Mike Fiers
Fiers was non-tendered because Oakland is not paying a mid-rotation starter, at best, a $10 million salary. According to Cot’s Contracts, the last Oakland starting pitcher earning that much money was Scott Kazmir in 2015.

The Brewers immediately come to mind as a home for Fiers because he’s a former Brewer that has survived in MLB despite having below average fastball velocity. His fourseam fastball sits around 90 MPH, which Milwaukee has some experience with. There is ample cause for concern with Fiers though. Last season his swing and miss rate dropped for the fourth straight season, and dipped below 20 percent for the first time in his career. As his whiff percentage has dropped, Fiers has allowed more home runs (ranging from 1.2 to 1.9 per 9 innings) and struck out fewer batters (losing almost two strikeouts per nine innings as there are more strikeouts now than any time in the history of MLB).

However, there may be an area ripe for exploitation which could bring renewed success for Fiers: his curveball. He threw the curve for around 16 percent of his pitches in 2018, which is around his career average. Based on results though, Fiers should be throwing it more. Batters have hit .196 and have slugged .307 against the pitch, both of which are his best numbers. In 2018, those numbers improved to .145 and .181, once again performing as his best pitch results wise.  The pitch also generates his most ground balls: over 60 percent of curveballs put in play over his career have been ground balls. His 2018 ground ball rate on curveballs in play was almost exactly his career average.

Fiers consistently buries the ball below the zone and generates a large amount of whiffs on pitches that would be balls. In 2018, almost all of the damage against the pitch was on pitches out of the strike zone, which a player can live with.

For a pitch that he’ll throw equally to lefties and righties, it’s a little baffling that Fiers hasn’t decided to ride the curveball hard as his overall results have gotten worse. His curveball usage was actually down almost 20 percent last season when compared with 2017. Even after the trade to Oakland, while he threw the pitch more, there’s opportunity to make it the focal point of his attack and Milwaukee has some experience in signing free agent pitchers and having them focus on throwing more breaking balls.

Fiers may not be worth $10M, but I think he would be an interesting signing for a team that has helped pitchers maximize their stuff to more fully reach their potential.

Blake Parker
After a season that saw regression across the board, the Angels non-tendered Blake Parker rather than pay his projected $3.1 salary. Superficially, his 3.26 ERA and career high 14 saves indicate a decent reliever. Digging a little deeper reveals some problems, though:

Most of Parker’s regression is found in performance against his fastball. In 2017, batters hit .179 and slugged .313 against his fastball, with a .204 BABIP, but those numbers rose to .315, .562 and .328 in 2018. Batters hit more home runs against his fastball in 2018 (10) than he allowed in total in 2017 (7).

After spiking in 2017, Parker’s fastball velocity fell from 94 to 92.8 last season. The pitch started the season slower and the velocity continued trending down. He also had a location issue. Parker had previously located the pitch away from both righties and lefties, generally avoiding the middle of the plate and looking to jam hitters as much as possible. That plan failed against both sides as Parker literally had a Rudolph nose in his fastball strike zone plot. While the velocity may not come back, better location can cure a lot of Parker’s ills as batters did the most damage against his poorly located pitches.

Parker also has potential with his other two pitches: the curveball and splitter. The curveball used to be his secondary pitch, but he shelved in it favor of his splitter in 2017. Parker brought the pitch back towards the end of the season. His whiffs on both pitches were down in 2018 and location may have played a role here as well. In his most effective season, Parker threw almost 62 percent of his curves and splitters below the zone, which dropped to 56 percent in 2018. In particular, he consistently missed that spot against left handed hitters. His whiff numbers on those pitches compare favorably in 2017 and 2018, but because he was missing his spot more, batters made more contact.

Aside from the velocity drop, Parker also just didn’t execute his pitches in 2018. If the Brewers think there’s an easy mechanical fix, then Parker is a potential cheap addition to Milwaukee’s monster bullpen.

Note: Projected arbitration salaries are from MLB Trade Rumors.

Related Reading:
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.

Related Reading:
Counterbuilding: Trading and Drafting
The Successful Rebuild

Better yet, depending on how one views revenue expectations from the 2018 season, the Brewers likely increased their share of labor spending to approximately 40 percent, based on publicly available information and various trend forecasts (from conservative to aggressive). All of this precludes the MLB Advanced Media money, which undoubtedly gives the Brewers ownership group more cash to leverage for both capital and labor projects.

[quick rant]Brewers, increase minor league pay! Pay your minor leaguers a living wage across all systems![/quick rant]

Of course, one of the difficult aspects of navigating the 2018-2019 offseason is that in order to increase the labor share of the club, Milwaukee actually had to go out and sign some players. So some previously rosy payroll estimates may be pushed back a few years (click that link if you’d like payroll analysis with Lewis Brinson arbitration horizon estimates): but this is a good thing, because the Brewers are in better shape with Lorenzo Cain and Christian Yelich patrolling the outfield, and they’re also in better shape with clearer salary arbitration pictures for Corey Knebel, Travis Shaw, and even Jonathan Schoop.

The trouble is, without assuming that the Brewers will allocate full playoff revenue, and an increasing share of overall revenue, to the MLB payroll, the 2018-2019 offseason might look a little boring if the club simply renews each and every one of their arbitration eligible players. Here’s how this group looks, with Cot’s Baseball Contracts estimates:

Without major revenue growth, and considering a similar distribution of revenue to labor, this is how the Brewers payroll freedom might project:

It is evident that on the most conservative estimates, the Brewers cannot keep each arbitration eligible player and sign additional impact free agents. This raises questions about how the Brewers will employ trade and non-tender (basically releasing an arbitration-eligible player for free) strategies to maximize space, while also raising questions about how lucrative the playoffs were, where that MLBAM money will kick in, and how the club will (or did) allocate profits from 2016-2017.

For if the most rosy scenario plays out, the Brewers could keep a substantially larger portion of arbitration eligible players, and continue to add impact talent on the open market. Thus, there is room across the roster for GM David Stearns to wheel and deal. This is a great time for counterbuilding, which basically means making trades that run contrary to the assumed roster building strategy of the team. If a rebuilding team is expected to trade MLB salary for prospects, and a win-now trade reverses that by bundling prospects for MLB salary, those positions can be mixed in contrarian fashion to help maximize roster resources. Given that the Brewers have the opportunity to develop numerous players at the MLB level in 2019, some (seemingly) head-scratching trades would be a great way to free up additional salary in order to bolster the prospects with gambles on more proven producers.

Stearns developed a contending club so quickly by trading for MLB assets in his first offseason; now the GM can ironically continue to maintain the health of his MLB roster forecast by shedding some salaries for prospects or depth moves. Given the strengths of the 2018 club, this could be just the strategy necessary to improve around the margins, develop top prospects, and land one big ticket free agent.

The Brewers need starting pitching help. The Brewers need an ace.

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┻┳| •.•) #Brewers didn’t need a SP
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— BP Milwaukee (@BPMilwaukee) July 31, 2018

Of course this would be the return line for the 2018-2019 offseason, because the line never went away during the season. A large faction of fans were dissatisfied with the starting pitching in April; they were satisfied with the starting pitching in May, “but can this staff beat ‘a dude’ in the playoffs?” (Yes!, it turns out); they were particularly dissatisfied with the starting pitching when the season ended in June and July, and again they were dissatisfied with the starting pitching at the trade deadline. This debate was simply never going to be won, because there is a contingent of baseball fans that refuse to either understand or accept what GM Stearns, pitching coach Derek Johnson, systemwide player development, and the front office are trying to accomplish. For arguably the first time in Brewers franchise history, certainly for the first time in a generation, the Milwaukee system strength is pitching, and not of the sort of high octane, all-risk dreamy profiles that flamed out at the turn of the 21st Century; this is a system that is built on turning a fabulous diversity of pitching profiles into potentially successful MLB profiles (witness the scouting range between Freddy Peralta and Corbin Burnes, for example).

When the dust settled, the system worked. The Brewers rotation was good. It was good any particular way you measured it; it was a good rotation if you divide rotation spots based on overall Games Started and workload measurements; it was a good rotation if you divide rotation spots based on true rotational scarcity (i.e., comparing each spot across the MLB); and it was a good rotation if you separate pitching classes into “true starters” and “replacements,” and measure each set of pitchers against different “spots” or “workloads.” The pitching staff was good if you believe in “Aces,” and it was good if you don’t believe Aces exist.

The Brewers rotation was good by every measurement except DRA, which should be the significant focal point of 2018-2019 offseason analysis in an effort to understand how Milwaukee assembled an elite fielding component in order to prevent runs.

If you do not wish to read the details, the table above summarizes the comparative results from each model. Each Brewers starter was assessed according to their relevant spot, and then compared by Innings Pitched (IP), Deserved Run Average (DRA), and Runs Prevented.

Rotation One: By Games Started
One way to assess a starting rotation is by ranking pitchers according to games started on a leaguewide basis. This ranking method is effective because it approximates the scarcity of both MLB resources (there’s not a whole lot of pitchers that can work full seasons) and roster construction. One benefit of focusing on games started instead of another performance metric is that analysts can reflect the success or failure of an MLB club across games started totals; for example, it matters that Gerrit Cole and Lucas Giolito both started 32 games despite widely divergent performances. The distance between Cole and Giolito is approximately 65 runs prevented, even though they worked the same number of starts, which raises an important question about how different teams assess the importance of effective starters versus soaking up innings. In fact, had Brent Suter and Zach Davies not faced injuries in 2018, they may have forced this question with the Brewers front office, and Freddy Peralta also arguably faced this (along with innings workload concerns) down the stretch run.

According to this measurement, there are approximately 10 rotation spots discernible by workload throughout the 2018 MLB, as well as emergency starters (who started one game; I will always assess emergency starters as their own category). On the surface, this is a pleasing model; the top starters by workload typically are the best starters in the game, even if there are differences between guys like Cole and Giolito, as discussed above.

On this model, it is clear that the Brewers succeeded because of their depth. A critique about the top of the rotation could be true in terms of DRA, as the contextual performances of Jhoulys Chacin and Chase Anderson were not comparable to top workload pitchers across the MLB. The importance of the depth should not be understated, from Wade Miley and Peralta to Brandon Woodruff and even Gio Gonzalez. If you’re reconsidering Gonzalez’s trade cost, not only should the veteran lefty’s surface performance be assessed, but one should not that, marginally, he was worth seven runs better than his median workload.

Another benefit of using this model is that analysts can assess “phantom” runs prevented where teams “miss” particular spots. For example, Chacin may not measure up to the median Top Spot prototype, but having his performance was better than not having a heavy workload pitcher whatsoever (in theory; Giolito’s performance would obviously have not validated a heavy workload benefit for the Brewers). If a team was missing a Top Spot, they theoretically would be punished 16-to-17 Runs Prevented. Milwaukee did not use a Five, Seven, Eight, or Ten workload, each of which approximately ranged from 2 to 4 runs below average; one could argue in this way that the Brewers also received 10 “phantom” Runs Prevented by avoiding these typical workloads.

This should help to validate the ideal that there are a couple of different ways to construct a rotation. A team could indeed bank on a Jacob deGrom type atop the rotation, and seek a 30 run advantage from their top workload. One must be careful of the cost for this type of pitcher, however, as if considerable resources are spent at the top of the rotation, they may be diminished at the bottom of the rotation. The Brewers demonstrated the “bottom-up” approach: they lost out on the Yu Darvish sweepstakes, and Alex Cobb did not bite on a one-year deal, so they proceeded with Chacin and Miley, plus their developmental pipeline. That internal pipeline was worth approximately five runs (better than their median workload) to the 2018 Brewers, while external candidates were worth more than 15 runs (better than their median workload). It was not flashy, there were no “dudes” on the marquee, but it worked.

Rotation Two: By Team

Of course, even the preceding model is relatively clean or “idealistic,” for MLB teams do not necessarily construct their rotations according to the same ideal. An additional method for assessing rotations is to judge each team’s rotation spot by turn; since two pitchers literally cannot start the same game, this method goes spot-by-spot, start-by-start for each MLB team. The benefit of this method of rotational assessment is that it reflects team preference, or injury and ineffectiveness circumstances, across the league. Some teams attempt to duct tape 13- or 14-pitcher rotations together, whether they are contending or tanking, while others attempt to yield more mileage from each spot. By giving each team one exclusive spot for each turn (until their pitchers run out), this type of rotational model can allow teams to be analyzed against attrition across the league.

Every team in the MLB required at least six rotational turns throughout the season, but this model demonstrates the divergence of team strategies one they hit six starters. Some teams preferred to give replacement starters two or three starts each, while others leaned on emergency starters.

The Brewers front office, coaching staff, and pitchers did a fantastic job weathering 162. They hit the right buttons in replacing some starters at certain points in time (such as resting Peralta down the stretch, or [arguably] “shuttling Woodruff between Triple-A and MLB), while giving starters room to breathe at others point in the season (this also applies to Peralta, who was given some time to adjust from rough starts, as well as Junior Guerra). By spitting on rotation spots 10 through 14, the Brewers also arguably saved 16 “phantom” runs, as the club would not have found effective pitchers (on average) digging that deep into league or organizational resources. (This line could be argued with further research, however, as one could note that someone like Corbin Burnes could have been effective in two starts, for example).

Rotation Three: By Type
During my time writing at Sportsbubbler (RIP) and Disciples of Uecker, I published annual starting pitching rotation rankings based on the decision point of 100 IP. If a pitcher worked 100 or more innings with 50 percent of their games as starts, they were a starting pitcher; if not, they were replacement depth. On this model, I attempted to assess pitchers according to Runs Prevented, with the ideal that (a) working a lot of innings should be worth more as a starter, and (b) rotation spots could be designated based on the resulting Runs Prevented rankings. I’m no longer certain of this method’s veracity, as I believe there are better ways to assess rotational scarcity and usage across the MLB. But, here we are, testing the Brewers 2018 rotation, so let’s assemble the pitchers.

Wouldn’t you know it, the 2018 MLB did not have many “true” rotation spots: there were only 129 pitchers across 30 teams that fit the first criterion listed above. This is not enough pitchers to fill a true five man rotation, and it’s hardly enough to fill a four man turn.

Yet, those Runs Prevented totals present some order to the universe. There are aces, even if there’s only a couple of them. There are nice middle of the rotation “dudes” that you can really sink your teeth into; 150 IP and 2 Runs Prevented feels like a solid effort for a team. Every contender would accept that workload (every MLB team would, for that matter).

Where there are not full-time starters, replacements are necessary, and MLB really dug deep in 2018: there were 227 replacement starters, including 57 Emergency Starters, across 30 MLB teams in 2018. Basically, on average, MLB teams were using more replacements than they were using regular starters. The Brewers are no different here, and in fact, that’s partially how they gained their value. Viewing the range of Runs Prevented across each of these roles should demonstrate the importance of having a solid organizational pitching strategy; replacement starters need not simply be the pitching equivalent of throwing spaghetti against the wall. Tampa Bay demonstrated this with their genius “Opener” strategy, and they produced one of the elite Runs Prevented units in baseball. The Brewers accomplished their success by using long-term replacements like Miley and Peralta, but they also received value elsewhere across their high-floor organizational depth.

If you previously thought the idea of “Phantom Runs Prevented” by not using a rotation spot was a suspect idea, this seems to be your chance to pounce on the Brewers for not using an “Ace” or true “Number One” starter. By this model, the Brewers were gutsy, punting nearly 63 runs prevented at the front end of the rotation. Yet, the club also did not use a true “Number Four” or full-time starter that should have been replaced, which bought the club another 43 runs prevented. All told, the Brewers rotation of regular starters lost the club approximately 19 runs here, thanks to their cavalier strategy.

Of course, the Brewers used every Replacement typology except a “true swingman,” and this is where the club torched the league. Gio Gonzalez and Wade Miley covered the lack of an “Ace” or “Number One” starter, and demonstrated the value in not having a Regular Four, either. Peralta, Dan Jennings (yes, Dan Jennings), and Woodruff gained significant Runs Prevented advantages in the replacement ranks as well. On top of these depth successes, the rotation was not bad overall; Suter and Guerra were close to true Number Three starters, and Anderson was close to a true Number Two starter. Chacin was better than a typical Number Two starter, boasting a Runs Prevented performance that almost placed him in a phantom “Number One” role for the club.

What is startling on this model is that the Brewers typologies also worked according to DRA. Once an analyst accepts that the club did not have a True Ace or True Number One starter, the threshold for assessing DRA is lowered significantly. Witness Chacin, for example, who was assessed against DRA that were significantly better than 4.00 on the first two models; his DRA performance looks much better on the final model, because once you stop comparing him to Aces, the comparison becomes more realistic. The Brewers deep organization also performs very well against median DRA requirements on this model, which raises a question about which model’s expectations one should use going forward.

The last remaining criticism for fans and analysts rests on how one interprets Deserved Run Average results for the Brewers rotation. On any model one chooses, be it based on Games Started, Team Rotational Turns and Scarcity, or Actual Runs Prevented performance, the Brewers’ rotation was good in 2018. Now it is worth digging through these models during the offseason, in order to gain important lessons for Corbin Burnes, Woodruff, and Peralta during their potential first full workloads in 2019, and even for reworking Jimmy Nelson. Milwaukee has proven the success that can come with aggressive rotational swings and an organizational pitching strategy, coupled with elite, efficient fielding.

An underrated 2018-2019 offseason would find David Stearns making moves to further improve the fielding (such as improving Right Field, and then working Christian Yelich primarily as a Left Fielder), which should in turn help boost the pitching depth strategy going forward. As it stands, the Brewers do not even need an external pitching move; this makes potential offseason moves even more interesting for speculation.

At least that’s one way of looking at it.

Here’s another: On Monday, January 8, the Brewers signed catcher Christian Bethancourt, a washed-out former prospect whose aversion to the strike zone makes him a sub-replacement level big league hitter. His previous organization, the San Diego Padres, attempted a conversion from catcher to pitcher/bench bat in a desperate attempt to wring some value out of his one elite tool. Unfortunately, Bethancourt couldn’t identify the zone as a pitcher any better than he could as a hitter, prompting the Pads—a rebuilding club with ample time to practice patience—to abandon their two-way experiment after removing him from the 40-man roster last April.

The Brewers’ deal with Bethancourt was a minor league pact; five other catchers already occupy spots on Milwakee’s 40-man roster. Two of Manny Piña, Stephen Vogt, and Jett Bandy, all of whom are without a minor league option, figure to break camp as the club’s primary backstops. Andrew Susac, who still has one option remaining, will in all likelihood be shunted back to Colorado Springs in search of his lost luster. He’ll be pushed by Jacob Nottingham, who frankly seems like he could use an escape from the suppressive run-scoring environment in Biloxi (a .209 average in 2017 belied a solid .263 TAv and strong defensive marks). It’s hard to envision exactly where Bethancourt fits into this picture.

To understand what the Brewers see in Bethancourt, one need only head back to scouting reports from his time as a fast-rising prospect with the Atlanta Braves. In 2014, MLB.com pegged the Panamanian youngster as the 76th-best prospect in the game, close to names like Lance McCullers, Jr., Michael Conforto, and Kyle Schwarber. Bethancourt was coming off of three straight selections to the All-Star Futures Game and drew praise for his canon arm and receiving skills.

Instead of coming into his own as the heir-apparent to Brian McCann, Bethancourt faltered with Atlanta in 2015, struggling to a .200/.225/.290 line in 160 plate appearances. The season was in many ways a realization of long-standing qualms about Bethancourt’s game. He struck out in 20.6% of his plate appearances that year, but walked in only 3.1% and managed just a .090 ISO. You could miss his at-bats in a blink of an eye. Behind the dish, Bethancourt’s soft hands, quick feet, strong arm, and natural athleticism were plenty to dream on. He threw out 45 percent of would-be base stealers and posted above-average pop times with an average of 1.88 seconds (scouts have even reported figures as low as 1.62 seconds). But in spite of flashing his solid tools, periodic mental lapses contributed to eight passed balls in 42 games (357 innings) and a few eyebrow-raising errors. After the season, he was traded to San Diego in a minor swap of roster-filler.

Bethancourt never took off in San Diego, appearing in 73 games as a catcher in 2016 before switching his primary focus to the mound last season. Now he’s tasked with switching back.

The Brewers are hoping to catch lightning in a bottle here. At 6’2” and 210 pounds, Bethancourt has the body of a premium athlete and the defensive skills to be a weapon behind the plate. Milwaukee has a well-regarded catching coordinator in Charlie Greene, who will drill Bethancourt on fundamentals and framing this spring in the hopes of maximizing his natural gifts. He made strides with his game-calling before heading to the mound; his time as a pitcher could perhaps even improve his ability to strategize how to retire opposing batters.

The bat admittedly needs work, though. Bethancourt’s chase rates have been hilariously high (the catcher has swung at 44.9 percent of pitches outside the strike zone in the major leagues), and he’ll have to improve on his career 3.7 walk percentage. His hitting mechanics were messy in the past; they have the additional drawback of being rusty now. While he can occasionally rattle off a sweet, uppercut power stroke, his lunge-heavy approach and propensity to hack at anything close to the strike zone frequently get him out of whack and prevent him from utilizing his best swing (and therefore from reaching his solid raw power). Still, Bethancourt was a slow adjuster in his ascent through the minors and is young enough that there’s still time for some instruction to stick. He’s never really had an extended shot at big league pitching; perhaps Darnell Coles can help him tap into some patience in spring training.

For his part, Bethancourt will no doubt be eager for the fresh start. He was known for his confidence as a prospect; if he starts launching balls into the bleachers in Colorado Springs, it’s not impossible to imagine him surging into a big league bench role as a 35-40 hitter with 60 defense and a 70 arm. That’s the upside. The downside, of course, is that he never reaches the major leagues again. Milwaukee is now the third organization to roll the dice on Bethancourt’s potential; here’s hoping that he’s David Stearns’s latest late bloomer.

Photo Credit: Rick Scuteri, USAToday Sports Images.

According to Cot’s Contracts, the Milwaukee Brewers finished with the cheapest 40-man roster salary for the second straight year in 2017, with a meager $78.8 million spread across the roster. The team has all of $25 million committed beyond 2018, invested in only two contracts: Ryan Braun’s and Eric Thames’s. The Brewers have a team that was a surprise contender in 2017 with all of the major pieces coming back in 2018, aside from the injured Jimmy Nelson, and they could be getting an impact player if Lewis Brinson can take the next step. From 2008 through 2014, the Brewers ranked no worse than 18th in final 40-man year end salary. Mark Attanasio’s pocketbook has been able to take the strain in the past, and it should be able to take another big contract or two this year as well.

Thanks to the anti-competitive behavior (my fancy word for “collusion” that may not be technically against the rules) we’re seeing in the free agent market, there is some talent remaining unsigned, sitting there for the taking without requiring the Brewers to cash in any of their precious minor league assets. Of ESPN’s top 20 free agents this offseason, 13 remain unsigned. Of particular interest to the Brewers are the pitchers; Jake Arrieta or Alex Cobb would be major upgrades over the likes of Junior Guerra or Brent Suter in Milwaukee’s rotation.

The current market suggests there might be bargains, too. Not a single player has received a deal longer than three years or pricier than $60 million. Addison Reed signed this past week with the Twins for just $17 million over two years, well below what many expected for a reliever entering the market as one of the better closer candidates available. Not only is the market looking shockingly cool, but as spring training approaches, players will want to avoid becoming the Kyle Lohse of 2013, who went unsigned deep into March and wound up making about 60 percent of even the lowest estimates of what he could earn.

This is where the Brewers need to pounce. Anti-competitive behavior like this could wind up helping teams with smaller budgets. A reduction of super-long free agent deals worth nine figures has almost no impact on the way the Brewers assemble their squad. The Brewers were never going to make those deals anyway, and their biggest contracts will almost always be handed out to homegrown superstars. Milwaukee’s free agent splashes have generally come on players entering the decline phases of their career. But if free agent prices come down across the board, the Brewers should be able to be active players for more and more players, players who would otherwise receive prohibitively expensive offers from large-market clubs for the Brewers to even consider them as a target.

Consider the New York Yankees of the 1980s. Steinbrenner pulled the Yankees up from years of mediocrity by investing heavily in free agents. His club won four pennants in six years from 1976 through 1981, not coincidentally the first few years of free agency. But in 1982, they dipped to fifth place, and the Yankees wouldn’t reach the postseason again until 1995, the first season after the strike.

In his autobiography A Whole New Ball Game, Marvin Miller discussed how Steinbrenner’s willingness to play into his fellow owners’ collusion scheme was an act of cutting off the nose to spite the face:

“Steinbrenner’s unwillingness or inability to recognize opposition to him first became apparent to me with the beginning of the owners’ collusion in 1985. Although he was the first to utilize free agents, and the most successful in building winning teams, he became a coconspirator by depriving his club of the opportunity to sign free agents. I was astonished at the time because it was so obvious that he was the principle target (along with the players) of the owners’ planned collusion, but apparently this thought had not occurred to him. Ted Turner, Gene Autry, and a few others were also targets, but George was the owner they most wanted to curb. Yet he seemed incapable of understanding that a club like the Yankees — one with no success (or talent) in building a team through effective trading, and without a record of effective player recruitment and development in the minors for some time — would certainly fall out of contention if it could not sign free agents. But he agreed and joined with his ‘brother’ owners in a scheme aimed at himself.”

I don’t know if there is active collusion going on in today’s MLB, but there’s no doubt that large market teams are currently choosing not to leverage their financial muscle, their single greatest team-building asset. If the Brewers can, they need to capitalize on this opening. It’s hard to imagine another time when their money can do more, especially when you consider just how close this Brewers team came to the postseason in 2017.

The Yankees could have been a dynasty throughout the 1980s, but Steinbrenner’s inability to get over the idea that free agents were taking him for a ride cost him a decade’s worth of winning. If teams like the Yankees, Dodgers, and Cubs want to make that same mistake here in 2018, let them. Let them wring their hands about long-term deals and the luxury tax like suckers. If the Brewers want to shock the baseball world and make it back to the postseason,  they need to take advantage of this opening and strike now.

Photo Credit: Jim Young, USA Today Sports Images

Previous:
Cashing Out OFP 2 (Midseason 2017)

Related:
Roster Surplus and Depth Questions
Refining WARP and OFP Pricing
2013 Prospect Class: Impact

Even the crown jewel of the system features rather extreme question marks for advanced minors prospects, as Lewis Brinson is a 70 OFP, potential All-Star Centerfielder that Baseball Prospectus christened with the risk note, “He may not hit major-league pitching. Wheeee!;” Luis Ortiz maintains a solid 50-55 OFP 3/4 starter, but as the innings pitched base fails to advance that “set up reliever” role looms larger and larger; Ryan Cordell was cashed out for Anthony Swarzak, a perfectly assessed trade ($0.0 day-of surplus, a perfectly even swap) to bolster the MLB roster that improved the club’s chances of reaching the playoffs. That Stearns cashed out Cordell’s role risk and repetition within the system at the perfect time leads one to wonder whether he’ll have the acumen to accomplish the same with Brinson and Ortiz, or whether the Brewers will go “all-in” with the risk profiles of both prospects. If you’re disinclined to desire Brinson as a headliner in a Chris Archer-type deal, recall superstar Carlos Gomez, who took three MLB teams to hit; in the case of Go-Go Gomez, would you have rather traded the all-tools, slow-growing CF for Johan Santana or J.J. Hardy?

What makes it difficult to assess Stearns’s trades thus far is that most of them feature nebulous concepts that cannot be captured at one point in time. The Adam Lind trade is a great example of this type of gamble, and it remains one of the GM’s best trades until (or, arguably, even if) none of the high-risk RHP reach the MLB. Even the Jonathan Villar trade is difficult to capture in terms of overall value; Villar is an incredibly useful MLB player, one that can offer a profile that is all-risk, all-discipline, solid power and speed around the diamond (see 2016), but one that can simply fail to click in a given year (as 2017 showed). To some extent, even the Khris Davis trade remains difficult to assess in terms of upside, for as Jacob Nottingham continues to improve catching defense (according to several scouting reports from 2016-2017), a “back-up catcher with pop” becomes somewhat intriguing (there are not many of those lying around, even if Brewers fans have recent memories of Jett Bandy they are wishing to shed).

The Jean Segura-Chase Anderson trade should demonstrate the difficulty of assessing trades in general, as well as the difficult of assessing Stearns’s trade. Since the Brewers traded a contract reserve player (Segura), they traded significant surplus, and now that surplus is further extended by the Mariners (since Segura has performed quite well in his change of scenery). But, nearly every Brewers fan knows that this surplus was not “real” in Milwaukee, or not applicable in Milwaukee; Segura was working on mechanical adjustments, and completely retooled his mechanics with the Brewers organization, to no avail. He literally ran out of time in Milwaukee, and is an example (like Villar) of how players can thrive with new opportunities (and, probably, new coaching and new vantage points on mechanical adjustments). Chase Anderson, on the other hand, pitched his first better-than-replacement WARP in 2017, thanks to mechanical adjustments and arsenal / approach adjustments. Anderson is to Milwaukee as Segura is to Arizona and Seattle, in this sense, but Anderson’s contract extension does not agree with his historical performance. One is inclined to price Anderson at his 2017 maximum, or even suggest that the righty can further improve, but this is not included in this surplus assessment. So, the Anderson-Segura trade looks awful, even including Isan Diaz’s excellent prospect surplus value to Milwaukee; my inclination is to criticize this ranking, and also learn from it: why are we, as Brewers fans, insistent that this is a typically good trade? Why might the trade be a bad one for Milwaukee? Or an indifferent organizational event?

Of course, the other problem is that former President Doug Melvin is simply smoking Stearns in terms of overall surplus returned to the organization. Obviously, this could serve as a lesson for Stearns’s trades (be patient, look what Domingo Santana and Zach Davies turned into), but Lewis Brinson and Luis Ortiz should not necessarily be viewed as 1:1 comparisons to Santana and Davies.

If 2017 was the year that the Brewers proved worthy of contending consideration, 2018 may be the year that defines Stearns’s tenure, both in terms of his ability to deliver a playoff appearance (that is absolutely one criterion for assessing a successful 2018; failure to make the playoffs in 2018 is a knock against the organization) and in terms of delivering on the future surplus of his major outstanding trades (either weave Brinson and Ortiz into immediate MLB wins, cashing out the surplus that way, or make the correct decision to wait out Brinson’s risk at the MLB level. No pressure!).

On Theory

In presenting the above trade tables, I would like to reply to some common criticisms of my surplus model, and speak to the current “Wins Above Replacement don’t mean Wins” controversy that is spreading around the Internet.

• First, one criticism of expressing Overall Future Potential (OFP) in monetary terms is that OFP is an extremely abstract concept that includes many components.
  • On a recent Milwaukee’s Tailgate podcast, former BPMilwaukee-Chief J.P. Breen described these shortcomings in useful, succinct terms: OFP includes everything from a player’s potential top ceiling to their position within a system (are they at Class-A or Class-AAA?) to multiple sources of scouting profile risk (which might be described as a player’s “floor.” Is their floor “useful MLB depth” or “won’t reach the MLB”? That’s a huge difference).
  • Ryan Topp added an excellent point about assessing a prospect’s ultimate ceiling as something that may never be attainable precisely because of risk; his example of Brewers RF prospect Demi Orimoloye was perfect, as Topp noted that if one was simply assessing Brewers prospects by absolute ceiling, Orimoloye would have one of the strongest, but his rawness and development distance from the MLB simply cloud that ultimate ceiling beyond usefulness.
  • I want to make it abundantly clear that I do not ignore these concerns, and in fact take them very seriously, while acknowledging that an OFP surplus rank is indeed one snapshot in time. This is why I use post-hoc analysis to return to surplus rankings during each season and during offseasons, and to judge trades and prospect rankings at one point in time (such as midseason 2015 for Josh Hader) as well as years later (such as preseason 2017 Josh Hader, and now, useful MLB reliever Josh Hader).
  • That one player such as Josh Hader can take a journey from 50 OFP to 60 OFP to #3 Starter Prospect to Impact MLB reliever should show the usefulness of tracking this concept over time (this also provides data to assess the type of “role appreciation” or “role depreciation” that occurs over time).
  • So, think of an assessment of OFP Surplus as “the future value a prospect potentially offers an organization, depreciated by historical risk.” One of the benefits of baseball analysis is that even as the game changes, there remain many congruent roles throughout generations, and so tracking the historical value of one type of OFP grade (such as 70 OFP from the 2013 Baseball Prospectus Top 10 list) can be calibrated with the history of the game (what is the projected value of each class of player, expressed over 18,000 careers?).

• Similar criticisms are made against using WARP (Wins Above Replacement Player) to assess a player’s future surplus value.
  • In my analyses, I use a harsh depreciation tactic to discount future production, using the general assumption that injuries, ineffectiveness, and aging curves affect MLB players, and that WARP is hardly a linear concept from year-to-year.
  • Additionally, recent discussion has questioned the relationship between wins and WARP, a position to which Jonathan Judge has provided excellent critique. There is not much to this debate that I can add that Judge has not already covered, but it is worth emphasizing that common fan, analyst, and writer usage of WARP fails to treat the metric as a tool to assess marginal performance.
  • In a sense, WARP cannot track with wins because its purpose is not to assess wins; if you want to assess wins, wins occur at the team level, not the individual level, and it is spurious logic to breach that fact with a basic question about whether individual players can be assessed their fair share of “wins.”
  • WARP is valuable precisely because it abstracts players from wins, and instead assesses them on marginal concepts (beginning with the relationship between Runs Scored and Runs Allowed, and the assumption that a minor league player would have a different production value should they be called up to replace an MLB regular). With this assumption in mind, WARP is perfectly transactional; it can be translated into dollars (typically assumed to be paid on the “free agency market”), and it can be used to compare players across teams, park environments, and leagues.
  • Keeping this in mind, it baffled me that Bill James would raise such a critique of WAR-family stats in the first place, for his criticism simply missed the concept validity of the statistic (i.e., you can’t ask a statistic to measure something it was not intended to measure). So, I understand that WARP is a problematic stat in many cases, but for the purpose of translating MLB trades into value statements, it is an excellent snapshot statistic that should indeed be updated by post-hoc analysis in every case.

• Again, these are value snapshots at one point in time. I believe my trade assessment method works precisely because MLB teams do indeed trade immediate MLB wins for future MLB wins (in the form of prospect potential), they do indeed trade players for cash and prospects (in many different combinations), and I hypothesize that because these transactions occur and we know they occur, we can measure their effectiveness. Obviously, a quantitative analysis based on surplus is not the only way a trade can be judged. A trade can be judged in terms of franchise narrative, in terms of player narrative (ex., “needs a change of scenery”), or even through different quantitative means (MLB trades could simply be assessed in terms of scouting grades on the player “tools” exchanged in the deal. This would be an entirely different system of analysis than the one I use).

• Keep in mind that these trade assessments are not absolute, they are not even intended to “hold” over long periods of time (ex., “day-of trade value” is crucial to assessing a team’s motives for a trade, but it is hardly the only point in time a trade should be assessed). But, since the Brewers spent July 2015-July 2016 rebuilding the franchise, I found it worthwhile to track the value of trades, since the value of the club would not simply be judged in terms of absolute team wins over that time period.

Photo Credit: Richard Jackson, USAToday Sports Images

Because of this, the centerfield job should be somewhat open to competition when the players report next spring. It should not be, by default, an opportunity to develop Lewis Brinson at the MLB level. If one player improves his game significantly during the next few months, then comes to Arizona as a brand-new ballplayer, that absolutely will change things. If that player is Brinson, great! But if that doesn’t happen, there’s another answer that the team should consider: a traditional right/left platoon between Broxton and Phillips. (While this scenario will consider Broxton and Phillips, it should not be construed as a dismissal of Lewis Brinson’s place on the roster. Rather, it is a recognition of the fact that a team contending for the playoffs should prioritize building a championship MLB roster over everything else, and that now applies to the Brewers.)

Phillips, who bats left-handed, has already shown the beginnings of a strong platoon tendency. Forecasting this off of 98 plate appearances is far from exact, and should thus be taken with a grain of salt, but Phillips’ OPS against right-handers in 2017 was .855; against lefties it was .311.

That might not be enough to establish a pattern but it’s certainly a trend that bears watching. Still, an .855 OPS in 87 plate appearances at the top level is impressive. When it comes attached to a base-stealer who plays elite defense, that’s even better.

Phillips’s struggles against lefthanders might be a small-sample-size mirage, or his swing-and-miss issues could be further exploited as pitchers learn how to attack him. If either of those comes up they can be addressed then, and not now when they’re nothing but hypotheticals. Plans can always change. But the Brewers have a perfect candidate in-house to fill out the other side of the platoon, so why not take advantage of the setup?

Keon Broxton’s role with the team has been a point of discussion for a while, but limiting his exposure to right-handed pitching might just be the answer to maximizing his value while minimizing his problems. Phillips doesn’t have enough MLB experience to generate a platoon splits graph on his BP player page, but Broxton does:

For his career, Broxton has a slash line of .286/.406/.500, with a .315 True Average, against southpaws. Turn the pitcher around and those numbers all fall off a cliff, to .210/.315/.379 and .250. BP’s defensive metrics graded Broxton as costing the Brewers just shy of seven runs in 2017, but he’s graded positively by those same numbers dating back to 2014 in the minor leagues. Plus, Broxton’s defense passes the eye test with flying colors:

Broxton’s baserunning aptitude is what truly sets him apart, though. He was the 27th-most valuable player in all of baseball by that metric in 2017. His exit velocity numbers, too, paint a picture of a ballplayer who could be elite in the right circumstances. By platooning him with Phillips and limiting his exposure to right-handers, who keep him off the basepaths at a critical rate, the Brewers are optimizing his ability to make a positive contribution and minimizing his chances of getting dragged into a vortex of failure.

As if the strategy wasn’t appealing enough already, Phillips and Broxton both have skill sets that make them valuable off the bench, too. Whichever one doesn’t start can be used as a pinch runner, defensive replacement, or pinch hitter against an opposite-handed reliever.

The National League Champion Los Angeles Dodgers have employed platoon splits heavily since Andrew Friedman was hired as general manager, and it is a huge reason they have been so consistently excellent. Putting your players in the best position to succeed is what every team’s management personnel and front office strive towards. The Brewers have an opportunity to do just that from the get-go with their two center fielders in 2018.

Photo Credit: Jeff Hanisch, USAToday Sports Images

Those narratives will undoubtedly carry into 2018 guided by the very same contradictions: Milwaukee will indeed be developing many young players at the MLB level (including Lewis Brinson, Josh Hader, Brett Phillips, and Brandon Woodruff), while the team also has several opportunities to improve with established players (either through trades involving their prospects, through free agency signings, or both).

To put it another way: GM David Stearns can take the roster in several directions, and certainly has the resources available to contend while continuing to develop some players.

One way to assess player value, and therefore roster needs, is to estimate the surplus value that each player (and their contractual situation) provides the team. Value is assumed to be production and scarcity, recognizing that a player is not simply valuable to a club based on production, but also based on cost and the general availability of that skill set within the MLB. Surplus is the difference provided between a player’s production and their contract, recognizing that these aspects can be double-counted (a team simultaneously receives a player’s production on the field and their production gauged against their contract). Based on these assumptions, I tracked the surplus value of the Brewers 40-man roster (as of October 20, 2017) by using harsh depreciation to reduce each player’s maximum value (recognizing that a player’s performance typically declines over time save for rare cases).

The following chart tracks changes in surplus entering 2017 to entering 2018, while also assigning an Overall Future Potential (OFP) role for each Brewers roster member:

What these surplus numbers can suggest, in the abstract, is the difference between “the number of the wins above replacement” a player will produce during their contract and the OFP a team might receive if they traded the player at this point in time (alternately, they might suggest a contract range; for example, if the Brewers offered Neil Walker a $30 million contract, they would likely retain some surplus value during that contract).

Using the extremely interesting and difficult case of Jonathan Villar to interpret this table, his 2016 campaign and contract control years still loom large enough to suggest that the Brewers should not move the infielder for cheap; but the shortstop-turned-bench/utility option does mean that Villar’s ultimate role is trending downward, meaning that if Milwaukee believes that role decline is real and will continue to materialize, moving Villar for less than his top value could offset the issues of rostering a declining role. This should outline the difficulty of making roster decisions: in the case of Villar, there is not necessarily a right answer.

I should add that surplus value is abstract in the sense that there is a point at which additional surplus does not provide a team transaction value. Scooter Gennett and Chris Carter should be the most specific examples of this phenomenon in recent Brewers memory, as both players retained solidly positive surplus value entering 2017, but were essentially unwanted on the trade market and therefore expendable for nothing. Following this example, a rule of thumb might be to expect any type of roster move once a player’s surplus value dips below $20 million (or, less than three wins above replacement). Looking at the table of the Brewers roster above, this fact should seem intuitive with many of the names on the list (for example, it is highly unlikely that the Brewers would be able to move a player like Andrew Susac or even Eric Thames for their maximal surplus value).

By averaging each player’s 2017, 2018, and OFP surplus value, and comparing that to their change in value over time, a rather intuitive 2018 roster emerges. In this case, I excluded each player with a Negative-50 percent change in value (ex., a 50 percent decline), which produced need at Catcher, Second Base, and Right-Handed Pitcher, with additional question marks about the Utility roles. This is a rather succinct picture of the actual needs for the 2018 Brewers, and it also shows that if a few key free agents are retained, or similar free agents from outside the organizational signed, the Brewers can assemble quite a good roster:

These tables need not force an analyst to rely on numbers alone in order to validate roster decisions. Compare the following descriptions of potential role upgrades for the 2018 Brewers with those players’ statistical trends, and find nearly 20 roster spots (on the 40-Man) that can be upgraded for 2018:

The benefit of this exercise is that additional roster functions can be analyzed, either through descriptive or analytical means. For example, one could compare some of the best Rule 5 Draft Roster Protection candidates with the players above in order to find the most salient moves for the future value of the organization. Via Brewerfan.net:

Once again, this should exhibit a rather intuitive process of evaluation. If the future value of a catcher such as Jacob Nottingham is better than either Stephen Vogt, Andrew Susac, or Jett Bandy (or all three players), it should not hurt to lose one of those players in order to roster Nottingham. Each of these catchers are good candidates for contractual non-tenders for this reason (and, indeed, catcher is a position that the Brewers can upgrade in terms of depth behind/alongside Manny Pina). Similarly, allowing Matt Garza to walk via free agency and rostering Marcos Diplan, Freddy Peralta, or Devin Williams in that place should improve the pitching surplus of the roster. Where it gets more interesting is considering a player like Mauricio Dubon, and whether he simply takes the spot of free agent Eric Sogard, or overtakes Villar or Hernan Perez.

Using these analytical approaches should validate the fact that the Brewers are in a unique position entering 2018. They are a good team, indeed, that also features many up-and-coming players to develop at the MLB level and many declining roles that can be replaced. Where surplus value becomes useful is targeting particular trades, or simply determining when a player should be released or non-tendered.

A player like Keon Broxton, Perez, Susac, or Vogt should demonstrate this difficult decision-making process, and perhaps cause fans to realign their expectations that these types of players can receive impactful trade returns to Milwaukee. Given the packed outfield for 2018, the Brewers could conceivably release a player like Broxton should trade partners refuse to bite with a 45-to-50 OFP / quality depth trade (matching Broxton’s $11.5M-to-$19.8M surplus), for the trouble is that Broxton’s expected role is indeed declining (and any particular trade partner will also know that). This should not simply be viewed as picking on Broxton, as the point exists for Vogt and several other players on the roster.

“Slingin’ Stearns” earned his nickname for wheeling-and-dealing on the trade market during his first offseason in Milwaukee, but that reputation has calmed over time (not surprisingly, as the club completed their rebuilding process). Stearns did not show any hesitation in aggressively using waiver claims and releases to define his 2016-2017 offseason, and now the GM’s reputation may be defined by how effectively he clears roster space for what’s next: refined future development and improved MLB roles to contend in 2018.

The 2017 season proved that these goals can align and coexist within the same roster, so there are no excuses for failing to improve this strategy by learning from the 2017 progression.

Photo Credit: Jim Young, USAToday Sports Images.

The Brewers vastly outperformed their pre-season expectations. They competed with the defending World Series Champion Chicago Cubs for the National League Central title through mid-to-late September. They finished three games better than the St. Louis Cardinals and eleven games better than the Pittsburg Pirates. This coming after most expected the Brewers to finish no better than fourth place in the division. They were a few late-season heart-breaking losses away from making the playoffs.

Unfortunately, the offseason for the Brewers is here, which means it’s time to start talking about potential free agent targets.

The Brewers are in a unique place. The team arrived as a contender a year or two before their expected window. They have an opportunity to build on a young core before they have fully developed.

GM David Stearns will certainly be looking to bolster an already solid bullpen, add some depth to the position player side of the roster, and (hopefully) an impact starting pitcher to place alongside Chase Anderson, Zach Davies, the injured Jimmy Nelson, and the various young prospects expected to eventually join the Brewers rotation.

Alex Cobb
The Brewers likely won’t be in on big-money starting pitchers such as Jake Arrieta or Yu Darvish. They are much more likely to go after a more cost-efficient impact arm such as Alex Cobb. Cobb has yet to turn thirty-years-old. The oft-injured right-hander is coming off the healthiest year of his career, throwing a career-high 179.3 innings. He was worth 3 WARP and posted a 3.66 earned run average. Cobb was worth over 4 WARP in back-to-back years in 2013-2014 before injuries limited him to just twenty-two innings over 2015 and 2016 combined. A long-term contract for Cobb would be taking on some risk that Brewers front office may not want at this point in their rebuild. If they opt for the gamble, they might strike gold and acquire an ace at a discounted price who is still at a relatively young age.

Jhoulys Chacin
Jhoulys Chacin offers a cheaper alternative without the upside that Cobb offers. The San Diego Padres gave Chacin his first full-time starting pitching role since 2013 and he took full advantage of it. He was worth 2.9 WARP, the best of his career, posting a 3.89 earned run average. Chacin featured a ground ball percentage over 50 percent, a home run per nine under 1.0, and a deserved run average at 4.13. He has also yet to turn thirty, he’s a few months younger than Cobb. Chacin is probably a more realistic option for the Brewers. He is unlikely to get a deal longer than two years due to his lack of a track record. Chacin would give the Brewers flexibility in filling out the rest of the roster.

Addison Reed
The Brewers already have their closer in Corey Knebel. The fact that they are already set at the top of their bullpen, and potentially have another dominant arm in Josh Hader, the Brewers have an opportunity to build a super-bullpen of their own. There are plenty of middle-of-the-road options to fill the Brewers bullpen. Addison Reed is one of the few true difference makers the Brewers have the opportunity of acquiring. Reed has been one of the most dominant relief pitchers in the league over the last three seasons. Reed would not be cheap. If the Brewers are keen on turning the back-end of their bullpen into a three-headed monster, Reed is the answer. The Brewers might be better off acquiring not one, but two lesser options in order to build some depth in their bullpen, such as Pat Neshek, Luke Gregerson, Juan Nicasio, or Mike Minor.

Neil Walker:
With the unreliability of Jonathan Villar, the Brewers are in need of some kind of stability at the second base position. They need look no further than the player who manned the position for most of the last month-and-a-half of the season, Neil Walker. Walker just finished up 149 plate appearances with the Brewers in which he posted a .409 on-base percentage. Up until this season, Walker had been worth over 3.0 WARP in three straight seasons. The Brewers are not in need of a difference maker on the offensive side of the ball. Walker is a perfect complement to the already formidable Brewers offense.

It is unrealistic to assume David Stearns and company will be able to fill every hole. It would be impractical to operate as if their window is closing. It is just now opening. At the same time, there are moves to be made for this team. It would be foolish for the Brewers front office to decide against building on an incredibly successful 2017 campaign.

All we can say right now is that it’s going to be an interesting offseason in Milwaukee.

Photo Credit: Orlando Ramirez, USAToday Sports Images