Dollarbill13

Lucroy should absolutely not be moved up in the order. So far, he's the same hitter that he was last year, only more of his ground balls are making it through the infield. Once his BABIP comes down, he'll end up as a .260-.270 hitter with little plate discipline and decent pop.

I'm assuming by 4th or 5th option you mean 4th or 5th best hitter? If so, I would argue that he is the 4th "option" behind Braun, Ramirez, and Hart. It seems that you are conceding the fact that he'll likely return to his career norms this season so unless he has an injury, why bench him?

Is there any evidence to suggest that either Rickie is not working on whatever is percieved to be causing his slump or that sitting on the bench will in any way help him work through his slump?

You've laid out a few examples of hot and cold streaks that Branyan has had but I don't think that shows that he's any more streaky than other players. Look at his 2010 season (the season where he had the 2nd most at bats of his career). His lowest monthly OPS was .718 and his highest was .877. That seems relatively consistent to me. For what it's worth, here is a study done by Fangraphs regarding past streakiness of players and how that correlates to future streakiness http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/index.php/were-going-streaking-again/

The reason Branyan has been with so many teams is that despite the fact that he walks a lot, his upside is basically a SLG heavy .800-.850 OPS that can only play 1B. He's a good, cheap option for a team that has a starting 1B or DH gig to give him. But given that he doesn't offer any defensive flex. ibility, he doesn't play so well as a bench player. And as far as the streakiness argument goes, pretty much every player is streaky. It's the nature of the game. All that being said, I think I'd rather have Green manning first than Branyan. If the debate is Ishikawa vs. Branyan, give me Branyan.

I doubt he'll ever be better than average in terms of plate discipline. He's 28 right now so he probably doesn't have much more "learning" to do. That being said, he doesn't need to walk 15% of the time to post a strong OBP. He finished at .397 last year with only a 9% walk rate. He won't hit .330 every year but a .310 average will lead him to a .380 OBP which is still very good given everything else he gives the team.

+1

Yeah no kidding. Injuries with pitchers are pretty common. Not that that has been the case for Greinke, but still any pitcher has to look at Narveson's injury and say hey that could just as easily happen to me. If that happened to Greinke he'd lose a ton of money. Some guys just don't go the financial security route though. They just hold out for the big bucks. Well he's already made about $40 million in his career so he should already have financial security.

Agreed... I think I actually would have done a double steal. But oh well, we won!

With all the question marks surrounding Utley, Weeks is arguably the best 2B in the NL right now. I'm shocked that anyone would want to trade him when our only replacement is someone whose upside is probably a dropoff of 100 OPS points.

From MLBTR... “I’ve been told that it’s just between my agent and the team now,” said Zack Greinke in regards to the news that the Brewers and his representatives have suspended negotiations about a contract extension. Greinke told reporters (including Todd Rosiak of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel) that "it might have been a long shot from the beginning" that the two sides would agree on a multiyear deal. Greinke can become a free agent after the 2012 season.

https://twitter.com/#!/closernews

Take their 90-72 Pythagorean record from last year, subtract a win or two for the net talent loss and a win or two regression to the mean from the rotation (even though Greinke missed a month, Wolfie pitched way above expectations and we only used six starters last year) and you can pretty easily get to a mid-to-upper 80s projection for total wins.

The flaw in that article's "12 guys with whatever OPS at 21 years old" stat is that only two of the 12 had less than 400 ABs. One was McCovey at 192 and the other was Lawrie at 150. Keep in mind, too, that we traded him after a .795 OPS season in AA on the power of a .350 BABIP and a .164 ISO. BABIPs are typically higher in the minors so he certainly looked like he had a long ways to go. Focusing on the stats, he looked like he could be a solid but possibly unspectacular player in the bigs. Obviously, projecting a 20 year old is not the easiest thing to do. He did have the pedigree to hope for stardom but he certainly wasn't a "can't-miss" prospect at the time. Then last year in the minors, his BABIP jumped to .380 and his ISO jumped through the roof. He was able to sustain the ISO in the bigs and maintain a solid batting average with a reasonably normal BABIP. His 2011 season was certainly the absolute best-case scenario for Lawrie and not something that Melvin or Toronto's management should have expected. What I find interesting about his big league stats is that his .318 BABIP was based on a 17% LD rate. A reasonable rule of thumb for BABIP is to take the player's LD rate and add 12% which would leave him at about a .290 BABIP. That would tell me that his batting average was somewhat inflated due to luck last year. If I had to throw out a projection, I'd put him at about .275/.350/.500 for 2012. Those would be outstanding numbers for a 22 year old but I'm not ready to enshrine him into Cooperstown yet. The million (or hundred million) dollar question is how he continues to develop. His d-baggy pics from facebook at least proved that he keeps him self in top physical shape. If he can put in the effort to stay in top shape and master his craft, he could very well be an All-Star and MVP candidate for a long time. This could be one of those trades that bites the brewers in the butt but 1) that is the risk that you take when you trade prospects for established players, 2) his improvement over his seasons in the Brewers' system was extraordinary, and finally 3) we had this coming after we took the Indians to the cleaners a couple years ago with Sabathia.

Keep in mind that there are only ~3 people elected in an average year. Start making a list of players from Young's era who would definitely be elected ahead of him (adding * to guys who would possibly be excluded due to connections with PEDs). Here is a list of players from his generation that have at least 2x Young's WAR: EDIT: If someone wants to fix these lists so they line up propertly, I would much appreciate it. Name WAR Greg Maddux 96.90 Randy Johnson 89.60 Albert Pujols 88.70 Chipper Jones 82.70 Jeff Bagwell 79.90 Ken Griffey 78.60 Frank Thomas 75.90 Mike Mussina 74.60 Pedro Martinez 73.50 Tom Glavine 71.60 Jim Thome 71.40 Derek Jeter 70.40 Jim Edmonds 67.90 Curt Schilling 67.70 Ivan Rodriguez 67.30 Larry Walker 67.30 Manny Ramirez 66.60 Craig Biggio 66.20 Scott Rolen 66.20 Kenny Lofton 65.30 John Smoltz 65.30 Carlos Beltran 60.80 Roy Halladay 60.60 Andruw Jones 60.40 Todd Helton 59.90 Jeff Kent 59.40 Vladimir Guerrero 59.20 Mike Piazza 59.10 Bobby Abreu 58.70 Mariano Rivera 56.30 Ichiro Suzuki 54.50 Michael Young 26.90 That list excludes known PED users including Alex Rodriguez, Barry Bonds, Mark McGwire, Rafael Palmeiro, etc. Here is where he ranks amongst players who primarily were shortstops: Name WAR Alex Rodriguez 104.60 Derek Jeter 70.40 Nomar Garciaparra 42.50 Miguel Tejada 42.50 Omar Vizquel 42.30 Jimmy Rollins 34.40 Rafael Furcal 33.10 Edgar Renteria 31.70 Michael Young 26.90 If he puts up 1,000 hits over the next five seasons, he'll probably add ~15 WAR to his total which I guess would put him in the discussion with the shortstops of his generation that aren't named Rodriguez or Jeter (even though he hasn't been a regular SS since 2008)

Who is this "Mark M" on twitter?

We could do a Brewerfan scoresheet league. I'd be happy to set it up if there was enough interest. We could do a keeper to give people reason to keep trying as the season goes on. http://www.scoresheet.com/BB_index.php

You could also put in some volunteer work with any kind of charity; that'd look very good on a resume, & you might wind up making some more contacts from it too. Given your comments/situation, if there's anywhere you could work to help provide pro bono or significantly discounted legal services, maybe that'd be worth exploring. Sorry if I'm just saying things here you already know http://forum.brewerfan.net/images/smilies/smile.gifI've contacted a few volunteer legal aid places in Milwaukee. Most of them even want you to actually have experience in the legal industry because you'd be working cases on your own. There is one that said they would provide training/advice but they don't have any "openings" now and they would keep me in mind. As far as volunteering with a law firm, that technically isn't legal so I haven't really gotten anywhere with that. I might look into asking if I can "job shadow" for a bit or something and see if I find any openings with that. The lack of experience is the main thing holding me back, even with applying for jobs that "only" require a Bachelors degree. I can't really get a job without experience but I can't really get experience without the job. It's kind of a chicken and egg thing. I know that most of the larger law firms in the area have specific programs for new grads. Even though you aren't technically a new grad anymore, it might be worth your time to try and get in touch with their recruiting departments and at least find out about their hiring process. You might at least be able to get in touch with someone who is in tune with the local hiring environment. If I were in your shoes, I'd probably write a generic letter to send to employers. One or two paragraphs would probably be sufficient. Start by explaining your situation and maybe some of the things that you've learned about your job search (just don't be negative) and about what you would bring to the table (hard work, positive attitude, etc.). Then do some research to customize your letter to the firm. Make sure you show that you are interested in cases/issues they were involved in and make sure to ask questions. You might not land a job there but you might get in touch with someone that knows someone that knows someone that is looking for cheap help. You can also probably take that strategy and try to get in touch with legal/financial departments of local businesses. I personally work as a financial analyst but I deal with legal contracts/questions on a nearly daily basis. I'm sure there would be businesses that would be willing to bring someone in for a few months to read a ton of contracts and turn the legalese into English. It certainly isn't glamorous but it would be something to put on your resume. If I could give one piece of advice for just about any job seeker would be DON'T rely on job boards. You really have to do most of your own work (or find a good recruiter, which is difficult when looking for an entry level job) and not be afraid to put yourself out there. It's a difficult process, but contacts that you think of as "dead-ends" now might turn out to be money down the road.

It was that if he wasn't the highest paid offensive lineman on his team that his whole contract would immediately become fully guaranteed.

There were some frontloaded contracts in the NFL to try and steal free agents away because of the hard cap. Seem to remember the offensive lineman that went to/from Vikings/Seattle because the other team couldn't make the numbers work for the next year. I suspect the backloaded contract is because of the baseball inflation rate and trying to maintain a somewhat even budget. If the baseball salary inflation rate was 2% instead of 7% (or whatever it is), it wouldn't be such a big deal to frontload more. By this time next year, Wolf's 2013 option will probably look like a decent value, whereas a couple of years ago it seemed like a forgone conclusion that it wouldn't be exercised. The Viking/Seattle thing had more to do with a clause that would cause the entire contract to be guaranteed. But yes, front loaded contracts can work better in a league with a hard cap because there might be more cap space available in current years than future years due to raises built into other players' contracts.

Marlins offer $111 over 6 years If that link is true, I think we should give up on Reyes.

Ditto. I'd much prefer Hairston or most any other proven & competent SS over a Kelly Johnson type. Yes, I'd even put Yuni B. in that group (the former, not the latter).I tend to put Yuni B in the incompetent Kelly Johnson type group, but I hear ya! Agreed regarding Yuni B as incompetant. The original thought behind my post (and I'm assuming the Weeks to SS post) was that if we're going to have a bad defensive SS, might as well have someone who can hit. I hope we can bring back Hairston but I'm not sure he'll be able to handle playing SS every day.

Actually I just looked where KJ compares in range to other 2B and while he's solid, he's not great. So he'd probably, at best, be a guy with very little range for a SS who is solid but unspectacular on plays that he gets to.

SS isn't a specialty position like Catcher. Catcher requires a completely different skill set than any other position on the field. Shortstop requires the same skill set only with much more skill due to the combination of length of throw, range required, and quantity of balls hit there. Catchers require a completely different skill set that includes blocking pitches, framing pitches, game-calling, and constantly throwing from an awkward position. Players don't typically move to more difficult positions, especially to shortstop. But I think if there is someone who could maybe do it, it'd be a middle infielder with good range who seems to have improved in the last couple years. It would certainly be a risk but we're also talking about replacing the worst hitting (Link) and fielding (Link) regular SS over the past thee years. I'd be fine with signing a slick fielding SS but Rollins will require at least a 4 year deal and Alex Gonzalez either just had a poor defensive season by his standards or he is declining.

Kelly Shoppach maybe? Baseball Prospectus Profile (I don't believe subscription is required for that link)