Farewell to Rickie Weeks

[coolcool]

The Brewers could use about 10 players with Weeks' attitude and a lot less Ryan Braun types.

 

Never did I think I'd see the day...

[SRB]

I'm a little surprised about all the "we'll miss Rickie Weeks" talk here. I get it. He's a good guy and a real professional. He kept quiet about being mostly benched this year and handled it much better than many, many other people would have. But let's not forget why he was benched in the first place. Forget his career numbers. Look at his recent numbers.

 

2012: .230/.328/400 and -0.4 WAR in 157 games

2013: .209/306/.357 and -1 WAR in 104 games.

2014 .274/.357/.452 and 0.2 WAR (but considering half his at bats were against lefties it kind of figures his numbers would be better)

 

Meanwhile he made $31 million over those three seasons. He is exactly the kind of player the Brewers need to move away from. No way should they even consider signing him again at what it would cost and again have two players that can only play second base. The fact is he is not the player he once was and we should not overlook his past few years because his overall career numbers may still be decent. I wish him the best. I hope he finds success with another team. But there is good reason for his time in Milwaukee being done.

 

Alternatively

2012: 0.9 fWAR

2013: -0.4 fWAR

2014: 1.2 fWAR

 

And for this season that was in only 286 PA, in which he outhit Braun and everybody on the team other than Gomez and Lucroy. Rickie's never had substantial platoon splits so I don't know why the fact that he faced mostly LHP matters that much. He had a nice little rebound campaign but the Brewers management simply did not want to play him all year.

[RobertR]

I think it's fine to say that many of us have no issue with Rickie Weeks as a person, even if he only occasionally lived up to the potential of when he was drafted. And noting that he had a good year in his final season with the Brewers seems to me to merely acknowledge the reality of the situation. Yeah, the last contract didn't work out as intended and he won't be back, but I think a lot of us have more positive than negative memories of him.

 

Obviously, the Brewers need to look elsewhere for the future. I'm sure Rickie will have some team with a black hole at 2B take a flier on him in 2015. Meanwhile, the Brewers will want to find a player that can platoon with Scooter (even if just as a fallback) and cover at least SS if Segura doesn't bounce back in 2015. They'll also have to figure out 1B and 3B in the offseason. Rickie doesn't help them at any of those needs.

 

I wish Rickie luck, but he'll be fine.

[monty57]

I'm a little surprised about all the "we'll miss Rickie Weeks" talk here. I get it. He's a good guy and a real professional. He kept quiet about being mostly benched this year and handled it much better than many, many other people would have. But let's not forget why he was benched in the first place. Forget his career numbers. Look at his recent numbers.

 

2012: .230/.328/400 and -0.4 WAR in 157 games

2013: .209/306/.357 and -1 WAR in 104 games.

2014 .274/.357/.452 and 0.2 WAR (but considering half his at bats were against lefties it kind of figures his numbers would be better)

 

Meanwhile he made $31 million over those three seasons. He is exactly the kind of player the Brewers need to move away from. No way should they even consider signing him again at what it would cost and again have two players that can only play second base. The fact is he is not the player he once was and we should not overlook his past few years because his overall career numbers may still be decent. I wish him the best. I hope he finds success with another team. But there is good reason for his time in Milwaukee being done.

 

Rickie is an example of why I dislike waiting until the final year of "team control" before offering an extension. You end up paying market rate for a guy who, for one reason or other, you have not offered to extend when it would have been cheaper. Rickie was injury-prone and inconsistent prior to his signing, and has been injured and inconsistent since his signing, and therefore has been overpaid during his recent tenure as a Brewers.

 

But that said, even though Gennett is the obvious choice as our 2B going forward, that is because of age, salary and team control. I doubt that Gennett will match Rickie's overall career numbers, and as I mentioned earlier, if both players have 600 PAs next year, I'd bet that Rickie will have better offensive numbers. The reason people (including myself) wanted to see Weeks traded prior to this year was to save money and free up the roster spot because no team should have two guys who only play second base. We couldn't trade him because of his bad contract, but I have little doubt someone will sign him to a more team-friendly deal.

[SoCal Brew Crew Fan]

I had a chance to talk with a few of the Brewers coaches a few years ago. Everyone one of them said at the time it wasn't Prince or Braun's team, it was Rickie's. Quiet leader in the clubhouse that everyone respected. To have a controlled, thoughtful team leader among a bunch of young guys learning their way into the game really stood out to me. I always loved watching him play. He's on my personal Mount Rushmore of favorite all time Brewers. He may not be in everyone's Hall of Fame, but he's in mine.

 

I'm still a little miffed Roenicke didn't play him that last game. A leader has to be more aware of the situation and not get swayed even when Rickie said he didn't want to do it just to get an AB or whatever. I'm sure there were a number of people that were watching just to see Rickie one last time. I know there was at least one Rickie fan in LA who sat through that torture just to get one last glimpse of his favorite Brewer.

 

Good luck next year Rickie!

[TURBO]

He should have started his last game, without question...

 

That is a blunder in my opinion, and any leader worth a damn would have realized that, even if Rickie himself didn't want to play, he should have been talked into it.

[prophet]

Rickie Weeks is, for all practical purposes, done as a Brewer. I can't imagine a scenario in which both sides would want to continue the relationship.

 

I've always liked Rickie as a player. As far as I could tell, he kept his head down, worked hard, and got what he could out of his talent. The talent was considerable. At his peak he was an All-Star and an exciting player. Unless Molitor or Money counts, I think he's had the best career of any Brewers 2b (though I realize a lot of people like Gantner much more than I do).

 

 

Career Brewers WAR per baseball reference

 

Gantner 22.3

 

Weeks 12.3

 

Per Fan Graphs

 

Gantner 19.5

 

Weeks 18.2

 

I think he was referring more to Gantner being a miserable and horrible human being rather than comparing them as baseball players. Just my guess though.