Matt Breen

The bullpen in 2012 was really awful. From baseballreference.com here are relievers from that year: Axford: -1.2 WAR Hernandez: -1.0 WAR Parra: -0.9 WAR Loe: -0.8 WAR Chulk: -0.4 WAR McClendon: -0.3 WAR Rodriguez: -0.2 WAR Dillard: -0.1 WAR Total: -4.9 WAR On the positive side, Veras, Thornburg, Stinson, Kintzler and Henderson combined for just 1.7 WAR. That's just brutal.

I think the key is creating and keeping financial flexibility. I don't want us signing a 30+ year old free agent player for 5-7 years and $100-200M. Those deals rarely work out well. With financial flexibility, you can: - Make modest free agent signings when necessary. - Make trades for players, absorbing salary in the deal (but not being stuck with a really long term contract) so you don't have to give up as much as you normally might. - Sign our own players to extensions. You can sign your own guys through their arby years, plus with a year or two of team options. This gives you a player for 7-8 years. We did this with Lucroy, Gallardo and Braun (at least with his first contract). There will always be exceptions to the rule, but if you are wise with your payroll, financial flexibility will really help this team. I think one of the big reasons we've lost in the past 5-6 years is the lack of depth. We've been forced to overpay for mediocre players (primarily pitching - Garza, Lohse, Suppan, Wolf) and not had money to fill holes or add depth. We've lived with too many black holes on this club, and it's killed us. Bringing in depth doesn't have to cost a done - but it does cost something. I'd rather have a Jerry Hairston Jr at $3M than a César Izturis for $1M. Too many times we ended up with an Overbay or Alex Gonzalez or whomever because that's all we could afford. Of course, you have to produce good, young players from the minors (and keep producing them). You have be willing to deal guys when you have younger and cheaper replacements (such as when we dealt Hardy and Overbay). Those moments are risky - but so is ending up with an old, overpaid team with horrible depth.

Valencia is reportedly in danger of not being tendered a contract by Oakland this year. http://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2016/09/as-likely-to-release-danny-valencia-before-seasons-end.html While he hit well last season, he is a bad third baseman - moving primarily to OF due to his fielding issues. He has also developed a reputation as being a pain in the butt in the clubhouse. Here's one quote after he got DFA by the Blue Jays: “(Valencia) is not a good dude. There’s a reason the Jays punted his ass out of town. It was one of the happiest days of John Gibbons’ managerial career, because Danny Valencia got the hell out of town.” http://bluejayhunter.com/2016/08/danny-valencia-drama-reaffims-blue-jays-decision-to-dfa-him.html The guy has been on six teams in five years. No one wanted to trade for him this past summer, so any deal would be for a non-prospect.

Logan Forsythe had a 3.4 bWAR in 2016, and a 5.0 bWAR in 2015. Why are they looking to buy him out?

A little over a week left. We are barely over 20 ballots at this point, so if you haven't voted, get your's in soon. Thanks.

I don't think anyone is ransoming the franchise to get a guy like Gillespie. He's not even a top 100 ranked player. But he is a guy who may be blocked (he may not be either, but that's a different story), so it behooves the Brewers to take a look at a guy like him. They did well with blocked players last year - Villar and Broxton, specifically.

Since John Briggs posted about Gillaspie, I thought I'd throw this info out about him: Casey Gillaspie is a switch hitting 1B selected in the 1st round (20th overall) in 2014. He played college ball at Wichita State. He is a big guy - 6'4" and 240 lbs. He will be 24 in January. He is the brother of Giant's 3B Conor Gillaspie. Gillespie's calling card is his power. His hit tool is considered average - at best. His lifetime batting average in the minors is .270. He is a patient batter, taking a lot of walks. His strikeout rate is generally around 20% - not too crazy for a player of his skill set. He appears to hit better as a left handed hitter. Gillaspie is about as slow as they come. Couple that with a below average arm, and that means he's a DH or 1B. Gillespie improved his hitting last year as he moved between AA and AAA. His average was a solid .284, but his power slipped a bit at the higher levels (18 HR in 472 ABs compared to 17 HR in 281 ABs in 2014 at A ball). MLB Pipeline placed Gillespie as the minor's 9th best 1B. He's not a Top 100 guy, but he's probably in your next 100 guys. I'm sure some other people have a better feel for Gillespie, but I've always thought of him as a good, not great hitter, limited by his poor speed and defensive limitations (I honestly don't know anything about his defense other than scouts generally have rated him as average). I see a guy who hits .250-260 with 25 HR. It's not great, but there's nothing wrong with that. I'm not sure the Rays are blocking Gillespie at this point in that he could DH for the club as well as play some 1B. The Rays DH position hit an awful .223 last year - so there's an opening. The Rays do have a decent 1B prospect in Jake Bauers, but he's probably a year away. Gillespie is the kind of guy that you certainly don't break the bank to get - but if you do get him, so be it. He showed a lot of improvement in AAA (although it was just 47 games). His limitations are pretty clear - he's a 1B. I'd love to hear what people who have seen him think about his bat. My knowledge is mostly scouting reports, stats, and a few videos. http://www.baseball-reference.com/register/player.cgi?id=gillas000cas PS - my autocorrect keeps changing the spelling of Gillaspie's name. It has an 'a' - not an 'e' in the middle. Sorry about the changing name.

Taylor Williams got up to #8 on our Top 25 to start 2015. A lot of people who saw him in spring training were raving about him - I think Braun or someone said he was the best arm in camp - that sort of thing. I wonder where he'll start next year. He only has 25 innings at A+. So maybe there. But he'll be 26, so I imagine they'll be fairly aggressive if he does okay.

Yes, you are correct. And it's Brinson, FWIW Unless we're talking Charles Bronson. But he's dead, so I doubt it. But yes, good point.

I know people think he is too obscure to be selected, but scouts are omnipresent. There is no way I'd leave him unprotected. I agree. People were raving about him in Spring Training in 2015. You don't want to risk giving up an arms like that.

My thoughts are that the club is going to looking at 2017 as yet another developmental season. They'll live with some experiments knowing that it might hurt them short term, but be net gains in the long run. That means Villar at 2B. We need players like Villar in the lineup, and he just didn't look good at 3B, so 2B is where he'll get slotted. His offense plays well at the position, and with some work, he probably will be a solid player there (hopefully better than at SS, where he was pretty erratic). The option is if someone offers us a really good trade - then you can consider that. Assuming Villar ends up at 2B, that means Scooter will get traded. Nothing wrong with Scooter, but he is limited against lefties (although he did okay this year), and he doesn't offer position versatility. His left handed bat is nice to have, but it's not like it is elite. His OPS against righties the last three years is .733, .713 and .802. That's not exactly irreplaceable. And it's not like his a defensive whiz. As for Carter, I don't see them losing 41 HR. But you never know. They could certainly trade him if they want to move on from him. The club could go after a left handed bat in FA - Brandon Moss, Adam Lind, Luis Valbeauno (who could play 3B as well) - just to name a few guys. Some are better than others. All have risks. As long as they aren't getting overpaid in years and cash, one might be a serviceable stopgap for the next year or two. Or maybe there are some minor league guys they are willing to take a chance on with the job. If they want to do something like that, now's the time to give it a try. Regarding the need for a left handed bats - I'm all for a balanced lineup, but I also think that they will emerge down the road. If we are a bit right handed to start 2017, then so be it. Many of our top bats are left-handed - Brinson, Phillips, Diaz, Clark, Ray - those guys may start arriving as early as 2017 (I don't expect any of them to start 2017 in Milwaukee, but Brinson and Phillips may get here next season). I'm not to worried about it all. I think we are still at the stage where so much of the future is fluid. The team needs to watch for opportunities - like they did with Broxton and Villar. Who knows what Braun might bring in a trade.

I know it was exciting that he led the NL in dingers, but let's not get carried away. Ha! Nice. Fixed it. It reminds of this old Onion article: http://www.theonion.com/article/christ-returns-to-nba-1996

Jon Heyman's latest column says it doesn't look like Villar will be a 3B next year - which means 2B is his likely destination. Also a note about Chris Carter. The Brewers have decided Jonathan Villar is not their future third baseman after experimenting with him over there, as was mentioned in this space last week. He could play second next year, however, following a very nice overall season … The Brewers will be weighing whether to tender Chris Carter a contract. Though he hit 41 home runs, it isn’t necessarily an easy decision for them, as he has work to do defensively and batted just .222. They will judge what his number will be and weigh that against the market. Considering the 50-homer potential, it may still be the safer play to pick it up, but it’s no guarantee. http://www.todaysknuckleball.com/inside-baseball-with-jon-heyman/heyman-power-ranking-mlb-playoff-teams

This is probably best in the 'random news' area, but it's so crazy I had to give it his own topic. Joe Buck said in his new book that he was 'addicted' to hair-transplant surgery - and had eight of them. Complications from one of the surgeries, in 2011, caused him to have vocal problems. http://www.si.com/tech-media/2016/10/06/joe-buck-fox-book-hair-plugs-surgery-voice

I laugh every time I see this.

Prince Fielder has got to be right up there. At least Howard's contract was not nearly as much and he was at least able to finish, or at least well, stumble to the end of his contract. To the Tigers' credit at least they were able to pass along some of Prince's contract to someone else before it was too late. If insurance pays a large part of the Fielder contract (and I admit that I don't know if it does), then I'd say the Howard contract was worse. By *not* playing, Fielder is doing the Rangers a favor, and letting someone else who can potentially provide positive value on the field get in the game. Howard was not only costing huge sums of money, he was providing negative value by simply playing. The Fielder contract was definitely not good, but he did play well for three seasons, so he wasn't awful like Howard for his entire contract. And as noted, there is insurance on the Fielder's remaining contract. Plus the Tigers are picking up some of the cost as part of the trade with Texas three years ago. I read that the contract is paid out as follows (annually from 2017-2020): $9M from Texas $6M from Detroit $9M from insurance So the Rangers paid Prince $54M over the last three years (2014-16), plus will add in $36M over the next four years. That totals $90M for at total of 0.3 bWAR. Not quite as bad as Howard's totals. Detroit, by the way, paid Prince $76M ($23M annually from 2012-13, and $6M a year from 2014-2020). He had 7.6 bWAR in his two years - so at least he did something positive - even if he was overpaid for it.

OPS doesn't always equate to Runs Scored? Just a guess. I believe it's a good indicator - but not perfect. We scored 47 runs less than the league average. Our OPS was .729, while the league average was .734, so pretty much right about average. One thing I would speculate about was the overall lineup strength - we were really weak in the bottom half: OPS (batting order) #1 - 5 of 15 teams #2 - 10 #3 - 3 #4 - 3 #5 - 13 #6 - 13 #7 - 10 #8 - 15 #9 - 12 With runners in scoring position, we had a .736 OPS vs the league average, which was .755. My thought is that we maybe we failed to score runs as expected due to the weak lower half of the order. Guys got on base, but the other guys just didn't them in that much. 't wasn't that we weren't clutch - it's that our guys just weren't that good. The exceptional play in the 1,3 and 4 slots elevated the overall OPS of the club to nearly league average. So perhaps our unbalanced lineup (good players vs bad players) really hurt us at times - thus the fewer runs. Just a thought.

A perfect reason to add an extra man or two to your list. Every poll someone lists someone twice, or only posts 24 guys, or something like that.

Keep enjoying Eddie's windmills at 3B. The entire staff is returning for 2017. http://www.jsonline.com/story/sports/mlb/brewers/2016/10/04/brewers-coaching-staff-return/91532264/

I just decided to start the voting now. Not a lot can happen with the team in the next month with the playoffs going on. I figure it's a good time for us to have something fun to do.

We would like to invite everyone to participate in the 2016 Post-Season BF.net Fan Community Top 25 Prospects voting. Please take time and submit on this thread your top 25 Brewer prospects. Feel free to list any resources or news that you feel might help people with their voting. Voting will conclude on October 21. You can change your votes at anytime through the 21st, so I recommend getting your picks in early. You can always go back and tweak your list. RULES 1. Submit your Top 25 prospects, in order, by end of day on Friday, October 21. Put the player's full name to avoid any confusion (such as which Diaz you are selecting). 2. You MUST submit 25 prospects. If there are only 10 or 15 or whatever, your list will not be included. 3. You are encouraged to go beyond pick #25 - adding a few more is totally fine. That way if someone in your top 25 is traded or released, or if you mistakenly miss a number, or have a guy twice, or whatever, I can just bump up your next player(s) into the Top 25. 4. Rankings are determined by total points. The top prospect gets 25 points, second prospect gets 24 points, etc. 4. As noted above, if you submit your list and want to change something, just add the change to the thread. I'll accept changes up to the deadline. 5. Within a week after the deadline, we'll publish the new BF.net Community Top 25. Eligibility questions: Rookie eligibility is determined by 50 IP or 130+ ABs at the major league level. - Ineligible players: Orlando Arcia, Jhan Marinez, Keon Broxton, Josmil Pinto, Andrew Susac, Tyler Cravy - Eligible players with ML experience: Wei-Chung Wang, David Goforth, Rymer Liriano, Garin Cecchini, Jorge Lopez, Michael Reed, Yadiel Rivera, Yhonathan Barrios, Adrian Houser, 1B Andy Wilkens, P Jacob Barnes, Manny Pina, Brent Suter, Damien Magnifico, Ben Rowen Player notes: - Adrian Houser had Tommy John surgery and will likely be out at least a year, so he may miss all or most of 2017. - OF Rymer Liriano missed all of 2016 following being hit by a pitch in pre-season. I have not heard any information on his return. - We have three Diazs in this organization. If voting for Isan, Brandon or Miguel Diaz, please be clear who you are voting for. - We also have multiple Williams - Devin and Taylor. - There are also two Ortegas - SS Angel Ortega and pitcher Jorge Ortega. - Please comment if you know other conflicts. New players to consider: - OF Ryan Cordell (acquired from Texas) Updated Prospect Rankings: MLB Pipeline mid-season Top 30 Brewers (updates as players graduate off lists): http://m.mlb.com/prospects/2016?list=mil MLB Pipeline mid-season Top 100 players (updates as players graduate off lists): http://m.mlb.com/prospects/2016 Baseball America mid-season Top 100 (does not include 2016 draft picks): http://www.baseballamerica.com/minors/midseason-top-100-prospects/ Baseball Prospectus mid-season Top 50 (does not include 2016 draft picks): http://www.baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=29756 Miller Park Prospects Top 40 Brewers (updated 8/07): https://millerparkprospects.wordpress.com/prospect-rankings/ Minor League Ball end-of-season Top 100: http://www.minorleagueball.com/2016/9/24/12932956/top-100-prospects-end-of-2016 Previous Polls BF.net 2016 Mid-Season Top 25 - viewtopic.php?f=64&t=34472 BF.net 2016 Pre-Season Top 25 - viewtopic.php?f=64&t=33867 BF.net 2015 Post-Season Top 25 - viewtopic.php?f=64&t=33436 BF.net 2015 Mid-Season Top 25 list - viewtopic.php?f=64&t=33032 BF.net 2015 Preseason Top 25 list - viewtopic.php?f=64&t=32447 BF.net August 2014 Top 25 list - viewtopic.php?f=64&t=31859 BF.net May 2014 Top 20 list: viewtopic.php?f=64&t=31355 Stats: Looking for stats? Check out this handy BF.net page: viewtopic.php?f=64&t=12293 Please note that we reserve the right to throw out ballots if we feel that the voting was done without following the rules or spirit of the exercise. Thanks for participating!

This is a big reason to do things in the next few weeks. It was the same reason we waited until after the trade deadline as well. You hate to start up voting, and then have someone get traded (and potentially add in prospects from a trade) that mess up everyone's lists.

Very first question for Eric Longenhagen in today's Fangraphs prospect chat: Billy: Have you gotten a chance to see Corey Ray yet this fall? What are your opinions on him? Eric A Longenhagen: I assume you mean the Brewers Corey Ray and not the Royals (who I saw throw a bullpen yesterday, he looked good). Haven’t seen CF Ray but heard he was on crutches this week so I’m looking into that. Crutches?! Anyone heard anything about this? http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/eric-longenhagen-prospects-chat-one-week-to-fall-league/

Correct. But it does suggest that good hitters in Korea can be valuable major league players. I think so much just depends on the player and his talent. The scouts just have to asses a player and make a judgement as to whether his game will translate to the majors. It's like that with pretty much any league.

Gracias.