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Brewers Organization Catchers

The Baseball Prospectus top 2019 Free Agents list had four catchers in the top 50: Yasmani Grandal, Wilson Ramos, Kurt Suzuki and Jonathan Lucroy. Eliminating Lucroy, who was the second worst catcher who received regular playing time in 2018, the Brewers have three options if they wanted to dip into the free agent pool to try and upgrade the position.

Yasmani Grandal was ranked 9^th best free agent this offseason and projections put him at least a  three year commitment between $15-16M a year. At that salary, Grandal would rank second on the team in annual salary, only behind Ryan Braun. While Grandal is entering his age-30 season, he only trailed J.T. Realmuto in catcher Wins Above Replacement Player (BWARP) in 2018 and was close enough that one could consider him the best in baseball. Grandal may have been the most complete catcher as he ranked second in both Value Over Replacement Player (VORP) and FRAA amongst catchers, which respectively measure offensive and defensive value, showing that he’s strong at both ends of the game.

If there’s one area of concern, it’s that most of Grandal’s defensive value came from framing. He led MLB in framing runs in 2018 but provided only slightly positive value for blocking and throwing runs. If the Brewers were to commit the resources necessary to sign Grandal, then they would need to believe his bat will age gracefully as well as that  he can continue to provide defensive value through framing, which is not a given.

Wilson Ramos is a year older than Grandal and with his injury history projects for a three year contract at $36 million. He doesn’t provide much defensive value. In his last season before tearing his ACL, Ramos had a 10 FRAA. Since the tear, he’s -3.9. Amongst catchers who caught at least 2,000 pitches, Ramos ranked 35^th of 61 catchers in FRAA, which make sense given his numbers: he’s not bad in any one area, but he also doesn’t stand out defensively.

Ramos will provide offensive value. In 2018, his True Average (TAv) was right behind Grandal and ranked fourth amongst all catchers. If you were concerned that a rate stat props up his value, then don’t worry because he was tied for seventh in VORP.

A big worry with Ramos would be playing time management. Prior to his knee injury, he maxed out at 131 games and 523 plate appearances. Last year he appeared in 111 games and went to the plate 416 times between Tampa and Philadelphia. While the Brewers don’t have any problems with rotating players, Ramos has no positional flexibility and would need to be paired with a competent backup who can cover somewhere between twenty-five to thirty-three percent of the playing time. Unless the market on Ramos falls short of projections, it’s difficult to see the Brewers making a strong play for his services because they’d also need to commit to a strong backup, perhaps straining the payroll too much for one position.

The last catcher in the top fifty is one who may make the most sense as a Brewer if he’s willing to leave his current club. Kurt Suzuki has had a late career renaissance at the plate in Atlanta, posting his two best TAvs in 2017 and 2018. In those two seasons, Suzuki started swinging more. Whereas prior to 2017, he was swinging at less than forty-five percent of the pitches he saw, he’s above a fifty two percent swing rate now, while also maintaining a contact rate above eighty percent. Suzuki finished sixth in both TAv and VORP amongst catchers in 2018, providing near equal offensive value to Ramos.

Suzuki does not provide much value behind the plate. He had a -5.5 FRAA in 2018, which was fueled by his poor framing numbers. He finished 52^nd out of 61 catchers in framing runs and his modest blocking and throwing numbers couldn’t offset the framing numbers.

Suzuki’s numbers have increased as he’s played fewer games. He’s split time with Tyler Flowers in Atlanta, playing in 186 games over two seasons with less than 700 plate appearances. The good news is that his advanced age and limited playing time make him a potential cheap upgrade for Milwaukee. Projections have him at two years and $10 million, which is reasonable enough to make him a realistic alternative to Pina or Kratz.

If the team does decide to look to the free agent marker to upgrade the catcher position, it feels like Suzuki would be the target. He’s a low cost option who could provide outsized production when compared with his salary. For an organization that always looks for surplus value in their acquisitions, a player like Suzuki makes sense for the team. Grandal and Ramos are buzzier additions but the cost of those two veterans may not fit in the budget. The good news is that the team has options at different levels outside the organization, so they can negotiate from a position of strength.

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Simply in terms of statistics and historical records, though, the Brewers are also likely to fail to match their 2018 performance next year. Here’s how playoff teams in the Expanded Wild Card Era have fared with 96+ wins in their follow-up year, sorted by Follow-up Wins:

Some notes:

• In 12 of 17 cases, the “follow-up” to the 96+ win playoff season featured a better Run Differential progression than Win-Loss progression. This could be an easy fate for the 2019 Brewers, given that the 2018 Brewers outplayed their Runs Scored / Runs Allowed in resounding fashion: the Brewers in 2019 could easily become a 92 or 93 win run differential team that neverthless only cracks 88 to 90 wins on the field.

• The Brewers are comparable to the 2015 Cubs, which is interesting because those Cubs were the outcome of a “tanking” / scorched-earth rebuild that required multiple years of building, while the 2018 Brewers required no such rebuild. Those Cubs featured a young emerging core of Javier Baez, Addison Russell, Kris Bryant, Kyle Schwarber, and others, while these Brewers featured a decidedly ragtag gang of free agents, trade acquisitions, and advanced minors chumps who rode their strengths to excellent team success (overcoming a veritable book of scouting weaknesses). There is no Bryant / Russell / Baez core for the Brewers; there might not even be a prospect as good as Javier Baez from the 2018 Brewers. Yet here we are: those 2015 Cubs were not a juggernaut, instead averaging an 84-win run differential and surging after the All-Star Break, which is rather similar to the 2018 Brewers’ mediocre underlying performance and white hot September.

• Perhaps the most compelling comparison is the 2014 Orioles, who (like the Brewers) posted mediocre run differential totals early in the season but contended thanks to an extended late season surge. The 2014 Orioles were in the midst of an excellent five year contending run that included three playoff appearances (including a League Championship Series exit in 2014). These Orioles were also quite similar to the Brewers insofar as they strung together elite pitching performances out of their bullpen and an unsung rotation, while also keeping a relative hodge-podge of different player development cycles in their batting order (ranging from young Manny Machado and Jonathan Schoop to aging Nick Markakis, Steve Pearce, and Nelson Cruz.

• Trends exhibited by the Nationals, Reds, Red Sox, and Cardinals should underscore the up-and-down, uneven quality of the current era of baseball. Stated simply, being a near-100 win season in one season is nothing close to a guarantee that a roster core will even be a playoff contender the next season, especially as teams lean on young roster cores to define their success “out of nowhere” (such as 2018 Athletics, or 2017 Rockies and Twins). The median win total among these 96+ win behemoths is 86, in the following season.

How will the Brewers overcome these trends? Or, if the Brewers do take a step backwards, how will that be defined as a success for 2020 and onward? Given the state of the Brewers roster and organizational depth, the answer to both questions is the same: the Brewers’ success will largely be defined either by establishing MLB roles for Keston Hiura, Corbin Burnes, Brandon Woodruff, Freddy Peralta, Jacob Nottingham, and other prospects, or else netting elite talent in a trade return (especially involving Hiura, who should not be traded but for returning surefire MLB production). Prospect development at the MLB level should be a significant portion of the story for the 2019 Brewers, regardless of whether those newcomers help bolster a playoff club or whether the club fails to defend their NL Central crown but establishes future roles for the players.

Additionally, the Brewers can continue to define themselves as a club “on the margins” by providing the proper salary arbitration deals; for example, the club already accomplished this cutthroat mission by designating injured veteran catcher Stephen Vogt, rather than allocating a couple million of payroll dollars on a gamble that he returns to his bat-first profile behind the dish. As demonstrated below, Vogt’s contract and production history would yield nothing more than a 45 Overall Future Potential (OFP) asset via trade (i.e., basically an organizational depth player with an MLB floor), and at an estimated cost of nearly $4 million (via Cot’s Contracts), it is clear that the Brewers could readily fill that organizational depth function with that amount of money while also potentially pursuing additional upside. This is a crucial source of value because (unfortunately for players) salary arbitration offers the Brewers a chance to “freely” cut a player if they do not wish to enter salary arbitration process; depending on how tight the club’s revenue and payroll scenarios are, rampant non-tenders could be a great opportunity to expand resources for improving the club.

The table below demonstrates the Average Surplus of the Brewers’ salary arbitration deals. The ideal of Surplus is defined with value including both production (“pure” performance in the field) and scarcity (how readily available that production is, in other words how expensive that production is). Unlike previous models of Surplus Value I’ve published, this year I’m using multiple ranges of three-year performances (2014-2016, 2015-2017, and 2016-2018) to produce estimates, while also including contract estimates that are “depreciated” and “highest possible value.” A depreciated contract detracts from previous performance, expecting that a player’s performance will decline over time, while a highest possible value contract places a premium on the most recent performance (the best example here would be someone like Patrick Corbin, who would probably get his best contract based on who places the highest value on 2018 and assumes that performance can be replicated). [Last year’s rankings are here].

• Estimate: Cot’s Contracts arbitration estimate.
• Arbitration Year: Demonstrates a player’s specific point in the arbitration process (which is typically three years long, but can in some cases last four years with the most advanced service time players).
• HarmonicOne: This is a one-year contract estimate that takes the harmonic mean between a player’s harshest depreciated performance and their fullest current performance valuation.
• Maximum: This is a one-year contract estimate that uses a player’s fullest current performance valuation.
• Minimum: This is a one-year contract estimate that uses a player’s harshest past performance depreciation.
• Average Surplus: This figure weighs the average of the three contract estimates against the salary arbitration estimate, while also recognizing that a team will benefit from the player’s production both in controlling the production contractually and receiving the production on the field. [Average of HarmonicOne / Maximum / Minimum] – [Arbitration Estimate] + [Average of HarmonicOne / Maximum / Minimum], or, [Scarcity – Contract + Production].
• OFP: This is the historical equivalent Overall Future Potential grade that relates to the player’s Average Surplus  (more here). Essentially, this estimates the type of prospect the Brewers might expect in return if another team values each player in a similar manner.

This table should demonstrate several important roster decisions:

• First, it is clear that there are several Brewers players that do not have Wins Above Replacement (WARP) histories that match their value. This is especially true in the case of Hernan Perez, whose scarce defensive flexibility is probably worth significantly more than WARP estimates, and Erik Kratz, whose glove-first profile at catcher could be crucial to helping Brewers pitchers without phenomenal stuff “play up” in terms of production. Corey Knebel is obviously valued much higher than WARP based on his stuff and high leverage relief profile. So, this surplus value model is not definitive, it should only be viewed as a starting point.

• Players like Domingo Santana and Zach Davies have unclear production roles and unclear trade value. This probably explains why Santana was not traded last offseason, despite fans’ perception of a “clear” need for starting pitching and Santana’s “odd man out” status in a packed outfield; but other clubs probably do not value Santana beyond surrendering a rotation depth / organizational depth arm, and it is understandable why the Brewers would not accept that. It’s likely players like Santana and Davies “play out” their roles in Milwaukee, rather than being subjects of trade.

• Stephen Vogt is obviously not under contract any longer, but I included Vogt for two reasons. First, including Vogt’s Surplus estimate should show the type of range of contract that may be released by the Brewers. Second, Vogt’s estimate is included above to gauge what a potential contract value might be in case he is retained in some other manner (such as a minor league deal with an MLB guaranteed rate). A $1.4 million investment in Vogt, for example, would provide ample surplus value for the Brewers retaining the veteran within the organization.

• Jonathan Schoop’s past production really drives any model of his contract value; Schoop is likely a non-tender candidate if his salary expands to $11 million, but it should be noted that if there is any expectations for the slugger to reclaim anything resembling his previous performance level, the Brewers could make a contract offer.

• Travis Shaw is an absurdly valuable player to the Brewers, and in fact is probably more important than any player on the club short of Cain and Yelich (below is a sampling of the surplus value for much of the remaining roster, for comparison).

What is difficult about assessing the Brewers roster for 2019 is that the club is void of many obvious trade candidates. For example, in cases like Schoop, Chase Anderson, and Eric Thames, the club would almost certainly be selling low and thus limit themselves to seeking a “diamond in the rough” of an organizational depth trade return (such as a reliever or starting pitcher that could be rehabbed, or a utility-type profile like Hernan Perez that could “play up” in Milwaukee’s defensive system). Here the importance of making proper development decisions for the likes of Burnes, Peralta, Nottingham, and other prospects comes into focus, as it should be evident that the Brewers do not have many roster assets that could yield talent that would be obvious improvements above their depth prospects (or primary ones, at that). Milwaukee’s crossroads for the 2019 offseason will be combining those proper development decisions with payroll freed at the margins of the roster to seek at least one impact free agency contract.

Thus, it is true that GM David Stearns could non-tender much of the club to refine the roster, and non-tenders in bulk might be expected as a way to accumulate impact cash: this is one route to an attempt at beating the recent record of excellent playoff clubs, and ensuring that Milwaukee does not have a playoff hangover. Yet making proper prospect development decisions will ensure that even if the Brewers do not reach the playoffs in 2019, it won’t be anything more than a small blemish, a chance to reload, within the five-year window opened last offseason.

The Los Angeles Dodgers opened the 2018 season with a payroll of more than $187 million, according to Cot’s Contracts, more than double Milwaukee’s figure. In fact, that number alone would comprise approximately 70 percent of the Brewers’ total revenue. Those contracts feature players like Clayton Kersaw, an elite southpaw who defies the rule that aces don’t exist, the exception that proves the rule, a pitcher boasting approximately 66 career Wins Above Replacement Player (WARP). That’s no fluke; Kershaw may not be as magical these days as he works in his age-30 season, but the lefty still managed a 3.11 Deserved Run Averaged (DRA). By comparison, Jimmy Nelson, the Brewers ace that everyone missed due to injured in 2018, posted a DRA of 3.32 last year. Ryan Braun, the Brewers’ best player, falls short of Kershaw by 20 WARP; Gio Gonzalez, the waiver trade deadline acquisition that serves as Milwaukee’s best career pitcher, has produced half the career value as Kershaw.

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But that’s not it; the Dodgers traded for superstar shortstop Manny Machado, they boast elite prospects from Cody Bellinger to elite reclamation projects like Justin Turner. The best position player prospect developed onto the 2018 Brewers is Orlando Arcia, who could certainly build a career as a glove-first shortstop, but struggled in 2018 before a demotion to Triple-A helped him his offensive production. Los Angeles boasts such a deep batting order that you might be forgiven if you forget that Yasiel Puig, Matt Kemp, Max Muncy, Enrique Hernandez, Yasmani Grandal, or Chris Taylor are a part of it (at any given moment); in fairness, though, I suppose the Brewers bullpen works the same way, as L.A. faithful might forget about Jeremy Jeffress, Josh Hader, Joakim Soria, Corbin Burnes, Brandon Woodruff, and company. Perhaps in a few years we’ll be writing about how the Brewers’ best pitching prospects developed onto the 2018 club (Hader and Burnes) forged their respective careers in the 2018 stretch run; that remains to be written.

By using Baseball Reference Multi-Year Park Factors, the Dodgers are easily the better team. Park-adjusting Runs Scored and Runs Allowed, and scaling them to the National League, one would have expected the Dodgers to win approximately six more games than the Brewers.

Team Deserved Run Average says the same (Los Angeles comes in at 3.51 while the Brewers are at a [still-respectable] 4.31); True Average (TAv) says the same, although it’s closer (Milwaukee’s overall batting performance of .275 is just behind the Dodgers’ MLB-leading mark of .280). The key areas where Milwaukee has the edge are in fielding (both in terms of Defensive Efficiency and Park-Adjusted Defensive Efficiency, although, again, it’s close), and the bullpen (again, it’s close).

Thankfully for all of us, they don’t play the games on paper. Thankfully for Brewers fans, fielding and bullpen can help to decide playoff series. On the field, the Brewers have a fighting chance.

It’s so easy to call the Dodgers the better team. What’s fascinating about the Dodgers, however, is that on the whole their overall on-field performance was worse than Milwaukee’s throughout the season. One way to measure the overall strength of a ballclub throughout the season is to average the team’s Winning Percentage pace (against a 162 game schedule) and average the team’s so-called “Pythagorean W-L” (this is the difference between a team’s Runs Scored and Runs Allowed translated into expected wins and losses).

Certainly, the Dodgers’ overall average Runs Scored and Runs Allowed performance looks much stronger than that of Milwaukee, but between games 28 and 81 the teams were basically equal to one another (that’s not an inconsequential number of games, either; that’s fully one third of the season). Interestingly enough, the Dodgers and Brewers started the season in completely inverse fashion. Los Angeles struggled to produce actual wins despite strong underlying run differential fundamentals, while Milwaukee used a bunch of close game victories to drive a mediocre run differential to elite record. Those following @BPMilwaukee on Twitter know that via Daily Pythagorean reports, the Brewers were basically an 84-win club as late as September 1.

Viewing these data in progressive fashion, one can see how each season unfolded:

Brewers fans loved to pick out random dates from the season and proclaim that Milwaukee was basically a .500 team. For this hobby, Los Angeles may have even been the better team to follow. On June 5, the Dodgers were 30-30; it even took a four game winning streak to get there. Of course, the Dodgers were battling quite a set of injuries, as one could literally form an All-Star team from some of their key beleaguered players from the first three months of the season. The rest is history, anyway, as the Dodgers sustained .600 baseball for three months to reach the playoffs. The underlying elements always looked good, and the on-field results eventually followed suit.

Milwaukee’s hot streaks came in fits and starts, by comparison. The Brewers were also a 30-30 baseball team, with their stretch occurring from June 1 through August 8 (the pessimists will point out that they really went 33-37 from late May deep into August!). Like the Dodgers, the Brewers snapped out of it and then some, basically book-ending their mediocrity with lights-out May and September campaigns.

For both teams, the successful narratives converge in September, which was the best month for both clubs in terms of actual record and runs scored / runs allowed. And so, their fates continued in Game 163, and through the Divisional Series, to what appears as a predestined series. Who else could take on these almighty Dodgers, the big-spending small market club that seemingly does everything right (save for ranking their executives’ criminal culpability). When you’re tempting to fall back on the narrative that the Dodgers indeed are the better team, as I frequently have been while studying both teams this week, remember that in the case of converting actual wins, the Brewers have been better for the entire season; when it comes to surging at the end of the season and forcing crucial games, both teams are equal. So why should there be any other League Championship Series on the Senior Circuit?

#ThisIsMyCrew #OurCrewOurOctober

Jeremy Jeffress struggled in his Game One appearance. The Rockies started the inning with three singles, then an Orlando Arcia error allowed a fourth straight runner to reach base before Jeffress settled down and recorded the next three outs. Looking at his pitch plot, he spent too much time in the strike zone.

About sixty percent of Jeffress’ pitches are sinkers or curveballs. His approach is to keep the ball low, either inducing swings on balls below the zone or living in the bottom third, extending from the middle to wide of the zone. The intent is even more pronounced when the sinker and curveball are isolated. Whether due to playoff jitters or just poor placement, Jeffress threw two sinkers that caught much more of the plate than he intended.

The playoffs are a heightened atmosphere where each mistake is magnified and takes on an outsized importance, but as his subsequent two scoreless appearances showed, this was one bad outing and there doesn’t seem to be a flaw that could come back to haunt Jeffress. His fourseam fastball velocity was slower than in any outing since April, but it ticked back up in Game Two and Three, and none of his other pitches showed any decrease in speed. There seemed to be some loss of horizontal movement, but the two pitches with the biggest drops were his sinker and curveball, which also rely on vertical movement for their deception. The sinker moved more than ever, while the curveball did suffer some loss in vertical movement.

Even taking into consideration his unexplained medical absence from the NL Central tiebreaker game, I think that there’s not much cause for concern with Jeffress. The team immediately inserted back into high pressure situations and he’ll continue to contribute as a back end member of the bullpen.

One of the major storylines coming into the series centered on how the Brewers would handle Trevor Story. Single season numbers against a team are too small of a sample size to be regarded as having any type of predictive value, but Story’s .333 batting average /.387 on-base percentage /1.222 slugging percentage slash line, which included seven home runs in seven games, worried some fans and pundits and became a talking point after the Rockies won the Wild Card Game.

It turned out that no one needed to worry, the Brewers executed their plan perfectly. They planned to keep the ball out of the strike zone and dare him not to swing. During the regular season, Story swung at thirty-two percent of the pitches he faced out of the strike zone. That number went up in the NLDS. The Brewers kept the ball low and away. The approach was best exemplified by his at-bat against Jeremy Jeffress in Game 1. Jeffress had run into some trouble and Story came to the batter’s box with runners on first and second with two outs and a chance to win the game with a hit. Jeffress threw three curveballs, none of which were particularly close to the strike zone, and Story waved at all three pitches.

Story finished the series 2-for-12 with six strike outs and one of his hits came in the bottom of the ninth in Game 3 when the series had already been decided. This pitching staff can lock down any batter in the league and will be up for the challenge of whichever team emerges from the other side of the National League bracket.

Josh Hader made fifty-five appearances during the regular season. He pitched on one or no days’ rest for sixteen of those outings. How often Hader will be used will continue to be a sub-plot throughout the postseason run.

Hader pitched four times last week, including the tiebreaker game. If the gloves are off, it was inevitable that he would need to pitch on back to back days, which he hadn’t done since August. After throwing 1 and 1/3 innings in Game One, Hader was used in a high leverage situation in Game Two to get Milwaukee out of an inning with a runner on third base and two outs. His spot in the lineup came up in the next half inning and Jonathan Schoop pinch hit for him, so Hader only threw twenty-two pitches in the two appearances. He exceeded that number in more than half of his 2018 games.

Hader added another seven pitches in Game Three and by finishing the series so quickly, he’ll get some extra time off. The middle of the NLCS includes three games in three days and it is unlikely that the Brewers can avoid using him in at least two of those games. The Brewers will need to hope that their regular season usage plan for Hader will keep him fresh for these important games.

The Brewers finished in the top 10 in MLB in baserunning runs. The area where they far outpaced all of baseball was opportunities to advance on wild pitches, passed balls and balks. Milwaukee is an aggressive team on the base paths; they were top four in stolen base opportunities. There is value in putting pressure on opposing pitchers and defenses and giving them something real to worry about when a batter reaches base. However, the team could use this next week to tighten up their running game. There were a few baserunning gaffes against the Rockies. The competition will level up in this next round and beyond, and Milwaukee cannot give away outs on the base paths from ill-advised advancements.

Jesús Aguilar struggled against the Rockies. He hit 1-11 with a walk a home run and four strikeouts. Aguilar started to scuffle in the second half, when he slashed .245/.324/.436, well below his first half line of  .298/.373/.621. As the year went on, Aguilar’s absurd numbers against fastballs went down, but his power against non-fastballs completely fell off a cliff.

Through the first two games, Colorado pitchers made sure to attack Aguilar low and away, which has been a season-long focus for pitchers. They also noticed the numbers in the above chart and gave him fewer fastballs to hit. For the season, he faced around sixty percent fastballs and never dipped below fifty five percent for a month. Fewer than half the pitches he faced in the NLDS were fastballs. The best news for Aguilar coming out of the series is that his home run came off a curveball. To get pitchers to respect him again, he probably needs to start laying off those pitches as much as possible. The effect of pitchers going low and away is even more pronounced when fastballs are stripped out of the zone plot. Aguilar can’t dramatically improve his pitch recognition on the fly, but even something like taking any pitch that appears like it’ll go below his belt will help him out because right now decent breaking balls are giving him fits and it’s creating a hole in the lineup.

Christian Yelich collected two walks in each game of the series. His regular season walk rate was 10.5 percent, but in the NLDS it approached fifty percent. In his second at bat of Game One, Yelich hit a home run off a poorly placed changeup. Pitchers had some success with changeups against Yelich in 2018, but all of them were inside or low; otherwise, Yelich had a good chance of hitting it far. After that, Rockies pitchers had their own plan to avoid getting hurt by Yelich.

While pitchers generally looked to get inside on him or keep the ball low, Colorado was all over the place, so long as the pitch wasn’t in the middle of the zone. They seemed content to make Yelich chase bad pitches, or take a walk. He also saw more fastballs than in any other month in the 2018 season. To Yelich’s credit, he was willing to take the walks. Pitchers have had more comfort pitching this way to Yelich because Lorenzo Cain has struggled at the plate. He went 1-12 with two walks; Games 1 and 2 was only the second time he went hitless in two straight playoff games. If Cain can get on base, pitchers may feel more pressure to give Yelich pitches in or closer to the strike zone. If they don’t, then it gives Ryan Braun the opportunity to hit with more men on base.

With Atlanta’s escape against the Dodgers last night, there’s a Game Four in that series (today, Monday, October 8). Brewers fans will want the series extended to a Game Five to ensure another cross-country trip for their eventual opponent. According to Baseball Prospectus’ adjusted standings, the Dodgers are the best team in the league and they’ve played like the superior team against the Braves so far, but this is why the games are played on the field.

Miley, at first blush, was low-hanging fruit for this kind of punchline. The southpaw’s 2017 season was an inescapable disaster, and his 5.61 ERA / 5.27 Fielding Independent Pitching (FIP)/ 7.61 Deserved Run Average (DRA) cocktail suggests that no amount of bad luck was to blame for his misfortune (his 5.3 walks per nine innings could have told you that, too). It was an ugly season, any way you slice it. If that were Miley’s line this year, he’d absolutely be the first man sent to the ‘pen.

Of course, that’s not Miley’s line this season. By the most basic (and, to a contending team, arguably the most important) of standards, 2018 Wade Miley has been quietly excellent: His results are beyond reproach. In 11 games started for Milwaukee spanning 57.7 innings (and including an injury-shortened one-out effort against Cleveland in May), Miley has pitched to an astonishing 2.18 ERA. He’s allowed three earned runs once this season, in a five-inning effort that resulted in a no-decision. Every other time out, he’s held his opponents to two earned runs or fewer.

Dip below the surface and the picture isn’t quite so rosy, true. But it’s rosy enough. Miley’s FIP for the year is a strong 3.72, and his DRA is 4.24, both bests since 2013. He’s striking out only around six batters per nine innings, which is a career low among full seasons, but not too out of the ordinary. Miley has never relied on blowing hitters away with elite velocity or ridiculous breaking balls.

Rather, when he’s at his best, Miley uses pinpoint control to compensate for middling stuff, giving him the results of a mid-rotation starter despite a repertoire that suggests a back-end or swing role. Never was this more evident than in his terrific rookie season for the Diamondbacks in 2012, when Miley spun 194.7 innings of 3.33 ERA / 4.18 DRA ball and rode his 1.7 BB9 to an All-Star nod and a second-place finish in Rookie of the Year voting (he finished just seven points behind Bryce Harper). He’s never quite equalled that output, but he’s come close, with a 4.23 DRA the following year and a 4.39 mark in 2014.

This season represents a welcome step back in that direction. Fans can thank the cutter, a pitch that Miley dabbled with only on occasion before deploying last year with 11.8 percent frequency. This year, that number is up to 38.5 percent, trading places and then some with his so-so sinker. The cutter finally gives Miley a viable weapon against right-handed hitters, who have hit Miley for a .775 OPS on his career. Perhaps it’s the novelty of the new pitch (and new division), but righties are batting just .160 against the cutter this year, which Miley likes to ride low and in. Miley has also wrangled his free passes down to a respectable 3.4 per nine innings, and he’s been even better lately: Over his last five starts (28.3 innings), that number is down to 2.2; over his last three, it’s sitting pretty at 1.6.

Of course, running the ball over the plate with greater consistency comes with its own inherent set of risks. But Miley has a much better defense behind him in Milwaukee than he did in Baltimore. Despite a greater number of balls in play, his Walks and Hits per Inning Pitched (WHIP) is down almost half a point from its ugly apex. Miley continues to be a solid ground ball pitcher, but his excellent 0.47 HR9 number is unsustainably low, as is the career-best .269 Batting Average on Balls in Play (BABIP) allowed. He’s stranding over 80 percent of runners on base. Many of these numbers scream regression. Crucially, though, they doesn’t scream regression to “horrible.” Just to somewhere in the vicinity of that 4.24 DRA.

Miley is pitching well at the right time for Milwaukee. (Paradoxically, his injury-shortened season may have something to do with that. Miley has historically run out of gas in September, with a 5.08 ERA in just shy of 200 autumn innings. This year, he’s fresh.) He’s not the sort of pitcher you’d want starting a Wild Card game, never mind this year’s sterling bubble-gum stats. But he’s not exactly a liability of the “I can’t believe a contending team is giving this guy the ball” variety, either. He’s rediscovered his command with the Brewers and has experienced a good amount of luck. The result is an average pitcher, just as he’s been for much of his career. That makes him a perfectly fine bet to keep the team in the game for fifteen or so outs. Even as Gio González warms the bullpen bench, Miley has earned the right to soak up some more innings down the stretch. And with Junior Guerra struggling and Zach Davies something of an unknown after his return from injury, González will get his chance, as well.

Photo: Jeff Hanisch, USA Today Sports Images

LHP Gio González was the most buzzworthy name acquired by the Brewers prior to the August 31 waiver trade deadline. The aftermath of the trade surprised some because out of his 308 career MLB appearances, only six have been in relief, yet the Brewers did not commit a rotation spot to the new acquisition. Before looking into his potential role in September and potentially beyond, I want to review his season to see what the team can expect.

Throughout his career, González has been a four pitch pitcher. At the time of his debut, the fourseam fastball was his primary pitch and he threw that pitch as well as his curveball on three-fourths of his selections. He rounded out his arsenal with a sinker and a changeup. As his career has progressed, that specific mix has changed, in particular as his average fourseam fastball velocity dipped from a high of 94.2 mph in 2012 to 90.8 in 2018. Now González throws the sinker most frequently, but his usage of all of his pitches has converged between twenty and thirty percent, as this year he is throwing a career low percentage for fourseam fastballs and a career high for changeups.

However, González’s new pitch mix has not produced good results. This season he has a 4.48 Deserved Run Average (DRA), which is his highest number since his late season debut in 2008. National League pitchers are striking out 8.5 batters per nine innings in 2018, up from 8.2 in 2017, yet González’s strikeouts per nine innings have dropped from the league average in 2017 to 7.8 this season. Among all MLB pitchers with at least 140 innings, González ranks forty-third out of sixty-eight pitchers in this ratio.

Naturally, whiffs are the first place to look to see if the veteran is not fooling batters anymore, but González’s swinging strike rate this season is 23.2 percent, slightly up from 2017 and only .6 percent off his career average. The lefty is getting a career low whiff rate on his curveball and his changeup whiff rate has declined for the fourth straight season, but his fastballs are in line with his career numbers. Maybe he should be throwing a few less curveballs when he has two strikes, but nothing in this pitch mix looks like it needs to be immediately corrected.

The usual indicators don’t show anything terribly off with González, yet batters are hitting him harder than before. Compared with 2017, his Statcast numbers have exponentially jumped. He was a top eight percent pitcher according to exit velocity and hard hit percentage last year. In 2018 he’s barely in the top seventy percent in both metrics.

His True Average (TAv)-against is .277, well above his career average of .253 and the highest full season number of his career. His Batting Average on Balls In Play (BABIP) is .319, which is twenty-four points above his career average but not a career high and he’s run much better DRAs in his other season above .300. He’s also right around his career average home run rate, so he isn’t encountering bad luck.

This is not the portrait of a savior for the pitching staff that is in desperate need of a course correction from a terrible August. However, there’s been some speculation that the plan is to use González as more of a long man, turning over a lineup once as a bridge between the brigade of five inning starters and the back end of the bullpen. This season, González has consistently allowed a lower batting average against and isolated slugging earlier in his appearances when compared with hitters’ second and third looks at him, and he gets more swings and misses.

2018 Batting Average Against Times through the Order vs. Overall

2018 Isolated Power Against Times through the Order vs. Overall

2018 Whiff Percentage Times through the Order vs. Overall

González doesn’t vary his pitch mix throughout his starts, which may hurt him as the outing goes on because he isn’t holding any pitch back and hitters are getting looks at everything the first time through the order. If he’s going to pitch this way, the numbers show that he is outperforming his seasonal stats in that first look at the order. González has not relieved since 2009, so asking him to come out of the bullpen is uncharted territory. However, he could be deployed effectively as an opener or as the first option out of the bullpen who can go for two plus innings, depending on where the batting order sits when he enters the game. This usage would make him a non-traditional acquisition, but it fits within the team’s overall strategy and pattern in looking outside the organization for help. The team needed innings, and there’s no reason why González can’t give them four to six effective innings a week, which would be better than ten mediocre innings in a traditional starter’s role.

Curtis Granderson was the lone bat acquired by the team last week, and he fills a narrow niche for the roster as well: lefty masher off the bench who can also spot start in each corner outfield position. As a team, the Brewers are slashing .253/.320/.425 against right handed pitchers, which is slightly above MLB-wide numbers against righties. Granderson’s unimpressive slash line of .245/.342/.430 improves around ten percentage points in each category when his twenty six plate appearances against left handed hitters are removed from his numbers.

Right handed pitchers are looking to locate low and away against Granderson, and a good amount of his five season high swing and miss rate of  27.6 percent is coming on low pitches out of the strike zone. Throughout his career, he’s generated the most power when he’s hitting higher pitches, and that pattern has continued in 2018.

The veteran is showing some age related decline as it appears his bat has gotten a little slower. Granderson has always performed well against fastballs, posting career Isolated Slugging Percentage (ISO) of .313, .250 and .282 against four seamers, sinkers and cutters from right handers, which are his best numbers against all pitches. Those numbers have fallen off this season, and his production has been buoyed by an uncharacteristic performance against split finger fastballs. In addition to catching up to fewer fastballs, Granderson is also whiffing more on breaking balls and offspeed pitches, which could be a sign that he’s cheating to try and catch up to velocity.

In Granderson’s limited role, the Brewers can hide his weaknesses and hopefully coax out a performance even higher than his current numbers against right handed hitters. He’s appeared in three games so far as a Brewer, with one start in between two pinch hitting appearances. That one start was against a pitcher who throws hard and mainly uses fastballs. He has one single and three walks in his six plate appearances. Hopefully his batting eye can be supplemented with some pop over the next month as he provides a breather for the outfield regulars.

The three-game series against the Cubs continues today, then the Brewers will host the San Francisco Giants over the weekend. Before yesterday’s game, the Cubs still had a ninety percent chance of winning the division, with the Brewers taking the crown in two thirds of the other scenarios. The two series against the Cubs and one against the Cardinals are the only head-to-head chances for Milwaukee to increase their odds the rest of the season. The Brewers have the best projected rest of the season performance out of Central division teams, but right now that’s not projected to overtake Chicago. San Francisco has had a disappointing season, which has seen them overperform their Pythagorean Record (estimated from Runs Scored and Runs Allowed) by 5.9 games, which is first in the National League and third in MLB. However, the team will play out September without two of their top three regular position players by TAv as Andrew McCutchen has been traded and Buster Posey is now on the sixty-day disabled list.

Moustakas’s mutual option is difficult to evaluate.  Mutual options are not usually exercised because one party or the other is incentivized to gamble on the market.  If the club wants to pick up the option, it is because the player has performed well and thus likely can get a longer term deal as a free agent.  Similarly, if the player wants to pick up the option, the team will likely feel like it can get similar production for less money in the free agency market.  However, Moustakas is a decent player (league average or better three of the last five seasons) that the Brewers may want to keep for next year, and Moustakas may be scared off of the free agent market by what happened last winter.  Thus, it is at least possible that the mutual option here is exercised.

In that best-case scenario, the Brewers traded two prospects with less than six years of team control for eight months of Moustakas (two this year and six next year).  Of course, whether Phillips and Lopez are worthy of a major league roster spot for six years each is an open question, but Phillips seems like a solid fourth outfielder at worst and Lopez is a potential bullpen option.  Each of those profiles has value around the league, and thus value in trades.  I don’t think it unreasonable to call this an overpay.

Then, on the day of the deadline, the Brewers traded Jonathan Villar, Luis Ortiz, and Jean Carmona to Baltimore for Jonathan Schoop.  Schoop is under team control through 2019, and he has been an above-average player just once in his career (4.7 WARP last season).  Villar, meanwhile, has a similarly inconsistent track record (4.7 WARP in 2016) and is under control through 2021.  Ortiz was a highly regarded prospect not long ago.  Although Villar has not shown any indication that he will return to being the player he was in 2016, Schoop is not a sure bet to be much better.  And because Schoop is a second baseman, the Brewers’ infield defense got much worse with this trade.  Just as with the Moustakas trade, I don’t think it is unreasonable to call it an overpay.

With all of that being said, however, I do not necessarily think these were bad trades.  The Brewers were trading from depth. Phillips and Lopez were already on the 40-man roster, and Ortiz was going to have to be added this winter (as was Kodi Medeiros, who the Brewers also traded at the end of July).  Additionally, Phillips’s path to regular playing time in the big leagues is completely blocked, with Lorenzo Cain, Christian Yelich, and Ryan Braun the likely starters for the next few years.  The club also has plenty of mid-rotation and middle-relief options, so Lopez, Ortiz, and Medeiros are surplus to those requirements as well.  The Brewers know the most about their prospects, and if they decided these were the players they felt least confident about, then dealing them is a smart decision that makes some sense.

But I think we are at risk of hand-waving questionable trades so that we don’t sound like prospect hoarders.  Most prospects don’t reach their ceiling or even make an impact in the majors, so organizations should be more willing to deal those they are not confident in.  Because of the Brewers’ pending 40-man roster crunch, they did have to make moves to get value for players they otherwise would have lost for nothing in this offseason’s Rule 5 draft (which Ortiz and Medeiros were both candidates for).  And although trading for Moustakas and Schoop could work out if they both hit and the Brewers can shift competently enough to cover the defensive holes, neither one seems a particularly good fit with this roster.

I don’t expect either of these trades to look particularly bad in hindsight.  Phillips is the only prospect dealt I have any significant expectations for, and Schoop could very well return to being an above-average second baseman during his time in Milwaukee.  What I do think deserves scrutiny is whether this was the best use of assets.  Just because a trade can be justified does not mean it was the right deal.  I cannot know what other options were on the table for David Stearns, but I am skeptical that the best use of major-league caliber assets was dealing them for short-term contracts for slugging infielders with no clear-cut path for the club to accommodate all of them.

Because of the information imbalance between public observers and the front office, it is relatively easy to defend a trade by finding a justification for it.  If we assume the Brewers have certain ideas about the players they dealt and acquired, then it can make sense.  And this front office has undoubtedly earned the benefit of the doubt with the way it has managed the roster and acquired talent (the Christian Yelich trade is a good example).  However, shipping off useful pieces for players that don’t particularly fit is questionable to me.

I am not suggesting the Brewers should have kept Villar, Phillips, and Lopez because of some chance that each becomes a star.  I recognize that those outcomes are unlikely.  Instead, I believe those players could have been traded for more.  Neither Moustakas nor Schoop is particularly exciting.  They are useful big leaguers, but acquiring them together has created a situation where Travis Shaw may get less playing time despite being a better hitter than either of the new acquisitions.  This use of assets just does not make sense to me.

While the offense got going after a slow start, the starting pitching was more unsettled. If there was one common disappointment in the offseason amongst Brewers fans, it was the lack of moves to solidify the rotation. There were bargains to be had on the market. Rumors had the Brewers showing interest in several different arms, but not consummating any big deals. Combined with the health status of staff ace Jimmy Nelson, there’s added pressure on the pitching staff to perform.

Chase Anderson took a big step forward last year, posting his lowest career DRA (4.05) by 1.16 runs and he was tabbed to make the start on Opening Day. Anderson baffled the Padres over six innings, allowing only one hit and three walks to go with six strikeouts. He leaned on his four seam fastball, throwing it forty nine times out of his ninety seven pitches. Interestingly, last year the only game he threw the four seamer more than half his pitches was … also his first start of the season. While he didn’t induce many swings and misses on the pitch (only three whiffs on twenty-two swings, well below last year’s 11.7 percent whiff percentage), he threw it consistently for strikes. His velocity on the pitch was 92.5 MPH, down from 93.75 MPH last season. However, his velocity readings on the pitch went up as the season progressed, before his injury interrupted his season.

The biggest concern from the outing would be his three walks in only six innings, with two of the walks coming after he had the batter at two strikes. The first walk was probably the most disappointing. Anderson got Chase Headley into a 1-2 count and couldn’t put him away.

In this plate appearance, Anderson only threw four seamers and his changeup. After Headley swung through a changeup for strike two, Anderson tried to change his eye level by going up for a four seamer. Last year, batters swung at that pitch around fifty percent of the times Anderson threw it. Headley somehow laid off. After that pitch, Anderson threw a changeup low and away, a spot where he can bury the changeup and get the most swings and misses, but once again Headley laid off. After a foul on a four seamer in the zone, Headley threw his fastest pitch of the day at 94.6MPH and it, and the at-bat, got away from him. For Anderson to take another step forward and become a legitimate number two starter, these are situations where he needs to finish the batter.

Jhoulys Chacin received the second start of the season and it did not go well. Chacin failed to get out of the fourth inning. He allowed nine baserunners and four runs, including two home runs, in just 3.1 IP, striking out one batter.

Last year Jhoulys Chcain had a 4.13 DRA, his lowest since his 2010 season in Colorado. Chacin’s success coincided with a pitch mix change. He focused on his sinker and slider, with both pitches having a career high usage rate. That increased usage came at the expense of his four-seam fastball, which he still threw as a change of pace pitch and a cutter, which has been effectively scrapped from his arsenal. Looking at the numbers, batters feasted off those two pitches, so limiting batters’ exposure was probably a wise career decision.

What went wrong on Friday? His pitch mix did get slightly out of whack. He traded some sliders for sinkers, though combined he threw the pitches at around the same rate as last year. So Chacin was throwing the right pitches, which is good. However, he couldn’t find the zone. Zeroing in on the 3^rd and 4^th innings, where he got himself into trouble and eventually run out of the game, we see a pitcher who was throwing around the plate, but not getting enough of it to get calls or induce batters to swing.

Last year, Chacin wanted to work down in the zone, and he could get some swings when he lived in the bottom third and slightly below. I count fifteen pitches around the bottom of the strike zone. Batters swung at five of those pitches, which is an unacceptable rate and well below his numbers from last year. For the Chacin experiment to work, he’ll need to start working in the zone more so batters respect his arsenal and offer at more pitches.

The Brewers will spend the next week at home, opening division play with three games against St. Louis and then four against Chicago. Based on Baseball Prospectus’ staff predictions, these are the two teams the Brewers will be competing with all season, so this week offers an early litmus test to see where each club stands. The Brewers’ rotation is lined up so Chase Anderson and Zach Davies will get starts in each series.

Photo Credit: Jake Roth, USAToday Sports Images

Note: This article was edited after publication to add Strike Zone graphics, which were mistakenly excluded from original publication.

After the 2020 season, franchise cornerstone Ryan Braun will shift from a guaranteed contract to a $4.0 million buyout of a mutual option. But, even if Braun leaves the team for 2021, the club is hardly at an end of an era. Seventeen players with likely roles for the 2018 club remain under contract as the clock strikes 2021:

Granted, some of these players might not be expected to stick with the club for this extended period of time. There are always trades, in the first place, which could knock some of these players off this list. Additionally, role depreciation could also knock others off the roster (here Jesus Aguilar, Jett Bandy, Keon Broxton, and Junior Guerra figure most prominently). Someone’s career could always derail in an unexpected way, as well, be it via injury or mechanical issues. But the basic point is that if the majority of these players have solidified MLB roles for 2018, they also build an outline for a 2021 club.

Imagine the Brewers pick up Ryan Braun’s option for 2021:

It’s easy to dream on prospects reaching the MLB and filling out this roster, especially given David Stearns’s recent comment that the club’s pitching depth is one reason the club soured on free agency options. But, even the development of prospects is not the point here; the point is that the last two offseasons have helped to open a path for a 2017-2018 offseason that improves the club for the short- and long-terms.

What is new about this? The current window opening for the Brewers is much more similar to the 1978-1982 Brewers than the most recent Brewers contender. In 2008, for example, the Brewers featured a well-controlled core of prime bats without much of a pitching staff structure extending beyond Yovani Gallardo. The 2011 and 2014 Brewers showcased different looks, contending as various contractual windows closed for the team. Once again, there was never enough congruence between the batting and pitching cores. This is what is new about the 2018 Brewers: they exhibit a core club that can compete in a mediocre National League, while also building for the future with an extensive window. Granted, there will be injuries, trades, and depreciation to knock out some of this depth, but the overall look of the club is one that is completely new to the Brewers.

If fans are angry about the starting pitching, perhaps they can be excused, for watching a Brewers club whose strength is pitching instead of batting (this is new territory for the organization!); if fans are angry about the lack of impact moves after acquiring Cain and Yelich, perhaps they can be excused, for watching a Brewers club that is ready to open a true three year window (and likely five year window) is also new territory. 2018 is a new frontier for the organization.

• There are some teams that nearly reach this ideal; in recent Brewers lore, the runs prevention and workload combination of Shaun Marcum / Yovani Gallardo / Randy Wolf / Zack Greinke / and Chris Narveson with Marco Estrada as the lone “replacement” is about as good a true pitching rotation as one can find. They prevented 14 runs, which is quite close to the 2017 Brewers rotational performance of 10 runs prevented.

• Other ideals exist with the 2014 Nationals (Roark / Zimmermann / Fister / Strasburg / Gonzalez and two short-term replacements; 95 runs prevented), or the 2016 Cubs (Lester / Hendricks / Arrieta / Lackey / Hammel plus one short-term replacement and five emergency (one GS) starters; they prevented 122 runs).

• But, let it be known that the ideal fails, too; the 2016 Cardinals rotation of Martinez / Garcia / Wainwright / Leake / Wacha and two short-term replacements was 25 runs below average (worse than the 2016 Brewers rotation, even!);

• The famous 2010 Giants won the World Series with about as true a five-man rotation as one can find, but Cain / Vogelsong / Bumgarner / Zito / Lincecum were 22 runs below average for the Champions (exactly as good as the 2016 Brewers rotation. Indeed, what does a Championship Rotation look like?).

Related Reading:
Depth Beats Attrition
83: 2018 PECOTA Projection
Fluctuation Race: Brewers and Cubs Rotations
Aces Don’t Exist: Rotation Spots
Aces Do Not Exist

As I wrote on Friday, this MLB environment is one in which teams employ over 300 starting pitching spots to complete the season. There ostensibly is only a pitching rotation for a couple of teams, with the remainder of the league simply finding ways to patch-up injuries or string together a low rotation that does not get too badly shelled on any given turn.

The Brewers have gleefully embraced the “replacement” rotation years under both Doug Melvin and David Stearns; Melvin’s 2012 rotation featuring Gallardo / Greinke / Fiers / Estrada / Marcum / Wolf plus four short-term replacements and an emergency starter was twice as good as the “established” 2011 rotation; this ragtag gang prevented 28 runs. Last year, David Stearns improved the rotation significantly, despite starting only Anderson / Nelson / Davies / Garza as regulars and using seven long- or short-term replacements and two emergency starters. This group was just about as good as the 2011 rotation; they prevented 11 runs.

In a sense, rotational queries are aesthetic queries. Do you prefer to steadily churn through a “set” group of five pitchers and take the results, come what may? This method can be dangerous as even relatively similar groups of pitchers can vary significantly from year to year. Take the 2015-to-2016 Cardinals, who made minimal rotational changes, and declined by 81 runs from their excellent 2015 core (excluding John Lackey, who left via free agency). One could complain that the Lance Lynn injury skews that, but his total loss for the season was not anything near that of Jaime Garcia or Michael Wacha’s year-to-year variation. The 2017 Cubs rotational decline has been well-documented, but it’s worth emphasizing that they made minimal personnel changes (in terms of starters) and declined by nearly 100 runs as a group compared to 2016. The Nationals, Mets, and Giants (other “consistent personnel rotations” also demonstrate wild variance between seasons).

Preventing runs is difficult even when a team employs five regular starters.

All this frames the lessons of the 2017 Brewers. Last year the club gambled on a set of mechanical and pitching approach adjustments, as well as a group of well-refined replacements, some declining veterans and in-house arms, and an interesting set of n’er-do-wells to effectively match the production of that ideal of Marcum / Gallardo / Wolf / Greinke / Narveson.

If anything, David Stearns effectively applied the lessons of the 2012 Brewers rotation in as effective a way as possible; it’s worth noting that those lessons failed in 2013 when Melvin went back to well, but it’s also worth noting the “solid rotational group” that was reassembled for 2014 also failed to improve. A Lohse / Peralta / Gallardo / Garza main group with swingmen Fiers and Estrada and MLB graduate Jimmy Nelson looks (in theory) like a much more stable group than either the 2012 or 2013 rotations; that 2014 group prevented three runs when all was said and done.

Enter the 2018 Brewers rotation, who could conceivably appear as the very best rotation of the last decade in Milwaukee (I suppose that’s not terribly tough when that decade includes 2009, 2010, 2013, or even 2015 and 2016 rotations, but well, improvements have to start somewhere!). The core group, entering the season, likely includes post-adjustment, post-breakout Chase Anderson, steady-as-they-come Zach Davies, underrated rotational depth man Jhoulys Chacin, and MLB graduate Brandon Woodruff. That group gives the rotation considerable merit prior to considering any additional depth options, as these four prevented 40 runs in 556 innings in 2017.

What is especially intriguing about the 2018 rotation is the pre-established depth entering the year. I’ve written about this at length here, so I will not rehash it, but basically, the club features Wade Miley as a potential minor-league contract “walk-on” (Miley has never posted a below replacement WARP); another mechanical & strategic adjustment candidate in Yovani Gallardo; and standard depth and potential injury returns from the 2017 rotation. For scouting, strategic, and performance characteristics, see “Trust the Rotation” and “How the Brewers Beat the Cubs.”

Here’s where I think most of the cognitive dissonance lies with Brewers fans: Brewers fans are idealizing the rotational turns of a club like the 2011 Brewers, where five set starters work the full season, ebb-and-flow, but ultimately produce value by virtue of their regular turns in the rotation. Granted, in terms of Deserved Runs Average (DRA) alone, Milwaukee’s main group of pitching depth entering the 2018 season should be at least average to begin with. Fans often forget that the current MLB could require withstanding a 4.70 RA/G to 4.80 RA/G environment in Miller Park / National League. A group DRA of 4.77 is quite solid if you’re playing 4.70 RA/G to 4.80 RA/G baseball. It’s not even a bad level of production if you’re playing 4.60 RA/G baseball.

What fans are missing, however, is that compared to their roles across the league, the Brewers’ depth pitchers are better than their professional colleagues. The PECOTA replacement depth assessment especially underscores this rotational strength. This is a difficult point to convey to fans and analysts alike, because most people assume the Brewers will be bad because instead of signing Lance Lynn or Yu Darvish to pitch against folks like Kyle Hendricks or Jose Quintana, etc., the Brewers will be running Brent Suter or Miley or Junior Guerra or somebody to the mound. There are two problematic assumptions here:

• That any of the Brewers depth starters will work regularly enough as starting pitchers to be assessed as a “standard 25-to-35 GS starter.” Instead of this assumption, fans and analysts ought to think of Miley / Guerra / Suter / etc. working in “bursts” across the season; they might reasonably, as a group, average out to a few starts here or a few starts there, but they hardly should be considered “full SP” roles

• That additional MLB competitors will not be using replacement starters. This is tough to consider, because no one knows the future. So obviously it’s easier to make an argument using a pitcher one expects to be a regular, quality contributor (let’s stick with Quintana and Hendricks here) than trying to project replacements. But, rotational mismatch works both ways, and it’s worth asking how the Brewers’ depth pitchers square against other depth roles across the MLB.

Thankfully, PECOTA keeps a vast database of potential replacements; 653 starting pitchers appear in the Baseball Prospectus March 2, 2018 pitching projection worksheet. What is fascinating about this assembly of projections is that while the projection system features double the arms than those likely used by MLB squads, the proportional alignment of these arms across rotational roles roughly matches the actual distribution of pitching roles in 2017. So, in terms of assessing the quality of pitching roles within one immediate MLB environment (juiced ball, fly ball revolution, etc.), there’s an immediate correspondence or complementary aspect between PECOTA’s projections and what might reasonably be expected to occur based on immediate experience.

I created two PECOTA rotational models. The first “rotates” through PECOTA projections in 30 player sequences, in order to estimate the number of rotational spots that exist in PECOTA. Since the system is used to project system depth as well as established MLB players, there are 10 rotational spots as well as a Replacement and an Emergency group in 2018 PECOTA:

Since this table is quite abstract, I then designed another model in which 2018 PECOTA data are distributed in a manner similar to the 2017 MLB rotation:

Here is a model that assesses the Brewers’ primary system depth against the potential MLB roles and replacements. The last two columns judge each pitcher’s runs prevented against both the 2018 PECOTA rotational spot and the comparable 2017 rotation spot (based on Games Started, as a “true” rotational measurement).

Finally, to assess another range of rotational roles, here is how the Brewers fare against the PECOTA full depth system (1-to-10 spots, plus Replacements and Emergency starters). These sets of columns provide the “Best” and “Lowest” rotational roles assigned by the PECOTA rotation, and then the runs prevented versus each role:

These figures tracking runs prevented by role are highly abstract, so I suggest reading them in the following way:

• While the Brewers’ overall rotation may have an “average” outlook, once replacement rotations begin to appear in the 2018 MLB, the Milwaukee replacements will have a runs prevented advantage of at least 30 runs (assessed against other teams’ replacements).

• All things being equal, the top four Brewers rotational pitchers are average compared to the major primary rotation roles, meaning that the additional low rotation role mismatches could help the team outperform their Runs Scored / Runs Allowed by approximately three-to-five wins.

• An alternate implication is that when the Brewers’ top four pitchers face other teams’ replacements, the Brewers will have a larger positive “role mismatch” than their opponents’ primary starters will have against Milwaukee replacements.

Assessed against other depth roles in the MLB, the Brewers 2018 rotation holds up quite nicely. The top of the rotation, even with considerable projected “decline” compared to 2017, remain average across the first four turns of the rotation. That Anderson, Woodruff, Davies, and Chacin indeed might reasonably be expected to work at least 102 starts is quite a solid proportion, and clearly leaves open space to assume injuries during the 162-game slog will occur.

Moving to the replacement and emergency starter candidates, however, the Brewers rotation begins to shine: frankly, over the course of their projected innings pitched, the Brewers depth are notably better than other replacement arms projected throughout the MLB. This should not necessarily be surprising, for where other clubs may have fewer tested options waiting in the wings, the Brewers have two 1,000+ IP veterans (Gallardo, Miley), and previously solid run preventers (2016 Guerra, 2016-2017 Suter). That’s before reaching the more inexperienced prospect depth, as well as potential injury returns (it’s not necessarily worth considering Nelson’s return, if for no other reason than to not establish false hopes or pressure), or even answering any questions about Josh Hader’s eventual MLB role (even he could “start” a game given the right match-up).

This type of speculative analysis should begin to show how the rotations of attrition may play out in 2018. It should accompany concrete scouting and strategic analysis of pitching profiles and performance pedigree. Thus far, it appears that the Brewers have indeed assembled rotational depth that is ready to be deployed in flexible roles (Suter as swingman; Guerra as a potential reliever / swingman; Miley as minor league option, “next-man-up”). Moreover, in terms of DRA alone, these pitchers ultimately have production levels that match #3 / #4 starters based on the actual distribution of pitching talent in the MLB. One should not get into exercises of “wishful thinking” about this rotation because this Brewers rotation does not need wishful thinking to work; however, role-by-role, these arms are better than replacement arms to a degree that one wonders which of these arms might be able to step into a more extended role should serious injuries or ineffectiveness take a toll during the season.

At worst, this 2018 Brewers rotation should be a group of arms that can hold games steady in waiting for the strong back-end bullpen to take over. At best, this 2018 Brewers rotation is simply hiding in plain sight, an unassuming depth club that is ready by design to replace starters. Once the wheels of attrition begin churning across the MLB, this is the type of rotation that can shine in fits and starts, around the margins of the team, in assuming ways.

Photo Credit: Joe Camporeale, USAToday Sports Images