adambr2

If the Brewers land Arrieta or Cobb, what would people think of a prospect heavy deal for Santana to Arizona headlined around Pavin Smith?

With no Santana trade apparently imminent and a lot of ABs to go around, if no trade for Santana, Thames or Braun happens before the season, how does everyone see the playing time being divied up? My thoughts: Yelich/Cain: These guys are, when healthy and rested, everyday players, Cain in CF and Yelich I would assume in LF most of the time and CF when Cain is off. Based on age and durability I would peg Yelich for 150 starts and Cain for 140. Santana: Defensive issues aside, he's still the everyday RF if he's on the team. I could see them possibly trying to give him days off against lefty heavy lineups if the opposing starter is RH. I'll guess around 125 games starting in RF and 5 as the DH in AL parks. Braun/Thames/Aguilar: Gets really tricky here. I have to think if Braun is healthy and reasonably effective defensively at 1st, he's the preferred option over Thames. I'll say 100 starts at 1st for Braun, 12 in LF and 5 at DH. Thames gets 62, all at 1st, and plenty of pinch hitting chances for both. Figures seem low for both guys, but what can you do with only so many starts to go around? Defensively the OF is just way too loaded now to be sticking Thames out in left anymore. I have no idea how they keep Aguilar around. I like him, but how do you justify a third 1st baseman on the roster with no versatility? If he somehow sticks around, I'd have to guess he basically does so in a PH and injury replacement only role. Phillips: This is another tough one to figure out, because Phillips deserves to be in Milwaukee, but he also deserves to play. Still, you can find about 60 starts remaining for him anywhere in the OF and he would probably be a late inning defensive replacement for Santana on pretty much a daily basis Broxton: Barring injury, there's just no room left. Fortunately he still has an option so I would guess he spends most of 2018 in Colorado Springs as the first call up when an outfielder hits the DL. If he lights up AAA and Phillips struggles at MLB, it isn't out of the question that they could temporarily switch spots from time to time. The rest of the roster isn't so complicated to figure out, but I will say that Villar will open 2018 as the preferred option at 2nd and get at least some leash to rebound, at which point Sogard could take on a bigger role if needed. Also, Perez should be far more limited to playing the IF than he was in 2016 and 2017. Also, most of these totals will be low because injuries can and will happen. It's pointless to try to predict these so I didn't try to.

It's more about VORP than OPS/OPS+. The glut of corner OFs/DHs - and good ones - has reduced the delta between him and the average available corner OF/DH. Put those numbers on an athletic CF with good defense... very different story. CF and corner OF are two very different positions so those aren't really comparable. Of course a 900+ OPS, gold glove CF is going to make bank but there's only 1 Mike Trout and he's signed for a few more years. There was no free agent hitter on the market even close to JD in terms of hitting ability. Cain, Hosmer, and Moustakas were the next best free agent hitters and the best OPS+ they ever put up between them was 132. Most were in the 100-110 area. JD is well above average. Hypothetically speaking, not considering team finances and who else is on the team, I would take JD on the contract he just signed over Cain on the contract he signed every time. There just aren't many hitters in baseball that will give you that combination of above average BA, with great OBP, and great SLUG. So it really comes down to how you weigh the defensive metrics and how many pegs you knock a guy down for defense bad enough to essentially turn him into a one way player, albeit a very good one way player. I think you could reasonably argue that Cain will be worth more wins than JD over the next 5 years. It could explain a lot of the troubles finding a decent offense for Santana. Right now this team profiles as having about the best bench in franchise history and a lineup begging for the DH.

Why not? If the DBacks come in with a good offer, I'd be all for it. Though I would agree an AL team is the better fit because of the DH.

CF Keon Broxton has realistic view of additions of Lorenzo Cain and Christian Yelich: "I can’t say I’m happy about it but it’s good for the team. Those are two solid players. Those guys have played better than me throughout my career. So, I really can’t be mad." Broxton's goal is to get better and not worry about OF glut with Cain and Yelich: "I know what I need to do to be where I want to be. I know if I played better, this probably wouldn’t have happened." I see nothing wrong with anything Broxton said. In fact I would categorize it as saying the right things.

Harrison still sounds like he wants out of Pittsburgh. Would Villar for Harrison straight up make any sense? Pittsburgh sheds salary and gets some upside and control. We get a safer veteran 2B with a big defensive upgrade in the middle of the IF. I just don't think Harrison has a ton of trade value. He's good, not elite, and his salary is about the going rate for his production this off-season.

Yeesh. If this is a reflection of Dickerson's value, no wonder we can't get anything decent for Santana.

Why do you think this? They just added Morrow and Cishek, Edwards and Strop are pretty solid, they have Justin Wilson for another year and Montgomery probably goes back to being a swingman. Davis is a big loss obviously but they seem fine in the pen to me.

Because Lucroy and Vogt are both former 2-time all-stars who cover both sides of the plate and have a much longer track record of success than Pina, who's not even that much younger than them anyway. They also both hit very well for their respective teams when traded to a contender last season, so they might still have a pretty good year or two left. And because Bandy is the 3rd catcher, which doesn't bode well for a team pursuing the playoffs with a 33 and (very soon-to-be) 31 year old catcher. I'm not that attached to it either way, but if Lucroy turns out to be a bargain and Pina had an option, I would love for them to be opportunistic and grab him. That would be incredible good fortune IMO if it were possible. It's a moot point because Pina doesn't have an option, but HH did say they're looking for a serviceable catcher so I think they're worried about the same thing I am, and rightfully so. ETA: Vogt actually doesn't have that much mileage, either. Less than 600 pro games at catcher. Pina has well over 1000. That matters a lot for anticipating age-related decline because of the demands of the position. Vogt wasn't traded last year. He regressed to the point of being DFAed. He was rated by both Baseball Reference and Fangraphs as literally being below AAA replacement level last year. He also has far more defensive holes in his game, despite the longer track record. That's something you definitely don't want in a backup catcher.

Here's the thing, majority opinions are dangerous because they tend to silence dissent and belittle minority opinions in very subtle ways that kill dialogue, sometimes without even knowing it. Calling "I wish Pina had an option" an insulting idea is probably in that category. It's likely to be a majority opinion here because we are all Brewer fans and in any sport, there's a strong tendency to overrate your own team's players a little. Similar stuff happened with Aguilar debates. There were many minimally-veiled jabs at the suggestion that Aguilar is just a AAAA guy, even though there's an abundance of evidence to back it up. Things like "how anybody could suggest Aguilar could be waived after the year he had is beyond comprehension" and stuff like that. And when someone holding the minority opinion jabs back, they're held to a different standard because the majority gets to define the terms of the debate. They can just ignore it (or not even realize it) when they do it themselves while calling others out for similar stuff. This is not just sports, but life. It happens all the time. Calling a potential demotion for Pina 'insulting' is not done to silence or belittle. It's exactly what I think of it. I think there are times you need to reward performance, even as risk of a regression. I think it sends a very poor message to demote a player to AAA after the rookie season he had. Although yes it is a business I don't even think you can justify it as a business decision as there's no way in my mind that Pina wouldn't be an excellent backup catcher at the very minimum especially with how strong he is defensively. If you disagree, than I would kindly ask you to explain why rather than put words in my mouth and saying you'll never change my mind about assertions that I never made.

I agree with Brew. You come off at times as extremely defensive over nothing. All I was saying is that Pina performed very well for us when given the opportunity at the MLB level and deserves a role on this team, not in AAA. Then you jumped on that and concluded that I was saying Pina couldn't regress and his minor league history was unimportant compared to what he did last year, neither of which I said. With that said I do put a lot more stock into Pina's much more impressive recent minor league history compared to what he was doing 5-6 years ago, and a number of baseball writers predicted before 2017 that Pina could surprise as a breakout candidate even as an older rookie.

Although he's still made millions, Lucroy has been a victim of bad timing his entire career. Signed a team friendly deal (which I still agree with doing, even though it didn't work out for him). Outperformed the deal and had his best years during the deal. Then he tried to get the Indians to drop his option to accept a trade there, which they obviously wouldn't, otherwise that would have worked out great for him. Instead he goes to Texas, they exercise his option, he has a down year and then the market crashes when he reaches FA. Bad timing on both. Good chance the best catcher in team history never even pulls down $7M in a single season.

That's the thing, salaries aren't escalating. Not right now. They're de-escalating, and even Dombrowski wouldn't be dumb enough to give Braun 3/57. The offer has now been reported from the Red Sox to Martinez as 5/100, not 5/125. So on a per year basis, with Braun being 3 years older, you're essentially placing equal present value on them, which they do not have. There are just numerous reasons why this won't happen. Like I said if you had suggested Santana as the fallback for the Red Sox on Martinez I could follow the logic there a lot better. 90% chance Braun finishes his contract here in Milwaukee, and on the 1/10 that he doesn't, it won't be in Boston.

I can't imagine not even having Pina on the 25 after a very nice rookie season anyway. That seems downright insulting.

1) Braun has no surplus value. In this market he may have negative value because he wouldn't get 3/57 today. So if you want to get something back you'd have to kick in a good percentage of his remaining salary. 2) I know you already mentioned it, but the NTC. I can't see Braun giving up his 10/5 to go even further from home and away from where he's spent his entire career. I guess never say never but it's hard to make much of a case for the Red Sox being an interest for Braun. Santana probably makes a lot more sense for both sides if they end up looking for a trade alternative to Martinez.

Not sure what happened, but according to the Rangers GM now they did not sign Oh and there apparently is nothing imminent with him and Texas.

Gross. I remember seeing him pitch against the Brewers last year and thinking 'Wow, this guy is awful.' I agree with Joey, there's no way he should be cracking this rotation even as is. I'd much rather see Suter or even Yo as the 5 starter. Heck go ahead and add Wilkerson and Bubba Derby to that list.

No, it really not. As I mentioned your mortgage would be paid off which for most is a substantial monthly bill. You would also be able to supplement that money with social security once you reached your 60s. It really depends on a number of factors -- your cost of living for one. Where I live in Central Wisconsin -- 40k a year will go a long way. Obviously as someone pointed out that 40k was just an example because it worked well as a round number. Most importantly, it depends on your priorities and what they are. If you need to have that vacation home, if you need to wine and dine, yes that will be a sad retirement. If you can find a way to live within lesser means and value your time more, it can be a very happy retirement. Others brought up the idea of having one spouse retire while the other continues working for health insurance, a great idea. Ideally you could simply have one spouse work part-time, but part-time jobs with decent insurance are hard to find. Obviously insurance is the million dollar question, and not an easy one. I don't know much about the government marketplace for insurance, never had to use it. My dad retired in his 50s from a modest job. He owns his home and makes enough in retirement to live comfortably. For extra side cash, he earns $300 per month from donating plasma twice a week, which takes about an hour each time. He actually enjoys the hour to just sit there and read or watch Netflix. This plan isn't for everyone, but it works fine for him. Retirement, or timing retirement, is nothing more than a choice between time and money. Every year you have less time and more money. I won't make 45, but I won't work a day into my 60s -- I've never heard of anyone on their death bed saying they wished they had less time and made more money.

They were going to win the division regularly anyway. Like the Brewers early this century, they suffered through a bunch of terrible seasons to build up one of the best farm systems in my lifetime, but unlike those Brewers, they're not botching it to an extent that would make Herb Kohl proud. The Brewers just have to be opportunistic and get good values and maximize their chances of making the wild card every year for a few years without compromising their ability to take over the division when the Cubs go through their inevitable cycle of having an extremely expensive core on the tail end of its prime, with no farm system to speak of. Even the best big market teams still have to go through that cycle, though not as often or for as long as small market teams. I'm much more mad about them getting Chatwood. That's exactly the type of guy the Brewers should have been after. Then maybe the Cubs sign two risky contracts instead of one, giving up two comp picks in the process. I actually thought Chatwood was a pretty considerable overpay at 3/38 and now that we've seen how the market developed I think it's even more of an overpay. I think they got better value with Darvish, actually. Chatwood could possibly end up being a steal for the Cubs, or maybe not . He carries high risk, and how much people were noticing how underrated he was, was starting to make him overrated, if that makes any sense. Chacin was our Chatwood signing. I'll take Chacin for 2/16 over the probably 3/40 it would have taken for Chatwood anyday.

I have a hard time using the Suppan signing to justify anything. That was just kind of a poor emotional choice made more less to try to put Milwaukee on the baseball map, with absolutely no analytical backing It really goes to show how much things have changed in the last 11 years. I don't remember exactly what the reaction was like here but I'm pretty sure it was mostly excitement. If we made the same move today, I think the reaction would be much different. Not only do you have smarter and better informed front offices today, you've got smarter and better informed fans.

Well, it sounds more like from what was reported today that our offer was somewhere in the neighborhood of 5/100. Stearns is smart enough to know that was never going to be accepted. So if that really was the offer, it was a lot more just trying to force the Cubs to be competitive in their offer and not land him for a big discount. If we weren't willing to go 6/126, we were never really that serious about getting him. That's kind of the problem JD Martinez is having now, no bidding war. It's Red Sox or bust and they're offering 5/125 and Martinez has no leverage. Boras I'm sure will try his damndest to manufacture some sort of bidding war but I don't believe for a second that the Diamondbacks are interested in matching that offer.

The problem with that thinking is it borrows from one year to pay for another. If in four years he's paid more than he's worth it hurts that team. The fact he was worth more a couple years ago doesn't change that. To be a perennial contender we cannot do that sort of thing. The Cubs may be able to do that but no way is it right for us. The only way I'd pay that much is to frontload it so the overpay comes in a year where we could afford it. Pretty easy to budget around the problem. Whether that be frontloading like you said or simply budgeting ahead for what you expect to be a lost year, more control for the same overall amount is a good thing. Doesn't make any sense to me that the same people who would say "good deal" for 5/125 would say "too many years" for 6/126 .

It's funny how opinions can differ so significantly. In my eyes, this off-season didn't change our path one bit. Yelich was Brinson's ceiling (I understand this is my opinion) ... so we simply swapped our best outfield prospect for what we hoped he could be. I certainly consider that a win. Harrison becomes blocked because of Cain/Santana/Braun. We won't need another starting outfielder until 2020ish when Braun is on his way out and Cain is presumably declining. By that time Harrison would have been dealt anyway and/or it will be the Tristen Lutz show... Harrison was never going to start for the Milwaukee Brewers. The only real loss we have is Diaz and depending on Hiura's trajectory ... he too may not have had a place on the 2020 squad either. Admittedly I'm not as high on Yamamoto as others. This year is to figure out which of our young starters (Burnes, Woodruff, Wilkerson, etc) are going to be staples in the future. I don't think the intention in our rebuild was to contend this year ... and while we are closer to that than I think was planned, I don't believe the moves we have made will hinder our ability to compete in '19, '20 etc. as you seem to be insinuating. We sold high on Brinson. It is very possible we sold high on Harrison as well. +1 Agreed with everything you just said and I’ll add that the Cubs adding Darvish may or may not help them continue their winning ways but I’m really hoping Stearns is just focused on doing what’s best for the Brewers. Taking on Darvish at his age and injury history for six seasons would not have been wise for the Brewers. He will find us pitching. We are in such a better place this season that last year and the year before that. We can’t overreact to these types of things. Stay the course. I agree. We worry far too much about what the Cubs do. They've got a good team, they've got money, and they're going to spend when they can. We need to do what's best for us -- we can't make every move with the Cubs in mind and we can't go toe to toe with every move they make in free agency. We're not going to win that game. Build from within and spend our resources wisely. Trading for Yelich and signing Cain weren't done to try to catch the Cubs by 2020, they were done to try to make the Milwaukee Brewers better. Which is all we should concern ourselves with. Also keep in mind that so many things can happen that could change fortunes. Yu or Quintana could decline in 2 years, Nelson or Burnes could emerge in a big way. Nor do we even necessarily need to win the division, being one of the top 5 teams in the NL would give us a shot.

Davies has been really consistent from year to year as far as season results. Anderson has been a sub 3 ERA pitcher the last season and a half and completely revamped his mechanics and added velocity last year. Nelson's emergence was the real deal last year, although I'm probably most concerned about him given his return from shoulder surgery. But I do think we have an underrated top 3.

Brewers aren't going anywhere with a rotation full of 3's and 4's. Anderson has been good but it took him a while to get there. Davies can be inconsistent. If you want to compete you need proven starters. IF they can get to the playoffs, they will get shellacked. If Stearns is going after Cotton it's probably because he thinks Cotton can be a top of the rotation pitcher 3+ years from now. Yep. Nelson didn't have great results his first year either, or even in 2016. Cotton just turned 26 and has about a year under his belt at the MLB level. He was a top 100 prospect -- I won't pretend to know why he struggled last year but it isn't necessarily because he can't be a good MLB pitcher. I just would only pay clearance rack price at this point.