When do we trade Corey Hart?

[HiAndTight]

Hart's contract is actually quite reasonable in relation to his

production. I think when you look at the comparable production between

him, Werth, and Crawford, and see what kind of money they got versus

what we signed Hart for just months prior, I think I'm pretty happy now

that we kept him for what we did.

 

I would think this would increase his value to other teams though. Look at what Washington gave Jason Werth ($126 million). The Brewers would still have plenty of power in Weeks and Braun to a lesser extent McGehee and Gamel. Beside, if you put someone in the lineup like Komatsu who is more of a contact hitter and then sign a Furcal you can move away from the over reliance on HRs that Milwaukee has had for years. A lineup of 1) Morgan 2) Furcal 3) Weeks 4) Braun 5) McGehee 6) Gamel 7) Lucroy and 8) Komatsu would be much more balanced I think. Plus, on top of losing Fielder's $15 million salary and Hart's $9 million salary, you'd lose Bentancourt's $6 million too. That could really buy them some financial flexibility until they restock their system.

This is very much my idea on how to sorta re-work this team moving forward.

 

I would also include a short term fix at 3rd base. Perhaps even someone like an Aramis Ramirez in hopes that he can bounce back, knowing you can work Taylor Green into the lineup.

 

I'd be nice to see a focus on OBP moreso than SLG and defense.

 

Most likely you'll just go with McGehee and if anything work in Taylor Green that way, but we definitely need to use Prince's money on shortstop at the very least. I'd be more than happy to raid the Dodgers Shortstops from this year and grab Furcal and Carroll.

 

 

 

However you do it, there are a ton of different options, but the bottom line is that I'd like to see us model ourselves a LITTLE bit more after the twins. Solid defensively almost across the board, and no black holes offensively rather than the best 1-4 in the league(or one of anyway).

[monty57]

If the Brewers pushed their prospects a little we could see whether or not Komatsu were able. He'll never bring the same kind of power as Hart, but I do think he'd be an upgrade defensively and with the OBP. Next season when Fielder leaves it'd be nice to utilize Weeks' power a little more by moving him down in the lineup. Morgan and Komatsu at 1 and 2 would be nice place setters for Weeks, Braun, McGehee and Gamel.

If by "pushed" you mean sending them to the majors before they are ready, then I don't agree. I don't believe they'd trade him this season for a AA prospect, pinning their playoff hopes on an untested (and not highly rated) rookie. The Brewers have several OF prospects who have the potential to make Hart expendable, but I hope they wait until they are reasonably sure that they're ready before pulling the trigger. That may be this offseason, in which case Hart would be a nice trading chip, and the salary relief (along with losing Prince, Yuni, Hawkins, Saito, Counsell, etc) would go a long ways towards improving our team for the future. Hopefully the money will go to land a top-of-the-line SS like Reyes, Rollins or Furcal, but there is also the possibility of trading Hart for a good, young SS and we'd have extra cash for doing something like extending Marcum and Greinke.

[HiAndTight]

If the Brewers pushed their prospects a little we could see whether or not Komatsu were able. He'll never bring the same kind of power as Hart, but I do think he'd be an upgrade defensively and with the OBP. Next season when Fielder leaves it'd be nice to utilize Weeks' power a little more by moving him down in the lineup. Morgan and Komatsu at 1 and 2 would be nice place setters for Weeks, Braun, McGehee and Gamel.

If by "pushed" you mean sending them to the majors before they are ready, then I don't agree. I don't believe they'd trade him this season for a AA prospect, pinning their playoff hopes on an untested (and not highly rated) rookie. The Brewers have several OF prospects who have the potential to make Hart expendable, but I hope they wait until they are reasonably sure that they're ready before pulling the trigger. That may be this offseason, in which case Hart would be a nice trading chip, and the salary relief (along with losing Prince, Yuni, Hawkins, Saito, Counsell, etc) would go a long ways towards improving our team for the future. Hopefully the money will go to land a top-of-the-line SS like Reyes, Rollins or Furcal, but there is also the possibility of trading Hart for a good, young SS and we'd have extra cash for doing something like extending Marcum and Greinke.

No, I believe he means promoting them quicker through the minors. Not sure where anyone would suggest "promoting them to the majors before they are ready." That just seems overly sarcastic and obviously not what he meant.

 

 

I also have no interest in signing Rollins and I don't believe they'd need to make any financial moves to be able to afford Furcal. I think anything over 2 years 10 million per for him is overpaying, and at what, 34, it's unlikely anyone's going to give him much more.

[monty57]

Not trying to be sarcastic at all. The sentence "If the Brewers pushed their prospects a little we could see whether or not Komatsu were able" gave me the impression that Paul is hinting that we should put Komatsu in the majors now, before he's probably ready, and let him sink or swim. I don't think we should do that, especially when we are in first place in the Central, and especially when in an earlier post Paul mentioned trading Hart for a A/AA prospect, which would lessen the talent on this year's team and hurt our chance at the playoffs. Playoff teams don't trade their All-Stars for prospects mid-season... they trade their prospects for All-Stars.

 

If that is not what Paul meant, than I mis-read his intent. I wasn't trying to be sarcastic. As I mentioned earlier, I'm fine with trading Hart "when we have someone reasonably capable of replacing him for a lower price and we can use the trade to increase our talent level elsewhere." That may be this offseason, it may be next season's trading deadline (probably only if we're out of it), and it quite likely would be after next season, as our prospects will certainly be MLB-ready by then.

[Warning Track Power]

Maybe I am being a little shortsighted but I have no motivation to move Corey Hart at all. I understand we have OF in the Minors that could/should be able to fill Corey's shoes on this team, but the idea of moving him to fill another hole (by the way which hole are we thinking he will fill? Not like a bunch of teams are willing to trade .300 hitting, gold glove D SS) is not something I would be motivated to do now.

 

To me it reeks of the Hardy trade for Gomez, where we trade a relatively proven guy for a prospect or relatively unproven guy. Granted it wouldn't be identical (Hart isn't at the low point of his worth) but it defintely feels similar to me. I'd rather roll with Hart, trade for Furcal, plug Gamel into first and extend Greinke and Marcum. A positional player core of Braun, Weeks, Hart, Lucroy and pitching core of Gallardo, Greinke, Marcum, Narveson, Axford is a pretty nice start to a 85+ win team. Depending on how the rest of the roster is constructed, I could imagine this teams playoff window being open for another 3-4 years with that core.

[TooLiveBrew]

Look at the Ryan Ludwick trade last season for a rough comparison. The Cards got Jake Westbrook (from CLE) & MiLB LHP Nick Greenwood (from SD) for him.

 

Ludwick was traded with roughly 1.5 seasons of contract control left (unless I'm missing that he has super-two status or something), during his age-31 season. If Hart were to be traded this offseason, it would be prior to his age-30 season & with two years of salary control remaining.

 

I'm not advocating Westbrook & Greenwood as some awesome return, but I also don't think it's that far-fetched that Melvin could find a trade partner in search of a corner OF who'd be willing to part with one pitcher of higher quality (as opposed to two so-so arms). If Corey can roughly replicate his 2010 success this season, I doubt many GMs would try to make low-ball offers & suggest that Corey hasn't established himself offensively. If 2010/'11 is roughly what he'll do in '12 & '13, his contract is a nice value. He'd fit into almost any team's payroll.

 

 

To me it reeks of the Hardy trade for Gomez, where we trade a relatively proven guy for a prospect or relatively unproven guy. Granted it wouldn't be identical (Hart isn't at the low point of his worth) but it defintely feels similar to me.

 

I'd really only like to see Hart moved if it was for pitching that has a chance to be effective at the MLB level. I have full confidence that between Gindl & Komatsu, the Brewers will have solid options for RF in the near future. That said, I also like Hart's bat quite a bit. It's not that I want to see Corey traded, it's that I want to see the Brewers sell high from positions of depth to help bring in more cost-controlled pitching. The main obstacle would likely be Corey's 15-team NTC.

[monty57]

WTP, I'm not calling for a Hart trade, but I think we need to keep an open mind about him. He is not someone like Braun, around whom you build a team. When/if the time comes that we have a corner OF at AAA that looks to be a solid MLB player, we can do one of four things: 1) Trade Hart and promote the prospect 2) Trade the prospect 3) Keep the prospect in AAA until Hart's contract expires 4) Bring the prospect up to sit the bench.

 

If the prospect is MLB ready, I don't like them wasting time in AAA, and I don't necessarily like the idea of getting draft picks for a player if you could reasonably replace the player and get more in trade than you could expect from the draft compensation. Therefore, if our OF prospects continue to develop, at some point we are either going to have to trade Hart or trade the prospects. Either one could be a viable option, depending on the circumstances, but since the Brewers are always going to be constrained by a "mid-level" budget, it may at some point be feasible to trade Hart and promote a prospect. While for the most part I was against extending Hart, Werth's offseason FA contract makes Hart (a similar player with a much lower salary) a fairly valuable trading chip at some point in the future.

 

There are a lot of moving parts, and therefore there are thousands of possible scenarios which could develop. I hope Melvin is at least open to listening to offers for Hart when he feels someone like Komatsu, Gindl, Schafer, etc is ready to step in.

[Warning Track Power]

TooLiveBrew[/b]]I'd really only like to see Hart moved if it was for pitching that has a chance to be effective at the MLB level. I have full confidence that between Gindl & Komatsu, the Brewers will have solid options for RF in the near future. That said, I also like Hart's bat quite a bit. It's not that I want to see Corey traded, it's that I want to see the Brewers sell high from positions of depth to help bring in more cost-controlled pitching. The main obstacle would likely be Corey's 15-team NTC.

This is something I completely agree with.

 

The overarching issue I have with it is that I don't believe a Corey deal would bring anything more than a #3 cost controlled pitching. I would expect a return at most of a Clayton Richard type pitcher, who is a decent pitcher with potential but is nothing more than a #4 on our staff now, and probably tops out as a low end #2. With Gallardo and hopefully a re-signed Greinke and Marcum, I'd be a lot more comfortable with Hart in RF than a Richard-type at #4. Now without a re-signed Greinke and Marcum, a Hart-Richard type trade would probably be worth investigating even though I believe Hart is worth more than Richard.

[monty57]

If there was any validity to the trade rumors last season, it appeared that some teams were willing to give up decent pitching prospects for 1/2 season of Hart. The rumors may have been unfounded, or the "decent" pitching may have been "meh" pitching, but I would think the contract makes him more valueable.

 

I agree that if he's traded, I'd like to see him traded for pitchers, but I wouldn't object to a good, young SS if one could be found.

[TooLiveBrew]

Good call on shortstop, monty.

 

 

I would expect a return at most of a Clayton Richard type pitcher, who is a decent pitcher with potential but is nothing more than a #4 on our staff now, and probably tops out as a low end #2

 

And I agree here. This is why a player like Hart can be shopped. If you can get 'Clayton Richard', you pull the trigger imo. Clayton Richard + Gindl/Komatsu > Hart. And that's not a shot at Hart.

[endaround]

I just don't see Hart being traded until after 2012 when Marcum and Greinke leave (unless the Brewers are out of it before the deadline next season in which case there will be a big amount of movement). The Brewers don't need the salary room next year with Fielder leaving nad Hart isn't really being pushed by anyone in AAA.

[Warning Track Power]

And I agree here. This is why a player like Hart can be shopped. If you can get 'Clayton Richard', you pull the trigger imo. Clayton Richard + Gindl/Komatsu > Hart. And that's not a shot at Hart.

I need to see more of these two but I can be convinced that is worth more than Hart as well. To me, trading Hart is totally dependent on the outcome of Greinke and Marcum negotiations. As End said, the Brewers don't necessarily need to create salary room in 2012 as Prince will be gone and Greinke and Marcum will still be under their current contracts. If only one of Greinke and Marcum are re-signed, I definitely could see Hart being traded for pitching. However, if both are re-signed I think a Hart deal will be for something other than SP because at that point we will have Greinke, Marcum, Gallardo and Narveson (pre-arby?) under long term contracts.

 

 

[paul253]

I don't think we necessarily need to trade Hart for pitching. While it'd be ideal, it would also limit the return some. I'm not necessarily advocating trading Hart because we desperately need pitching prospects. I'm more so advocating it because we have so many outfield prospects that are a year or two away from the majors and because Hart's value was at it's peak last season and I don't want to see it fall back down. Likewise, I don't want us to be forced to hang on to all these outfield prospects forever while we try to figure out what to do with them (exactly what they've done with Gamel. Luckily it looks like we will finally have a spot for him next season but usually it doesn't work out that well). While we could always use more pitching, I think you need to approach it like the draft and get the best prospect available. A shortstop would be great and I'd be ok with a 3rd base prospect too as Gamel is now a first basemen and Taylor Green is far from a sure thing.Catching prospects Tyler Robers and Cam Garfield have done nothing this season so catching would be an option if you can get a good one. Getting pitching in return for Hart would be ideal, but I don't want it to be pitching or nothing because as others have said you might not get much.