And That

He has more value to a team that does not currently have any other viable options at the position, than he does to a team that has currently viable options at the position. Which would be most teams. But not Milwaukee. Players values do not occur in a vacuum. Players are worth different things to different teams. Do the Brewers think he is worth $8 million? I have no idea. They might not. But they also might think that even though he isn't worth $8 million, they will be willing to pay a premium on his value because they have no other real options at present, and are choosing not to go back to the revolving door of crap at the position.

Right, they wanted to trade him because they were stretching their budget and felt that they had in-house replacement options. If their next best option had been Garrett Cooper and they had $10 million more in salary to play with, guessing he's still an Astro.

I believe part of the rationale for the Astros non-tendering Carter was that they were already stretching their budget, and felt that they had in-house replacement options ready to go. The Brewers do not have any salary issues, and unless either you're extremely bullish on one of Cecchini/Cooper/Pinto or think they'll move Santana to first base next season, they have no ready in-house options to replace him.

I hate the Cubs.

And will again some day.

Bradley's performance wasn't drastically different, either. His walk rate increased, and his strand rate went way up. I think it was a little dumb for the Brewers to give up on him, but it was a little dumb for the Braves to give up on Wren, too.

If you look at how the first round actually shook out, though, Josh Vitters, Daniel Moskos, Ross Detwiler, Matt LaPorta, Casey Weathers, Jarrod Parker, Phillippe Aumont, Matt Dominguez, and Beau Mills were all taken in the first 13 picks. I don't even have a recollection of Beau Mills.

So is it flabbergasting that the Braves removed Bradley from their 40-man roster and the Orioles claimed him? These things happen to every team. Kyle Wren is making the Braves look about as silly as Jed Bradley is making the Brewers look silly.

The average A+ ball pitcher is about 23, so while I am extremely concerned about his performance this year, he also still realistically has a number of years to figure things out. And something completely different, BA did a 2007 re-draft. You'll never guess who they have the Brewers picking. Rats. Or who the Rockies should have taken right after him.

Using CheezWhizHead's wonderful spreadsheet, and with my own adjustments and unnecessarily complicated additions to his calculations, it spits out: [pre]Ranking Name Position 1 Lewis Brinson CF 2 Josh Hader LHSP 3 Brett Phillips CF 4 Phil Bickford RHSP 5 Brandon Woodruff RHSP 6 Luis Ortiz RHSP 7 Trent Clark CF 8 Isan Diaz 2B 9 Marcos Diplan RHSP 10 Freddy Peralta RHSP 11 Jorge Lopez RHSP 12 Jacob Barnes RHRP 13 Ryan Cordell CF 14 Wei-Chung Wang LHSP 15 Cody Ponce RHSP 16 Corey Ray CF 17 Jordan Yamamoto RHSP 18 Jon Perrin RHSP 19 Corbin Burnes RHSP 20 Michael Reed OF 21 Gilbert Lara SS 22 Lucas Erceg 3B 23 Kodi Medeiros LHSP 24 Aaron Wilkerson RHSP 25 Zack Brown RHSP 26 Trey Supak RHSP 27 Miguel Diaz RHSP 28 David Burkhalter RHSP 29 Devin Williams RHSP 30 Troy Stokes OF 31 Jon Olczak RHRP 32 Daniel Brown LHSP 33 Kyle Wren CF 34 Tyrone Taylor CF 35 Adrian Houser RHSP 36 Emerson Gibbs RHSP 37 Joantgel Segovia CF 38 Jacob Nottingham C 39 Angel Ventura RHSP 40 Mario Feliciano C 41 Bubba Derby RHSP 42 Conor Harber RHSP 43 Jesus Lujano CF 44 Thomas Jankins RHSP 45 Jorge Ortega RHSP 46 Yadiel Rivera SS 47 Yhonathan Barrios RHRP 48 Gabriel Garcia 1B 49 Garrett Cooper 1B 50 Daniel Missaki RHSP 51 Aaron Myers RHSP 52 Jose Sibrian C 53 Luis Aviles SS 54 Drake Owenby LHSP 55 Braden Webb RHSP 56 Brad Kuntz LHRP 57 Tristan Archer RHRP 58 Rymer Liriano OF 59 Dustin Houle C 60 Damien Magnifico RHRP 61 Mitch Lambson LHRP 62 Nate Griep RHRP 63 Angel Ortega SS 64 Johan Dominguez RHSP 65 Javier Betancourt 2B 66 Chad McClanahan 3B 67 Wendell Rijo 2B 68 Brent Suter LHRP 69 Eric Hanhold RHSP 70 Aaron Familia 3B 71 Jordan Desguin RHSP 72 Nash Walters RHSP 73 Max McDowell C 74 Tyler Spurlin RHRP 75 Moises Perez 1B 76 Demi Orimoloye OF 77 Carlos Herrera RHSP 78 Clint Coulter OF 79 Tucker Neuhaus 2B 80 Nathan Rodriguez C 81 Nate Orf 3B 82 Nathan Kirby LHSP 83 Luis Manon 2B 84 Ronnie Gideon 1B 85 Blake Allemand SS 86 Monte Harrison CF 87 Jake Gatewood 1B 88 Trey York 2B 89 Nate Griep RHRP 90 Wes Wilson 3B 91 Franly Mallen 2B 92 George Iskenderian 2B 93 Taylor Williams RHRP 94 David Denson OF 95 Mitch Ghelfi 1B 96 Victor Roache OF 97 Dustin Demuth 1B 98 Payton Henry C 99 Quintin Torres-Costa LHRP 100 Miguel Sanchez RHRP[/pre]

Miami has regularly been on his list of teams he'd accept a trade to. Washington and Tampa were in 2015 as well.

I think the announcement may have been geared more towards season ticket holders than people who are there a handful of times a year or less. If you're at the park 20, 40, 60, 80 times a year, I would guess that increasing the variety and accessibility of the food options is actually a pretty welcome perk. It's also a selling point for would-be season ticket holders. Buy a 20-pack, never eat the same food twice.

Didn't they kind of try that with Rick Peterson? I remember when he came, everyone in the organization got their delivery analyzed, players with higher injury risks were flagged, etc. Not to say they shouldn't do something like what you mentioned, it's a good idea. Edit: Peterson is now the Orioles' "Director of Pitching Development" - a role he's held since 2012.

That's a pretty fantastic picture. Stearns, Quinn, Schlesinger, Karl Mueller?

I think it's in the ballpark. Because it is all interior work, plus the copious architectural costs, and the fact that they need it done, tested, and ready less than 6 months from today, it will definitely be a pricey improvement.

I would also argue that Kang, Park, Kim, and Lee aren't really apples to apples comps with Thames as far as KBO players going to MLB. Thames has five years of professional baseball experience in America, whereas the Korean guys did not have that track record. The guy that immediately popped into my head with Thames is Roberto Petagine. He had a number of really, really good years in Japan, came back to the US, didn't stick, and went back to Asia. Granted he was in his middle 30s when he came back, but it did not work out for him. Just scanning the KBO batting leaderboards this year, I see Wilin Rosario has a 961 OPS, Nick Evans has a 957 OPS, Luis "Lucho" Jimenez has a 901 OPS, Danny Dorn has an 892 OPS, and Brett Pill has an 880 OPS. Hector Gomez even has an 819 OPS. So I would look at what those guys are going in the KBO, versus what they were doing in the US. Some of those guys were ok players over here, and I'm guessing that's what Thames would end up being as well.

Mr. Wilson goes by Wes, not Weston. For reference.

Probably. Then again, every time I see so few data points being taken as a sign of something, I think to myself, Bill Spiers hit 3 home runs in his first 5 games in 1991. Little me was so excited. Bill Spiers ruins everything.

If there's going to be another poll at the start of the season, it might make sense to get this one in before trading season ramps up. There's also some value in doing another one, I think, despite the lack of loads of additional data points. It takes time (at least for me) to process the minor league season as a whole, and looking through the system over the past few days and doing some additional reading/researching, I've begun changing my opinions a bit on some of the players, for better and worse. My $0.02.

The AFL runs from 10/9-11/19.

http://www.thecubreporter.com/book/export/html/3538 Free agents-to-be must be reinstated by the morning after the World Series ends. Everyone else must be reinstated within 5 days of the World Series ending.

In other words, there's not really enough data to suggest whether Thames should retain his Korean success, or if he's more or less the same guy he was 4 years ago with the career 727 OPS.

n=1, but Jung Ho Kang hit a similar .356/.459/.739 in Korea and posted >.800 OPS each of his two seasons here, .816 his first season and .867 this season. I'd take that in a heartbeat from Thames as a LH bat. Byung Ho Park put up production nearly equal to Thames in 2014 and 2015. He slashed .191/.275/.409 for the Twins this year, with a Carter-ian K rate.

Goforth, Wilkins, Lopez, Houser, and Cecchini were all recalled (not to report) on Monday in a procedural move. All members of the 40-man roster are now on the active roster.

Stearns and Counsell spoke about this in the end of season press conference today, and acknowledged the Brewers' right-handedness. Counsell basically said he's looking for players that can hit right handed pitching, and he doesn't care which side of the plate they bat on, though subjectively lefties on righties make more sense. Stearns said that the Brewers are always looking to diversify their roster, in terms of left/right, type of athlete, etc. So they are aware of it, but it didn't sound like it was a big priority to rectify in the near future. Team is still more concerned about acquiring talent than talent with such a specific trait.