Point Beer Is Best

Saw on twitter that Sandy Alderson said a prominent recent rumor - likely the one involving Lucroy - was "dead on arrival." Crappy offer aside, that's two seasons in a row where Alderson has publicly made comments regarding deals with Milwaukee that seem to paint a "hey, we tried but the other guys are unrealistic."

(4) The trade didn't involve the teams we've been linked to for relievers (Cleveland, Washington, Texas) so there demand is still there while supply has been reduced. I'd say the relief market was set when the Marlins got a 39 year old Rodney for Chris Praddock. In a weird way, with Stearns reportedly asking for Praddock plus two more prospects for Jeffress (and then the Marlins doing to deal with San Diego instead), Stearns may have started this all off by setting a high price on Jeffress weeks ago.

By Baseball Prospectus' PECOTA system, Chapman is worth .5 WAR the rest of this season, Jeffress worth 1.1 WAR through 2019. I really don't think it's a relevant question though. Teams that make deadline deals are trying to win this year. Jeffress' value past this year won't mean a lot to the team trading for him, IMO. It's almost strictly about what he can do over the remaining games this year. This is the dynamic that we won't really have an answer to until Smith/Jeffress is traded. Yes, Jeffress would seem to have more value over 3.5 years than half a year of Chapman. That's not really debatable. But this is the time of year that teams are making moves motivated more by the season at hand and would seem to put more emphais on guys with proven track records as opposed to future control. And they tend to make more emotional decisions. While we may salivate at what Chapman just returned, I just don't know if a team would offer anything comparable for Jeffress. I do think the current market could yield much more than in recent memory, but I also don't want to get my hopes up.

You'd think I'd be above engaging this article's author on Twitter, but apparently I'm not. He's really, really convinced TDA is fair compensation for Lucroy because "He's been a Top 100 prospect 5 different seasons."

Read this if you'd like to throw up in your mouth: http://www.forbes.com/sites/zachpetersel/2016/07/24/travis-darnaud-jonathan-lucroy-trade-would-be-win-win-for-new-york-mets-and-milwaukee-brewers/#590ef158364f

There was a lot of speculation on this deal being contingent on Chapman signing an extension, but it appears that was just rumor. Prediction: Chapman will be wearing (Yankees) pinstripes opening day next season.

The Mets media seems to really be pushing this narrative of D'Arnaud being the centerpiece, but like others have said I don't see him having much value to Milwaukee at this point. He might be in a deal, but only if he's an afterthought from our perspective.

If the Brewers won't accept the deal, how is that the Mets have "enough" to get a deal done? That was my thought. Those sentences seem incompatible, unless they mean that the Mets system "has enough" to get a deal done, but the offer of D'Arnaud + prospect isn't what the Brewers have in mind.

That is an incredibly steep price to pay (#1 prospect) for Chapman if you don't get him locked down. Cashman should be executive of the year if he somehow landed the Cubs #1 prospect (plus more as rumored) and then turned around and signed Chapman as a free agent.

The part of that article that I thought was interesting is that it mentions he Brewers were scouting the Mets' lower level minors. That's consistent with what we've seen reported on this site. They are definitely looking to get a few guys in the lower minors they feel good about along with a more "known" advanced prospect in any upcoming deals would be my guess.

Not to derail this further, but if the Cubs are giving up their #1 prospect, they may be trying to sign Chapman to an extension. They definitely have the advantage over Cleveland in that regard.

Don't know much about Torress, but that would seem to be a haul. I'm not sure where our relievers (Smith, Jeffress, Thornburg) would be valued in comparison to Chapman. Our guys have more team control, but lack the "star" power that Chapman has, and a team that places more emphasis on this year than the summation of the next three may be willing to pay more for a true rental like Chapman than our guys. They could be thinking, What's more valuable to us - a guy who will give us 2.0 WAR the remainder of the season, or a guy who will give us 7.0 over the next 3.5 years (and just 1.0 this season). Just using arbitrary WAR numbers as an example.

I have a hard time believing that even Dave Stewart would make a deal to sell low on Shelby Miller after giving up Dansby Swanson to acquire him a few months ago.

There gotta be a joke here about a guy named Sale going around and slashing uniforms.

Jeff Passan has confirmed this report. Sale took a scissors to all of the uniforms.

I don't know how the CBA would address this, since the MiLB players are not union members.

Carter won't be a FA until after the 2018 season if they decide to go that route. According to Sportrac, it is actually after the 2017 season: http://www.spotrac.com/mlb/milwaukee-brewers/chris-carter/ According to baseballreference, he's eligible for FA after the 2018 season. According to Cots, he has 3.159 years of MLB service, which I believe would have been accurate as of the beginning of the season.

I think they are planning a Marlins-style spending frenzy to open up their new ballpark. Their rebuild timeline isn't quite meshing with the stadium timeline so they are probably looking to accelerate it a bit (or at least throw money at some big names to keep fans interested until the prospects are ready). I'm not sure what the FA crop looks to be like this offseason, but we all know the starting pitching field is very weak (which is why this would be a perfect season to deal Nelson if we're so inclined), so Atlanta is in the unenviable position of wanting to throw money at FA's so they don't have to deal the prospects they've hoarded, but there may not be many players worthy of that spending spree.

I could be mistaken, but wasn't it Phillips who was added because of Fiers?

I'm assuming I'm not the only one doing this at Brewerfan from now through the deadline: http://media.giphy.com/media/ToMjGpBsrsHfZuhzvY4/giphy.gif

Agree. It seems that every single deal has come without any warning, including the most recent in-season deal to send Hill to Boston.

Good... GOOD.... Everything is proceeding as I have forseen... /Evil cackle

It really completely depends on a) the current situation of the franchise and b) the player being offered by the "selling" team. As others have touched on, we have good depth in the minors but lack the star power we had when we eagerly anticipated the arrivals of Weeks, Hart, Fielder, Hardy & Braun. Had Stearns arrived a couple of years ago when we were perceived to have one of the worst farm systems, then I think the strategy of acquiring "packages" of talent in the lower minors (guys with good draft pedigree and those "lottery ticket" type players). But with the general consensus being that we have a good system overall, and feel like our player acquisition team (Montgomery, et al) are more competent than their predecessors, the trade market acquisitions should now focus on players of higher quality rather than quality. Let's go get more bang for our buck. And of course it then depends on who we're offering. Some were upset by the Lind trade, but perhaps it was Stearn's view that if he focused on a one-for-one deal to get a single player with the most current value it just wasn't overwhelming. Weighing that option against the comp pick (which was also risky given Lind's back injuries and the very real possibility he would accept the QO), I can totally understand why he went the route of grabbing three teenage international prospects. Using "The Guy" approach with Lind likely would have only yielded a borderline prospect, so why not take a gamble on a quantity of lower level guys that fit your profile? But when you are selling a Lucroy/Braun or one of our high leverage relievers, I think you have to go for "The Guy" because "The Guy" is more likely to have significant value. I'd rather trade those types of players for prospects that have say a 90% chance of being an MLB starter and a 70% chance of being an all-star at least once in their career and maybe a 50% chance of being a perennial star as opposed to getting three players who have high upside but their chances of becoming a star are just indeterminable at this point. Kind of the "better to have a bird in the hand than 2 in the bush" type thinking when it comes our more valuable players.

I like the idea of shortening the season and expanding the playoff field. More teams will be "in the race" at the deadline which not only helps fans stay interested longer (more $$ at the turnstiles), it also increases trade value of players on the very few teams totally out of contention which should help them become relevant sooner. An expanded playoff field is a necessity for more small market teams to ultimately win a championship by getting hot at the right time.

The New York Daily News Article also mentions the Brewers are scouting the Mets lower levels. Regarding Mets lower level prospects, an interesting one is last year's Mets 3rd round pick LHP Max Wotell. Wotell started for the Kingsport Mets on Saturday and has had some early (albeit small sample size) success in Rookie ball. Wotell also has a somewhat funky delivery that appears to cause some deception and timing issues for hitters. This makes sense given all that we know (Mets need relievers, Brewers like to scout lower levels looking for players who in 2-3 years would never be included in a similar trade). I know this method infuriates those looking for a 2-3 year rebuild, but looking longer term this strategy should yield more major league talent (and higher likelihood of above-average players, and thus more sustained success) by sheer volume.