely continue to hold down the starting spot. Statistical Nugget: This season, Vaughn has a .998 OPS with runners in scoring position. Hitter of the Month – Jackson Chourio 90 AB, .367/.408/.600, 33 H, 7 2B, 4 HR, 17 RBI, 6 BB, 3 SB It’s a pity that Chourio hit the injured list with a hamstring strain just as he was reaching the peak of his powers. After a lukewarm start to the year, his 1.008 OPS in July was enough to lift his season OPS+ to 119, the same mark as his rookie year. He’s still a little swing-happy and walks less than 5% of the time but his natural abilities at the plate have kicked in to compensate for his weaknesses, at least for now. The bad news is that he’s estimated to miss another 2-4 weeks which may halt any momentum he had going into August. This has given Blake Perkins and the newly acquired Brandon Lockridge a chance to stretch their legs and they’ve been playing decently, especially the former. However, only time will tell how much the Brewers will miss the presence of Chourio over the next month. Statistical Nugget: This season, Chourio has a Weighted On Base Average (wOBA) of .286 against fastballs but a wOBA of .568 against offspeed pitches. View full article

Image courtesy of © Jeff Hanisch-Imagn Images Honorable Mentions DL Hall 8 G, 13 ⅓ IP, 2.70 ERA, 6 H, 4 ER, 5 BB, 10 K, 0.83 WHIP After a rocky start to his Brewers career last year, where he dealt with injury, DL Hall is finally living up to the hype that followed him from Baltimore. He has filled a fantastic niche as a more durable bullpen arm, either pitching multiple relief innings or serving as the opener. He has yet to pitch more than three innings this year, but the results so far seem to indicate that this level of work suits him well. His arsenal has taken a big step forward, particularly his fastball offering which wasn’t particularly effective in 2024 but has now become a lethal weapon. Now fully healthy, almost all of his pitches have found a way to be effective. His slider in particular has caused some problems for opposing hitters, holding them to just a .095 average so far this year. Statistical Nugget: Hall has held opposing batters to a .369 OPS with the bases empty but a .990 OPS with runners in scoring position. Freddy Peralta 6 GS, 32 ⅔ IP, 3.58 ERA, 25 H, 13 ER, 12 BB, 36 K, 1.13 WHIP The Brewers’ resident workhorse continued his strong season in July. He has been a little more susceptible to damage compared to the first few months of the season but overall, he has been pretty consistent, especially by his standards. He has been more reliant on the fastball this season, throwing it 56.1% of the time, more than any other full season in his career. Also receiving more of a spotlight has been his changeup which has replaced his slider as his favorite secondary offering. Statistical Nugget: Peralta has generated a run value of 33 in the shadow portion of the strike zone, more than all but two pitchers: Paul Skenes (34) and Tarik Skubal (36). Quinn Priester 5 G, 29 ⅓ IP, 3.07 ERA, 28 H, 10 ER, 8 BB, 28 K, 1.23 WHIP With each passing day, Quinn Priester looks like more of a steal by the Brewers. Acquired from Boston in exchange for Yophery Rodriguez, a Competitive Balance Round selection, and pitcher John Holobetz, Priester has quickly become one of the team’s most valuable starting pitchers. With a season ERA of 3.27 over 20 starts, it seems like Milwaukee really knew something the Pirates and Red Sox didn’t. A true sinker baller through and through, his overall groundball rate of 57.4% this year is higher than 96% of qualified pitchers. His breaking ball offerings aren’t too bad either with a sweepy slider and a curveball that doesn’t move much but tunnels well enough with the fastball to fool hitters. Statistical Nugget: In high leverage situations, Priester has held opposing hitters to a .448 OPS. Pitcher of the Month - Brandon Woodruff 4 GS, 22 ⅓ IP, 2.01 ERA, 13 H, 5 ER, 3 BB, 29 K, 0.72 WHIP Despite a layoff that spanned a season and a half, Woodruff came back like he never left. He stepped on the mound for the first time this season on July 6th against the Marlins and hasn’t looked back ever since. He has gone six strong innings in all but one of his starts and has been working efficiently, consistently keeping his pitch count under 90. Even in the face of injury and missed time, he’s still turning up the gas on command. Speaking of command, it has been pristine since his return. With a strikeout rate of 35.6% and a walk rate of just 3.8%, he isn’t giving his opponents much of a chance. Other dominant numbers include the .116 average against his four-seam fastball, .240 slugging percentage against his sinker, and 42.5% whiff rate on his changeup. It’s a sample of under 30 innings but so far, he’s been as dominant as we’ve ever seen him. Statistical Nugget: Woodruff has a groundball rate of just 19.4% despite throwing a sinker 29.8% of the time. View full article

Image courtesy of © Geoff Burke-Imagn Images Let’s face it – Milwaukee wasn’t going to be one of the biggest movers at the trade deadline. There was little reason to believe that they’d finally make the moves that fans have been clamoring for, and now that they’re leading the NL Central (albeit by just one game), why would they take risks and have some fun with the roster when they can just coast? It’s a modus operandi that has become all too familiar for fans who have been waiting for the organization to turn a good team into a great one. As per usual, the moves they did make did make them better, but whether the improvements are meaningful enough to create a deep postseason run remains to be seen. To recap, here are all of the big league moves they’ve made since the All-Star break: Additions C Danny Jansen RHP Shelby Miller LHP Jordan Montgomery OF Brandon Lockridge Losses 2B Jadher Areinamo (#24-ranked prospect) LHP Nestor Cortes SS Jorge Quintana Danny Jansen was the first move made by the Brewers this year. In addition to being a solid backup option that should give William Contreras more rest, his numbers against southpaw pitchers and surprising pop should supplement an existing weakness in Milwaukee’s lineup. The Brewers were reportedly quite active in this year’s reliever market, where the best arms were being priced at a premium. Although they missed out on some of the more marquee names like Mason Miller and Jhoan Durán, Milwaukee managed to acquire Shelby Miller without having to forfeit a high-value prospect. Shelby Miller has been outstanding with Arizona this year, posting a 1.98 ERA with a 3.12 FIP and ten saves over the 36 ⅓ innings he has thrown. He has been on the shelf since July 7th with a right forearm strain, but has been making excellent progress and is expected to start a rehab assignment soon. On the other hand, Jordan Montgomery and I have about the same chance of throwing big league innings for the Brewers this year. While my problem is more of a pure skill issue, Montgomery is still recovering from Tommy John surgery and isn’t expected to return until after he hits free agency this offseason. Instead of sending a top prospect to Arizona, Milwaukee opted to pay $2 million of what is now effectively an underwater contract to get the deal done. Brandon Lockridge has put up good numbers in Triple-A but has failed to find the same success at the major league level, currently carrying a 46 OPS+ over 95 plate appearances. He has the potential to be a decent depth piece, but likely won’t be a needle mover for the team this year, especially given the talent the Brewers currently have in the outfield. To be fair, the players they did sign do fill real needs. However, some of the lingering questions about positions like first base and shortstop still remain. Protecting the farm system was clearly a priority as the Brewers only lost one Top 30 prospect in Jadher Areinamo and opted to pay the Diamondbacks in cash instead of talent. In a vacuum, this year was a mixed bag at best and painfully underwhelming at worst. But baseball isn’t played in a vacuum. A few of the Brewers’ most heated rivals were also buyers at the deadline, and depending on the newly acquired talent, could create a serious problem for Milwaukee’s postseason aspirations. The most obvious first place to look is in Chicago. The Cubs, who lorded over the NL Central for quite some time, have been the Brewers’ stiffest competition in the division all year. Here are the moves that they made: Additions LHP Taylor Rogers RHP Michael Soroka RHP Andrew Kittredge UTIL Willi Castro Losses RHP Ryan Gallagher (#8-ranked prospect) SS Ronny Cruz (#13-ranked prospect) OF Christian Franklin (#14-ranked prospect) RHP Sam Armstrong (#17-ranked prospect) OF Ivan Brethowr SS Wilfri De La Cruz The most apparent aspect of their strategy was a far greater willingness to part with prospect talent to get big league help. Willi Castro gives them more infield depth while Taylor Rogers and Andrew Kittredge are solid bullpen options. Unfortunately, despite needing starting pitching the most, they only managed to pick up Michael Soroka, who has a lukewarm 4.87 ERA over 16 starts this season. Like the Brewers, the Cubs didn’t make major improvements. In fact, a totally unbiased person who just so happens to write for Brewer Fanatic might even argue that the Brewers did just a little more to fill in the gaps on their roster. As for the other teams in the NL Central, there are few notable moves to speak of, at least not ones that would shake up the standings. The Cardinals sold three key relievers, the Pirates traded away David Bednar, and the Reds added Ke'Bryan Hayes and Zack Littell. For the remaining months of the season, the division is essentially a two-horse race. But if we zoom out and take a look at the National League as a whole, Milwaukee’s activity at the deadline pales in comparison to the bigger market teams. The Mets, Phillies, and Padres were some of the most aggressive teams this year and picked up plenty of impactful talent. Milwaukee has an upcoming series against all three of those teams before the end of the season and will more than likely face one or more of those teams in at least one postseason series. This is the annual Brew Crew Conundrum. They’ll give you 90-95 regular-season wins one way or another and will also probably win the division. But when it comes down to brass tacks, they just haven’t had the gumption to make a real championship run. After five consecutive first-round exits, you’d think they might want to buck the trend, but 2025 seems to be more of the same. It’s admittedly challenging to compete with larger payrolls and colossal media markets, but Milwaukee’s core of talent makes it worth trying. We can wax poetic about whether we felt the team did too little or just enough, but the next two months will give us the answer we’re so desperately seeking. View full article

Hoskins has been out of action since early July when he sustained a left thumb sprain while making a tag at first base. He was originally expected to be back in the lineup by mid- to late-August, but the most recent updates suggest that he isn't expected to start his rehab assignment until then. Milwaukee did (sort of) hedge against this by acquiring Andrew Vaughn from the White Sox, and he has been playing incredibly well so far, almost suspiciously so. Since joining the team, he's slashing .375/.439/.771 across a sample of 57 plate appearances, which is way above his career norms of .250/.306/.414. It's unclear as to whether the front office truly saw something in him worth making him the Brewers' starting first baseman down the stretch, but if they just saw him as a holdover that has worked out far better than expected, they'll have to start looking for more reinforcements. Ryan O'Hearn stands out as one of the only options at the position that could give the lineup a real boost. With a .456 slugging percentage and 133 OPS+, he's a hitter with qualities that compensate for the current lack of pop. As it stands, Jackson Chourio is the only hitter with a slugging percentage over .450 and the team's combined slugging percentage of .387 places them 23rd in MLB. The only move Milwaukee has made so far is to acquire Danny Jansen to serve as their backup catcher, which does make the team better, but perhaps not enough to push them past their typical first round exit. In an ideal world, Andrew Vaughn would maintain his 234 OPS+ through the end of the season but reality will likely set in before long. Will is true abilities still be enough to take the Brewers to the next level or should they seek more help before it's too late? View full rumor

if steven kwan signs with the brewers I will finally have a reason to buy my first jersey and that alone should be reason enough for the team to sign him!

Across his 587 innings behind the dish this year, he has been worth 2 Defensive Runs Saved. He is one of the worst at pitch framing (-4 rSZ, -8 Framing Runs Above Average), has a decent catcher ERA of 3.68 (2 rCERA), has had mixed results controlling guys on the base paths (2 rSB, -2 Caught Stealing Runs Above Average), but is outstanding at blocks (9 Blocks Above Average, 2 Blocking Runs Saved). In other words he is good at some things and bad at others. Not sure if that helps 😬

He was brought in to fill in whatever gaps the team had, either at third base or pinch running and to his credit, he had pretty solid numbers in the minors but hasn't managed to carry it over to the majors just yet.

Image courtesy of © Lexi Thompson-Imagn Images Back in May, when things were at their worst, I ironically wrote a piece about how lousy things were looking for the Brewers. Since then, they’ve turned things around, and although they fell one win short of their true goal of granting the city of Milwaukee free George Webb burgers, they now have 61 wins and are in a great position for the playoffs. Despite the Cubs’ best efforts to reload in the offseason with Kyle Tucker and whatever clone of Pete Crow-Armstrong they’ve now molded into an MVP-caliber player, the Brewers have caught up. According to FanGraphs, Milwaukee entered Sunday with a 92.1% chance to make the postseason, but more importantly, they also held a 41.1% chance to win the division and a 25.1% chance to clinch a bye. This is where the team ends up every year. They’ve become a perennial presence in the playoffs over the past several seasons, but seem to have one key weakness. And whatever that weakness is, invariably, it shows up glaringly in October. After losing in the 2018 NLCS to the Dodgers, the Brewers have won exactly two playoff games. Somehow, this is the same number of playoff wins as the Miami Marlins have over the same span. So, with a few days left before the trade deadline, the front office faces a tough decision. They can do what they usually do and stay the course for the most part, making a few small moves to pick up an unorthodox reliever or platoon bat before being unceremoniously bounced in the first round of the postseason. Or, they can do what they rarely do and commit to the current roster. The latter option is far from an easy task. After all, there are few positions on the roster that are clear weaknesses and that have straightforward replacements available to be acquired. However, the good folks at Brewer Fanatic have already done the scouting work necessary to identify a few good options. In fact, Matthew Trueblood recently looked at 105 of them. There are a few names that stand out on the list. Eugenio Suárez and Ryan O’Hearn could help fix the lineup’s current lack of corner infield pop, and O’Hearn in particular could lift a sagging first base tandem of Rhys Hoskins and Jake Bauers, both of whom are currently sidelined by injury. If the Brewers value positional flexibility, Willi Castro could be a great utility piece to help fill whatever gaps arise down the stretch. Of course, all three of these are rental players who would hit free agency at the end of the season, a characteristic to which Milwaukee’s front office is typically averse. This is the habit that should be broken this year. Risk aversion is a spectrum, but those who break no eggs make pretty crummy omelettes. It’s understandable to want to maximize value for money and prospects, but this season has been different. From starting the year by being beaten by the Yankees so badly it made torpedo bats a talking point, to going on an 11-game winning streak against tough competition, the Brewers have endured the valleys and are now ascending the peak. Despite its flaws and lack of any real superstars, this roster has shown resilience and the ability for anyone to step up on any given night and do what needs to be done to secure the win. It’s clear that their usual trade deadline strategy works great for obtaining regular season wins, but it hasn’t yet led to any meaningful championship progress, so why not change it up? How does that saying go: the definition of insanity is not doing anything at the trade deadline despite having the ability to meaningfully upgrade what’s already a very competitive roster? In a worst-case scenario, Milwaukee trades away a few of their Top-30 prospects and still makes their usual first-round exit. Would this constitute a failure? Maybe, but it would have probably been preceded by good decisions. After all, when is the last time the Brewers signed a bad free agent contract or got fleeced in a trade? Baseball is an unpredictable sport. The more one tries to control the chaos, the more they tend to seal their own fate. For too long, it seems like the front office has tried to minimize risk. As a result, their potential upside has been inherently limited. So why not try taking a leap of faith? If it goes well, then great. If not, we’ll all grieve for a bit, then have a laugh about it and say we tried. After all, you know what they say: there’s always next year. View full article

Image courtesy of © Bill Streicher-Imagn Images Over the weekend, I wrote an article giving a high-level overview of where Milwaukee’s roster stood and what positions could use an upgrade. If you haven’t yet given that article a read, I’d recommend doing so, but in case you’re strapped for time, the overall takeaway was that the team currently has two potentially critical weaknesses: shortstop and the bullpen. So, how do the available players at this year’s deadline help solve those problems? Let’s start with shortstop. It’s no secret that Joey Ortiz has had his fair share of struggles this season. While the defensive statistics may contradict what fans see every night on television, his offensive output is uncontroversially poor. However, there are two major factors that will likely keep him on the roster for the remainder of the season. First, he’s starting to turn things around at the plate. Here is how his OPS has looked month-by-month. Month PA OPS March/April 116 .484 May 83 .489 June 90 .748 July 46 .683 While these numbers are hardly otherworldly, they have steadily gotten better. The second factor that works in his favor is the total lack of real upgrades. The shortstops on selling teams are either not for sale (e.g., Gunnar Henderson, Bobby Witt Jr., Corey Seager) or barely—if at all—an upgrade over Ortiz (Taylor Walls, Nick Allen, Ezequiel Tovar). So, ignoring contract concerns altogether, there just aren’t very many realistic options to begin with. Two players perhaps worth a closer look are Xavier Edwards and Otto López, both of whom are having good seasons with the Marlins. However, both come with plenty of team control, which would drive up Miami’s asking price and would end up creating a middle infield logjam in the future. Furthermore, given his pedigree and remaining team control, Milwaukee is hardly in a rush to ditch Ortiz, even if he has performed less than ideally this year. For the Brewers, third base is similarly murk, despite the increased availability of impact talent. Eugenio Suárez and Ryan McMahon are the main names gaining traction, but Milwaukee would hardly go for such expensive and mainstream options. In fact, there’s a lot to suggest that sticking it out with Caleb Durbin might be the move. Like Ortiz, Durbin got off to a rough start at the plate but has shown improvement, albeit at a quicker pace. He posted a .795 OPS in the month of June and has been hot in July, hitting to a .968 OPS. Thus, with the homegrown option on the upswing, there’s little incentive to sacrifice any of the organization’s prospect equity. The bullpen, however, is one place where there could be real upgrades made. The Brewers already have Trevor Megill, so it’s unlikely they’ll be willing to match the bids of other teams for high-leverage talent like Emmanuel Clase or Jhoan Duran. If anything, the organization’s M.O. is to find a funky guy with an unassuming profile but one or two knockout qualities, and shape him in their own image. Nick Mears and Grant Anderson are two relievers who fit this mold and have been outstanding in their roles this year. Jake McKibbin recently proposed Gregory Soto as a possible target who would add another lefty with a great soft contact profile. Reid Detmers is a southpaw who has good whiff and strikeout rates, but has struggled to limit walks and hard contact this year with the Angels. If Milwaukee wanted to get really spicy, they could go for someone like the Rays’ Mason Montgomery, who profiles as an even more extreme version of Detmers with a 13.2% walk rate and a 9.6% barrel rate. However, his Stuff+ metrics are outstanding, with top-notch grades on his four-seam fastball and slider. He was shaky enough at the big-league level to get optioned in early July, but he could be exactly the type of project the Brewers excel at developing. The Angels’ Ryan Zeferjahn is another intriguing bullpen option, with brutal surface-level numbers but more appealing underlying qualities. Top-quartile whiff and strikeout rates and excellent Stuff+ grades for his fastball (120) and slider (126) haven’t yet been able to balance out his command issues, but he’d be another possible option for the Brewers to pursue. While the roster’s relief pitching needs some refining, the rotation seems as stable as ever. Although some believed Freddy Peralta would be moved, Matt Arnold has all but confirmed that he’s here to stay, at least for this year. With Brandon Woodruff back to business and the other three arms holding down the fort, the Brewers have a surplus of starters. Either the team will rock with a six-man rotation, or they'll trade away the excess depth (in the person of either Nestor Cortes or Jose Quintana). First base is more of a toss-up than any of the aforementioned positions. Rhys Hoskins had been great all year until hitting a complete roadblock in June, managing just a .532 OPS. He hit the injured list with a sprained thumb and isn’t expected to return until August, putting Milwaukee in an uncomfortable position. With Jake Bauers also injured, they’ve temporarily filled the gap by promoting Andrew Vaughn, previously acquired from the White Sox. He has been productive over a small sample, but his last few seasons don’t exactly inspire confidence that he’ll be able to sustain his current performance. There are even some rumors that claim Hoskins could be traded, which could mean that Milwaukee chooses to replace him entirely for the remainder of the season. Will Josh Naylor, Ryan O’Hearn, or someone else take his spot, or does the front office still believe in his ability to be productive down the stretch? This, to me, is the biggest question heading into this year’s trade deadline for the Brewers. A lot of things are clicking for this team. With the help of an 11-game win streak, Milwaukee has caught up to the Chicago Cubs in the standings and are now all but a shoo-in to this year’s playoff picture. Now, the question isn’t so much whether they have the pieces to make it there, as it is whether they have the pieces to make a real run at the World Series. Until the dust from the trade deadline clears, all we can do is sit, wait, and ruminate. View full article

On a more serious note, I will say that a couple of things may have made it more difficult to see the forest from the trees Getting mollywhopped by the Yankees to start the year May was the worst month for a couple of key players like Caleb Durbin, Isaac Collins, Christian Yelich The bullpen was pretty bad in May and has since turned over quite a few pieces like Joel Payamps, Elvin Rodríguez, and Tyler Alexander This is a pretty accurate assessment of the situation at the time. It's not that these players weren't able to be productive, they just weren't productive at the time. Now that they've had more time to figure it out, and we've gotten some major pitching help, the Brewers are, as the kids might say, "so back." That said let's hope they don't flip the switch and go 0-10 at some point later this year 😬

dude they gotta be cheating it's gotta be black magic somebody check the milk formula

I think this is a valid concern but I believe the out likelihood of each batted ball is compared to other similar batted balls, so assuming softly hit ground balls that must be charged have been difficult to convert to outs for other infielders, it would be reflected into the out probability. Another good point. Fielder positioning is also acknowledged as a weakness of rPM per BIS: So as with pretty much every statistic in baseball, interpret each number as you will but I wouldn't rely on it to define your perspective entirely. My perspective on Joey Ortiz is broadly that it has been a worse year than last year and of all the positions in the lineup, shortstop seems like one of the biggest holes right now. That said, I still think he has great upside and it's not like there's an easy and obvious upgrade out there so I don't think there's as much urgency to get rid of him.

DRS is definitely a pretty opaque metric but I think once you take a look at the deeper numbers, it adds a little more color. If you're super bored while having to spend time with your in-laws or that nephew you resent, Fielding Bible has a brief description of the DRS calculation as well as how each underlying piece is calculated. The biggest area that drags down Ortiz's DRS is rPM (AKA Plus Minus Runs Saved) which, according to FanGraphs, evaluates the fielder’s range and ability to convert a batted ball to an out. More specifically, each batted ball event is compared to similar batted balls based on exit velocity and horizontal launch angle to calculate a likelihood that it is converted to an out. The less likely the play goes for an out, the more "credit" the fielder receives for making the play. The more likely the play goes for an out, the more the fielder is punished for not making an out. More can be found at the top of this article. Of course, other statistics like Run Value and Expected Batting Average share a similar weakness in that we can only go so deep as external viewers. I wish I could see all of the batted ball events that punished Joey Ortiz the most but until then, we only have the metric to go off of. Furthermore, it is noted that DRS isn't a great metric over a single season since defense varies quite a bit. One might point out that Ortiz has a top decile OAA which highlights the difference in the two metrics. Outs Above Average only measures range but doesn't penalize players for making errors or botching double plays. OAA is a narrower measurement of fielding while DRS is more of a composite figure. Because FRV is based heavily on OAA and arm strength, it paints a similar picture of being above average that doesn't seem to align with DRS. To me, this is the key differentiator. If we look at fielding percentage, Ortiz's number of .975 places him 18th out of 25 qualified shortstops. It still doesn't explain why the Brewers have insisted on giving him consistent playing time at the role and how their internal metrics may differ. Maybe they think he can figure things out, maybe they insist he's the next Derek Jeter. Either way, the statistics that we have access to paint a suboptimal picture, even if it isn't the entire story.

Image courtesy of © Vincent Carchietta-Imagn Images Every baseball roster is at least a little lopsided. The existence of a “Goldilocks” team where every position contributes evenly is about as possible as a Mariners World Series appearance in the next decade. On the bright side, this uneven distribution of talent on a major league squad is exactly what makes trade deadline conversations so entertaining. For a team as competitive as the Brewers, the discussion should largely be framed on what sort of upgrades they should prioritize before making the final postseason push. To start, let’s make this process as empirical as possible. First, we’ll look at the high-level offensive and defensive statistics of each position and how those numbers compare to the rest of the league. Using this information, we can gauge where the most glaring holes in the lineup are, if any exist. Position OPS Defensive Runs Saved Catcher .722 (11th) 2 (10th) First base .793 (9th) 0 (16th) Second base .731 (7th) 6 (6th) Third base .619 (26th) 6 (4th) Shortstop .546 (29th) -7 (27th) Left field .756 (12th) 2 (14th) Center field .738 (10th) -6 (23rd) Right field .728 (16th) 7 (8th) This simple table makes a few things quite apparent. The outfield is well-rounded, except for some lackluster fielding work by Jackson Chourio and Sal Frelick when they have to play center field. Brice Turang is still one of the best second basemen in baseball, Rhys Hoskins has remained a solid contributor at the plate when healthy, and William Contreras is still a valuable backstop, even given his offensive regression. These positions are by no means perfect, and most are good, not great, but they aren’t problematic enough to be high priorities for the front office this year. While most positions are above average with either the bat or the glove, one position is clearly below average in both: shortstop. The struggles of Joey Ortiz have been apparent for the entire season, and despite seemingly coming back in June with a .748 OPS over 90 plate appearances, his first 30 plate appearances of July culminated in just a .578 OPS. This mark is still somehow better than the .570 OPS he has for the entire season. His struggles at the plate seem to be creeping into his defensive effectiveness as well. His range is still top-notch, but his eight errors and -8 Defensive Runs Saved paint a grim picture. There seems to be a lack of urgency and focus overall, something the Brewers are clearly aware of. Still, it may not be enough to push them to pursue a new shortstop. Ortiz has already shown that he can hang at the major league level when things are clicking; he has plenty of team control left, and there just aren’t very many viable shortstop targets available. I suppose Eugenio Suárez played a bit of shortstop for the Reds four years ago, and I bet Zac Gallen was an excellent shortstop in Little League. However, realistically, it’d be challenging to find a suitable upgrade. There are slight upgrades that can be made at other positions, such as right field and third base, but one quality the lineup is clearly missing is power. The Brewers are slugging just .383 as a team, 22nd in MLB. Getting a power bat, perhaps at third base, could be what Milwaukee’s offense has been missing. The aforementioned Eugenio Suárez is one of the most enticing options here as he has been having a career year in Arizona, posting a 142 OPS+ and leading the National League in RBIs with 78. Ryan McMahon and Ramón Urías are two other options, but both are similar to Caleb Durbin in that they’re all defensive assets and offensive liabilities. However, Durbin has turned things around recently and is now sitting at a 103 OPS+, far better than the marks posted by McMahon and Urías, so expect him to keep his spot if Suárez isn’t available. When it comes to pitching, the Brewers are actually in pretty good shape. Overall, Milwaukee has a combined 3.66 ERA, which is tied for 7th in MLB. However, separating the numbers by role highlights some potentially glaring issues. ERA WHIP Innings Pitched Starters 3.39 (5th) 1.24 (13th) 477 ⅔ (25th) Relievers 4.00 (18th) 1.26 (10th) 375 ⅔ (5th) The bullpen is on the verge of being overworked. Of the four teams with more bullpen innings than the Brewers, three are non-contenders (White Sox, Marlins, Athletics), and the other is the Dodgers, whose 60-day injured list would be a top-five rotation in baseball if they were healthy. Milwaukee’s rotation is rich in talent, but other than Freddy Peralta, none are really innings eaters. Brandon Woodruff has made just two starts since returning from his long layoff, Jacob Misiorowski is a true rookie, Jose Quintana sometimes finds himself laboring to get through five innings, and Quinn Priester is still ramping up to higher volume. It puts Milwaukee in a tricky position because there’s just no room for a back-of-the-rotation arm that would give you six to seven gutsy innings every five days and reduce the bullpen’s workload. The Brewers have clearly chosen to prioritize quality over quantity, which should dictate how they plan on constructing the bullpen in the second half. The two hidden gems of the bullpen are Aaron Ashby and DL Hall. Milwaukee has recently experienced great success using long relievers (shoutout my guy, Bryse Wilson), and having two quality arms capable of covering multiple innings of relief is a primary reason the pitching staff has made it this far. Of course, more is always better, so if they so choose, the front office could look at another durable arm. There’s hardly a need for a flashy, lights-out, one-inning closer like Emmanuel Clase or Jhoan Duran, but someone capable of getting more than three outs like Jake Bird could be a sneaky upgrade. As is, the Brewers have a solid roster. It’s the reason that they find themselves within striking distance of the Chicago Cubs in the NL Central despite a rocky start to the year. However, they have a relatively high strength of remaining schedule with a series against the Dodgers ringing in the latter half of the season, so they can’t afford to rest on their laurels just yet. Furthermore, making it to the postseason is one thing. Milwaukee’s faithful are all too familiar with the feeling of a first-round exit. If the team wants a real chance at making a meaningful run, the seemingly small upgrades at this year’s deadline could end up making big differences come October. 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we already know what his extension looks like its 7.5 feet jk love ya jake :)

hey wait why can't i find keston hiura anywhere on that list i thought he was next up

Image courtesy of © Michael McLoone-Imagn Images ABS, or automated ball-strike, is technology that seeks to solve the age-old problem of missed umpire calls. Even the most casual of baseball fans has, at least once, witnessed a pitch down the middle being called a ball or a pitch in the other batter’s box being called a strike. As pitches have only become nastier over the years, it has become increasingly difficult for home plate umpires to make consistent, accurate calls. To try and rectify this recurring pain point, MLB has experimented with shifting this responsibility onto our future robot overlords. The process is straightforward. Home plate umpires will continue to make calls manually, but if a pitcher, catcher, or hitter believes the call was incorrect, they can signal for an ABS review by tapping their head. At this point, the high-tech system will be consulted for its call of the pitch, which will serve as the final result. Each team will receive two total challenges per game, and these challenges must be made immediately without help from teammates or the dugout. The team will only lose a challenge if the umpire's call is confirmed. While this system has already been in use in the minor and independent leagues for quite some time, the closest it has gotten to debuting in the big leagues was this year’s spring training. The technology wasn’t ubiquitous, but it was used in 13 different ballparks, and overall, the reception was quite positive. According to MLB officials, 72% of fans reported that it had a positive impact on the game, and 69% expressed interest in seeing it implemented in the future. But what are the downsides? One might be the delaying of games. After all, rules like the pitch clock and three-batter minimum were implemented solely to ensure that baseball moved at a more Gen-Z pace, but this seems like it's moving in the opposite direction. More consistent challenges and reviews of every bad call would theoretically drag things out. However, the whole process is pretty seamless, and based on spring training results, each challenge added just under 14 seconds to the game time. Another possible outcome is that catcher framing may become obsolete as a result. Backstops spend their whole lives learning how best to manipulate umpires' eyes to steal strikes, and it has created immense defensive value for the position, but it’s far more difficult to deceive a machine. If opposing batters are able to challenge pitches, the subtle art of framing could become significantly less important or even entirely anachronistic. Perhaps you’re concerned about the welfare of umpires as a group of working individuals, and you're seeking a fair and empathetic perspective. Like Charlie Bucket’s father in the famous Roald Dahl tale, will their jobs be taken by a man-made replacement? Initially, it seemed that way. During the later stages of minor and independent league testing, MLB considered using full ABS to call every pitch, but they ended up deciding on the challenge system instead. Why they’re hesitating on a complete transfer of responsibility depends on who you ask and how cynical they are, but even if every pitch were called by machine, home plate umpires would still be needed to make other sorts of calls at the plate. Despite its flaws, it’s clear that the consensus around ABS is largely positive. Unless you have a deep distrust of machines and are somehow reading this article on a clay tablet or papyrus sheet, this is a positive evolution of the sport. In many ways, the All-Star Game is a perfect proving ground for this technology. It’s a low-stakes event that’s more fun than functional, and there will be plenty of eyes on it. MLB’s biggest stars who didn’t get exposure to the technology during spring training may finally get a crack at it, although most individual appearances are admittedly very brief. The group that is probably most excited about this change is probably the active players. We’ve already seen instances of ejections over missed calls this year, and let’s not forget when the Brewers were on the favorable end of a bad call and witnessed one of the greatest player meltdowns of the past decade. To fans at home, a missed ball or strike is just that, but to those whose job it is to play the game at the highest level, these mistakes are far more costly. It may not be long before we see this technology installed in every major league ballpark. Like the pitch clock, it may initially seem like a rule that'll take some getting used to, but before long, it’ll likely become an integral and necessary part of the baseball experience. View full article

Image courtesy of © Michael McLoone-Imagn Images Outside of a shaky first month, it has been another solid year for Trevor Megill. Now the Brewers’ undisputed closer, he has a 2.64 ERA with 19 saves, on pace to comfortably surpass what he accomplished last year. There’s plenty to be happy about, especially for a player costing the team less than $2 million this year, and while almost everything is moving in the right direction, one aspect within his arsenal could be a cause for concern. Like many relievers, he throws just two pitches: a four-seam fastball and a knuckle curve. The latter is a notoriously difficult pitch to hit, boasting a whiff rate of 56.8% and a slugging percentage against of just .250 this year. With late and sharp downward movement, opposing hitters are often left looking foolish while swinging over it. However, despite having similar metrics on the pitch in 2024, it wasn’t his most valuable weapon. That award went to his four-seam fastball, which generated four times the run value. This came as no surprise since he threw it more than 70% of the time and averaged 98.8 mph with 18 inches of induced vertical break. In 2025, he’s throwing it just as hard with even more induced vertical break (19.2 inches, to be exact), but a few key statistics have shown year-over-year regression, not improvement. Fastball 2024 2025 Whiff % 22.2 16.3 BA .209 .265 SLG .279 .368 Normally, this wouldn’t be a huge deal. As stated earlier, he’s still having a great year. However, it’s a clear weakness in his game and hitters are starting to notice. In his most recent outing against the Marlins on July 4th, he threw 21 fastballs. Eight of them were called balls, four were called strikes, and eight were fouled. Velocity wise, he got up as high as 101.3 mph, but he still failed to generate a single swing and miss. We saw a similar story in his outing during his June 29 against the Rockies. Of the 12 fastballs he threw, he generated no called strikes and just two swinging strikes. In what was ultimately his third blown save of the season, a fastball that was chased outside of the zone by Thairo Estrada was the nail in the coffin. Even on pitches that are located off the plate, guys are finding a way to get their bats to the ball. One could argue that it was actually the home run he gave up to Orlando Arcia on a knuckle curve that spelled his doom, but that’s exactly what the bigger issue is. With only one effective offering, it’s not nearly as difficult for hitters to use an approach that works. We may already be seeing cracks in the ice. In May, Megill posted a 0.90 ERA over ten innings. In June, he posted a 3.18 ERA over 11 ⅓ innings. Reduced effectiveness also means reduced efficiency and higher pitch counts in each appearance. Prior to May 26, there was only one appearance in which he threw more than 20 pitches. Starting with a grueling 34-pitch inning against the Red Sox at the end of May, he has since had five outings with more than 20 pitches (although one of which was admittedly for two innings). Baseball demands frequent adjustments, and it’s difficult to survive in the big leagues if you don’t adapt. In a constant game of cat-and-mouse, pitchers and hitters struggle to gain an upper hand on each other, exploiting even the most minor mistakes. Based on his recent performance, it seems like Megill is more on the hot seat than one might initially assume. If he wants to remain a dominant bullpen presence through the second half, something with the fastball will have to change to get him back to peak form. View full article