MNBrew

You can never have too much talent. If bringing Ben Sheets back represents an upgrade because of what he can presently do, it's an effort worth making. Unfortunately, I wonder if this may be an altogether moot point because, remembering his departure, the bridges may already be burned beyond repair.

Wilson vs. Barmes, Barmes vs. Bartlett, Bartlett vs. Betancourt, and so on. This is all a bunch of debating which rusty, crappy old car is better than the other rusty, crappy old cars on the used car lot. It seems to me that outside of Jose Reyes, with any FA shortstop we're talking a B- player or lower. I'm not walking WAR, league average, or any of that. Looking at them in terms of a simple but broad glance - in terms of being a solid offensive player and a solid defensive player -- not just relative to other SS's or other FA SS's -- most of the guys out there are NOT complete players, ergo not the sort of players that merit getting truly excited about. For all of them, there are very notable flaws in one or more facets of their games. I think you have to start with your sights set high. I know it's not very realistic, but I want Jose Reyes. You have to aim for the big fish. Who else with a skill set like that is 1) coming up in the Brewers' system, or 2) likely to be available to acquire at a reasonable cost in the foreseeable future. If the Brewers don't get Reyes, at minimum I'm hoping Melvin would trade for a nicely solid SS. If Prince is gone, we have at least a bit of money available, though exactly how much is not known, but that can help toward an upgrade. The Brewers have reasonable alternatives at every other position. I'm really hoping they can pull off a significant upgrade at SS. Otherwise, if they're faced with Barmes or Wilson or Betancourt or Counsell or any of the other varyingly unattractive options out there, it just comes down to choosing which player's combination of strengths and weaknesses is most appealing relative to the others and then living with that choice and the in-some-way lacking skill set that comes with it.

That over-inflated 2-yr/$18M contract the Giants gave Edgar Renteria wasn't exactly a Sabean moment of glory, either. No, not a heinous contract in terms of length. But it was heinous in terms of badly overestimating the market & acting early in doing so. The proactive approach here resulted in major egg on the Giants' faces.

What he said. The only consistent thing I can glean from hearing so much negative (incorrectly, per my opinion) ranting about Braun's "lousy" defense that isn't rather easily refutable (overall speed, assists, chronically minimal errors, & solid arm AREN'T issues) is that he sometimes takes bad routes. Gold Glove doesn't mean perfect defense. It should mean pretty much the best at the position, though. The best defenders, whether by Gold Glove or obviously well-earned renown (since Gold Glove status can easily still reflect a player's offense than defense; witness: Rafael Palmeiro as a Gold Glove 1B when he spent 75% of the year as a DH), still blow the occasional play, miss the cutoff man, may even directly cost their team a occasional game with a mental or physical lapse. I'd have a tough time arguing Braun over Parra. But given how the truly more deserving Jeff Cirillo routinely lost out on Gold Gloves to Scott Rolen, who for all his defensive strengths still got more "cred" for his D thanks to his bat, I'd say if Braun wins this over Parra, while perhaps not fully "just" from a purist standpoint, it'd still be very appropriate and only fitting.

Aaron Rodgers, anyone? Steve Young? (Wrong sport, of course, and there are no guarantees with Gamel, but they're two examples that perfectly typifying your point.)

True except you did have to hear BA announce- "Betancourt goes after the first pitch and pops up to...." Love that line! We still have Gomez to do that if Yuni's not back. Gomez is good at that, too.

The last thing I'm eager to do this offseason is trade Marcum, but I'd trade him for Hanley & even throw in Hart (for our financial flexibility) or McGehee (if they have a 3B need given that Casey's nothing short of quite affordable) if necessary if it took that to even out the deal.

The beauty in both these options being declined is that the teams we got these two from are on the hook to pay the buyouts. Most other teams facing these kinds of decisions are considering their own money, not someone else's. That's almost like having your cake & eating it, too.

If it's not Reyes at SS next year (I'd love for it to be), then wouldn't Hairston be the reasonable backup option to Yuni?

It sure seems to me that any notion of NOT extending Greinke is the beginning of the path to another long stretch of at-best mediocrity. Any excellent rotation needs real strength at the top. Top prospects (Peralta, Thornburg, Heckathorn types) and mid-grade prospects (Rivas, Fiers, etc.) may eventually reach that level or at least become strong complementary pieces. But a rotation loaded with those types without Greinke & Gallardo at the top has a far greater chance of leading to years like this year's Twins rotation had than this year's Brewers rotation. To me, that's a chance not worth taking!

Signing Clint Barmes to be the starting SS is basically the equivalent of playing Carlos Gomez to be your everyday starting CF, though slightly better on offense and slightly worse on defense (as would be about anybody compared to Gomez's defense). Davidoff's line about Barmes is that he peaked in 2011 w/ the Astros. A .244 BA & .312 OBP is peaking? Only Ozzie Smith would be worth $5M/yr. defensively with that kind of offensive "peak." No, no, no, no, no. A thousand times, NO! Many of Davidoff's contract predictions may prove true, but it sure seems like his lens seems to be what one of the NY teams would pay every single one of those guys. I don't think there's any way the Brewers go after Pena, let alone for $10M/yr. They have too many other needs to blow $15m/yr. on 2 plus-defense players if it also means such lousy hitters.

I don't dislike Headley, but between a bit of a McGehee rebound & what Green could well possibly do, I just don't see any great reason to trade for Headley that couldn't be trumped by what Green might also be able to do, and for a fraction of the price.

It sure seemed like Cruz misjudged where he was relative to the track & the wall, pulling up short on the ball b/c he thought he was closer to the wall than he was. Watching his gait going after it, he sure had time to cover the extra 4 feet he needed to get that ball into his glove. It actually struck me as being much like Morgan's costly misjudged play at the wall in one of those games in AZ.

Morgan's "streaky" offense must be what kept his BA going back & forth between about .320 and .335 most of the season. I'll take that kind of streaky. I'm not gaga about Morgan, but other than some rather questionable plays in the playoffs, I thought he was pretty darn solid all year. Even the world's best defensive players (not that Morgan's one of them) are going to make a few boneheaded plays over the course of the year, some of which may directly blow a game or two for their team. Back to the original topic of the thread, as I've stated elsewhere, I'd LOVE to see the Brewers land Reyes, however long the odds may seem.... On a related point, I believe Melvin's season's-end pro-Yuni comments not only are fair at face value (in a certain legitimate way), but also could very well be classic GM-speak along the lines of the once-oft-heard "I'm not motivated to move Overbay" mantra. Assuming the timing's right, there's nothing stopping Melvin from including Yuni in some other deal along with the $2M from KC to pay for the option, essentially leaving the choice on his option to another team. . . . However seemingly unrealistic this scenario, it's nonetheless easily feasible.

I can't ever remember a team having this kind of "team of destiny" aura like these Cardinals. More lives than a cat. Unbelievable. If St. Louis wins this thing, the Brewers can at least look back with dignity about two very significant things: 1) The last 3 times they've made the playoffs, they'll have lost to the eventual WS champs; and 2) They made it within 2 wins of the World Series and were the last team eliminated before the WS loser lost the WS. I don't care how you slice that latter one, but in the big picture, there's no disgrace in the season they had (though you could argue there was at minimum some ugly loss of face for how badly they lost the last 2 games to the Cardinals). I really keep rooting for the Cardinals to lose. But it hasn't worked since late August, so I don't have great hopes that that's going to change much in the season's last game tomorrow night. Boo! Oh, it would be quite pleasing, though, should Texas actually come back tomorrow night and totally shut down St. Louis (PAST the last out, since just getting up to the last out isn't enough to convince the Cardinals they're going to lose).

David Freese being David Freese, why in the world wasn't Lowe pitching him inside????? Seriously. Fail to bust him inside once, shame on you . . . but lucky to get another lead. Fail to brush him back in the next AB with the game on the line AGAIN? You deserve to lose if you keep failing to correct the same mistake against these evil Cardinals. Just ask our dear Brewers.

David Freese being David Freese, why in the world wasn't Feliz busting him inside? Didn't Texas learn anything from how the Brewers pitched Freese & the rest of the Cardinals all NLCS?

For all the chances the Brewers had to recall an IF this past year, the fact that Maysonet never made it to Milwaukee tells me he's AAA roster-filler and more than a step or two down the line in the contingency plans. I've stated elsewhere that I'm hoping our two reserve IFs next year on any given day next year are Hairston (can play 2B, SS, 3B) and the one non-starter out of Green (3B, 2B), Gamel (1B, 3B), & McGehee (3B, 1B). My gut feeling is that we're dealing with significant injuries or some other form of roster depletion if Maysonet's holding down a spot on the 25-man next year for any period of time.

That head-count on the 40-man is all temporary anyway b/c in a few days, players will start filing for free agency. It becomes easier as needs arise to outright a player or 2 to the minors, or DFA someone, eventually non-tender one/more players, etc. (granted, other teams end up with openings, too, but ...). There will also need to be guys added to the protected 40-man. And the whole process continues all the way into Spring Training. For the record, I was also wondering how I also came up w/ 41 rather than 40, but the Rogers explanation makes perfect sense.

I hate the prospect of losing Prince, but as noted above, we have in-house options to replace him (Gamel, McGehee). We also have in-house options at 3B (McGehee, Green). I agree w/ whomever said it above: SS & the bullpen are the biggest areas that need taking care of. To that end, I do drool at the positive impact Reyes could have to the point that I wonder if Mark A. would fork out the dough to make it happen. - Reyes' defense at SS, along w/ Gamel at 1B, would help the whole IF defense and balance out the questions raised about McGehee's limited range at 3B. - Reyes' offense as a prototypical All-Star leadoff hitter would stand to have a huge impact on the whole lineup. His price tag will be HUGE, but the more I think about it, the more I think that's the signing the Brewers have to make every effort to make.

This is The Sporting News' award, not the Baseball Writers' Assn. It's a great award for Gibson, but it's not the "official" one.

Per the computer-generated strike zone, the NLCS umps consistently called low &/or outside pitches to RH hitters as strikes. The Game 5 Dotel/Braun matchup screwed Braun badly in that way because it got so extreme -- there was a pitch that Molina "framed up" but actually grabbed about 6 inches off the ground that got called a strike -- so what choice did Braun have at that point but to swing at anything (of course, he still swung & missed at the pitches in the zone later in the AB, but he was dead meat by that point). I think the original point is that, after Game 3 last night, the Cardinals just tore apart another pitching staff much in a way very reminiscent of what they did to the Brewers. So a "those suckers just keep bludgeoning every opposing pitcher" reaction was a very natural one. . . . Not to mention that this thread was started & my first reply came while tonight's game was in the 1st or 2nd inning. . . . So just a normal human reaction after all the Cardinals offense last night.

You keep throwing out Fukudome as a potential Brewers in various offseason/2012 threads. I don't get the fixation, esp. not at the $8M/yr. for 3 years I've seen you mention in a couple other threads. He kept playing himself out of starting roles for the Cubs -- who were lousy over much of his time there, thus plenty of opportunities for about anyone to succeed -- in spite of multiple chances to live up to the potential based on his stellar Japanese career. Yours kinda reminds me of my excitement when the Brewers got Paul Householder in a trade. He never lived up to his Cincinnati-prospect hype, but I was convinced based on that hype, a handful of solid games, and perhaps the best throw from LF to the plate I've witnessed in person that he'd be the real deal. Well, he was really just mediocre at best, and I'm convinced Fukudome's never going to be anything close to what the media hype made him out to be when he came over from Japan. He's really proven to be a role player at most, and we already have a pretty good one in RF in Hart. . . . Not that I'm convinced Hart's the best guy for RF in the long run, but I see him as being a whole lot more reliable than Fukudome.

I totally agree. It's been easy to lament the Brewers' lousy pitching and how they could've pitched certain guys but didn't (e.g., busting Pujols inside a few times). But with how St. Louis has been hitting just about everyone, I'm not sure the Brewers could've done anything more to have ensured any better fate. Plain & simple, the Cardinals' stretch of hitting may well carry them all the way to another World Series championship -- much as I hope that won't be the outcome! -- they've just been that good.

Okay, so Fiers/Peralta are not much cheaper than Narveson, but are they perhaps a higher-ceiling guys than him? I knew Narveson was appreciably over 2 years of service time, but I hadn't realized how relatively far from 3 he still was (I suppose 2 years, 102 days won't earn him Super-2 status).