Hoffman to Brewers, 1 year for $6 mil plus $1.5 mil in incentives

[craigharmann]

TH's updated blog says no club option. Just 2009. Works for me. I love it!!

[Patrick425]

I have the Brewers at around $75 mil right now, which might be a few million on the high side.

 

 

 

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Ahh, I was not accounting for the the fact that several of those players would not be on the opening day roster.

[Mike Felder]

I'm a big fan of all-time saves leaders playing for Milwaukee.

 

http://www.baseball-reference.com/bpv/images/d/d2/Fingersrollie.jpg

 

Just watch your elbow, Trevor. Oh, and pay your taxes. Welcome aboard!

[Bernman23]

7 of the 8 Hrs he allowed were in pitcher friendly Petco Park.

How is that a negative sign, exactly? Unless he wrote into his contract that the team would fly to Petco every time he got called up in the 9th inning for a save opportunity, it's actually a positive sign. One should be more concerned if he was artificially benefiting off the friendly environment for pitchers in San Diego. Actually, the reverse happened. He pitched much better in road parks, like Miller. Where he will ply his trade for about half his appearances in 2009. A fact which I'm very excited about, especially because he won't be phased by pressure ala a Mota or Gagne (when his confidence was fleeting post PED's). That's what makes pitching in the 9th different than any other situation, on average (I realize that's not ALWAYS the most important inning/situation of a game though). To wit who cares about the current nastiness of his stuff, or any closer for that matter. Just as long as they are able to retire batters.

 

I agree though, a top flite starter will be more impactful to the team (especially with how inconsistent the offense projects to be again, we need a slump buster), and I hope this move doesn't preclude it like Doug had seemed to imply in previous interviews. Maybe he was just being coy though for bargaining leverage.

[aracko]

Once again - Hats off to Mark A.

[TooLiveBrew]

I heart Doug Melvin. Great work, Doug.

 

 

Going for on one year makes the contract so much more valuable.

 

Totally agree. This deal is a great fit for both parties, and honestly I'm surprised Hoff chose the Crew over the Dodgers.

[giffted1]

Fantastic work by Doug and co.

 

Hoffman's age is a bit of a concern but he was still effective last year, and a one year deal for a reasonable amount makes it much less risky. This move allows us to use CV in high leverage situations throughout the game rather than just the ninth which would have likely happened if he was named closer. Also by adding another reliever we have the flexibility to move a guy like McClung to the rotation. Finally some good news in what has been a dreary off season for the most part.

[TuesdaysWithRillo]

Well let's start out with the predictions.

 

I say 35 saves with a 3.5 ERA in 60 innings of work.

[PeaveyFury]

From Tom's latest blog on the incentives:

 

Hoffman will reach all of the incentives if he finishes 52 games this season. The incentives start kicking in at 35 games finished.

 

http://www.jsonline.com/blogs/sports/37275114.html

[brewerguy71]

I dont think this is a monumental move or anything, but it is a nice pick up.

 

Lets not forget that he still is 41 years old and his best pitch is a 74 mph changeup.

 

I am kind of baffled at the exuberance by fans regarding next years team. The pitching staff is an all out mess imo. Gallardo has the potential to be an ace, Parra is an injury risk imo, and the rest of the rotation is bottom end loaded. The bullpen now has a 41 year old closer, a guy who is coming off of surgery and was quite ineffective last year (Riske), another whos best years are behind him (Julio) and a couple of guys who can do nice work in Villanueva (never can be the closer) and McClung (one pitch pitcher, no where else that he can be effective other than as a set up guy).

 

And all of this talk about bringing Sheets back is pretty alarming too. There is a reason why he hasnt gotten a lot of attention this offseason.....his arm is injured. Why would anyone want him back? The team didnt want him back when he was healthy.

 

Hoffman is a nice pick up, but I still see this team as a 83-84 win team next year. (Healthy) Sheets and Sabathia losses are going to keep this team quite far from how they finished last season in the standings.

[brewmann04]

Now Doug find us a Starter and add Abreu and it would be a nice offseason.

[MessiahRp]

Woo Hoo!!!! Closer.... CHECK!!! Next up hopefully a call to Sheets to come back home!

Melvin certainly made it sound like if we got a closer we would not go after a starter (and vice versa if we had gotten a starter) because he feels McClung can handle the load on the other end. This was from his 1250 WSSP Interview with Sparky a couple days back.

 

Rp

[steve267268]

I really don't understand why Mark A. gets kudos for this. Doug Melvin, yes. But Mark A.? Yes, thank you, Mark, for reaching EXXXTTTRRAA deep into those pockets to pull out the 7.5 Million it took to seal the deal. By today's baseball standards, that is just not a lot of money. If i were to find out that we DIDN'T get Hoffman because we only wanted to give him 6.5, i would be furious. This type of move, from an ownership standpoint, is to be expected.

 

In 2004, we decided to give Sheets about 10 million per. He was one of the best pitchers in the game at that point! Even in that year, it could be argued that 7.5 wasn't an extraordinary amount to pay a closer. Fast forward to 2009, and we will be looking at between 12-15 million to retain Sheets, who isn't as healthy as he was in 2004. He's not as good as he was in 2004. And he's not about to get any better. He has peaked, yet we would potentially pay him 12-14 million. Inflation, Suppy and Demand, call it whatever you want to call it. If Mark A. dishes out THAT kind of money for Sheets, I will personally write him a thank you note. Not that Sheets deserves that much, but we need Sheets if only for the possibility that he could have two out of three somewhat injury free seasons of <3.33 ERA.

[TooLiveBrew]

Lets not forget that he still is 41 years old and his best pitch is a 74 mph changeup.

 

Unless I've missed new reports, it's still regarded as one of the best changeups in the game. The velocity really isn't super important when the m.o. is changing speeds. Though I do think that in general we shouldn't be expecting the Trevor Hoffman that his reputation is built upon. I'm not enough of an expert to know all the why's & how's, but his FIP was an unspectacular 3.99 in 2008... even with a bit of good luck on the .268 BABIP (career .280). One thing I see is that both his LD% was down & GB% up outside of career norms, so perhaps that's where the lower WHIP came from relative to FIP? Not sure.

 

 

The team didnt want him back when he was healthy.

 

Based on what? Didn't they wanted to offer him arbitration after the season & go from there?

[PeaveyFury]

Melvin certainly made it sound like if we got a closer we would not go after a starter (and vice versa if we had gotten a starter) because he feels McClung can handle the load on the other end. This was from his 1250 WSSP Interview with Sparky a couple days back.

 

Melvin is also very misleading through the media. We had no interest in bringing in Trevor Hoffman 2 weeks or so ago.

[thebruce44]

I am kind of baffled at the exuberance by fans regarding next years team.

 

People are excited because this was a playoff team last year while dealing with injuries in the rotation and every offensive player underachieving besides JJ. I can go through the numbers if you like, but I think it has been posted here before.

 

I would feel better with another starter, but I would not be surprised to see this team win 87 games as it stands now.

[Patrick425]

Not to belabor the point about players not wanting to play in Milwaukee, but was looking at Cot's contracts to see if they listed no trade clauses. Most of them are just listed as full or partial or "can block trades to x number of teams". I found 3 that listed teams. Eric Chavez and Brian Giles have no trade clauses that include Milwaukee. T. Hunter had the teams listed as well, but they did not include Milwaukee. So, not a very big sample size.

 

This might deserve it's own thread, but I ran across some interesting caveats in some of the contracts as I was skimming them.

 

Matt Holliday - Can not play football until after 2010

Beltran - Requires the team purchase him one of those machines that throws tennis balls with numbers on them.

Percival - Gets a Vintage Auto

[Oldcity]

Yeah exactly. People who are doom and gloom might be forgetting that just about every hitter outside of Hardy underperformed last year. Odds of that happening again are pretty low.

[PaulRigdon]

Does anyone think that the Hoffman signing gives us a shot at trading for Peavy?

[billyhallfan]

now maybe peavy wouldn't deny a trade to milwaukee...

 

in all seriousness, it is a great deal, hoffman is a great guy too, hopefully melvin isn't done yet...

[rluzinski]

He's a flyball pitcher moving to a HR park, so there is some reason for concern. I don't think his increase in HRs last year is that alarming in itself, though. Yeh, he doubled his rate but it was still only 8 HRs total. It's like looking at someone's batting average after 8 hits. Everything else looked pretty good so I think he'll be at least serviceable.

 

Is he overpaid? Closers in general seem to be overpaid, so probably. Better to overpay by a few million on a one year deal than by 10's of millions on a multiyear deal, though.

 

It kind of sounded like the Brewers weren't going over $80 mil this year, so unless they free up salary with a trade, Melvin is probably not getting a new starting pitcher via free agency.

[billyhallfan]

you beat me to it rigdon...

[TooLiveBrew]

This might deserve its own thread, but I ran across some interesting caveats in some of the contracts as I was skimming them.

 

Matt Holliday - Can not play football until after 2010

Beltran - Requires the team purchase him one of those machines that throws tennis balls with numbers on them.

Percival - Gets a Vintage Auto

 

I agree it's thread-worthy (hint hint! http://forum.brewerfan.net/images/smilies/smile.gif). The notes I always like to see are the guys that have charitable stuff written in their contract language. Iirc Sheets had some good stuff... and Braun of course comes through:

 

Braun to donate $25,000 annually to club charity

[GoudaBrew]

Interesting to see there is no option. Is there such a thing as a club/player option? Where the two sides each have an opportunity to play or pass.

 

Also, the incentives kick in if Hoffman finishes 35 games. So, barring an injury, this is most likely a $7.5 million contract.

[JJHardy7]

And most players DO live in warmer climates year around. Just because they play ball in Milwaukee doesn't mean they can't live in a warmer climate during winter!! So obviously, their families don't live here year round. The school year takes up about 3 months of the baseball season. 2 months at the beginning and 1 at the end. If you take into account that the player is on the road approximately 1/2 of that time, the player is missing their families for 1 month at the beginning of the year, and 2 weeks at the end of the year more than if they were close to home. The school year really doesn't have a bearing on anything because unless the player plans on living here, they are not going to switch schools for 3 months. And during the 4 month summer months, the family can live in Milwaukee, or commute back and forth. I'm sure players can afford to buy multiple plane tickets.

 

Players do not live in warmer climates year round if they play in Milwaukee. Milwaukee is not a warm climate. I'm not going to go into this into a debate you apparently want to start, but it's how things work. If Milwaukee is offering a similar figure to a warmer climate, the warmer climate is probably going to win. I think you're forgetting about spring training and like you brought up the fact their on the road. If you have a family and kids and they live in CA and you play in Milwaukee, how much fun is your family going to have in Wisconsin away from all their other family and living in your apartment/condo/house that is temporary? I think you're vastly negating that fact. Milwaukee isn't anywhere near the top of the list for free agents to come. If the team keeps winning maybe, but that's the bad part of baseball and not having a salary cap. Milwaukee just isn't a place most professional athletes would want their families to live if they're from other parts of the country.

 

If you think Milwaukee is a great place for free agents, that's your opinion and that's fine. I personally think it's in the lower 1/3 and that might be too kind on my part. I've lived in Wisconsin and Milwaukee and it's not a terrible place to live. I think the perception for those never living in Wisconsin or Milwaukee isn't very kind and does not help bring free agents to the city.