Khris Davis to the A's for C Jacob Nottingham and RHP Bubba Derby; Latest: Sean Nolin claimed from A's, too

[Boomer5]

I honestly don't see why anyone cares whether we are a 62-win team or a 81-win team. Nobody expects us to make the playoffs, and either way you're looking at a >50% chance we lose any given game. Who cares???

 

I care, greatly. I think many misunderstand my POV on the offseason, as opposed to July. This is the MLB board and I my "negativity" is only discussing the MLB roster. I AGREE with what Stearns is doing. I WANT the Brewers to develop not just a good, but the best farm system in the game filled with 8-10 top 100 players going forward. 81 wins would be a disaster, assuming the goal is to win a championship in the next 5-7 years.

 

The Brewers are playing Chess, not Checkers. Checkers is adding Cecchini types et al in 2016 and saying well he might be OK. Checkers is adding a Carter and saying well he could be better than Lind, etc etc etc. The reality is in this day of advanced metrics, teams dont give up cheap talented players to waivers and pennies on the dollar trades, so the likelyhood is all these fillers are more likely to perform at 2015 levels than former prospect levels.

 

Ever heard of Colin McHugh from Houston? He's doing pretty well for a waiver wire claim.

 

Is this the basis for your contention to my comment regarding "likelyhood"? That all players acquired off waivers will perform at high - prospect projection status - levels?

[Bnowell4evr]

Is this the basis for your contention to my comment regarding "likelyhood"? That all players acquired off waivers will perform at high - prospect projection status - levels?

 

You said that "teams don't give up cheap talented players to waivers and pennies on the dollar trades."

 

I provided an example of a player from Houston (where our GM came from) that completely shoots down that comment. Now do I know if Liriano or Cecchini will be anything other than roster fodder? I don't even know if Cecchini will make the ML roster as he has options remaining. All I'm saying is that until they are given an opportunity, you cannot make a definitive statement on them one way or the other. Would anyone have ever thought that Casey McGee or Brady Clark would be decent major leaguers? I wouldn't have bet on em.

[brewerfan82]

I think the divide between the "tank"/"not-a-tank" crowds comes down to this:

 

- The "tankers" believe if there's a way to make the major league team better (even marginally) and all available resources aren't used, then you can assume they're trying to lose and are tanking.

 

- However, as a "non-tanker", I don't think the main objective of the major league team's construction has been to lose as many games as possible, but rather to maximize each position's potential to provide value to the next contending team in Milwaukee. Whether that's by filling them with players that could have a big half and get flipped for more assets (Carter, Hill) or to give opportunities to young cheap players with many years of team control left (Santana, Villar, Cecchini, Flores, Liriano, Arcia soon, Phillips soon). The "tankers" may just see these guys as rejects with no potential value, but I see them as lottery tickets that we are in a position to take a chance on. You may want to fill center with an Austin Jackson to get another win this year, but I think there's more potential value in giving the guys on our roster a shot to show they can be effective in the majors. Even if guys like Flores, Liriano and Cecchini can prove to be effective utility players, they provide a lot of value in the next 5-6 years as low-cost options to fill out the roster that cost less than someone like Parra did, but can actually contribute more than someone like Schafer did.

 

We all know this team isn't contending. Some of us care if they try to eek out a few extra wins in the process, some of us don't. Some of us think they should "tank" to try to get that number one pick/draft money, some of us don't think that should be the main objective, but still see the benefits if it happens as a side effect of trading today's assets for tomorrow.

 

The thing I don't understand is the aggressive nature of some to insist they "know" the main objective is to lose as many games as possible, that getting the top pick is a crucial part of the rebuild's plan, and that this team is guaranteed to be one of the two worst teams in Brewer history (which if you weren't around for the 90's/2000's, would be quite a monumental task). It just seems very extreme/conspiracy-theory-ish to me, as I think there is plenty of evidence to at least "possibly" think that's not the case and for people to be so extremely absolute makes their credibility and intentions in pushing it constantly very suspect to me.

[Boomer5]

I think the divide between the "tank"/"not-a-tank" crowds comes down to this:

 

- The "tankers" believe if there's a way to make the major league team better (even marginally) and all available resources aren't used, then you can assume they're trying to lose and are tanking.

 

- However, as a "non-tanker", I don't think the main objective of the major league team's construction has been to lose as many games as possible, but rather to maximize each position's potential to provide value to the next contending team in Milwaukee. Whether that's by filling them with players that could have a big half and get flipped for more assets (Carter, Hill) or to give opportunities to young cheap players with many years of team control left (Santana, Villar, Cecchini, Flores, Liriano, Arcia soon, Phillips soon). The "tankers" may just see these guys as rejects with no potential value, but I see them as lottery tickets that we are in a position to take a chance on. You may want to fill center with an Austin Jackson to get another win this year, but I think there's more potential value in giving the guys on our roster a shot to show they can be effective in the majors. Even if guys like Flores, Liriano and Cecchini can prove to be effective utility players, they provide a lot of value in the next 5-6 years as low-cost options to fill out the roster that cost less than someone like Parra did, but can actually contribute more than someone like Schafer did.

 

We all know this team isn't contending. Some of us care if they try to eek out a few extra wins in the process, some of us don't. Some of us think they should "tank" to try to get that number one pick/draft money, some of us don't think that should be the main objective, but still see the benefits if it happens as a side effect of trading today's assets for tomorrow.

 

The thing I don't understand is the aggressive nature of some to insist they "know" the main objective is to lose as many games as possible, that getting the top pick is a crucial part of the rebuild's plan, and that this team is guaranteed to be one of the two worst teams in Brewer history (which if you weren't around for the 90's/2000's, would be quite a monumental task). It just seems very extreme/conspiracy-theory-ish to me, as I think there is plenty of evidence to at least "possibly" think that's not the case and for people to be so extremely absolute makes their credibility and intentions in pushing it constantly very suspect to me.

 

Im sure this is directed at me, so I will respond.

 

When the team loses 94 games and trades away/is in the process of its key performers for primarily A and rookie ball talent then fills the roster with other teams 40 man cuts and possibly two rule 5 guys, it's hardly breaking new ground to suggest the team is going to be very bad.

 

This is a board that lost its mind having one rule 5 guy deep in the bullpen due to losing depth over the course of the season but having 2 is shrewd? Davis is meh but Kurt N (im not going to bother learning to spell his name), Cecchini, Villars, Carter, Broxton are shrewd pick ups that will allow the team to be better?

 

Or how about the team lost 94 games...but that wasn't an indication of the talent? How so? As they say, show the work.

[monty57]

Or how about the team lost 94 games...but that wasn't an indication of the talent? How so? As they say, show the work.

 

I think that means that if you ran a Monte Carlo on it, the roster as it was constructed at the start of last season would only have had as bad a record as it did around 1% of the time. Everything had to go wrong for that team to lose that many games, and it did. Teams with decent talent sometimes have horrible seasons and that happened to last year's Brewers.

 

To bring that to predicting this season, you shouldn't say something like "we lost Gomez, so that's X wins right there," because in that comparison, you need to use what Gomez did for us last year, when he had a down year and was then traded. We had a lot of down years last year, so a simple reversion to the mean from some guys like Garza and Peralta can add a little to this year's team. I don't think we will be good, and it is possible that we will lose 100 if everything once again goes wrong (i.e. None of the pitchers improve and all of the guys we picked up stink), but it's also possible we end up near .500 if the pitchers put it together and some of the guys we picked up have decent seasons.

 

I know that many here hope the latter doesn't occur, as that would mean we lose draft position and pool money, but it also means that some of our young "scrap heap" pickups have greatly increased their value, either as a long-term answer for Milwaukee (Cecchini, Carter) or as a trade chip (Garza, Hill).

 

I am going into the season with the understanding that we will likely lose a lot more than we will win, but will greatly enjoy watching guys (both at the MLB and MiLB levels) to see how they will fit into the future of the Brewers. Cecchini and Carter are two guys I'm really pulling for, because if either of them prove themselves to be MLB regulars, we will have plugged a big hole going forward.

[Boomer5]

Or how about the team lost 94 games...but that wasn't an indication of the talent? How so? As they say, show the work.

 

I think that means that if you ran a Monte Carlo on it, the roster as it was constructed at the start of last season would only have had as bad a record as it did around 1% of the time. Everything had to go wrong for that team to lose that many games, and it did. Teams with decent talent sometimes have horrible seasons and that happened to last year's Brewers.

 

To bring that to predicting this season, you shouldn't say something like "we lost Gomez, so that's X wins right there," because in that comparison, you need to use what Gomez did for us last year, when he had a down year and was then traded. We had a lot of down years last year, so a simple reversion to the mean from some guys like Garza and Peralta can add a little to this year's team. I don't think we will be good, and it is possible that we will lose 100 if everything once again goes wrong (i.e. None of the pitchers improve and all of the guys we picked up stink), but it's also possible we end up near .500 if the pitchers put it together and some of the guys we picked up have decent seasons.

 

I know that many here hope the latter doesn't occur, as that would mean we lose draft position and pool money, but it also means that some of our young "scrap heap" pickups have greatly increased their value, either as a long-term answer for Milwaukee (Cecchini, Carter) or as a trade chip (Garza, Hill).

 

I am going into the season with the understanding that we will likely lose a lot more than we will win, but will greatly enjoy watching guys (both at the MLB and MiLB levels) to see how they will fit into the future of the Brewers. Cecchini and Carter are two guys I'm really pulling for, because if either of them prove themselves to be MLB regulars, we will have plugged a big hole going forward.

 

The 2014 team that went 82-80 finished the year July-Sep at 31-47 for a .352. Not an insignificant sample size.

 

The 2015 team went 68-94 for a .420. Certainly not an insignificant sample size, either. If anything, they actually outperformed what the 2014 squad left off.

 

CC did go for a .445 after Rons 7-18 start. Better, but since then they have traded away decent to good players (with more to go) and have replaced them on the MLB roster with worse players by most any metric I have seen available. Im not sure how that is in dispute unless there is some model I have missed. If you can show me the improvement of the 16 vs the 15 team Id like to see it. Other than Davies/Anderson vs Lohse, I don't see any obvious wins in the 15 to 16 MLB moves.

 

This is baseball for teams like Milwaukee. They will not acquire the super elite talent unless they draft it or use their minor league chips to trade for it, and accept they will be gone when their FA time hits.

 

When you look at the '16 roster regarding this trade, I can promise you that Davis will hit more MLB HRs than Nottingham will, no matter how much you like Nottingham and you think he will stick at C. And that is the point of a trade like this. Build for the future at the expense of the now. You cant trade to move up the draft and acquire more pool $$ but you can weaken your team so that they have a better chance of picking higher.

 

So in basketball terms, its Davis for the two A ball guys plus some more ping pong balls to land the top pick. Its really that simple. Ditto Lind for three rookie league guys. Ditto KRod for nothing of value. Ditto buying Diaz, a guy who lit up in Rookie ball.

 

Thats what Theo did and thats what Stearn's team did. It is what Milwaukee is doing. The difference is Milwaukee had a better system than those teams did when they started so in theory if the 16-18 drafts are what we hope, Milwaukee should have a super power on their hands and all this talk of the Kurt N's of the world magically becoming valuable assets will be something we all laugh at.

[MadScientist]

So 4 years of Khris Davis got from Oakland about what Oakland got for a half year rental of Scott Kazmir. To me that seems like the return was low for someone with rare power numbers. If Nottingham works out at catcher, then it is all good, but it has to work out. Either Sterns likes Nottingham a whole lot, or he was somewhat desperate to get a catching prospect in the system.

 

Regardless of how this works out, I will miss Davis's walk up music. It was the only one I liked.

[FVBrewerFan]

I THINK what Monty is saying is this season is a can't lose season. The goal is not to lose as many games as possible. That may be the result of stockpiling as much young talent as possible, but not the goal. However, if they are one of the worst 2-3 teams, fine, they get the benefit of that in next year's draft.

 

However, if they surprise and actually win 75-78 games that's also a good thing because it means you would have more than a couple guys having very good seasons. If it's Santana, Nelson, etc.... great bodes well for the future. If it's guys like Garza, Lucroy, Braun, Scooter....also great. Worth a lot more in a trade at the deadline.

 

Either way benefits the future, so you can't lose.

[Boomer5]

So 4 years of Khris Davis got from Oakland about what Oakland got for a half year rental of Scott Kazmir. To me that seems like the return was low for someone with rare power numbers. If Nottingham works out at catcher, then it is all good, but it has to work out. Either Sterns likes Nottingham a whole lot, or he was somewhat desperate to get a catching prospect in the system.

 

Regardless of how this works out, I will miss Davis's walk up music. It was the only one I liked.

 

Davis is a tough guy to evaluate. Is he the .809 OPS guy without much of a platoon split for his career who fangrahs compares to Nelson Cruz and hit an amazing 20 HRs in Aug and Sep, or is he the guy who cant throw and for the first half of the season was pretty much worthless and injury prone?

 

On the other hand, Nottingham is 50/50 to stay at catcher due to passed balls and command and his power vanished when he was traded to Oakland. But he is one of the higher rated catching prospects in the game, has a 38% cs rate, and that is rare. Stearns also should know him very well, so that is something we have to consider.

[Beast Light]

I figured Khris Davis would be traded but I thought it would happen at the deadline. You have to wonder how much longer it will be before Lucroy is gone. We have obviously been building for the future for quite some time but with each trade, I become more impressed with the team's commitment to the plan.

 

Time will tell but I really hope the new GM knows what he is doing (as I'm sure we all do). As for now, I'm extremely excited about the talent they are accumulating. It's starting to feel like the early 2000's again.

[Thurston Fluff]

Just because a team only won 68 games does not in any way mean they had 68 win talent.

 

Actually I think that is exactly what it means.

So the most talented team in baseball always wins the World Series?

 

Or at least the 10 most talented teams in baseball always make the postseason?

 

Winning 3 series is not at all the same as what happens over 50 series. I'm quite sure you know that so I don't understand what your point is there. As far as the most talented teams always getting to the playoffs that is accurate. The actual measurement used is who wins the most games. If that is the test then the ones who win the test are the best. The talent test is not which team has the most players who's stats best fit a predictive model. It's who wins the most games. I think there can be time when a team who is almost as talented as another can pull the upset. When two teams are close to each other then things like the unbalanced schedule (something I wish they would change) and dumb luck play a larger role. Now if his point was a team who wins 68 games is really only a 65 win (or something to that effect) level fine. What doesn't happen is a team with low talent suddenly wins a boatload of games or vice versa. Injuries aside of course.

 

The overall idea that a team's talent is, or should, be based on anything but how they actually do is simply wrong. The reason we know certain talents are beneficial is because of how many wins they provide not the other way around. If a team does not provide the wins projected then the talent wasn't what was predicted.

[adambr2]

The notion that Stearns did the Davis deal out of motivation to make the 2016 team worse and therefore improve the 2017 draft pick is ridiculous. It's all about the big picture. Our team goals at this point fall over a longer span than 162 games.

 

Davis, for all his power, has enough warts to be a 1.3 WAR player. The difference between him and Santana in the W/L column this season is very nominal, and frankly, irrelevant.

[Jenkins5]

Bubba Derby gets no love but kid looks like a young, dominant Tyler Thornburg. Be really interesting to see how much he will leap if he picks up where he left off last year.

 

Jake Nottingham is a stellar get in my opinion. Brewers have been cleaning up on former Astro 6th round picks who blossomed to star prospects (Phillips & now Nottingham). Overall, Stearns already knew a ton about him from working in the Houston & is a player he had targeted and really wanted.....The way Ray Montgomery really pushed for Isan Diaz (my speculation) to be a top target from DBacks.

[KCBrewerfan34]

Stearns is going to have a very long leash thru this rebuild. I seriously doubt he's making trades out of desperation. The catching prospect looks to be a prize and he gets a pitcher who was lights out his first year.

 

Can't Santana pretty much do what Davis can do and he's a much better defender, Braun goes back to left.

[danzig6767]

Bubba Derby gets no love but kid looks like a young, dominant Tyler Thornburg.

You get this off 37 innings from a former college pitcher in A ball?

 

FWIW, he seems a solid second guy thrown in to the trade, but there are an endless amount of guys who did well in very tiny sample sizes at A ball like 37 innings is and that ended up being the main high point of their professional baseball careers.

 

I'll start getting a little more excited about Derby's future if he pitches really well once he reaches AA ball and then can repeat that success in AAA.

[brewcrewdue80]

Maybe the guy just didn't care but fulfilled being there.

 

I don't think that is a good example. If he doesn't care I guess he will never be any good with that attitude.

 

Also why are we freaking out over Josh Hader's huge fall league performance, but if Santana does poorly it is nothing? Seems like it should go both ways.

 

Santana made a brief ML appearance in 2014. And some more in 2015. He's got a great AAA line. Him having to prove himself at his winter ball is past. Hader on the other hand has 0 games played at AAA much less ML. He needs to show up and attempt to show some kind of learning or improvement. Can also say Hader had just 104IP vs the 123 he had the season before. His arm had innings to throw.

Santana 126games 460PAs vs 147 598PAs. So it stands with reason the young man may have been tired. Hader's arm didn't have that reason.

 

 

On to the subject of Tanking and was it Olney who's upset at what Milw has done to fit his idea of the team tanking.

 

So in a perfect world with the team trying to acquire winning talent through ML player trades/signings. We should still have Gomez +9mil. Lind +8mil. Segura +3mil. Gone after a FA SP. Kept KRod +7.5mil. Fiers would still be on team.

So let's see: 50mil+27 or 77mil. We'd probably have picked up a Doug Fister on a 2year deal for 18mil vs the 1/7.

And now we're a 90win team and not tanking right? Obviously wouldn't have a single one of the younger players. So let's build a maybe 80win team at 85-100mil payroll. And have a minors club ranked near the bottom so to satisfy not tanking. Next year after we'd have lost Gomez, Krod, and Lind we'd put Reed/Taylor in CF. Rogers would be at 1b. Segura would be traded for Arcia to play SS. We'd sign a 3b. Still have a mediocre Staff. No depth. spend somewhere 85-100mil on payroll sell the team as a winning squad that can compete with the near 100win Central teams after not doing so the prior 2seasons. Hey we ain't tanking. Aint winning also but we keep giving the college try.

 

Nah we don't want that. So let's change the rules now that the Cubs are 100win team of what looks like the next decade. We can't let what they did work for other franchises. We gotta stop this. Want it to be fixed? Retract to 20 Teams. Have 40man rosters vs 25man. Eliminate the bottom 10markets so 150+Million payrolls. Or, just let it be. Milwaukee won't have 35year olds getting starts. Signing 33year old+ to fill your team to me would be tanking. Playing AA players would be tanking. Giving AAA guys and under 28year olds shots at playing, isn't tanking. It's called being young and needing time for talent to lead to wins.

[CheezWizHed]

Winning 3 series is not at all the same as what happens over 50 series. I'm quite sure you know that so I don't understand what your point is there. As far as the most talented teams always getting to the playoffs that is accurate. The actual measurement used is who wins the most games. If that is the test then the ones who win the test are the best. The talent test is not which team has the most players who's stats best fit a predictive model. It's who wins the most games. I think there can be time when a team who is almost as talented as another can pull the upset. When two teams are close to each other then things like the unbalanced schedule (something I wish they would change) and dumb luck play a larger role. Now if his point was a team who wins 68 games is really only a 65 win (or something to that effect) level fine. What doesn't happen is a team with low talent suddenly wins a boatload of games or vice versa. Injuries aside of course.

 

The overall idea that a team's talent is, or should, be based on anything but how they actually do is simply wrong. The reason we know certain talents are beneficial is because of how many wins they provide not the other way around. If a team does not provide the wins projected then the talent wasn't what was predicted.

 

Well, the 1987 Brewers (and Detroit Tigers) were more talented (i.e. wins) than the Twins, yet we didn't make the playoffs and the Twins won the WS. [sarcasm]Not that I'm still bitter or anything...[/sarcasm]

 

I don't think he is saying that a "68 win" team is suddenly going to win 95 games with the same talent. But that a "68 win" team (by prediction) might actually win 60 or 75 wins simply by variations in luck, injuries, schedule, etc... That the actual results are sometimes determined by a Bartman.

[And That]

Even the worst teams in terms of talent will have post season odds >0% at the beginning of the year because, in the gazillion potential iterations of a baseball season, a simulation (Monte Carlo or otherwise, also see Las Vegas oddsmakers) will show that bad teams could potentially make the playoffs. It's not impossible. It therefore stands to reason that if bad teams stand a remote chance, mediocre teams stand less than a remote chance. Likewise, really good teams also stand a less than remote chance of not making the playoffs.

 

So I don't buy the logic that just because a team makes the playoffs, it is necessarily more talented than a team that does not make the playoffs. Final results do not define true talent level. It's just what happened to happen over that particular 162 game season. 162 games is not a meaningful sample size in the population of all potential outcomes. If the whole season were rewound and played over and over again, the results would be different every time even through the talent level stayed the same.

[MKE81]

Maybe the guy just didn't care but fulfilled being there.

 

I don't think that is a good example. If he doesn't care I guess he will never be any good with that attitude.

 

Also why are we freaking out over Josh Hader's huge fall league performance, but if Santana does poorly it is nothing? Seems like it should go both ways.

 

Santana made a brief ML appearance in 2014. And some more in 2015. He's got a great AAA line. Him having to prove himself at his winter ball is past. Hader on the other hand has 0 games played at AAA much less ML. He needs to show up and attempt to show some kind of learning or improvement. Can also say Hader had just 104IP vs the 123 he had the season before. His arm had innings to throw.

Santana 126games 460PAs vs 147 598PAs. So it stands with reason the young man may have been tired. Hader's arm didn't have that reason.

 

 

On to the subject of Tanking and was it Olney who's upset at what Milw has done to fit his idea of the team tanking.

 

So in a perfect world with the team trying to acquire winning talent through ML player trades/signings. We should still have Gomez +9mil. Lind +8mil. Segura +3mil. Gone after a FA SP. Kept KRod +7.5mil. Fiers would still be on team.

So let's see: 50mil+27 or 77mil. We'd probably have picked up a Doug Fister on a 2year deal for 18mil vs the 1/7.

And now we're a 90win team and not tanking right? Obviously wouldn't have a single one of the younger players. So let's build a maybe 80win team at 85-100mil payroll. And have a minors club ranked near the bottom so to satisfy not tanking. Next year after we'd have lost Gomez, Krod, and Lind we'd put Reed/Taylor in CF. Rogers would be at 1b. Segura would be traded for Arcia to play SS. We'd sign a 3b. Still have a mediocre Staff. No depth. spend somewhere 85-100mil on payroll sell the team as a winning squad that can compete with the near 100win Central teams after not doing so the prior 2seasons. Hey we ain't tanking. Aint winning also but we keep giving the college try.

 

Nah we don't want that. So let's change the rules now that the Cubs are 100win team of what looks like the next decade. We can't let what they did work for other franchises. We gotta stop this. Want it to be fixed? Retract to 20 Teams. Have 40man rosters vs 25man. Eliminate the bottom 10markets so 150+Million payrolls. Or, just let it be. Milwaukee won't have 35year olds getting starts. Signing 33year old+ to fill your team to me would be tanking. Playing AA players would be tanking. Giving AAA guys and under 28year olds shots at playing, isn't tanking. It's called being young and needing time for talent to lead to wins.

 

YES. THIS. and Olney has long been terrible. The Brewers have veteran MLB players at C, 1b, 2b, 3b, LF (Braun). Villar has parts of 3 MLB seasons and is getting his shot to start. Liriano has a small MLB stint and is getting his shot after a strong showing at AAA / Broxton is 25 and getting his shot after spending the majority of last year at AAA. Santana has 2yrs in AAA and was up enough last year to not qualify for Top Prospect lists otherwise he would have been Top 100 again. Rotation is all veterans. Pen is all veterans. What does Olney want from a small/mid market team that has a pipeline of Top 100 Prospects transitioning to the MLB level in 2017...to sign established FAs and block their development at this level? He's awful

[CheezWizHed]

True, but pretty unlikely (despite what "Major League" might have you think. ).

 

Statistically speaking, I was referring to more of a +/- 1 sigma deviation where you are talking more about exceeding +3 sigma deviation (i.e. the least talented team in the MLB making the playoffs).

 

http://www.canadianmetalworking.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/30/2013/12/Sigma-chart.png

[Jenkins5]

Bubba Derby gets no love but kid looks like a young, dominant Tyler Thornburg.

You get this off 37 innings from a former college pitcher in A ball?

 

FWIW, he seems a solid second guy thrown in to the trade, but there are an endless amount of guys who did well in very tiny sample sizes at A ball like 37 innings is and that ended up being the main high point of their professional baseball careers.

 

I'll start getting a little more excited about Derby's future if he pitches really well once he reaches AA ball and then can repeat that success in AAA.

 

What do you think Thornburg was? A three year college player who dominated in the same fashion in his small sample in R+/A- at 20/21. The have same body type with decent power for size. Both rely heavily on an outstanding change up that is their #1 out pitch.

 

Thornburg 9G, 6GS, 23.1 IP 1.96ERA, 11BB, 38K, 1.11WHIP, .179 Ave

14.46 k/9 4.24 bb/9, 39% k% to 11% bb% 3.54 FIP

 

Derby 12G, 8GS, 34.2 IP 0.78 ERA, 10BB, 45K, 0.84 WHIP, .161 Ave

11.7 k/9 2.6 bb/9, 35% k% to 8% bb% 2.54 FIP

 

We here were very excited for Thornburg after that showing as he rose all the way to #11 to start 2011 season in the Power 50.

 

I am not saying he is Thornburg 100% but I believe he is overlooked in the trade. He could be a real nice pitcher in our system. He doesn't need to reach AA to think he could be a good pitcher

[Boomer5]

True, but pretty unlikely (despite what "Major League" might have you think. ).

 

Statistically speaking, I was referring to more of a +/- 1 sigma deviation where you are talking more about exceeding +3 sigma deviation (i.e. the least talented team in the MLB making the playoffs).

 

http://www.canadianmetalworking.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/30/2013/12/Sigma-chart.png

 

[sarcasm]So...You're saying there's chance![/sarcasm]

[And That]

True, but pretty unlikely (despite what "Major League" might have you think. ).

I'm not out to prove likeliness, just disprove absoluteness.

 

For reference, Fangraphs' playoff odds (based more or less on perceived talent level at the time) going into last season had the Phillies at 99.8% likely not to make the playoffs, but both World Series teams were less than 30% likely to make the playoffs (and both under 2% likely to win the World Series). Teams among the most likely to make the playoffs included the Nationals, Mariners, Red Sox, Angels, and Indians.

 

Obviously there can be some debate over the methodology in any particular simulation and talent level changes over the course of the season, but I think it is readily apparent that a team with X talent level will not always have Y wins - it just doesn't work like that. X talent may give you a two deviation likelihood of Y +/- 10 wins (or whatever the # may be). Talent over or under performs more or less all of the time.

[Bnowell4evr]

So 4 years of Khris Davis got from Oakland about what Oakland got for a half year rental of Scott Kazmir. To me that seems like the return was low for someone with rare power numbers. If Nottingham works out at catcher, then it is all good, but it has to work out. Either Sterns likes Nottingham a whole lot, or he was somewhat desperate to get a catching prospect in the system.

 

Regardless of how this works out, I will miss Davis's walk up music. It was the only one I liked.

 

I wouldn't overlook Bubba Derby in all of this. The BA prospect handbook was just as high on Derby as they were on Nottingham. Throw in Stearns success in Houston with snatching up young pitching prospects before they exploded onto the scene and I'm really intrigued with the guy.

[Boomer5]

Maybe the guy just didn't care but fulfilled being there.

 

I don't think that is a good example. If he doesn't care I guess he will never be any good with that attitude.

 

Also why are we freaking out over Josh Hader's huge fall league performance, but if Santana does poorly it is nothing? Seems like it should go both ways.

 

Santana made a brief ML appearance in 2014. And some more in 2015. He's got a great AAA line. Him having to prove himself at his winter ball is past. Hader on the other hand has 0 games played at AAA much less ML. He needs to show up and attempt to show some kind of learning or improvement. Can also say Hader had just 104IP vs the 123 he had the season before. His arm had innings to throw.

Santana 126games 460PAs vs 147 598PAs. So it stands with reason the young man may have been tired. Hader's arm didn't have that reason.

 

 

On to the subject of Tanking and was it Olney who's upset at what Milw has done to fit his idea of the team tanking.

 

So in a perfect world with the team trying to acquire winning talent through ML player trades/signings. We should still have Gomez +9mil. Lind +8mil. Segura +3mil. Gone after a FA SP. Kept KRod +7.5mil. Fiers would still be on team.

So let's see: 50mil+27 or 77mil. We'd probably have picked up a Doug Fister on a 2year deal for 18mil vs the 1/7.

And now we're a 90win team and not tanking right? Obviously wouldn't have a single one of the younger players. So let's build a maybe 80win team at 85-100mil payroll. And have a minors club ranked near the bottom so to satisfy not tanking. Next year after we'd have lost Gomez, Krod, and Lind we'd put Reed/Taylor in CF. Rogers would be at 1b. Segura would be traded for Arcia to play SS. We'd sign a 3b. Still have a mediocre Staff. No depth. spend somewhere 85-100mil on payroll sell the team as a winning squad that can compete with the near 100win Central teams after not doing so the prior 2seasons. Hey we ain't tanking. Aint winning also but we keep giving the college try.

 

Nah we don't want that. So let's change the rules now that the Cubs are 100win team of what looks like the next decade. We can't let what they did work for other franchises. We gotta stop this. Want it to be fixed? Retract to 20 Teams. Have 40man rosters vs 25man. Eliminate the bottom 10markets so 150+Million payrolls. Or, just let it be. Milwaukee won't have 35year olds getting starts. Signing 33year old+ to fill your team to me would be tanking. Playing AA players would be tanking. Giving AAA guys and under 28year olds shots at playing, isn't tanking. It's called being young and needing time for talent to lead to wins.

 

The Brewers only course of action is to get really lucky and beat any statistical projection on most of their players or tank like they doing now to build their farm system.

 

If Olney wants to get upset, it shouldnt be what the Brewers are doing, it should be what the Cubs did with big market payroll capability and what the Phillies are doing now.