Brewers Trade for Mike Moustakas, Royals receive Phillips and Lopez

[wallus]

Very ballsy. It's almost like Clancy took over for Stearns for one day.

 

One thing for sure is that Shaw is a team first guy. This could make him look very bad.

[ebmackenzie]

 

Oh well, Stearns will have to live this one down if it blows up.

 

How would we know if the other deal breaks down? If part 2 doesn't go through then we would never know and think that Shaw to 2B was the plan.

 

It could be that part 2 of the spring OF acquisition fell through and DSantana got stuck in AAA because we stocked up on outfielders and nothing else happened.

[trwi7]

How would we know if the other deal breaks down? If part 2 doesn't go through then we would never know and think that Shaw to 2B was the plan.

 

There may not be another deal and Stearns would still get blame if there was supposed to be another deal and it didn't happen and we ended up with a guy like Shaw playing 2B.

 

This isn't like the outfielder thing in the winter where it was just guys being blocked. This is a team that's trying to make the playoffs putting a guy who has never played 2B and doesn't have close to the athleticism to play there because Stearns felt the need to get another 3B. If this blows up, it's 100% on Stearns whether this was his plan or another deal fell through.

[MillerParkSouth]

This is the first deal of Stearns that I really don’t like. Seems awfully rich cost for 2 months of a guy with a .300 OBP to make our defense worse. I find it hard to believe that that package couldn’t get us Dozier. I don’t see this ending well.

[Oxy]

I think this was a case of "What can we get for Phillips and Lopez?" rather than "let's go get Mike Moustakas." We are a marginally better team with Moose, and we gave up guys that needed to be traded. I don't think it is a whole lot more complicated than that.

[adambr2]

I think this was a case of "What can we get for Phillips and Lopez?" rather than "let's go get Mike Moustakas." We are a marginally better team with Moose, and we gave up guys that needed to be traded. I don't think it is a whole lot more complicated than that.

 

I really don't think you do something as drastic as move your 3B to a position he's never played if this is your thought process. I think it was a little more than that.

[coolhandluke121]

I don't really like it. Gotta give them the benefit of the doubt on evaluating Lopez and Phillips, but that's just one aspect of the deal. I guess Moustakas is going to turn some fly outs into home runs at Miller Park, and it's not like Villar/Miller was great defense at 2b anyway.... I'm still really surprised they did this though.

[travisteck]

Any chance that this is a preventative move and shaw goes on to the DL for a while? I know he's been playing hurt for a while (I remember a beat writer mentioning that a few weeks back on Twitter).

 

Obviously wouldn't be ideal, but just throwing it out there.

[OldSchoolSnapper]

After reading more I don't think another move is coming. They are sticking Shaw at second.

[JohnBriggs12]

Let's remember it's 2018, not 1988. A lot more outs do not involve defense at all. For the most part, this Brewer staff is a strikeout/flyout staff. Plus, I seriously doubt that if they have a lead after 6 innings, that both Shaw and Moustakas will be in the game. We could see instances where Aguilar gets rested, and Shaw goes to 1B too, with Thames in the OF.

 

Shaw will probably be no worse than Jeff Kent, who was a corner infielder who played 2B most of his career.

[And That]

There will be another move. No way they are playing Shaw at 2B.

Care to wager?

[Noche]

Good move. We are more talented today than when I went to sleep.

[SoCal Brew Crew Fan]

It’s a bit of a head scratcher, but I like Stearns taking a shot. The team is behind a couple other teams talent wise so taking some prudent risks makes sense. They didn’t give up much and maybe Shaw can do it. This team should also score some runs. Who knows what the price rage was on others like Dozier. In Stearns we Trust!

[sveumrules]

With the continuing rise of strikeouts in the game there are less balls in play than ever, which obviously means less opportunities for fielders to help or hurt their team.

 

Plays at 2B are down almost 20% from just ten years ago.

 

(https://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/where-defensive-opportunities-have-declined-most/)

 

I for one am happy to see DS & company rolling the dice on new strategies where data suggests the risk is worthwhile.

[Ennder]

How long does a flight from New York to San Francisco take? Assume he will be suited up by Sunday.

about 6 hour flight

Well Counsell said he would be playing tomorrow, so I assume he’ll be on a cross country flight in the morning (if not the red eye).

 

The Royals game was rained out on Friday, he easily could have been on a plane the second the deal was done. It was probably done a bit of time before it was announced as well.

[torts]

Exciting! Love this! Moar dinngerz!

[Lathund]

Very ballsy. It's almost like Clancy took over for Stearns for one day.

 

Wouldn't that have meant that Perez gets a 5 year extension, Arcia is traded and Stokes being promoted to play CF?

[Eye Black]

Resetting the rumored Moustakas interest from this past January as captured in the Sign Moustakas, Trade Shaw Thread, the off-season speculation on the Brewers interest in Moustakas initially came from Jim Bowden via this Tweet:

 

#Brewers continue to be “in” on RHP Jake Arrieta & also 3B Michael Moustakas with the idea that if they signed Moustakas they could trade Travis Shaw to NYY, ATL or NYM according to a club source.

[Bombers]

I like this trade. Moose hitting in Miller Park will be fun. A LH bat will be a good add. And also the 40 man issue at end of season. Can’t wait to see what happens the next few days

[ThisIsMyCrew]

I do appreciate that the MM and Soria trades weren’t really leaked until they were basically complete.

[igor67]

I have no problem with the price, maybe Phillips develops somewhere else but I also get a vibe from him at this point that that will take him a season or tow of mediocre numbers he'll pop with an interesting prime and just fade kind of fast. Big offensive improvement for sure especially since the park effect really suggest he could go off down the stretch for us. From the GM who finally figured out how to make the closer concept irrelevant I'm providing a fair share of trust (also after 1.5 very competitive seasons) that he knows something we don't about the defense.

[adambr2]

I don't mind having Moustakas around, but it does bother me to an extent how lefty heavy we have become in the lineup.

 

The troublesome part about this trend is how poorly it matches us up with the main competition in our division, the Cubs, who are almost exclusively left handed in their rotation. It essentially neutralizes 3 of our biggest offensive weapons in Shaw, Moustakas and Thames.

 

I guess it probably is helpful to Aguilar and Braun to some degree but not as much as it hurts us when you have to take out Shaw and Moustakas for Perez + Villar or Saladino basically every time you face the Cubs.

[Eye Black]

Some of David Stearns initial comments via The Athletic: It could be musical chairs in the infield as the Brewers acquire Mike Moustakas ...

 

“The truth is, with the way we move our infielders around, conventional positions don’t apply to us all that much,” general manager David Stearns said on a conference call with reporters. “We ask a lot of all of our infielders, to play all over the dirt.”

 

 

Another interesting note from the article is that Stearns said the teams have been discussing a potential trade for at least a month.

[fondybrewfan]

If Counsell and staff didn't think Shaw was capable of playing even a mediocre 2B I don't think Stearns goes ahead with this. So obviously the coaching staff feels comfortable so I trust that this won't be a train wreck. I am sure range will be an issue but I just want the routine plays. Kind of like Thames in the OF.

 

Even with the OBP the offense today is much better than the offense yesterday.

 

Stearns strategy is clearly trying to make defense less of a priority. Get an awesome bullpen with huge K totals, get an offense that hopefully scores a lot of runs, and if the defense weakens to some degree than so be it. Get the lead on teams and make defensive switches late in games as necessary.

 

To this point we have substantially improved the team while not really trading anyone of great significance IMO. Curious to see what, if anything, Stearns is still trying to pull off. Catcher or SP I would imagine.

[Boomer5]

They still have to turn a DP which is kind of important.

 

If the Cubs had done this wed all be laughing at them and rightly so.