trwi7

I would absolutely despise moving prospects for veterans. We seriously just reloaded our farm system and we're willing to throw it away because we had a good 40 game stretch? You at the very least wait until Woodruff and Hader come up and see if they can provide improved pitching from within instead of getting impatient and blowing your prospect depth while still in a rebuild. If the Brewers were 35-47 and then had a 24-18 stretch, nobody would be talking about buying. The only reason it's happening is because this stretch happened at the beginning of the season.

Full marks to Franklin for turning around like 15 times for a ball that was in the air for about 4 seconds.

Who knew that a 30 year old waiver pickup with little (no?) big league service would be terrible?

It takes our attention away from another piss rocket given up by Anderson though

Of course Sogard is going to hit 2nd. He's a scrub but he reminds Counsell of himself. Knew when he got called up he was going to play way too much.

Can't decide who is worse between Jerry Augustine and Davey Nelson.

Earlier FS Wisconsin had a graphic that said Garza throws his fastball 20% of the time and his slider over 60% of the time and that immediately raised a "you guys are dumb" flag so I went to fangraphs and it says he's throwing his fastball 63% of the time and his slider 20% of the time.

I don't think the Brewers deserve top prospects for Braun and I wish they would've taken the best offer from the Dodgers or Giants this winter.

I was told about 10 days ago that we would get good value because he was striking guys out or something. Just ignoring that he was also walking a ton of guys and leaving meatballs over the plate that consistently get crushed. I was dubious of getting a nice haul for him even if he was pitching well. Only signed for 2 months and he's clearly not in the Chapman tier that could get you a really good piece despite being a rental.

Walking 7 in a little over 12 innings in his "good" appearances is kind of terrible.

Preds!!!!!

That send was worse than any Sedar send and he was almost safe.

He's both and ESPN is already making him the next Tebow, Lin and Manziel which is incredibly annoying.

Even before Thornburg got hurt it was PTBNL or $100. That alone should tell you about the quality of the player coming back.

This goes back to player development but he flashed the makings of a decent one back in A ball. He only threw it like 3 or 4 times a game though. I know his numbers wouldn't be as good in the minors if you had forced him to throw it says 15 times a start but he might have been better off in the long run had he improved it to even average or even slightly below average levels.

We aren't getting much for Feliz anyways. He's a 1 year contract who hasn't been the same since he got hurt. His value on the trade market is minimal.

We literally traded Smith, who was injured earlier in the year and having a mediocre year for Bickford like 5 months earlier. You could make the argument that Jeffress got us Ortiz (or at minimum Cordell, who I'm not a huge fan of but is a decent enough prospect.) I'm saying a prospect like Bickford or Ortiz (not necessarily a pitcher) but a prospect of that caliber would make more sense for us to acquire at this time for one of our trade pieces than acquiring Shaw would.

My point in bringing up Kershaw, Lincecum and Scherzer wasn't to say I knew they were going to be Cy Young winners or anything like that, it was to point out that there was no chance the Brewers could draft them because of where they picked to point out the absurdity of the argument that "you can get talent anywhere in the draft."

Fan interest sucks already. Going bottom of the barrel on payroll will help mitigate any revenue losses and no free agent is going to say "well, they lost 100 games 4 years ago and didn't even try to win, so they're definitely off my list." For the most part, we shouldn't be going after free agents anyways. The only guys we can afford are the older mid tier guys and they all end up sucking either throughout the entire contract or at the end of it. That should have absolutely no bearing on what we're doing now. Trading Gomez and Lucroy was absolutely the right thing to do. Trading the bullpen arms was absolutely the right thing to do. Once again, the problem I have (with Thornburg) is what we got in return. Why are we looking to get Shaw? Why are we not looking for another prospect? An average 3rd baseman? We need that now? Absolutely have to go out and get it? Why? Explain it to me because I don't understand it at all. Use a reliever to get that extra prospect that a team doesn't want to give up but will help push it over the top. Use it to get a pitching prospect like Bickford. Don't use a reliever to get an average 3B who's already 27. Draft position is huge in every sport but especially MLB. Not only because the higher you pick the more players you have to choose from but also because of the bonus money. If I can cut a deal with say the 3rd best prospect and give him a couple million less than slot, I can save that money for a guy that falls to my next pick and give him money helping my chances of landing impact talent. Say you're picking 1st and 40th in the draft but save money on your first pick and a 1st round talent drops. Would you rather have the 1st and say 40th best prospects in a draft or the 3rd and say 24th best prospects in the draft? Bonus money is huge in the draft now and it would be foolish to not acknowledge how having more money in the draft helps you manipulate the kind of prospects you can get and it's a lot easier when you have top 5 bonus money (or better) instead of say the 11th most money to spend. But once again, why is trading for Shaw necessary now? You say the roster is fluid but you need to explain to me why, with a trade chip like Thornburg, when relievers are going for high prices all around the major leagues Stearns just had to get that 27 year old 2.5 WAR 3B for a rebuilding team. It didn't make sense to me at the time and it sure as hell doesn't make any sense now. Shaw is the kind of guy you pick up after your prospects start to establish themselves and you're ready to take a step towards maybe competing for a playoff spot but don't have a player at whatever position you're looking to trade for. The vast majority of our batting WAR so far has come from Thames, Braun and Pina, all of whom are either 30 or above or will be 30 in about a month. Our top pitcher by far so far has been Anderson who will be 30 in 6 months and if he was healthy, Guerra would likely be one of our top pitchers at 32. So no, this isn't a young team or at least, the guys contributing to the wins aren't young. Maybe I'd feel differently if some of our young players were carrying the team or we had an amazing farm system or at least a farm system that would be the undisputed best in our division but we don't even have that.

Jesus, of course you can find talent everywhere but the higher you pick, the more talent is available to you. You still have to pick it. Hey, that 81-81 team in 2006 was feel good (I guess) story but looking back, wouldn't you rather be a little worse and draft between 7 and 11 where Kershaw, Lincecum and Scherzer went instead of 16th where we took Jeffress? In seasons where we actually don't care about wins and losses as a franchise, like this one and the one last year and maybe even next year. I'd much rather lose a ton than put out a middling team, which it seems like we're trying to do. Hell, it's not even like you can say we're winning on the backs of our prospects and young players. We're winning on the backs of 30 year olds. We're letting young talent get taken in the Rule V over crappy veterans and then getting rid of said veterans while losing the young talent anyways. It's incredibly frustrating.

I care. I'm not going to enjoy a mediocre season. The higher you pick, the more choices you have and the more money you have. Spoiler alert: That's a good thing. I'm not playing, so I don't give a crap. 14 extra losses in a season isn't going to destroy me emotionally, so I'd much rather see that.

The fact that he's a 27 year old average player with little upside on a rebuilding team and we went out and sought a trade for him? I completely disagree with the way Stearns is handling this rebuild and I don't know if he has Attanasio in his ear telling him not to bottom out but it's like they're afraid to lose 100 games when that would be infinitely better than losing 86.

Glad during the rebuild we're picking up average players like Shaw to knock us down the draft boards.

Normally I'm not a hurry up the pace of play kind of guy but the amount of trips to the mound that Willson Contreras takes to the mound is ridiculous. Umpires need to tell him to knock it off and get back behind the plate.

8-1 against the Reds and Blue Jays. Go against decent teams and we still suck.