Christian Yelich

[adambr2]

Why on earth does every made up offer on these boards always includes Isan Diaz? Geez, it's maddening.

 

Because our first round pick is better and Diaz just hit 710 ops in A ball and isn't much of a defender.

 

Admittedly it's a sell low on the guy but he has to start hitting before he can be taken very seriously.

That was the first time he hasn't hit and you are overstating the severity of his offensive season. That would also be the first time I'd heard him described as not much of a defender. Hiura makes giving him up easier but he is a quality prospect.

 

I agree with everything you said besides the defense. Isan is definitely a bat first prospect. Pretty limited range and weak arm which will likely keep him limited to 2B.

 

Not that he will be a disaster, he could play passable 2B potentially but his upside is his potential to be a slugging middle infielder.

[82brewcrew82]

I agree with everything you said besides the defense. Isan is definitely a bat first prospect. Pretty limited range and weak arm which will likely keep him limited to 2B.

 

Not that he will be a disaster, he could play passable 2B potentially but his upside is his potential to be a slugging middle infielder.

To me "not much of a defender" means below average. Everything I have ever read on Diaz says he should be serviceable at second.

[homer]

I think if Brinson was able to match Yelich's career numbers I'd be pretty cool with that. Therefore, I'm cool with the guy who already has Yelich's numbers.

[82brewcrew82]

I think if Brinson was able to match Yelich's career numbers I'd be pretty cool with that. Therefore, I'm cool with the guy who already has Yelich's numbers.

Is his name Yelich? I do agree with the sentiment.

[tmwiese55]

But you're also giving up multiple other good prospects, and likely at least one of our few starting pitching prospects and you already have Santana.

[NievesNoNO]

The Brewers could offer up an entire OF to the Marlins if they wanted. I could see giving both Brinson and Philips +. Maybe sign Cain in addition and keep Broxton around as a 4th OF. Then trade Santana (as has already been suggested by many) to Cleveland for Salazar.

 

That would seem like a whole lot of moving parts but this is the time for being unreasonable. I think it would make for a different dynamic at the top of the line up with some decent consistency and balance.

 

Yelich

Cain

Braun

Thames/Aguilar

Shaw

Villar

Arcia

Pina

 

I'm starting to come around to the idea of giving up some of these position prospects to get some value for the MLB roster. Sometimes I forget that they will actually have more drafts in the coming seasons. There's so much smoke coming from the rumor mill with this team over the last few days that I think something significant is pretty inevitable at this point.

 

From Tom Haudricourt's twitter feed:

"With #Brewers On Deck coming up on Sunday, never discount the joy that owner Mark Attanasio gets by stepping to the microphone and telling the team's fans they have done something big. Or, perhaps, some things big."

[82brewcrew82]

But you're also giving up multiple other good prospects, and likely at least one of our few starting pitching prospects and you already have Santana.

I think Santana is the next domino. This is how the game is played.

[82brewcrew82]

From Tom Haudricourt's twitter feed:

"With #Brewers On Deck coming up on Sunday, never discount the joy that owner Mark Attanasio gets by stepping to the microphone and telling the team's fans they have done something big. Or, perhaps, some things big."

Yummy. Cryptic confirmation. Me likey.

[tmwiese55]

But you're also giving up multiple other good prospects, and likely at least one of our few starting pitching prospects and you already have Santana.

I think Santana is the next domino. This is how the game is played.

 

Right, I mentioned out of why the need to give up your #1 guy and more when you already have a good guy sitting there that costs you nothing who's also controlled for years.

[superfly]

But you're also giving up multiple other good prospects, and likely at least one of our few starting pitching prospects and you already have Santana.

I think Santana is the next domino. This is how the game is played.

 

Right, I mentioned out of why the need to give up your #1 guy and more when you already have a good guy sitting there that costs you nothing who's also controlled for years.

 

Because that guy plays defense worse than an oak tree and you might be able to get good controllable starting pitching for him.

[pacopete4]

How great is it that we could actually have a legitimate lead off hitter?!?

[82brewcrew82]

But you're also giving up multiple other good prospects, and likely at least one of our few starting pitching prospects and you already have Santana.

I think Santana is the next domino. This is how the game is played.

 

Right, I mentioned out of why the need to give up your #1 guy and more when you already have a good guy sitting there that costs you nothing who's also controlled for years.

You're thinking in a vacuum. Play it out two moves down the road.

[tmwiese55]

I have, and I see us moving a lot of prospects out to put together a team that still is not a favorite to make the playoffs. And you could probably just take the money you're going to spend on Yelich and Cain and just sign a P and have just about the same win expectation while keeping all your prospects.

 

I'm excited and glad to be involved in some action for once, but I'm a bit worried they're rushing things while 3 teams are loaded right now instead of letting the rebuild play out. And in a way just overthinking things a bit.

[brewtank34]

How great is it that we could actually have a legitimate lead off hitter?!?

 

Yelich

Braun

Shaw

 

 

Yes please.

[82brewcrew82]

I have, and I see us moving a lot of prospects out to put together a team that still is not a favorite to make the playoffs. And you could probably just take the money you're going to spend on Yelich and Cain and just sign a P and have just about the same win expectation while keeping all your prospects.

 

I'm excited and glad to be involved in some action for once, but I'm a bit worried they're rushing things while 3 teams are loaded right now instead of letting the rebuild play out. And in a way just overthinking things a bit.

If they get Yelich I don't think they move on Cain. I think they roll with some combination of Broxton, Braun, Yelich, Phillips, Thames and Perez. They move Santana in a deal to say Cleveland for Salazar and Kipnis plus a prospect. If all that gets pulled off, I think they go hard after Arietta.

[bill hAll Star]

I have, and I see us moving a lot of prospects out to put together a team that still is not a favorite to make the playoffs. And you could probably just take the money you're going to spend on Yelich and Cain and just sign a P and have just about the same win expectation while keeping all your prospects.

 

I'm excited and glad to be involved in some action for once, but I'm a bit worried they're rushing things while 3 teams are loaded right now instead of letting the rebuild play out. And in a way just overthinking things a bit.

 

Amen.

[tmwiese55]

Good on Stearns for trying all this, more power to him and good luck on pulling all this off. I'll believe it when I see it but I'm biting my lip on how much it's all going to cost after years of building up all these prospects attempting to do a rebuild the way we've all wanted to do it up until now but now changing course fairly sharply. It's been working imo so far

[82brewcrew82]

Good on Stearns for trying all this, more power to him and good luck on pulling all this off. I'll believe it when I see it but I'm biting my lip on how much it's all going to cost after years of building up all these prospects attempting to do a rebuild the way we've all wanted to do it up until now but now changing course fairly sharply. It's been working imo so far

I'm not sure why you think trading for Yelich is gong to drain the system. I'm also not sure why you think this is changing course.

[brewmann04]

High heat hinted it will sting

[82brewcrew82]

High heat hinted it will sting

I would think so. Yelich is an outstanding ball player. Still doesn't mean the system is drained.

[SRB]

Have to say I was wrong about not wanting Yelich. I didn't realize he had 5 years left on a team-friendly contract.

 

I would trade Brinson, no question. I'm actually a bit iffy on Brinson's value. My concern is it would take Brinson and a few of our other top-100 prospects who I don't want to part with.

[pacopete4]

Good on Stearns for trying all this, more power to him and good luck on pulling all this off. I'll believe it when I see it but I'm biting my lip on how much it's all going to cost after years of building up all these prospects attempting to do a rebuild the way we've all wanted to do it up until now but now changing course fairly sharply. It's been working imo so far

 

Shooters, shoot. Eventually you gotta make some moves to win. All these prospects won’t pan out or have a spot on our team for them. Grabbing a OF like Yelich with five years of control is a great way to maximize some of these prospects.

[CanOfCorn]

Let us think about this for a moment. It seems fairly clear with past moves that Stearns highly values players that can play more than one position. This would fit with the narrative that he's trying to sell Santana hard and trying to acquire a guy like Yelich who can play all OF positions. He also seems to value guys like Harrison, Nunez, Villar, etc. This would also fit with him wanting to sell high on a guy like Diaz who seems inept at playing a different position besides 2B at the MLB level. I love the way Stearns thinks about this. Since we are a smaller market team we need to think about this per position.

 

We need to look at it this way. We need to improve our team by 8-10 wins from last years team in order to be in contention for the NL Central. Obviously with Nelson out for a period of time I put our current roster at about an 80-82 win team. We need to hit 90. That's the goal in the end.

 

Make the Yelich trade with Brinson, Ortiz, Diaz, etc. (probably shouldn't cost that much though...just throwing names out there) going to the Marlins and trade Santana to an AL team for a SP and possibly a 2B (Salazar/Kipnis)

 

C - Pina/Vogt

1B - Thames/Aguilar

2B - Kipnis/Villar

3B - Shaw/Perez

SS - Arcia

RF - Phillips

CF - Yelich/Broxton

LF - Braun

 

 

SP - Nelson (when healthy)

SP - Salazar

SP - Anderson

SP - Lynn

SP - Davies/Woodruff/etc

 

 

That's a solid lineup/rotation right there. I think these are all pretty realistic moves and puts us right near contention without having to overspend on anyone. Yeah it is a decent prospect haul we'll have to give up for Yelich but with the depth that we have I'm not sure it really hurts us. In my opinion, Santana has played his best year in the majors. I feel this is something he can't sustain with his build and he's only going to digress more from his already poor defense. Sure we don't have that 'ACE' but we have 4 guys who are pretty legitimate #2 guys right now. That's a better overall rotation than we had in 2011/2012. I think this gets us pretty close to 8 wins over our last year's roster especially if we get the 2016 version of Kipnis. It gives us some flexibility with the rotation and even some additional trade bait (Woodruff, Davies).

 

Maybe we make another deal for another OF that isn't Broxton. That's also a possibility. I could also see us getting someone else to man 1B. I still like the idea of an Abreu trade. DBACKS are also listening on Corbin which could be something Stearns could get in on. Lots of possibilities right now. I can't remember a time where there were so many valid avenues we could go this late in the offseason. Very unique situation right now for all of Major League Baseball.

 

The best thing about this is that the entire rotation would be under team control thru 2020.

[adambr2]

I have, and I see us moving a lot of prospects out to put together a team that still is not a favorite to make the playoffs. And you could probably just take the money you're going to spend on Yelich and Cain and just sign a P and have just about the same win expectation while keeping all your prospects.

 

I'm excited and glad to be involved in some action for once, but I'm a bit worried they're rushing things while 3 teams are loaded right now instead of letting the rebuild play out. And in a way just overthinking things a bit.

 

I find it kind of funny that we're worried about things being too rushed when all off-season we've complained about how slowly things have gone. And by the way, that's not a dig on you, just an observation on how quickly perspective can change.

 

Anyway, if there's anything I'm not really worried about regarding Stearns, it's that he's rushing things. It would have been so easy last summer, especially as a new GM having a loaded system, to make a move in response to Quintana and bite the bullet, give in to the A's and give them Brinson to get Gray here. But he didn't. I have quite a bit of confidence that all the potential moves have been very methodically calculated and analyzed. I don't think he's looking to do something to do something, if that's the implication here.

 

You have to look at more than just our win expectation for 2018. Christian Yelich is a 5 year investment. Does he make us better than the Cubs, Dodgers, and Nationals? No, he doesn't. But he's a long-term investment that completely locks down one of our OF spots at a very high level through 2022, at a cost that affords us the opportunity to spend the rest of our payroll flexibility elsewhere.

 

And on that note, I think we, myself included, worry a little bit too much about what the Cubs, Dodgers, and Nationals are doing. Of course you want to pay attention to your competition, but let's remember, we don't need to be better than any of them for 162 games -- we just need to be at least the 5th best team in the NL. So let's get to that point first, build ourselves into that top 5 NL team and then figure out what we need to do to get better from there.

 

This isn't like moves from 5-10 years ago of just looking to fix a short-term problem. Yelich is a young, high level player who would be a core player on this team for at least the next 5 years and possibly a 5 WAR player in this lineup and park.

 

Look, we all like Santana, and I get what you're saying, that he's already here and producing, but they've been shopping him since the winter meetings. It's possible that the FO's strategy going forward includes an emphasis on OF defense and that Santana doesn't fit into that long-term plan. Yelich also offers a little bit different dimension to our lineup that we don't have near the top. I like Santana. But Yelich is just better. And rest assured if that is our plan, we aren't giving Santana away. So the possibility of adding both Yelich and a high end starter to the rotation still exists, and if we go into next season with that, especially if Nelson is at full strength, that's definitely going to get people excited.

[MNBrew]

For all the prospect build-up that's SO necessary for the Brewers' long-term organizational health, eventually there are only so many roster spots -- both on the active 25-man and the "future-minded" protection spots on the 40-man -- and you're smart to use a few prospects as trade chips for a single, larger improvement.

 

If that's what this potential Yelich move amounts to, I can buy it -- in spite of the fact that, like many here, I'm wary of the sting.

 

Not all the prospects will pan out. If you trade a couple before that proves to be their case, then you've used them wisely. In hindsight, the guy it hurt worst to lose in the Sabathia trade was the PTBNL (Brantley) and few would've projected him as such as opposed to 1 or more of the 3 know commodities at the time.

 

I think of the Twins of about 15 years ago when Cuddyer & Restovich were coming up. They had piles of prospects but pretty much hung onto ALL of them too long -- definitely overplayed their hand -- and got absolutely zero out of way too many out of them, whether that was their MLB contribution or their value as a potential trade chip.