Sheets watch (closed in deference to new thread)

[bbaehman]

Sheets will sign in Houston or Texas...that's according to a very good source

[hauser42]

Brittle Ben will not be wearing a Brewer uniform nect year. I hope he goes to Hou for next season, they could use a top end guy like that to waste away on the bench.

[DHonks]

I don't see Sheets pitching for an NL team outside of the Brewers. He likely doesn't want to hit

[And That]

The Rangers sound like a good fit. Nearish to his home, and they're always desperate for pitching. They might give him 5 years, just to get him.

[rluzinski]

Brittle Ben will not be wearing a Brewer uniform nect year. I hope he goes to Hou for next season, they could use a top end guy like that to waste away on the bench.

 

Sheets pitching a 3.4 ERA over 160 innings would obviously make them a worse team? I'd love if you could explain how you worked that out in your head.

[Ennder]

hauser42 has an unnatural hatred of Sheets so I wouldn't bother with it.

 

Sheets biggest flaw is that he is a flyball pitcher, I think he'd probably be better off going to a pitcher park. He could do ok anywhere because he is just that good but to play to his strength he should be in a non HR hitting park.

[endaround]

Sheets could dominate in LA

[logan82]

I am not sure Sheets would do well in Colorado. Other than that I agree he will do well anywhere.

[nate82]

Sheets will sign in Houston or Texas...that's according to a very good source

Sheets would have to take a pay cut if he goes to Houston. The last I heard about Houston going after free agents was that they would be signing there own free agents and if they don't do that they won't spend this winter. The Rangers feel confident in Padilla and Millwood why I don't know but they do. I don't see either of those two teams even offering Sheets a contract.

[honuswagner21]

Someone correct me if I am wrong but I remember hearing that Sheets now lives in Dallas and not Louisiana which certainly puts the Rangers on the map. But I am on board with the possibility that he accepts arbitration and takes a 1 year deal with Milwaukee. If not, Houston, Atlanta, or Texas are the call for me.

[GenoSeligPrieb]

All I keep reading is that Roy Oswalt is recruiting him to the Astros, and that the Yankees could try to sign him if they don't get CC or trade for Peavy.

 

I'm fine with either possibility. Houston could wind up handcuffing themselves, financially, with his contract, when he heads to the DL. But I don't rule out the Yankees because they can pee money away on any banged up, overpriced free agent they want, at any time. $13 or $15 million a year, sitting on the Disabled List? Nothing new or troubling for them.

 

Honestly, the highest I'd offer Ben to stay, would be 3 years @ $25,000,000, tops. I know that won't get it done, because some free-spending team who doesn't look at the consequences of their payroll decisions, and who feels their roll of the dice on such an injury-prone starting pitcher will be lucky (the Yankees, maybe someone like Seattle or Arizona) will sign him for probably 5 years, $75 million. And I say, mazel tov!...go for it!

 

My patience with Sheets ran out when we needed him most a few weeks ago, and he came up injured yet again. I'm not saying he was dogging it, but the fact was that he didn't answer the bell. We're so used to operating without him for so long, that it shouldn't be tough to patch together a Sheets-free rotation in '09.

 

I could even see DM phoning Jack Zdiurencik, and kicking the tires on an Erik Bedard, for a few of our nuggets Jack scouted. I'm not saying that's the ultimate solution, but I wouldn't be shocked if I heard something like that....

[thebruce44]

Not to hijack, but I foresee a lot of Brewers-Mariners trades in the future as Geno said. Seems like this always happens when two franchises are tied together in any sport(Brewers-Toronto-Texas, Packers-Seattle).

[Oldcity]

Bedard is a bigger injury risk than Sheets. I'd much rather try to re-sign Sheets before I gave up players for Bedard.

[rluzinski]

"We're so used to operating without him for so long, that it shouldn't be tough to patch together a Sheets-free rotation in '09."

 

All we'll have to do is find a someone who can put up a 3.5 ERA for 150 IP next year. How hard could that be?

[GenoSeligPrieb]

"Bedard is a bigger injury risk than Sheets. I'd much rather try to re-sign Sheets before I gave up players for Bedard. "

 

Stevo:

 

I'm not saying that's the way I'd prefer to go, or anything. I'm just saying that Bedard's price will be temporarily low, and Jack Z may be open to dealing with us for some of the nuggets that he thought had talent, back when he was here. Hell, Doug STILL yearns for ex-Rangers.

 

And do you REALLY think Erik Bedard (3 trips to the DL in 4+ years), is more of an injury risk than Sheets (8 times in 6 years)? Nah. In fact, other than, say, Mark Prior, off-hand I can't think of any pitcher in the game who's a bigger injury risk than Sheets.

 

"All we'll have to do is find a someone who can put up a 3.5 ERA for 150 IP next year. How hard could that be?"

 

It'll be easy, Russ. YoGa seems capable of that, at least. And my money says he'll stay a lot healthier.

 

Again, I'm not saying Sheets is not a terrific pitcher...when he's out there. Put it this way: I'd rather pay a starting pitcher $8-10,000,000 a year, for a 4-ish ERA, as long as he gives us at least 200 IP, than give Sheets and his 3.5 ERA more than $13,000,000 if we'll still need a starting pitcher to take at least 10 of the starts he misses every season.

[Ennder]

And do you REALLY think Erik Bedard (3 trips to the DL in 4+ years), is more of an injury risk than Sheets (8 times in 6 years)? Nah. In fact, other than, say, Mark Prior, off-hand I can't think of any pitcher in the game who's a bigger injury risk than Sheets

 

Without a doubt he is a much bigger risk. His injuries are a lot scarier and in areas that are much more likely to repeat. Sheets isn't even in the top 20% of starting pitchers in injury risk if you are talking 'expected' days lost for the season.

 

What he needs is a team that will try not to push him too much instead of Yost who abused him more than almost any other pitcher in baseball this year. I still blame Yost as much as Sheets for the problems in September.

[phxMILWfan]

"Bedard is a bigger injury risk than Sheets. I'd much rather try to re-sign Sheets before I gave up players for Bedard. "

 

Stevo:

 

Again, I'm not saying Sheets is not a terrific pitcher...when he's out there. Put it this way: I'd rather pay a starting pitcher $8-10,000,000 a year, for a 4-ish ERA, as long as he gives us at least 200 IP, than give Sheets and his 3.5 ERA more than $13,000,000 if we'll still need a starting pitcher to take at least 10 of the starts he misses every season.

Don't take this the wrong way but that 4-ish ERA that throws 200IP is Suppan... I don't know that I'd rather have him.

[hauser42]

Brittle Ben will not be wearing a Brewer uniform nect year. I hope he goes to Hou for next season, they could use a top end guy like that to waste away on the bench.

 

Sheets pitching a 3.4 ERA over 160 innings would obviously make them a worse team? I'd love if you could explain how you worked that out in your head.

Brittle Ben will show up and the Stros will have wasted a ton of money on a player that will never play enough to help the team get over the hump.

 

Ender I do dislike Sheets. I preached it all seaso long when the team needed him the most he would not be there for his teammates. Yes once again he got injured and was not there at the end of the season when they needed him. He tried to gut out a game, but that surely turned out horrible. Sheets has a ton of talent, but he is missing something that will keep him from really reaching that level. He has injuries every season and really lacks the killer attitude needed. Once CC came over he should have stepped it up to make it two great top guys going for the Brewers, no he goes into a swoon and let the team almost miss the playoffs. Keep bring up those great seasons and numbers of the past when this team had talent around him, he could not get the job done.

[Ennder]

Ender I do dislike Sheets. I preached it all seaso long when the team needed him the most he would not be there for his teammates. Yes once again he got injured and was not there at the end of the season when they needed him.

Everyone is entitled to their own opinion but this paragraph more or less sums up everything I dislike about the Joe Morgan side of baseball. The only pitcher ont he team that was there when 'we needed them' was Dave Bush. Parra tanked the last month+, Sabathia tanked in the playoffs, Suppan tanked the last month+. Going into the season I expected 180 IP or so out of Sheets given his recent years. Yost decided to use him such that he was in the top 5 in PAP going into Sept and the team payed the price for a bad manager yet again. Sheets was hardly the problem with the team.

 

You seem to suffer from unrealistic expectations for pitchers. Only 9 pitchers in all of baseball have gone 200+ IP the last 3 years. Only 15 went 200+ IP each of the last 2 seasons. If you go to 4 years it is something like 5 pitchers in all of baseball. 200+ IP is the exception with pitchers and not the rule. You should expect 150-180 IP from most pitchers each year and you can't count on any pitcher 'being there' come the playoffs. It is why teams build around offense and play for depth in pitching. It is the reality of baseball. Sheets is not some loser who has gone out of his way to get hurt and is a freak of nature. He is a pitcher and at least 90% of them go through major injuries every 5-6 years and a good 10-15% of them lose their seasons/careers to injury every year. Over 33% of all pitchers end up on the DL every single year and pitchers slated for a job in the starting rotation is more like 40%. You should expect 2 of your 5 starters to end up on the DL and probably at least 2 of your pitchers who start the year on the roster to end the year on the DL.

 

Taking it a step forward Sheets is the classic example of a pitcher mishandled by an organization. He had a bad back in 2004 but they still decided to increase his pitch count by 250 pitches that season. He had surgery in the off season and developed his shoulder issues the next year. They tried to bring him back about 4 months early for no good reason and he aggravated the injury. Then after 156, 106 and 141 IP Yost pushes him hard all year putting him in the league leaders in PAP, he starts to have arm soreness in September and Yost proceeds to stick him out there for 120 pitches on Sept 6th and then 113 pitches in just 6 innings on Sept 11th. If you really have to lash out at someone for Sheets failure to finish the season stick a big red bullseye on Yost who completely misused him during his career and especially this year.

 

Five years from now when Sabathia and/or Lincecum have had major arm surgery and missed significant playtime we'll hear the same tripe about them, that they just can't stay healthy and aren't tough and blah blah blah but the reality will be they were mismanaged and got hurt and it is just part of baseball. It is revisionist history without a care for the reality of the situations.

[sveumrules]

i agree that the idea that sheets somehow wasn't there when his team needed him is pretty off base. so they didn't need him for those 198 innings that he put up a top 5 era in the league? how meaningful are those september games if sheets hadn't pitched like the top end starter he is for the first five months?

[rluzinski]

Yo is one injury away from getting labeled "injury prone" by the fans himself. And I was talking about replacing Sheets with a free agent, which you will never be able to do. A 3.5 ERA over 160 P is worth a heck of a lot more than many seem to realize. $13-15 mil in arbitration? Sold! If a #6 type pitcher has to chip in a 5.0 ERA over 50 IP, you are still doing very well for yourself vs. whatever you'd get in free agency for the same price. Exactly how many true sub 4 ERA free agent pitchers are out there without an injury history of their own?

 

The only pitcher on the team that was there when 'we needed them' was Dave Bush. Parra tanked the last month+, Sabathia tanked in the playoffs, Suppan tanked the last month+.

 

Which goes back to a point I made in a different thread. Had Sheets been able to keep pitching but had a 5.0+ ERA over the last 2-3 starts, somehow many fans would have determined that he had a better overall season. It's OK to pitch poorly; just don't miss a start.

[GenoSeligPrieb]

"Don't take this the wrong way but that 4-ish ERA that throws 200IP is Suppan... I don't know that I'd rather have him. "

 

Phoenix:

 

If Suppan were indeed capable of an ERA at the 4.00 mark, his 4 year, $42,000,000 deal would have been worth it. But he's not that guy. He'll give you a 4.80-ish ERA, which isn't even close.

 

If I were to pull a prototype out of my hindquarters here, I'd say a solid SP who DM should at least inquire about this winter, with that 4.00-ish ERA and 200+ IP, is...maybe a John Parrish from Baltimore, a Kyle Davies from KC, a John Lannon from Washington... I'm not saying Doug should just pull up his shopping cart and take whomever he wants off the shelves, like the Yankees can and have, but that's the type I'd target. Not that expensive, under 30, on the way up, all that. Again, it may prove difficult to pull off this type of deal, but if we can get that kind of production, I'd be satisfied, since I don't expect us to land a major star SP anyway. Hell, if we wind up with CC, YoGa, One of the guys I listed above, along with Bush/McClung and Suppan, there are few teams who can line up that well.

 

OK, if CC goes elsewhere, and Sheets leaves, too, then we DO have some pricey salary slots available, and since our offense is fine, then maybe we can get someone to take our money, and perhaps bring in a solid veteran like a Derek Lowe or an AJ Burnett to help YoGa anchor the rotation. But again, free agents tend not to take our offers, so we may have to trade a nugget or 2 to make it happen.

[endaround]

Yes get rid of that injury prone Sheets and bring in AJ Burnett!

[1992casey]

This topic has been added to the Designated Threads List.

[Oldcity]

Yes, A.J. Burnett and Bedard are much bigger risks--Not because of the amount of DL trips but because of the severity and type of injuries they've had.