Part One: Cooper / Gatewood / Hiura

Throughout the season, I’ve attempted to provide contextual statistics that help fans read along with the box scores. If we are going to have to read imperfect information, we might as well know as many things as possible for the league. For example, in Brinson’s case, we have a swirling set of circumstances: although he’s very young for AAA Pacific Coast League, he’s also facing easy competition in an extremely friendly hitting environment. This does not diminish his tools, but it should add some salt to the stat line. To accompany this installment of the Midseason 2017 3 Up 3 Down, here is an attempt to provide a normalized index for the Brewers’ “regular” minor leaguers thus far. This exercise should also be taken with a grain of salt, as there are imperfections even with the information available about minor league players; for example, a player’s youth in a league may not necessarily make the league more difficult depending on their toolbox, or a player’s park environment also might not accurately reflect the impact on player development.

One benefit of normalizing statistics is that players can be compared across levels to some degree. So, I normalized a player’s On Base Percentage Plus Slugging Percentage (OPS) or OPS-allowed for pitchers by using:

• Individualized Opposing OPS normalized by league context (league median Opposing OPS for regulars).
• Batting and Pitching Park Factors (where available) normalized against median league park factors for regular players.
• Player age normalized by league median age for regular players.

Weighing these elements together, consider the Brewers batting minor leaguers with 100+ PA, and minor leaguer arms with 30+ IP (and available park factors). Tables are pasted below for maximal reading enjoyment. Batters are ranked from high-to-low to showcase the players whose OPS performance occurred against the “lowest” or toughest Opposing OPS, and pitchers are ranked from low-to-high to showcase the arms whose OPS performances occurred against the “highest” or toughest Opposing OPS. Take a grain of salt with this index, as age is highly favored, as is park factor. Park factor may also unduly impact opposing OPS, as there is a good argument to be made that such a number should not be park adjusted (since it already expresses context in a different manner). But, it’s an approximation of a batter or pitcher’s OPS performance against their environment, which may be something to keep in mind alongside scouting reports or other “naked” discussions of their performances.

The BPMilwaukee Editorial Staff (Nicholas Zettel and Kyle Lesniewski) contributed to this feature, as well as Craig Goldstein and John Eshleman from the Baseball Prospectus prospect team.

3 UP
LHP Nick Ramirez, AA Biloxi (picked by Kyle Lesniewski): The Brewers drafted Ramirez in the 4th round in 2011 out of Cal-State Fullerton to be a power-hitting first baseman. The power has always been there as the left-handed slugger clubbed 95 home runs in 685 minor league games, but his career appeared to have stalled out after a third straight season of hitting under .250 in Class-AA. Last fall, the Brewers asked Ramirez to switch back to the other position he handled during his collegiate career: left-handed reliever. After a six year layoff, Ramirez has shown a surprisingly good feel for mound work while navigating through the Southern League. He’s appeared in 28 games and tossed 42.0 frames, yielding only a minuscule 1.50 ERA. His 29:17 K/BB rate and 3.68 FIP are a bit more pedestrian than the ERA would suggest (though he is generating an absurd amount of infield fly balls at 23.8 percent), but again this guy hadn’t pitched in over a half-decade prior to 2017. Nick has flashed a 90-91 MPH fastball along with a changeup and curveball and has been able to hold opposing lefties to just a .180 batting average against. Oh, and he also has two home runs and a 1.207 OPS in 19 plate appearances as a hitter this year, too. Ramirez is set for minor league free agency this fall if Milwaukee doesn’t add him to the 40 man roster, but a switch to the mound should certainly lengthen what appeared to be a career on life support less than a year ago.

C Mario Feliciano, A Wisconsin (picked by Craig Goldstein): Was it obvious that Lucas Erceg was the better prospect than Mario Feliciano following the 2016 draft? Certainly, Erceg was the more polished ballplayer, and his quick ascent during the 2016 season allowed him to churn the hype machine on his draft position. But, separated within the BaseballAmerica pre-draft Top 500, the two were respectively ranked #72 and #103, which is not an extreme spread and not necessarily as impactful as separating the #5 prospect from the #36 prospect. Both Erceg and Feliciano were drafted in the second round, Feliciano as a Competitive Balance pick. The reports on Feliciano were optimistic about his ability to stick behind the plate from the get go, which also theoretically gives the youngster positional advantage over Erceg. This is not to say that I expect Erceg to drop out of the 2018 Top 10 and Feliciano to leap into the Top 10 (they both could be there!), but simply that there is not a clear chasm of value between Erceg and Feliciano in the long term, and in the grand scheme Feliciano may be the better pure future value prospect.

Goldstein on Feliciano: He’s cooled off of late but he has the athleticism to catch and his bat is potent enough to handle a switch off the position should it come to that.

IF Aaron Familia, Dominican Summer (picked by Nicholas Zettel): Don’t scout the stat line, I know, I know, but if you’re going to scout the stat line there’s not many places better to do so than the Dominican Summer League. These guys are so far from the MLB as to be literal dreams, but there’s still good reason to maybe eye up some peripherals and see how the young guys in the league are performing. Familia is one of the Brewers’ 2016 signings from the July 2 period, and he returned to the Dominican Summer League after a rough first stint during his age-17 season. Now, Familia has found his footing, walking 10 times in 68 PA as of this writing, along with eight extra base hits and a .278 batting average. That walk rate is above average even for the 2017 DSL, as is the extra base hit total (the 2017 DSL has a .238 AVG with five percent of plate appearances resulting in an extra base hit). One ought to keep an eye on Familia, as the Brewers have recently been aggressive in promoting young DSL talent to the USA midseason (Franly Mallen comes to mind, for example). If Familia continues to prove himself, he could add to the bulk of amazing high risk talent at the bottom of the Brewers system.

3 Down
OF Corey Ray, Advanced A Carolina (picked by Craig Goldstein, Josh Eshleman):
At Baseball Prospectus, Christopher Crawford praised the Corey Ray pick following the 2016 draft: “He can flat out hit, and he has underrated pop from the left side. He’s also a guy who can steal 30-40 bases, and I give him at least a chance to stick at center. The upside is high, but it’s the extremely high floor that makes me love this pick. Good job, Milwaukee.” More measured debate focused on the potential issue of Ray as a ‘tweener (centerfield versus left field), with additional questions arising about how Ray’s offensive profile might play should he become a left fielder. Perhaps that high floor ‘tweener looks pretty solid, although scouting questions are eating at that high ceiling.

Goldstein on Ray: Ray hasn’t had a bad season by any means, but in my viewing he didn’t pop like you’d think a top-five selection would, a sentiment echoed by others I’ve talked to.

Eshleman on Ray: The primary concern among scouts is Ray’s hit tool, and he has struggled with velocity in 2017, a primary reason has k-rate has ballooned over 30%.

RHP Marcos Diplan, Advanced A Carolina (picked by Kyle Lesniewski): Diplan was mentioned as one of the prospects to keep an eye on in the Top 10 Prospects post from the BP main site earlier this year, but he’s struggled mightily to prevent runs ever since a midseason promotion to high-A last season. His fastball can hit the mid-90s and he flashes a plus slider, which has helped him miss bats at a rate of 9.6 K/9 this season. But his control appears to have taken a step in the wrong direction, as he’s issued walks at an 11.5 percent clip this season and has already unleashed nine wild pitches. Diplan’s diminutive stature and still-developing changeup may mean he’s already ultimately ticketed for the bullpen at some point, but a 5.77 ERA/4.82 DRA/4.71 FIP isn’t what you want to see out of a guy who is supposedly considered to be one of the org’s better pitching prospects.

2B Javier Betancourt, AA Biloxi (picked by Nicholas Zettel): What do you do with a prospect like Javier Betancourt in a professional era that fetishizes home runs, strike outs, and walks? Betancourt is exactly the opposite. The advanced ball second baseman is batting approximately 77.8 percent of balls into play for the season, which basically means that Betancourt’s strike outs, walks, and home runs total the basic strikeout rate of the typical 2017 Southern League batter. Granted, there was never a ton to dream on for Betancourt from the day the Brewers traded for him, as he’s a true glove first second baseman without a high ceiling on the bat (ex., the opposite of Isan Diaz, perhaps). Yet, I think there’s something worth looking into for nearly any young batting profile (at age-22, Betancourt is indeed among the small class of younger AA players) that can maintain a median performance for that age group at an advanced level of professional baseball. I also think it’s worth looking at Betancourt precisely because he is such a left turn from the typical Brewers prospect at the moment (all tools, lots of swing and miss, boatloads of speed and power to make up for that). A bit of a wrinkle in Betancourt’s defensive position accompanies a recent slump, but it could be worth stating that if Betancourt continues to play at 2B and 3B, a modified utility profile could escalate the odds that he gets a chance to test this all-contact profile at the MLB level.

Betancourt perhaps is the answer to a question I ask myself from time to time, is there room for “bat control” guys in contemporary MLB? Which is simply to remind everyone that iterations of baseball are subject to professional preferences (and perhaps biases). One could conceivably design an MLB based around guys like Betancourt, which raises another interesting question, namely what would we think about guys like Lewis Brinson or Demi Orimoloye or Keon Broxton if the league was all about the Betancourts? Not that the league should be all about the Betancourts, but rather what value could be found in a seemingly stalled prospect profile that nevertheless is producing at an advanced class.

Minor League Context Tables:

I cheated and included Corbin Burnes in Class-AA Biloxi because if you can’t cheat a little bit, what’s the fun?

2016 Southern League
I am opening this ongoing series by discussing the Southern League, since the Brewers have a number of top trade acquisitions assigned at their Class-AA Biloxi affiliate. Furthermore, general fan and press sentiment suggests that many of these players had disappointing seasons. This tough, dismissive judgment seems suspicious when one considers important details like Jacob Nottingham gaining the ability to work behind the dish and stick at catcher (thereby strengthening his overall value and development); personally, I would peg Nottingham as a clear Top Five prospect candidate in the system, given the overall projection of his power and the increasing understanding that the youngster has the ability to play catcher.

This is not something that someone would immediately conclude from Nottingham’s .234 / .295 / .347 AVG / OBP / SLG batting line. Yet, compared solely to age-21 prospects in the Southern League, Nottingham carried one of the heaviest workloads, produced a batting line that was near-average for age-21 players, and demonstrated better than average isolated power. A skeptic might accuse me of using statistics to put lipstick on a pig, but in fact digging into the context of Nottingham’s season shows much more value in his batting line than one might initially expect; coupled within his defensive progress, that’s a fine season for a player that is three years younger than his league’s median age.

What is quite interesting in the Southern League this year is that batting performance fluctuates quite wildly by age, as pitchers taking the plate and late season call-ups, part time players, or MLB players rehabbing injuries impact the proceedings. Simply looking at the list of players working in AA at any given time shows the hodge-podge composition of that level, and the Southern League is no different; there are 19-year old standouts like Ozhaino Albies, second chance 22-year olds like Tyrone Taylor, somewhat stalling (on the surface) names like Billy McKinney, and lots of AA veterans and organizational depth (like Nick Ramirez or Dustin DeMuth, for instance).

For this exercise, I isolated players with more than five PA. This may sound arbitrary, and in some cases it is, but an empirical glance at the list suggested that this was a reasonable cut-off to include rehabs, short call-ups, and other oddities (as well as pitchers batting), while also isolating performances like would skew data too far in the other direction (such as 0 or 1 PA performances).

Against their age group, one can now more fully judge the Brewers Class-AA 2016 campaigns. First, let’s look at the young guys:

Placing these seasons in context should illuminate a few points:

• Brett Phillips had quite a good season, even considering his slump and other issues at the plate.
• Good grief, Domingo Santana is young. Sometimes it’s easy to forget how young these guys are once they make the MLB; Santana is young even for the Southern League, let alone MLB!
• Note that someone like Tyrone Taylor, who is basically forgotten among the luxurious OF prospects returned via trade, actually had quite a solid season for his age.
• These statistics only cover the surface of judging these players’ contextual seasons, but this should be a start to offset some of the more dismissive press these players are receiving from other sources.

Here are some of the older depth players on the Shuckers:

Given the stacked young minors and top prospects that the Brewers need to fit onto their 40-man roster, it is difficult to judge whether these guys will make the MLB with Milwaukee. However, some of these players have traits that may catch with other organizations, should they find themselves out of Brewers navy come winter. A player like Kyle Wren is particularly interesting; many fans wanted to see Wren called up, but if Wren did not make the MLB in a depth OF capacity in 2015 or 2016, it’s difficult to see him protected now that the club has many other choices for the offseason.

Of course, Melvin didn’t always struggle in this facet of management. The first five years of his tenure (2003-2007) saw the Brewers draft Ryan Braun, Yovani Gallardo, Rickie Weeks, and Jonathan Lucroy, among others. Those players combined with Prince Fielder and Corey Hart, J.J. Hardy, and Bill Hall — whom the team had selected in the pre-Melvin seasons — to form a strong nucleus that helped the club make playoff runs in 2008 and 2011.

After that, however, the prospect well dried up — such that, for five years running, the Brewers have placed in the bottom five of BP’s organizational rankings:

[Note: These rankings began in 2008.]

With the aforementioned core heading to the Major Leagues, Milwaukee sorely needed to replenish its system. Melvin responded with the opposite due to the club’s competitive window. In deals for CC Sabathia, Zack Greinke, and Shaun Marcum, he sent away Matt LaPorta, Zack Jackson, Rob Bryson, Michael Brantley, Lorenzo Cain, Jake Odorizzi, Alcides Escobar, Jeremy Jeffess, and Brett Lawrie. Some of those players didn’t end up accomplishing much, but the prosperity of some of them — particularly Brantley and Cain, each of whom has played at a borderline-MVP level in the past couple years — have made many fans regret the trades retrospectively.

Inadequate drafting compounded the woes of those deals. Jack noted in his piece that the club’s picks from later years haven’t yet amounted to much. Over the past few years, teams such as the Rangers have managed to maintain a solid minor-league system despite swinging big trades, and they’ve done so by constantly restocking their affiliates through the draft and international free agency. Part of that is good scouting, too, while part of that is a willingness to spend money. Melvin’s Brewers partook in the former half of the equation while neglecting the latter half, though, and it has come back to haunt them.

With that said, Milwaukee has made recent strides. BP’s writeup of the farm system stated that it possessed “talent to makes several teams quite jealous” — a massive improvement from its standing over the past several seasons. After spending the first half of the decade in the minor-league cellar, the 2015 Brewers have taken the necessary steps to move back up to the top half.

Part of this, in fairness, happened before this year. In August, Julien Assouline analyzed the team’s drafts under Melvin, who had perhaps not received the credit he deserved. Some of Melvin’s strengths there stem from the early years, but even in the later part of his run with the Brewers, they fared moderately well. Derek Harvey commented that the club’s drafts from 2009 to 2014, under late scouting director Bruce Seid, provided them with numerous quality players that presently stock their system. Indeed, of the top-20 current Milwaukee prospects, eight — Jorge Lopez, Devin Williams, Monte Harrison, Tyrone Taylor, Jake Gatewood, Kodi Medeiros, Yadiel Rivera, and Michael Reed — came from drafts during that span, while Orlando Arcia and Gilbert Lara signed with the team as amateur free agents in that period.

Still, an improvement of this magnitude, and in this short a span, suggests something different in the past twelve months. Part of the difference stems from the 2015 draft, which has (to this point) yielded incredible rewards. Four of those top-20 prospects came to the team in June: Trent Clark, Cody Ponce, Demi Orimoloye, and Nathan Kirby. Clark stands out as the best of the bunch, but all four have intriguing upside and could continue to blossom further. New scouting director Ray Montgomery, as Harvey observed, seems to have taken off.

The team’s decision to finally rebuild has helped with that. July saw them deal away established starters Aramis Ramirez, Gerardo Parra, and Jonathan Broxton, as well as (relative) stars Carlos Gomez and Mike Fiers. Those trades — which, as J.P. Breen correctly posited, meant the team had recognized that its window has closed — brought back a great deal of prospects. Yhonathan Barrios, Zach Davies, Malik Collymore, Domingo Santana, Brett Phillips, Josh Hader, and Adrian Houser now occupy various levels of the Milwaukee system; Phillips, Davies, Houser, and Hader ranked in the top 20, while Santana has already begun to contribute at The Show. Together with Marcos Diplan, an intriguing top-20 farmhand whom the team acquired in last January’s Yovani Gallardo swap, they amount to a formidable group.

Overall, David Stearns inherited a solid amount of prospects when he became the GM in August. Surveying the trove a couple weeks before Melvin stepped down, Derek Harvey concluded that the system had gone from the bottom to the upper half of the league — a prediction that, as stated previously, we’ve likely seen come true. Stearns didn’t stop there, though. In his four-odd months atop the organization, he’s made several trades to bolster the minor- and major-league depth, further improving the system as a whole.

The first two transactions came in mid-November. Stearns swapped Cy Sneed for the Astros’ Jonathan Villar, then followed that up by shipping Francisco Rodriguez to the Tigers in exchange for Javier Betancourt and a player to be named later (catcher Manny Pina). Seth Victor described Villar at the time as “a good acquisition for a team that needs middle infield depth and flexibility,” a player who won’t make a noticeable difference yet should still provide some value. Betancourt — who rounded out the top 20 — is, in Chris Crawford’s estimation, “a high-floor prospect with a fairly well-defined ceiling.” In other words, he could become a Villar-type player a few years down the road.

After BP published its top-20 list, Stearns has made a few more moves, evidently in an effort to muck up the rankings. First came the Adam Lind trade, which brought back three young pitchers: Carlos Herrera, Daniel Missaki, and Freddy Peralta. While I can certainly see the logic in Jack’s distaste for the deal — Lind gave us something to cheer for in this dreadful 2015 season, and those players always hurt to lose — I ultimately come down on the side of J.P., who expressed cautious optimism regarding it.

Not long after that, three more prospects came to Milwaukee. The day following Lind’s departure, the Red Sox sold Garin Cecchini to the Brewers for cash considerations. BP’s Bryan Grosnick called the deal “[t]he definition of ‘buying low,'” as a disastrous 2015 had caused Cecchini’s stock to plummet. Likewise, the players Milwaukee snagged in the Rule 5 draft — Colin Walsh from the Athletics and Zack Jones from the Twins — don’t carry elite pedigrees, or much upside, for that matter.

These deals nevertheless give the Brewers plenty of options for 2016 and beyond, as J.P. outlined a few weeks ago. (Plus, the quantity acquired from these transactions only increased thereafter, when the Brewers sent Jason Rogers to the Pirates, receiving Keon Broxton and Trey Supak in return.) Overall, the solid 2015 draft, along with Stearns’s willingness to trade anything not nailed down, has translated to a complete turnaround in Milwaukee’s minor-league system.

What does this mean for 2016? Well, as J.P. pointed out, the Brewers have more routes they can take at the Major League level; although few of those will likely lead to wins, the results should give the team some clarity for 2017. More immediately, it means the Triple-A Sky Sox will presumably play better in 2016. Michael Schwarz explained how that affiliate would progress with legitimate prospects filling its roster. The biggest takeaway here, though, is general optimism. Years and years of no future, at long last, appear to have come to an end. Now, more so than at any point in recent memory, there could be hope on the Milwaukee horizon.

BP Milwaukee is digging deeper into the Brewers’ farm system, though, as Christopher Crawford and the rest of the BP Prospect Team have exclusively provided their No. 11-20 prospects for Milwaukee. The scouting information comes from Crawford (compiled and written by myself), with some of my personal thoughts coming at the end.

11.  Nathan Kirby, LHP
12. Jacob Gatewood, SS
13. Demi Orimoloye, OF

A common refrain in the Brewers’ system, none of the three prospects listed above were a part of the organization two years ago. All are intriguing pieces, but patience will be essential. Kirby was once considered a safe top-five pick before injuries knocked him to the supplemental round. His recent Tommy John surgery pushes his timeline back even further and makes his ugly 5.68 ERA in Class-A rather irrelevant. In truth, he’s not too different from fellow UVA alumni Danny Hultzen, just with a shoulder that’s not decaying.

Gatewood has massive bat speed and plus-plus power potential — as evidenced by his 40 extra-base hits in just 389 at-bats — but the contact issues prevent him from being anything more than a high-value lottery ticket. What’s crazy is that Orimoloye could have more upside than Gatewood. The Brewers’ fourth-round pick has three tools with 60 potential and showed a bit more feel for hitting than expected. He could be a Top-100 prospect by the end of the 2016 season, if his early success carries into the upcoming campaign.

14. Josh Hader, LHP
15. Adrian Houser, RHP
16. Kodi Medeiros, LHP

Hader pitched well in Double-A for the Astros organization this past year, but the left-hander kicked it into a higher gear after moving to Double-A Biloxi. He has an above-average fastball that touches 98 mph and two competent secondary offerings. Although his penchant for missing bats has garnered him a lot of attention from Brewers followers, the arm action remains ugly and difficult to project. That latter piece will unfortunately follow him until he’s able to put together a substantial body of work at the highest level.

Some folks in the industry were most impressed with Houser and his development in the second half. The command and the secondaries come and go, an inconsistency that could force him to the bullpen, but his 2.92 ERA and 4.0 percent walk rate for Double-A Biloxi illustrate the fact that he made some impressive adjustments that could help him stick as a starter if everything continues to progress.

Medeiros isn’t too different from Hader, just a couple levels his junior. The lefty has some strong supporters in the industry who believe in his devastating fastball-slider combination, while some are heavy detractors due to his poor changeup, bad mechanics, and non-ideal size. On the bright side, the 19-year-old handled an aggressive promotion to full-season ball and didn’t allow a single home run in 93.1 innings. He could ultimately be a reliever, but he could be a darn good one.

17. Yadiel Rivera, SS
18. Marcos Diplan, RHP
19. Michael Reed, OF
20. Javier Betancourt, 2B

The final quartet is a mixed bag, with potential bench bats and a talented young pitcher with extreme variance in his potential outcomes. Rivera and Betancourt are glove-first middle infielders (at shortstop and second base, respectively) with little chance to do anything special with the bat. Betancourt has a bit more bat speed and more feel for the barrel, but Rivera is one of the best defensive shortstops in all the minors. While they’re a pair of unexciting prospects, small-market organizations need to develop quality bench players to ensure they don’t have to overspend for them in free agency.

Speaking of homegrown reserves, Reed may be the perfect fourth outfielder. No standout tools and a lack of physical projectability limit his ceiling, but he’s well-rounded, smart, and can provide quality defense in the corner outfield spots. He hit .278/.379/.422 in Double-A. The power needs to take a real step forward, though, if he’s going to stick as an everyday guy.

Diplan is another guy with big stuff and a small body, so all the natural question marks pertain. He posted a 3.75 ERA in 50.1 innings for Helena in the Pioneer League, striking out an impressive 25.7 percent of the batters he faced. At 19 years old and ages away from being anything concrete, he’s a wild card in the system.

BREEN’S TAKE

Although the above list is grouped in three tiers, it should be noted that a significant drop-off exists between Kodi Medeiros and Yadiel Rivera, at least for me. The top-16 prospects can largely be ordered however you’d like. Personal preference matters. I know at least one scout who would push Hader and Houser into the top-10, another who would demand for Orimoloye to be ranked higher, and yet another who would balk at Kirby’s omission from the top-10 list. That’s how these things go, which is why all prospect lists should be read for their content much more than the individual ranking slots.

Still, the future of the Brewers’ system depends on the development of many of these players. If Hader, Houser, and Medeiros ultimately wind up as sure-fire relievers, this list suddenly has a different complexion. Similarly, if Gatewood cuts down the strikeouts and continues to hit for power and Orimoloye enjoys more success in 2016, the Brewers will have a plethora of high-end offensive prospects that should help them shorten their rebuilding process. And if general manager David Stearns bolsters the system with additional trades this winter, things look even more promising.

I believe the most encouraging aspect of Baseball Prospectus’ top-20 Brewers prospects is what is not present. Guys like Clint Coulter, Tyler Wagner, Damien Magnifico, and Miguel Diaz have legitimate big-league potential (to varying degrees and with different timelines, of course) and couldn’t crack either of the lists. Those will certainly feel like oversights to some people, but it’s really splitting hairs whether someone is ranked No. 17 or No. 23. The real takeaway is the fact that the Brewers have enough depth to have 20-plus prospects with legitimate big-league potential.

And given the fact that David Stearns has already shown a willingness to move Major League players for prospects, the full-blown rebuilding process in Milwaukee has a chance to be less painful than the one that happened in Chicago or Houston. A fan can’t ask for anything more than that.

In general, a lot of things go into a trade. All potential trade partners have to be explored, the loss of that particular player has to be justified by the return for both parties, one owner may have to agree to take on extra salary, and scouts and analytics departments have to agree on the cost-benefit analysis of taking on a new player and all they bring to the table. That means having previously scouted the players yourselves and having near-exhaustive knowledge of their tools.

What’s really interesting though is the timing of the deal. It’s not as if an absolute smorgasbord of closers are reportedly on the market. There’s Aroldis Chapman. Maybe Ken Giles, if you’d like to already grant him the closer’s title. That’s it. Craig Kimbrel has already been dealt. It should be noted that perhaps the fact that Kimbrel has already been traded tells us that although it seems so publicly, the closer market isn’t so thin. Or the overwhelming return for Kimbrel made it too good to pass up. We don’t know. Stearns—or any front office person—would know this much better than us outsiders.

I don’t have any insider information here, nor do I mean to pretend to. However, let’s move forward assuming the closer market is actually more saturated than previously thought. It’s not even that much of a stretch, considering the fact that Andrew Miller is also rumored to be on the market. Say that, hypothetically, a lot of teams expect Darren O’Day to close as well. Frankly, those are very believable scenarios. It wouldn’t be too difficult to imagine a couple more of your own hypothetical situations. Kudos, then, goes to Stearns for being able to get a non-zero return for K-Rod.

But still, why now?

If O’Day is expected to close, that saga will end soon enough—the reliever market is stagnating until he signs as a free agent. If Miller gets dealt, the Yankees would reportedly be looking for a massive return. Despite playing the same position, the difference in quality between Miller and Rodriguez means we’re probably looking at a different market of teams. Add to the mix that the Cincinnati Reds are actively shopping Chapman and reportedly want him dealt this offseason. It seems that we have a curious case for trading away a second-tier closer before other, bigger chips fall into place and teams get desperate.

After all, what did the Brewers have to lose by keeping Rodriguez while other aspects of the team are addressed first? In fact, there’s a case to be made that trading away Rodriguez right now is selling as low as you can on a player. Nick Lampe wrote a great article over at Beyond the Box Score where he broke down the differences between offseason and trade deadline deals. His conclusion, while tentative, was that “there does appear to be some evidence that teams pay a significantly higher price … to acquire marginal wins at the trade deadline.”

If that’s true, though, why would Kimbrel have garnered such a huge return during the offseason? As Ben Carsley over at BP Boston wrote, the Red Sox “gave up two–two!–top-100 prospect types and two more lottery tickets for a relief pitcher.” That’s a huge return, no matter if you buy the ‘proven closer’ narrative or not. Perhaps a shift is beginning in how contending teams acquire elite relief pitchers. When Jonathan Papelbon got traded mid-season, it was for a Double-A prospect who lacks upside. Of course, it’s worth noting that Papelbon is considered to be overpaid and has a slew of clubhouse issues attached to him.

Moving even further, perhaps Stearns believes that selling a closer mid-season will become harder now that the outcome of the Papelbon deal has happened. That is to say, Papelbon’s post-trade antics have given a bad name to closers with tempers everywhere. Rodriguez doesn’t have Papelbon’s track record, but at the same time, he’s been known to get into some altercations of his own. K-Rod is hypothetically one outburst away from being much more difficult to trade. Furthermore, Stearns could just want the right-hander not involved in anything come spring training. Perhaps K-Rod had even privately expressed concern for closing for a losing team. Who knows what is happening on the inside? Nonetheless, J.P. Breen did a great job of breaking down why Stearns would want to be rid of Rodriguez sooner rather than later.

With all of that being said, the offseason still seems like an odd time to trade a non-elite closer. Rodriguez is a ‘proven closer’ (someone still believes in that, right?) on a contract that is pretty team-friendly. With his current deal technically expiring at the end of the 2016 season (though it does have a $8 million team option for 2017), Rodriguez would be one of the optimal ‘rental relievers for a pennant race team at the trade deadline’ candidates. Furthermore, the return of the trade is fairly comparable to the Papelbon trade who gets paid quite a bit more than K-Rod.

New Brewers prospect Javier Betancourt could have upside, but although he is still quite young, his bat has already had trouble adjusting at the High-A level. Stearns and his front office could be really high on Betancourt, however, there’s a large chance that at the 2016 trade deadline—at the very least—a similar deal would still be available. It’s perfectly conceivable that a better deal could have even come up, too. According to one report from The Detroit News, Betancourt’s future value is only 45 (not an everyday player). That’s a far-cry from the Andrew Miller trade that took place during the 2014 season in which the Red Sox acquired a prospect with a future value of 60 in Eduardo Rodriguez. Certainly K-Rod and Miller aren’t fully comparable pieces, however, Miller did end up being a rental pitcher for the Orioles.

The fact is that the move is by no means a bad one for Stearns. A closer on a team that isn’t expected to win a lot of games is a strange asset to keep. It’s just a weird time to pull the trigger on such a mediocre return. Kimbrel just got traded for two top-100 prospects. Chapman is going to fetch a similar return for the Reds perhaps shortly. O’Day could sign a deal that only the Dodgers will afford. Giles has been linked in rumors to two or three high-level prospects. That makes K-Rod a really unique asset. He’s second-tier compared to these guys which could have made him appealing to a much broader array of teams. Everyone can afford a K-Rod, not everyone can afford a Kimbrel or an O’Day. All the first-tier players could have settled into their own teams and it wouldn’t have affected Rodriguez’s trade value one iota.

In the end, this trade will likely be a footnote in Stearns’ tenure as Brewers GM. It won’t matter if Betancourt pans out or not, getting rid of Rodriguez was a good move. However, for one of his first moves, the timing didn’t exactly show patient baseball acumen.

Baseball Prospectus || Detroit 2016 Top Prospects (Nov. 17, 2015) 

In a fantastic bit of fortuitous timing, BP released their annual list of Top-10 prospects for the Tigers just hours before one of them, eighth-ranked 2B Javier Betancourt, was dealt to Milwaukee for closer high-leverage reliever Francisco Rodriguez. Brewers fans that don’t care about the soul of their favorite baseball team will lament the departure of K-Rod, who has actually done a pretty good job re-inventing himself as a finesse pitcher as his fastball’s velocity has fallen into the high-80s.  The rest of bid good riddance to bad rubbish as K-Rod takes his tired “athlete with domestic violence issues” act across Lake Michigan, where we can only hope he will not view the change in scenery as license to get physical again after run-ins with the law at his last two stops in New York and Milwaukee.

Climbing Tal’s Hill || Houston Astros 2015 Season Recap: Jonathan Villar (Nov. 3, 2015)

Naturally, after a trade, writers for both teams are going to have some things to say about the players both coming and going. However, I find that the recent transaction often colors this analysis in one way or another, so when I’m looking for an honest assessment of a player, I want to find out what the locals were saying before they knew anything about a potential move. That’s what I’ve found here in this post from earlier this month from Aric Cisneros (@ariccisneros) over at Climbling Tal’s Hill, the Astros wing of Sports Illustrated’s FanSided network. The Brewers acquired SS Jonathan Villar from Houston on Thursday in exchange for Double-A starter Cy Sneed. Villar became something of a pariah for Astros fans as they impatiently awaited the arrival of Carlos Correa even though, as Cisneros points out, his numbers compare very favorably with ALCS MVP Alcides Escobar, who will never pay for a drink in Kansas City again.

Baseball America || Trade Central: Astros Clear 40-Man Spot With VIllar Trade (Nov. 19, 2015)

J.J. Cooper (@jjcoop36) brings his own analysis of the trade between Milwaukee and Houston on Thursday. While Villar is out of options, limiting Milwaukee’s flexibility with the 25-man roster somewhat, he isn’t arbitration-eligible until 2018 at the earliest, making him a very inexpensive option in the infield for the next couple of years. For Astros, perhaps the most immediatley valuable piece they received in the deal is the cleared spot on their 40-man roster on the eve of deadline for protection from the Rule 5 draft. Sneed’s ceiling is generally regarded as back-of-the-rotation starter, and he’s more likely to end up as Quad-A organizational depth.

Brew Crew Ball || SB Nation’s MLB Off-season Simulation: Faking a Brewers Rebuild (Nov. 18, 2015)

Okay enough with real #HotStove moves, let’s talk about some nonsense. I swear I’m not going to do this often, but I had a lot of fun both completing this simulation and writing about what I did, and I want to share it with y’all. Each November, Max Rieper (@maxrieper) at Royal’s Review, SB Nation’s Royals blog, gathers 30 of SBN’s writers to take over General Manager duties for each team and let’s them simulate the off-season over the course of the week. I had the keys to the Brewers front office this season, and made some moves in an effort to both improve the current MLB roster and bolster the minor league system, while slashing the payroll under $80 million. If you’ve got time for 3,000 words of pure nonsense, feel free to take a look.

The Brewers traded Francisco Rodriguez to the Detroit Tigers on Wednesday morning in return for infield prospect Javier Betancourt and a player to be named later.

It hasn’t always been a perfect fit, but the right-hander has remained in Milwaukee for several reasons:

(1) He’s long been adamant that he prefers to close ballgames. Because the Brewers have historically struggled to develop high-end arms in their farm system, Milwaukee hasn’t had a closer-in-waiting to justify parting ways with Rodriguez. His clearest path to the ninth inning has been with the blue and gold.

(2) Doug Melvin and the coaching staff trusted K-Rod as a positive clubhouse presence. The 33-year-old mentored young Latin American players and displayed a strong work ethic that his fellow relievers could model. Numerous stories can illustrate Rodriguez’s positive affect behind closed doors; however, a recent tweet from Elian Herrera perhaps best sums up his clubhouse value. Although many fans dislike the unquantifiable nature of “clubhouse presence,” I’ve come to appreciate the importance of positive role models for young players. And that’s not uncommon in life. As children and young professionals, we all have benefited from mentors, as we all naturally seek to mimic the successful. K-Rod served that role beautifully for the Brewers during his time in the organization.

(3) The small and familiar market of Milwaukee allowed Francisco Rodriguez to hide his horrific history of domestic abuse accusations. The story benefited from a benign neglect in the Brewers’ media market — something that came up from time to time when trade rumors surfaced, but rarely discussed because it didn’t attract eyeballs. After all, the vast majority of Brewers fans knew about it and either chose to disgruntedly tolerate it or willfully forget about it. Moving to a new (especially larger media market) always risked the possibility that such a story caught national headlines and became a scandal. That was never a risk in Milwaukee.

In the end, though, Rodriguez kept re-signing with the Brewers because Doug Melvin valued him. The club’s former general manager believed in the right-hander’s ability to adapt to declining stuff and believed in his underlying peripherals. That trust paid off in 2013 when the Brewers were able to trade K-Rod to Baltimore for Nick Delmonico — which seemed like a solid return at the time — and did so again in 2015 when he saved 38 game and compiled a spectacular 2.21 ERA. As the rest of us (myself included) saw a pitcher declining, Melvin saw a pitcher evolving. I covered this more in-depth at Baseball Prospectus a couple weeks ago.

This long-standing relationship is likely why K-Rod continuously ended up back in Milwaukee and why the organization failed to trade him this past summer. The veteran reliever was more valuable to the Brewers organization than he was to any other organization in baseball. He had more than on-the-field value to the club and didn’t have the same off-the-field detractions that he would elsewhere. It’s overwhelmingly likely that the Brewers never received an offer they considered to be worth more than the value Rodriguez already provided.

The restructuring of the Brewers’ front office and the complete transition to David Stearns altered the calculus in this equation. I opined earlier this week that Stearns wouldn’t have the same loyalty to Francisco Rodriguez and may not value his clubhouse presence as highly as Melvin, all of which would probably lead to an offseason trade. That came to fruition on Wednesday.

In return, Milwaukee received 20-year-old Javier Betancourt, a middle infielder who hit .263/.304/.336 with the Tigers’ High-A affiliate, the Lakeland Flying Tigers. On Wednesday (by coincidence, surely) Baseball Prospectus rated Betancourt as the eighth-best prospect in Detroit’s minor-league system. The Tigers may have the worst farm system in all of baseball — which means such a high ranking isn’t much of a compliment — but the Venezuelan native does have some tools that could eventually push him to The Show.

Betancourt is a high-floor prospect with a fairly well-defined ceiling. Despite showing some barrel control that could give him a league-average hit tool, he’ll offer next-to-nothing offensively. The power projects to be non-existent, and he won’t walk much. He’s someone who could hit .270-.275 with a .310-.320 OBP and fewer than five homers. That’s essentially what Scooter Gennett did for the big-league club in 2015, and he was barely a replacement-level player. What differentiates Betancourt, though, is the glove. He can pass at shortstop in short bursts and is an above-average defender at second base, making him a potentially useful utility infielder.

Such prospects are unexciting. He doesn’t break the top-20 in the Brewers’ minor-league system, for me, and will need a lot to go right if he’s going to be anything more than a glove-first bench player. In a trade that effectively dumps $9.5 million and frees up a 40-man roster spot, though, someone like Betancourt is a nifty return. It adds youth and versatility. It adds a lower-risk prospect in a minor-league system that is flush with high-end, volatile players. Moreover, it provides depth in the middle infield, which is an under-appreciated luxury in today’s game. In short, Betancourt shouldn’t be penciled into any future Brewers’ roster, but he represents good business. That’s always commendable.

More importantly, trading Francisco Rodriguez to Detroit signals that David Stearns has assumed full control of the Milwaukee Brewers. He’s a general manager with no connections to the veterans of the big-league club and few connections to the minor-league system, which means he doesn’t have any favorites. He’s not afraid or unwilling to trade someone. He’s open-minded and simply focused on positive baseball value and acquiring as many young players as possible in the franchise’s current transition.

This should be a strong hint that past reluctance to discuss Jonathan Lucroy, Ryan Braun, or Adam Lind with other clubs is no longer applicable. David Stearns is his own man with his own staff and his own philosophies. Doug Melvin remains connected to the club as an advisor, but I believe this K-Rod trade illustrates the extent of the relationship between the two front-office members. The former GM has no residual power. He won’t be a shadow that looms over the Stearns regime. He’s precisely what his title implies: an advisor.

I don’t think that Francisco Rodriguez’s departure can be construed as proof of a “full rebuild” or the beginning of a true “fire sale” — whatever connotation one wants to place on those words — as this is a move that should have been completed a half-dozen months ago. Stearns simply changed the valuation calculus. Perhaps this will also prove true for players like Lucroy and Braun. I’m not sure. What this trade does symbolize, though, is that David Stearns is unquestionably in control of the Milwaukee Brewers franchise, and that’s a huge positive for the fan base. Power struggles in baseball front offices never end well for the on-the-field product. And if there was any lingering concern about that in Milwaukee, I think this clearly snuffs out the flame.