Chase Anderson’s 2018 season has been quite different from his 2017. His strikeout rate has dropped, his walk rate has risen, his ground ball rate has dropped, and his home run rate has risen. None of those trends are indicators of success, so it is no surprise that his ERA is almost two runs higher […]
Author: Seth Victor
Should the Brewers Move Downtown?
Last week, the Arizona Diamondbacks received permission to look for a new stadium site and then relocate as soon as 2022, even though their original deal required them to stay in Chase Field until 2027. Bob Nightengale then reported that the team is expected to abandon its current home in downtown Phoenix and instead move […]
Run, Pitcher, Run: A Dave Bush Story
A baseball season is long, and weird things happen as a result of teams trying to pace themselves through 162 games. The 25-man limit forces managers to get creative, and in-game roster contortions create amusing situations where players are put in positions they are not comfortable with. Everyone has their favorite; there is an entire […]
What Could Make Jhoulys Chacin Good?
I went into this research assignment trying to figure out what has to go right for Jhoulys Chacin to be good this year. I’ve come out of it with no real idea at all. Chacin has had an up-and-down career. He was quite solid for many years in Colorado, which is impressive given that he […]
Early Season Keys for Chase Anderson
As we all are aware at this point, Chase Anderson had a breakout season last year. In 25 starts, Anderson posted a DRA- of 86.1 and a cFIP of 94, which was the first time he had been better than league average by either of those metrics. His 8.5 K/9 and .265 BABIP against were […]
Stealing the Spring
Spring training occurs every year. And every year, as we reach the end of spring, people wonder whether we can take anything away from the statistics; every year, the answer should be no. The results don’t matter, so pitchers spend different starts working on one pitch or another. Hitters face these pitchers, and they are […]
What is Aguilar’s Role?
For a player with virtually no big league experience prior to last season, Jesus Aguilar made quite the impression with the Brewers. In parts of three seasons prior to 2017, Aguilar accumulated 64 plate appearances. Last year, though, he put up a .284 TAv in 311 plate appearances in his age-27 season. He got virtually […]
A Modest Free Agency Proposal
The biggest story of the offseason has been free agency’s glacial pace. Jack Moore wrote about how this looks like collusion over at the Baseball Prospectus main site, but an innocent explanation exists as well: teams are being smart consumers and trying to avoid overpaying players who are about to enter their decline phase. If it […]
Jonathan Villar and High-Risk Gambles
It should come as no surprise for me to say that the Brewers are not favorites to win their own division. PECOTA’s projections have been released today, and the Brewers are projected to be an 83-win team, or six wins worse than the Cubs. Their 83-win projection puts them in the same range as the […]
What Will Happen with Keon Broxton?
Two weeks ago, I wrote about how the slow free agent market will cut into the Brewers’ ability to make trades to address their second base hole if they don’t re-sign Neil Walker. In those two weeks, basically nothing has happened. There have been rumors that the Brewers were close to a substantive trade, but […]