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.

For a player who has always been whifftastic, Jonathan Villarhas reached a new level this season, raising his Strikeout Percentage to 30.5 percent, which would be his highest rate since he was in Advanced-A ball. This weekend Villar went 1-8 with five strikeouts and a walk, continuing his troubling trends at the plate this season. He’s seen his swinging strike rate has jump from 27.8 percent in 2016 to 30.1 percent this season. While his swing rates are up across the board, it’s his numbers on pitches outside the zone that are the most cause of concern.

Villar has swung at more pitches outside the strike zone (26.1 percent in 2017 up from 22.8 percent in 2016), and he’s making less contact on those pitches than he did last season (47.6 percent to 53.2 percent). Meanwhile, the percentage of pitches he even sees in the zone has gone down for the third straight year to 47.6 percent this season.

Looking at Friday night’s zone profile, when Villar struck out four times in five at bats, is instructive on how this season has gone.

Dodgers pitchers were actively avoiding the plate, feeding him a steady diet of high and low pitches, which Villar was ready to hack at. While he’ll never be a selective hitter, this version of Villar is borderline unplayable. Villar makes his living on lower pitches, which he can drive for power. Pitchers saw last year that when they elevate the ball, Villar doesn’t connect. Baseball is a game of adjustments, and now that pitchers have exploited a hole, Villar needs to find a method to resist those high pitches.

It goes without saying that Carlos Torres had an ugly Saturday night. He’d only allowed five runs in a relief outing once in his career, in September 2012 pitching in Colorado. The cutter has been his primary pitch since 2013, and his usage of the pitch has only increased over time, jumping from 44.2 percent in 2013 to 69.8 percent this season. However, he took his usage of the pitch to the extreme on Saturday, which may have been his undoing. According to Brooks Baseball, Torres threw twenty-five cutters and two curveballs in the ninth inning. What’s more, he threw the curveballs as consecutive pitches. In one inning, he threw the same pitch, at the same general velocity (91.0-to-93.5 MPH) twenty-three times, which seems absurd, especially in light of how the inning played out.

Updates from last week: Jimmy Nelson struck out eleven batters on Friday, using a similar pitch mix as his last start, and Eric Thames is no longer slumping.

Looking Ahead: While the Brewers had a disappointing week, so did the rest of the N.L. Central, and they remain in first place with the best run differential in the division (+29). This week will see them continuing to play the N.L. West. The Giants are up first, playing four games in Milwaukee starting tonight. They have had a disappointing season so far, highlighted by their team wide .250 Total Average (TAv), which puts them 26^th in MLB. After the series against the Giants, the Brewers hit the road for seven games, starting with a weekend series in Arizona.

1.491
Holy Eric Thames. The ex-KBO slugger has not lost a single step in his transition back to the big leagues. The number above is his OPS through 53 plate appearances. He leads the league in WARP and fWAR for position players. He leads the league in home runs. He has been everything the Brewers have hoped him to be and more. Oh, and he’s only making four million dollars this year.

Now, there is no way Thames will keep up this pace. It is likely more realistic to expect him to halve his OPS than keep it over 1.000. But it’s encouraging nonetheless. If he were to suffer a season ending injury tomorrow he would have already deemed his four million dollar contract a bargain due to his 1.4 WARP. The Brewers will gladly take that.

26.9 Percent
The Brewers struck out more than any team in baseball history in 2016. Their 26.9 percent strikeout rate through 15 games would shatter the previous record of 25.5 percent, which was a tie between the 2013 Astros and last season’s Brewers. Yet, the Brewers are not even the league leader. That dubious title would go to the Tampa Bay Rays, who are sporting a 28.6 percent strikeout rate. The game is changing and strikeouts are becoming more accepted in exchange for more power, but it has to be a cause for some concern that the team is striking out so much. If and when the Brewers go through a dry spell in terms of scoring runs, look for the high strikeout rate to be the main culprit.

1.88
The number above was the combined ERA between Neftali Feliz, Jacob Barnes, Corey Knebel, Carlos Torres, Jared Hughes, and Jhan Marinez in 43 2/3 innings from the group (entering play Wednesday). This is an incredibly encouraging sign for a bullpen that was expected to be a weakness for the team according to PECOTA and many experts. If this group can keep up a similar pace, these relief arms make for easy trade deadline chips. Then again, if they continue as one of the most success full bullpens in baseball, it hard to believe the Brewers will be too far away from competing for a wild card spot.

9.74
Zach Davies’s DRA through three starts is 9.74. Once again, only three starts, but it isn’t what anyone would want from Davies, who was heralded as the next Kyle Hendricks all off-season. His FIP is 4.84, which is less than a run worse than his career average. One could jump to the conclusion that this bad stretch is entirely BABIP and strength of competition driven (Rockies and Cubs at home, and the up-start Reds on the road), but there are a few troubling trends in Davies’ line. First, he has walked five batters per nine innings. Davies’s groundball rate has fallen to 42 percent, continuing a career long trend of a transformation into a fly-ball pitcher, and his strikeout rate fallen back under 7 percent as it was in 2015. These three starts against stiff competition aren’t any reason to lose faith in Davies, fantasy players might look to buy stock in him at his low point. He is someone to keep an eye on in the Brewers rotation.

25
The Brewers hit 25 home runs as a team through their first 15 games, and they added two more on Wednesday thanks to Jett Bandy and Travis Shaw. Most of the thanks goes to Eric Thames and Ryan Braun, who have combined for 12 home runs, but ten different Brewers have already homered just 15 games into the season. Only seven teams have hit more than 40 home runs in the month of April, all of them coming since 2002. The Brewers are well on their way to approaching that 40 home run mark for the month. It’s pretty amazing the power this team is flashing even after trading Khris Davis and then getting rid of Chris Carter last offseason. It makes you wonder what kind of damage the Brewers could do with a DH spot.

After pitching in the last two games of the Toronto series, Corey Knebel only got into one game over the weekend, but he extended his scoreless streak to start the season to 6.7 innings. On Sunday he allowed an infield single and struck out two, raising his season total to nine strikeouts against four baserunners. Knebel did it yesterday by pumping gas and daring the Reds to hit it: he threw nineteen pitches, fifteen of which were four seam fastballs with an average velocity of 97.6 mph. Interestingly, he threw his four breaking balls in sets of two: Arismendy Alcantara saw two in a row, then after Joey Votto’s hit against the curve, Knebel went back to it on the first pitch to Adam Duvall. Knebel has been relying on that pitch to induce weak contact. Batters rarely swing at it (only 9.38 percent this season), but it has produced a 100 percent ground ball rate, exemplified by Votto’s check swing dribbler against a shifted infield.

To look at a less positive performance, Carlos Torres came in to relieve Zach Davies, and promptly gave up the lead in Saturday’s loss. Torres was heavily reliant on his cutter, throwing it for fifteen of his twenty-one pitches, and the Reds teed off on the pitch, knocking it for all three of their hits and he threw it for ball four in his lone walk of the inning. Looking at his strike zone plot, aside from the walk, Torres wasn’t wild, he just threw too many pitches in the zone.

Torres generally lives down in the zone, and that’s where he finds his most success. When his pitches go up, they land in the sweet spot for most hitters, and he can get hit hard.

Checking in on something I noted last week, Jimmy Nelson turned in another very good start in the series opener on Thursday. He pitched seven innings, allowing on run on five hits and no walks, striking out five. Nelson continued to deemphasize his sinker, throwing it for only twenty-four of his one hundred and one pitches. Last season, only in two starts did he go to the sinker with a lower frequency, and each of those starts were in September. His fifty-nine four seam fastballs is a career high. It was also the first time more than 50 percent of his pitches in a start were four seamers. This is the new Jimmy Nelson, and the results have been fantastic thus far.

To check in on the other item from last week, Eric Thames went 7-16 with two walks and five home runs. His homers came off four seam fastballs, a changeup and a curveball. Right now, he’s gotten his whiff percentage on hard pitches down to 4.76 percent this season. There is zero reason anyone should be throwing him a fastball. As long as teams continue to test him, Thames is going to mash. His offspeed whiffing has held steady (18.18 percent) and his breaking pitches whiffs inched up to 17.07 percent after the last week.

Looking ahead: This week the Brewers face the Cubs in Chicago and St. Louis at Miller Park. Both opponents are coming into the week scuffling, losers of three straight, so this will be a real opportunity for Milwaukee.

All numbers from Brooks Baseball.

Prior to that terrible August baseball, the Brewers showed an extended stretch of solid play. This stretch may need to be revisited depending on how the September string plays out, but thus far one can analyze a bizarre string of 80 games where Milwaukee flirted with true .500 baseball. You know it by heart: Junior Guerra made his singular starting pitching debut, Zach Davies attacked batters, Jimmy Nelson outplayed his peripheral performance, and guys like Hernan Perez and Keon Broxton were at various stages of acquiring their 2016 sealegs. In one sense, a rebuilding club that plays well for 80 games is a non-story; in the “regression to the mean” discussion, baseball is tough enough that even a bad team might be expected to come back to average over the course of such a long season.

From May 1 through July 31, the Brewers went 39-41, thanks to a 328 RS / 337 RA differential. That run differential shows that the club was near “true .500 talent” for three months, and also that the club was winning thanks to the strength of their pitching. By now everyone knows that the club could not keep up that pace because Stearns traded Jonathan Lucroy, Aaron Hill, Jeremy Jeffress, and Will Smith prior to the deadline (but in a hilarious twist, the Brewers are climbing back, now 15-21 since the deadline thanks to their surge).

Compiling a National League average run environment for May through July from Baseball Reference, and adjusting it for Miller Park, one finds that the almost-.500 Brewers bats were approximately 18 runs below average. Extrapolate that for a full season, and….well, you get the picture. The offense performed poorly, but what is interesting is that some of those performances were simply bad timing from players that had other good months in 2016:

In the small sample size world, it is worth remembering that the pennant race itself is nothing but creating and manipulating circumstances for success (or luck), so it absolutely matters that some of these players were better during other months of the season. They just happened to have their respective solid Aprils or Augusts when the pitching staff was getting shelled. Thankfully, the club happens to be rebuilding, so something like Keon Broxton’s explosion takes on a different note (one can then judge Broxton’s performance and future value); maybe the story of Broxton’s organic development preordained July struggles to yield late season success. It is especially interesting to see the ebb and flow of the great seasons produced by Jonathan Villar and Ryan Braun, both players that the Brewers can reserve well into their next competitive cycle and employ as part of that contending core.

Thankfully, the pitching staff excelled during May, June, and July, performing at a rate approximately 15 runs better than Miller Park and the National League. Notably, while Guerra, Davies, and Nelson had a great stretch, the rotation itself was not great across the board. Chase Anderson and Matt Garza countered some of the benefits provided by the three leaders, although those three leading starters ensured that the Brewers would have a chance to win on most days of the week.

The bullpen is immensely more interesting, in terms of future roster assets, from this three month set. Carlos Torres and Tyler Thornburg will both be under salary arbitration control for 2017, and both pitchers could sustain roles in a serviceable (or better) ‘pen.

Among the Brewers’ controllable arms, the club reserves Jacob Barnes, Jhan Marinez, and Michael Blazek. Blazek has seen a return of some previous command issues, but he has also fought injuries throughout the year. Barnes and Marinez have quietly worked in the background, and both righties have some intriguing traits that are worth a longer look. Coupled with Corey Knebel’s late season surge (3.65 DRA, 0.4 WARP), or even that of Rob Scahill (4.38 DRA, 0.1 WARP), it is not difficult to see a relatively deep set of relief arms ready for the 2017 campaign. This set looks even deeper when one considers the next batch of 40-man roster protections, waiver claims, or offseason acquisitions.

The most obvious response to this type of analysis will be that 80 games hardly matters in the grand scheme of things, especially when the club bookended that performance with 23-36 ball (good for a 63-win pace). Yet, those teams were not necessarily the same as the May-through-July unit, especially not in April (which featured an almost completely different cast of players). As a rebuilding GM, Stearns has effectively rotated options onto the roster while making quick decisions on some players, too; instead of hanging on to some early season flops (because, who cares if a rebuilding club wins?), Stearns adjusted the roster, made new acquisitions, and arguably found more future value because of those moves.

Now, one can look at this string of play, perhaps even considering it next to a strong September (if that continues to materialize), with an eye toward improving the roster in 2017. As I have written all year, at some point the Brewers will need to decide to keep good players to maximize current performance and future value; by making quick roster decisions and fielding some genuinely competitive players throughout the season, Stearns has already proven that the Brewers’ strategy to put the best possible rebuilding team together can pay future dividends.

Over the past year, the Milwaukee Brewers’ front office has been plenty good–but they’ve gotten awfully lucky, too.

The quickest way to jump-start a rebuilding process is finding value in players cast off by other teams. In taking something you got, essentially, for free and turning it into something useful. Over the past year, the Brewers have tried to do this repeatedly. Not all of their efforts have worked out–Ramon Flores, Keon Broxton, and Alex Presley have combined for negative one WARP, Will Middlebrooks is whiffing at a 40 percent clip since finally making the big club, and Garin Cecchini hasn’t even looked good by AAA ballplayer standards, and with the artificial stat inflation for hitters inherent in Colorado Springs. But for each of these failures, which cost nothing, the front office has made a number of great calls.

Honorable Mention: Sean Nolin, RP and Rymer Liriano, OF

Once one of Toronto’s top prospects, Nolin is probably best-known as one of the pieces who was sent to Oakland in the ill-fated Josh Donaldson trade. When the A’s traded for Khris Davis this winter, they waived Nolin from their 40-man roster to make room for him–and the Brewers pounced, effectively adding him to the return package.

In Spring Training, Nolin suffered a partially torn UCL, and seemed doomed to Tommy John surgery. But with a partial tear, sometimes the ligament can heal naturally. The Brewers had him reevaluated in May, and decided that things were progressing enough to where surgery wasn’t necessary. If things continue progressing, he could see a couple of September innings. But Nolin’s medical past is far from spotless–a groin injury in 2014 ended his season and caused him to miss part of 2015 as well–and the franchise doesn’t need his immediate contributions, so the prudent course of action might just be to wait for 2017.

Rymer Liriano was struck in the face with a pitch in Spring Training, fracturing several bones, and is expected to miss the entire season. If that hadn’t happened, there’s an outside shot that he’s close to the top of this list thanks to the opportunity created by Domingo Santana’s injury-riddled first half. But on the bright side, he’s working his way back from the traumatic injury.

Update on #Brewers OF Rymer Liriano, hit in face by pitch in spring training: Still working toward getting back on field for baseball work.

— Tom (@Haudricourt) June 25, 2016

For both Nolin and Liriano, the best way to describe this season is “to be continued.” They’ve both got the talent to contribute to the big-league club, and could do so as soon as 2017.

T-5. Jhan Marinez (.4 WARP)

“Jhan Marinez struggled through another Triple-A season plagued by injury, ineffectiveness, gopher balls and the same lack of command that keeps him from leveraging his upper-90s heat and wipeout slider into a major-league bullpen gig; if he ever learns how to pitch, look out.”

That’s the BP Annual, on Marinez, back in 2014. Since then, he has gone unmentioned twice. But a funny thing happened in those two years–Marinez learned how to pitch. During his prospect days, Marinez was known just as much for his live arm–his heat touches 98 on the radar gun–as his complete inability to control it. He regularly posted walk rates north of 6.0, culminating in a 10.3 walks per nine nightmare at AAA Toledo in 2014 that won him a demotion to AA. There, he cut his walks to 4.5 per nine, and that ratio has continued trickling downward ever since.

Still, the Tampa Bay Rays designated the out-of-options Marinez for assignment in May, and the Brewers acquired him for nothing more than cash as a result. And since then, Marinez has been an undeniably effective part of the bullpen. He’s walking just 3.9 batters per inning, striking out 10.08, and posting a 2.60 ERA. All in all, Marinez has been worth four-tenths of a win–and that’s despite the fact that opponents are hitting .380 off of him on balls in play.

As a prospect, Marinez featured two pitches–a high-octane fastball and an inconsistent slider. Today, both of those pitches are complementary to his sinker, which he throws over half the time:

Clearly, Jhan Marinez learned how to pitch–and the Brewers are the beneficiaries. Marinez also qualifies as a sneaky name to watch for fantasy baseball purposes, too–if Milwaukee goes sell-happy and unloads both Jeremy Jeffress and Will Smith in the next few days, Marinez has classic closer stuff.

T-5. Carlos Torres (.4 WARP)

The Mets signed Torres to a minor-league contract in 2013, and turned the cutter into his primary pitch. That year, he was worth 1.2 wins. In 2014, that number fell to .5. Last year, he was .2 wins worse than replacement level, as his strikeout and hit rates each hit a career high. The Brewers gambled that last year was a fluke, and that he could be a cheap way to make the bullpen a touch better. They’ve been rewarded with .4 wins, Torres’s highest K-rate in the Majors, and a 2.90 ERA. Jeremy Jeffress and Will Smith get all the press, and Jhan Marinez has the electric stuff, but Torres has evolved into the steady, reliable piece who ensures that the former two can be traded and the bullpen will still be pretty good.

This year, Torres has taken his “cutter as the primary pitch” approach to a whole other level. It’s actually interesting to watch the evolution–as time progresses, Torres goes from throwing the cutter as a second pitch, to a first offering with a plurality in the high-40 percent range, to a first offering used just north of 50 percent of the time. This year, Torres’ arsenal has evolved even further, and he’s thrown the cutter over 75 percent of the time since May:

T-5. Chris Carter (.4 WARP)

On August 7, 2012, I made a simple transaction in one of my dynasty leagues. I don’t even remember who I dropped, to tell you the truth–but I called up Chris Carter from my protected minor leaguers. I tell you this because that was four years ago, and Carter is still on that team’s roster–which is quite remarkable in a high-activity 14-team league. Chris Carter threads the needle of a very specific kind of ballplayer: he’s valuable enough to employ, but not valuable enough to sell.

I can’t pretend that I don’t get it. At times, Carter can be a very, very frustrating player to root for. I’d say the most accurate way to summarize his game would be “extreme risk and reward.” When Carter is locked in, he can carry your team–this April, he put up an OPS of .922 to nicely acclimate himself to his new hometown fans. But when he can’t find his stroke, he turns into a black hole in the middle of your lineup–like this July, when he’s struck out 39 percent of the time and his OPS has cratered to .688. He’s a part-time superstar, but he’s not the type who has outrageous platoon splits so you can’t really tell which Carter is coming to the ballpark on any given night.

At ten million a year, or more, Carter would be a disappointment. But the Brewers are paying him between $2.5 and $3 million this year, depending on performance-based incentives. The value of one Win Above Replacement varies somewhere between $5 million and $8 million, depending on who you ask, and Carter put up .4 WARP in his worst season as a full-time regular, 2015. It was a no-lose proposition, especially since the team had jettisoned both ends of their first-base platoon in the prior month.

Having put up .4 WARP to this point in 2016, Carter has already provided value commensurate with his contract. But it’s worth noting that a year ago, Carter swooned hard in July with a slash line of .109/.176/.304–then neutralized that with a .333/.400/.822 September. More than any player on this list, Carter’s position is far from locked in.

Three years ago, John Sickels of MinorLeagueBall made an absurd prediction that Carter would make an All-Star Team and be an MVP candidate. In fairness, he admitted in the title of the piece that it was an absurd prediction and, like most insane predictions, it didn’t come true. But it speaks to the level of raw talent that Carter has, even if he’s incapable of harnessing it for more than a month or two at a time. In his mid-20s, it was easy to see him putting it all together for a whole year–now, I’d say that’s wishful thinking. But for the cost of less than half a win, he’s been a good value at first base for a team in transition. And if you’re going to take a long-shot gamble on someone, you always want to bet on someone with at least one elite skill.

4. Kirk Nieuwenhuis (.7 WARP)

The Brewers have gotten exactly what they expected from Nieuwenhuis: a smattering of home runs and steals, good plate patience, acceptable defense, and an average that flirts with the Mendoza line. Last year, Nieuwenhuis accumulated .6 wins in 117 plate appearances. This year, he’s been worth .7 in 266. He’s not a black hole, but he’s not all that helpful, either. On the bright side: it’s not like Keon Broxton, Ramon Flores, or Shane Peterson would have done anything more useful. By the time the Brewers are a contender, Brett Phillips will be roaming center field, and Nieuwenhuis will be pinch-hitting and making the occasional spot start, which seems like a good eventual role for him.

For the low-low cost of a waiver claim, the Brewers acquired a player who brings some things to the table, and whose biggest weaknesses can be mitigated in an eventual part-time role. He combines power and speed, and he’s posted better FRAA marks while playing the corner positions than in center–even though he’s capable of playing all three positions. And his struggles to make contact have a pretty easy explanation, too:

The 2015 BP Annual noted that “Nieuwenhuis’ approach is basically to attack any fastball in the zone, take all breaking pitches, and occasionally look stupid on changeups he thought were fastballs.” The pitch-type breakdown of his career supports this. Against overmatched rookies still refining their secondary and tertiary offerings, he can rake–and these are the players he should get his at-bats against in the long run. But pitchers who are pitchers, rather than just throwers, effortlessly turn Nieuwenhuis to pudding.

Still, it remains to be said that a player who can put fastballs over the fence, steal bases, and play three outfield positions is a valuable commodity in the big leagues. Nieuwenhuis might not be too impressive as an everyday centerfielder, but he’s still a worthwhile piece that cost nothing to acquire.

3. Aaron Hill

Aaron Wilkerson and Wendell Rijo are hardly a king’s ransom in prospects, but they’re both intriguing young players–and all the Brewers had to do was take on some salary for about three months to make it happen.

For what it matters, before the Red Sox traded for him, Hill was worth 1.8 wins to the 2016 Brewers. The Brewers’ $6.5 million of his salary is roughly what a single win would be worth in free agency. So for those keeping score at home, the deal was a win on four different fronts–Hill provided value beyond what the team paid him, the team got a better minor-league asset by taking on Hill, he provided value to the rebuilding effort beyond even what the WAR column can quantify, and then Hill was successfully flipped for something that will have value beyond this off-season. Making scrappy moves like that is how you turn a bottom-feeder into a dynasty.

2. Junior Guerra

Look, if you were skeptical of Guerra at first, I don’t blame you. But we’re fifteen games in, and Guerra has been worth 2.1 PWARP thus far. That’s half a season’s worth of starts–if you stretch it out to a full 30, the 4.2 PWARP would have been the 19th-best mark in all of baseball last season. Brewers fans calling him an “ace” might not be all that far off–the 19th-best pitcher in baseball would qualify as a “fringe ace,” the type of guy who could be the #1 on a middle-of-the-pack team, or the #2 on a championship contender, or the #3 on the best pitching staff in the league.

I wrote earlier this season about why pitchF/X data shows that Guerra is not a flash in the pan. But since then, two further developments have solidified my belief that Guerra will have a successful career in his thirties.

The first development happened in late June. Guerra took the mound against the Los Angeles Dodgers on the 16th and turned in his worst start of 2016: the Dodgers chased him in the sixth inning with five runs to his name and just four strikeouts under his belt. Since Scott Kazmir was similarly off point, the Brewers won an 8-6 slugfest, but that was owed more to the offensive fireworks of Chris Carter and Jonathan Villar than Guerra’s work. Less than two weeks later, Guerra drew the Dodgers as his assignment once again–and he altered his game plan in the gutsiest way imaginable. He all but cut his best pitch out of rotation. Guerra threw 109 pitches in shutting out the Dodgers over eight masterful innings, and only two of those pitches were splitters. It was a true pitching gem–Guerra’s 18-pitch first inning was the most laborious frame he suffered through, and he carved apart the Dodgers like a hot knife through butter. I have no idea what Guerra saw in the Dodgers during that first game, but I’m beyond impressed with the adjustment he made. Eliminating your “out” pitch against a team that just hit you hard is the kind of crazy tactic that you only use when you’re dead sure you spotted a weakness. That Guerra is capable of this kind of gamesmanship is encouraging, to say the least.

Guerra’s second adjustment came at the All-Star Break. In the first half, he threw a four-seam fastball and slider in addition to his signature splitter. But in the nine days between his last first-half start against St. Louis, and his first second-half start in Pittsburgh, Guerra had the time to add a secret weapon to his arsenal:

Ironically, it was adding a sinker to the mix that inevitably doomed the career of Wily Peralta, but we have to remember here–every ballplayer is different. And thus far, the sinker experiment has worked. Guerra fanned six in six innings against the Pirates in his first start of the half, then outdueled the far-more-expensive Jon Lester in his second try before the bullpen blew the game.

The sinker is an ideal pitch for Guerra to add to his arsenal, as it serves as a perfect blend of his best two incumbent options–the fastball and the splitter. Guerra’s sinker is indistinguishable from his fastball until it drops:

Guerra has a new weapon in his arsenal, but more importantly, he’s shown that he can adapt on the fly at the big-league level. That’s very big, and it’s very good if you’re a Brewers fan.

1. Jonathan Villar

Okay, maybe we’re cheating here by some people’s definitions. Villar wasn’t technically “free”–to pry him from the Astros cost Milwaukee a minor-league pitcher named Cy Sneed. But I would counter that Sneed was not, nor did he ever show any indication that he would turn into, an “asset.” He might not have been “nothing,” but he also held no tangible value.

The 25-year-old Villar hadn’t put up great numbers in three partial seasons with Houston, but his power/speed combination at a position of scarcity made him a valuable asset. Still, with names like Jose Altuve and Carlos Correa entrenched into the lineup, and even Luis Valbuena and Marwin Gonzalez winning favor over Villar, there was no real place for him in Houston. Last year, at this point in time, Villar was playing minor-league ball.

Two pieces of information from before the Villar trade are worth noting. First, he got back to the big leagues when rosters expanded in September and went 8-for-25 with three steals in limited action, while striking out just twice. Second, Brewers’ GM David Stearns was working in Houston’s front office while Villar was playing for Houston’s farm system last year. Publicly-available advanced analytics for minor-league players are still pretty spotty, but there’s no doubt that Houston’s modern-thinking front office is tracking everything on every player in that system. Stearns was one of the few people in baseball with the ability to accurately tell if Villar had made the kinds of structural changes that could turn him into an offensive weapon.

Villar wasted no time making his presence felt in Milwaukee. Though the Brewers pitched Wily Peralta on opening day, and therefore got beaten into a pulp, he took Madison Bumgarner deep in his second at-bat:

And since then, he hasn’t slowed down. Villar’s .297/.379/.437 slash line, paired with a league-leading 36 stolen bases, makes him the prototypical leadoff hitter, and the peripherals back it up, too. Villar’s 2015 and 2016 contact rates are significantly higher than the two years prior. The implication we can take from this is that, sometime during his minor-league exodus, he made some type of mechanical tweak that resulted in not just more contact:

but better quality contact, too:

Detractors will point to Villar’s .400 BABIP as an unsustainable mark. But just how unsustainable is it? Villar’s 57 percent groundball rate should, in theory, be killing his BABIP–only he’s also put up a silly 11.3 percent infield hit rate. Coming up through the minors, Billy Hamilton’s track-star speed was supposed to revolutionize the leadoff position–today, as it turns out, Villar is doing it instead. The Brewers gambled that, at just 25 years old, the rough edges of his game could be refined down, and it’s a gamble that has paid off with a genuine star–Villar’s 3.0 WARP places him snugly between Jonathan Lucroy (3.1) and Ryan Braun (2.9). It goes to show you that, even in the age of advanced analytics, one team’s trash can be another team’s cornerstone.

Top Play (WPA): Solid but definitely unspectacular outings from starters Jimmy Nelson and Tommy Milone blew up in the pivotal sixth inning, when the Twins scored three runs in the top half of the frame to tie the game at 4. The Brewers responded, though, with Aaron Hill welcoming new pitcher Ryan Pressly with a home run to left field (+.167).

This home run ultimately proved to be the difference in the game, although the Brewers’ four-run seventh did eventually put the game out of reach. This was a team win from Milwaukee, as every position player posted at least one hit except Yadiel Rivera. Each of those seven Brewers got two hits except Jonathan Villar.  Jimmy Nelson was able to scatter ten hits well enough to limit the Twins to four runs; the damage could have been much worse.

Bottom Play (WPA): After the Brewers took the lead in the sixth, Nelson was about to post the all-important shutdown inning. However, Brian Dozier chased him with a double; Craig Counsell decided that Nelson had gotten far enough, so he turned to lefty Carlos Torres to face the middle of the Twins lineup.

Torres proceeded to walk Joe Mauer and Miguel Sano, setting up a bases-loaded showdown with Oswaldo Arcia–who, by the way, had just hit a monster home run off Nelson in the inning before. Torres, though, was able to strike out Arcia (-.142), ending the danger and setting the stage for the Brewers to explode in the bottom of the seventh.

Key Moment: The top of the sixth looked like it would be the turning point of the game. The Brewers led 4-1 after five innings (86.5 percent win expectancy), and Nelson was headed back out to preserve the lead.

Nelson has been one of the Brewers’ best starting pitchers this year, and although Wednesday was not his best outing, the lead still must have felt safe in his hands. However, he was unable to hold it, giving up a big chunk of the lead in spectacular fashion (a long home run by Arcia cut the lead to 4-3). And Eddie Rosario followed two batters later with an opposite-field home run that snuck over the left center wall, tying the game and putting the Twins back in position to win.

This was ultimately made relatively moot by the Brewers offensive explosion in the seventh, but a 4-1 lead in the sixth is the type of game that good teams will expect to win. Now, the Brewers are obviously not a good team at this point–nor are they really trying to be. And even good teams blow leads, particularly in the middle innings. But this did look to be a particularly key moment.

Trend to Watch: Jonathan Lucroy had well-documented struggles in 2015, and he is off to a rough start in 2016 as well. His .243 TAv remains well below his career average, which is disappointing for a Brewers club that would have hoped for a quick, obvious, and easy bounce back to boost his trade value before the trade deadline.  But hits in the last five games might bode well for the Milwaukee catcher, and having a productive Lucroy in the middle of the lineup would make the team much more dangerous.

This type of start coming off the heels of a normal Lucroy season would not raise many eyebrows, but it is particularly worrisome given his struggles last year.  If this is the beginning of his turnaround, the Brewers will be a happy club.

TOP PLAY (WPA): After Carlos Torres opted out of his minor-league deal with the Braves, the Brewers signed him to a big league deal. That decision proved costly, at least in the home opener.

After the Brewers got off to an early lead, the Giants came back and took a 5-3 lead going into the fifth. That’s when Wily Peralta was removed from the game, and replaced by newly-signed Carlos Torres. Torres got two quick outs but then walked Brandon Belt.

The following batter was Matt Duffy. Torres fell behind early in the count, after throwing two straight balls. Duffy then took a strike and with a 2-1 count with 2 outs in the fifth, he hit an up and in fastball deep to extend the lead. At 7-3, the game was pretty much out of reach and the Brewers were unable to come back.

Worst Play (WPA): The Brewers got off to a strong start. Wily Peralta, got the nod for opening day, and got a quick 1-2-3 first inning, helped by this Aaron Hill diving play:

In the bottom of the first, Madison Bumgarner was in unusual bad form. He was battling the flu, which may have ignited his poor, early start. Santana lead off the game with a quick single. Three out of the four next batters were able to draw walks, which put the Brewers up 1-0 with one out and the bases loaded. Hill, who was acquired earlier in the offseason, then came to the plate. After taking the first strike, he grounded into an inning-ending double play, killing the rally.

Trend to keep watching: It’s the first game of the season, therefore, there aren’t many trends to note, but one thought-provoking part of this game was Domingo Santana leading off.

Santana isn’t your typical leadoff hitter. He’s not the quickest player on the team, nor is he a prolific base stealer. In his short stint in the majors, he’s walked at an above average clip, but he doesn’t make a ton of contact and he strikes out a ton (33.7 K%). His on-base percentage last year was pretty good and has been solid throughout the minors, which is a positive but it’s unusual to see someone who strikes out that often at the leadoff spot.

Derek Harvey, managing editor of the Brew Crew Ball, noted that this might be the lineup versus left handed pitchers, but then again, why would you have Scooter Gennett in there instead of Colin Walsh. On the other hand, this could just be a situation of Craig Counsell playing his “main starters” on opening day. Either way, Santana seems to be one of the main starters, on the Brewers. He also crushed lefties last year and got on base at a decent clip which might be provoking Counsel’s choice of having him in the leadoff position. It’ll just be interesting to see whether this lineup changes against right-handed pitchers, and how he decides to use Santana considering his platoon splits.

Gennett and Villar:

“Villar! Hill! Broxton! Gennett! Your 2016 opening-day Brewers who wouldn’t be recognized in a community grocery store,” said Jeff Sullivan in a FanGraphs chat.

It’s true that both Jonathan Villar and Scooter Gennett aren’t household names. If you’re not a Brewers fan or a die hard baseball fan, then you probably aren’t familiar with these players. With that said, they both did interesting thing’s in this game.

First, Gennett hit an absolute shot.

Scooter Gennett's bomb clocked at 108.5 MPH off the bat… He didn't hit a ball that hard all last year. His hardest last year 103.64 MPH

— Daren Willman (@darenw) April 4, 2016

The interesting part about this home run is that Gennett didn’t hit a single home run against lefties, in 2015. In fact, he’s never hit a single home run against any lefty in his big league career. At least, until this one.

This very well might have been a fluke, but’s it’s interesting that Gennett got the nod against MadBum even though he’s been awful throughout his career against left-handed pitchers. It’ll be interesting to see if he’s made an adjustment in his game, and will provide more sustained production against left-handed pitchers. If that’s the case, then the Brewers have found their second baseman of the future, even though this outcome is still very unlikely.

Villar also had a nice moment.

In 2015, Villar only hit two home runs. In 2016, he’s already got one. Villar is obviously just a placeholder for Orlando Arcia, but if he’s able to hit for more power than usual, then he should get more playing time once Arcia makes his debut.

UP Next:

The Brewer are playing again tomorrow against the Giants. This time, they’ll have Jimmy Nelson on the mound facing Johnny Cueto.

The Brewers got their heads beaten in today, but they still remain an interesting team. There’s a lot of potential and young players who are ready to prove their worth. Try to find solace and joy in their performance. Joy in the little things, and don’t get too upset at the final score, because if you do, then this will be a long season.

If anything, it’s nice to have baseball back.