Jimmy Nelson/Hunter Morris/Jason Rogers/Ariel Pena optioned to Nashville

[JohnBriggs12]

Again this is something that surprises no one. It's not a dire situation at all because the core of their team: Braun, Gomez, Segura, Lucroy are all under team control through at least 2016 and going off of the samples for last year with Davis and Gennett, perhaps they've been a bit underrated.

 

The rotation situation too is solid if not spectacular and under control for two more seasons.

 

Filling in around that core for the next 3 or 4 seasons can be done without a first class farm system. There's time to find and develop guys who will be part of the next core.

 

Melvin turns 62 in July. His days are likely numbered to some extent. They probably need to add a young up and coming guy as his assistant/heir apparent.

[TheCrew07]

Is there that big of a difference in the front office or in minor league coaching from the wave of Fielder/Weeks/Braun/Hardy/Hart/Gallardo to now? Or is it just that the Brewers have been shooting blanks in the draft since that big wave? Is Jack Z the missing link?

 

I feel these questions belong with this topic because these players were considered very good prospects coming out of the draft but still aren't MLB ready yet. Is the problem scouting or development or both?

 

I have literally hundreds of posts on these topics over the years, but to sum it up I think people are going to go "chicken or the egg" and pick one or other, I think in terms of how the question was framed the answer is both. However I'll take it a step farther and say the organization's vision has been the core issue, and that runs right up to the top in Mark A. I think for many years you could objectively say that the Brewers were the 3rd best run organization in the division from top to bottom, but with everything that's changed (and some issues which have remained) since 2008 I think we're clearly 4th or 5th best. The Brewers aren't progressive in any particular way, they follow market trends in almost every regard, lag behind the market in others, don't really seem to grasp that if you cycle talent you can win today and tomorrow, etc. Without going into any detail at all as I've previously posted my thought in great detail the Brewers are just plain average or below average in every aspect, though I do think the pro-player scouting side is probably the strongest part of the organization. Melvin is also an adept patcher in that he's good at playing whack-a-mole with holes on the MLB roster, but I don't see any long term strategy or vision from the organization, and that has to change.

 

We've never really had depth of talent as an organization, we've basically been 1 player deep at every position and whenever the organization had a +1 that player was traded for some kind of short term solution. From my perspective depth of talent is key, and I don't mean role player depth, I mean replacing Beltran with Taveras, or being able to replace Holliday with Piscotty... having a legitimate player coming up who can be productive and cover an injury or 4. There are posters around here that are fine with that, JB12 hits on that idea in his most recent post, the idea of "the big league roster is solidified, what else do we need?" but I think that's way too shallow a view of the organization. The Brewers aren't just the 25 man roster, not in the short or long term.

 

I don't understand the fascination with "proven veteran talent", plenty of teams around MLB are showing you can win with young talent and that rookies can play a significant role in the post season. I see the other teams in the division (with the exception of Cincy) working to maintain a good mix of youth vs veterans, which is exactly what I would like to see the Brewers do. However we're more like the Cubs of 5-6 years ago, trying to milk every last productive season out of veteran players while we slowly fade to the back of the pack. I'm dead serious when I say that I have no problem projecting the Cubs to be relevant again maybe as soon as 2015 but certainly by 2017, they have the young hitting talent coming, a couple of intriguing pitchers, and the money to spend on FA pitchers to shore up any holes they might have. I don't see Theo repeating the same mistakes he made at the end of his tenure with the Red Sox.

 

In short I see the Cards, Pirates, and Cubs ascending as franchises while the Brewers and Reds are desperately trying to maintain what they currently are. The Brewers could be competitive in 2014, but I don't think there's much legitimate hope looking ahead to the future. The "one season at a time" mentality is going to get you so far and I think we reached our zenith with this strategy in 2011. We just don't have the resources anymore to chase meaningful short term solutions for upcoming roster deficiencies, but that should have never been the focus in the first place.

 

If you're always 1 step behind the market, if you don't consistently develop impact talent, and you are the smallest market in baseball so you don't have gobs of money to spend, and don't find a way to continually cycle fresh young talent back onto the roster then your days are always going to be numbered. You can have spurts of success, but you're never going to sustain anything, and I think that's the Brewer organization at its core.

[Fear The Chorizo]

When this current team is no longer viewed as even a potential contender, I can see a GM/succession switch happen pretty fast with Melvin likely opting to bow out rather than try to rebuild again. To me, this year's Brewers team is similar in many regards to the White Sox teams a few years ago. They were several years away from their World Series title with quite a few key contributors still on the team. They had alot of veterans on the roster, many on contracts paying them market value at moderate length, and if everything broke just right for them they'd find themselves back in the playoffs. Their farm system had been gutted by Kenny Williams making bunches of trades to fill big league holes and missing often in the draft. Their payroll was stretched pretty thin, and they had little flexibility in terms of trading valuable MLB assets because their owner was paranoid of another "white flag" deal that would drastically lower attendance & fan interest.

 

They hovered about 5 games over/under 0.500 for a few years, then last year a few key injuries happened, veterans really declined, and they sucked to the point where they almost lost 100 games last year.

 

But, they had a very good offseason over the winter that was set up by some good trades, salary dumps, and acquisitions made by their new GM after Kenny handed over the reins knowing full well it wasn't going to be pretty a few yrs ago. Their farm system is on the upswing, veteran trades have brought in young talent, and they signed some talent that could significantly outperform salary.

 

For the Brewers, instead of a groomed successor I think when Melvin's time is over as Brewers' GM they need to clean house and bring fresh faces in throughout the organization. The GM/baseball ops president needs to have full control of who works for him at all levels.

[JohnBriggs12]

I don't see the White Sox as a great comparison. Their core group the last several years was much older and not as talented as the Brewers. I think the Brewers have more time than say the 2010 White Sox. You are talking guys like Konerko and Pierzynski who are now both in their late 30's compared to Braun and Lucroy who are 8-9 years younger and better. Gomez is still younger now than when the Sox acquired Rios. I suppose you could compare Alexei Ramirez to Segura, though Segura's considerably younger too. Some guys the Sox thought would turn into core players haven't. Beckum was very highly touted.

 

But what the White Sox did this past winter, bringing in Abreu shows that it's not just drafting and developing that goes into building a roster. Brewers had a taste of that with Aoki who's now brought a nice young lefty in Smith into the mix. Yes they also drafted and produced an ace in Sale, but they've had under the radar guys come through like Jose Quintana who they got off the scrap heap in a very Doug Melvin type move.

[brewcrewdue80]

Just pretty sad to read Sickels assessment. I read it and pretty much come away with Roache and a bunch of future nobody's. A class of guys who appear to have some kind of talent, but are in an organization that won't develop it to anywhere near it's full potential. Or if anything, take that talent and revert it back to non-talent. Guys like Jungmann, Pena, Hellweg, Coulter B type prospects heading to C type prospects or worse.