What is with the lack of homegrown talent

[Jopal78]

The Brewers organizational development system is no different than the majority of the other clubs.

 

A team is most likely to find a Brain, Fielder, Weeks, etc when drafting in the first ten spots or so. Just like the Cubs drafting Bryant, Schwarber and Baez when picking near the top of the draft.

 

The Brewers simply traded a lot of talent away late in the Melvin years. Stearns, like nearly all GMs, valued different types of players and remade the minor leagues jesttiaoning players who didn’t fit his sough after profile.

 

In addition to Yamamoto and Fiers; Cy Sneed (Villar trade) is going to make the major leagues sooner than later. Anthony Banda should be back some time this year as well

[rickh150]

With the lack of homegrown talent in the past, especially with starting pitching, it was amazing that they thought they somehow happened to now have developed three starters in one season. That may go down as one of the biggest blunders in franchise history, when this window has been one of the best in franchise history and now this season is looking like a major failure.

 

 

If this season, where we currently have the 4th best record in the NL (against the 10th highest payroll) is looking like a major failure, what would you call the Giants spending 177 million (3rd in NL) to be the 2nd worst team?

 

Or the Nationals spending 163 million (4th in NL) to likely miss the postseason? Or the Mets spending 159 million (6th in NL) to likely do the same?

 

Major failure? We are a playoff team right now! And we have had many options in the rotation, including about all from our system. We'll get Gio back soon too, and we'll do something else by the deadline....

[mtrebs]

Again, the team’s record now isn’t really the issue. It’s how the team is playing. They have a lot of holes right now, more than last year. Management didn’t make the team better than last year, and I don’t believe they will do better than last year. We will have to wait and see how it really plays out, but if they don’t make the playoffs or don’t get far, people will be upset that management didn’t make moves to improve the team.

[Fear The Chorizo]

Again, the team’s record now isn’t really the issue. It’s how the team is playing. They have a lot of holes right now, more than last year. Management didn’t make the team better than last year, and I don’t believe they will do better than last year. We will have to wait and see how it really plays out, but if they don’t make the playoffs or don’t get far, people will be upset that management didn’t make moves to improve the team.

 

I think I'd like to see specifics on all these perceived roster holes to know that DS didn't actually make this years roster more talented. IMO heading into spring training this season, their roster was much better than what they had on the NLCS roster simply by adding Grandal and replacing schoop with moose for a full season.

 

Unless you are a prophet and stated back in March that shaw and jesus would hit like pitchers, knebel would blow out an arm and wahl would blow out a knee, chacin and Byrnes would be terrible, etc, your point is reinforced only by hindsight.

[Ron Robinsons Beard]

Again, the team’s record now isn’t really the issue. It’s how the team is playing. They have a lot of holes right now, more than last year. Management didn’t make the team better than last year, and I don’t believe they will do better than last year. We will have to wait and see how it really plays out, but if they don’t make the playoffs or don’t get far, people will be upset that management didn’t make moves to improve the team.

 

Thankfully this team has played well enough that they can play like crap for a week and it doesn't put them in a hole. There's still a long way to go, and I'd bet dollars to doughnuts that they have a few more stretches of crappy play in them. It's a matter of keeping those stretches small, and taking advantage of the hot stretches by trying to prolong those as much as possible.

[mtrebs]

Again, the team’s record now isn’t really the issue. It’s how the team is playing. They have a lot of holes right now, more than last year. Management didn’t make the team better than last year, and I don’t believe they will do better than last year. We will have to wait and see how it really plays out, but if they don’t make the playoffs or don’t get far, people will be upset that management didn’t make moves to improve the team.

 

I think I'd like to see specifics on all these perceived roster holes to know that DS didn't actually make this years roster more talented. IMO heading into spring training this season, their roster was much better than what they had on the NLCS roster simply by adding Grandal and replacing schoop with moose for a full season.

 

Unless you are a prophet and stated back in March that shaw and jesus would hit like pitchers, knebel would blow out an arm and wahl would blow out a knee, chacin and Byrnes would be terrible, etc, your point is reinforced only by hindsight.

 

I'll clarify that my grief is with the decisions on the pitching side. Although I was fully expecting Aguilar to continue to struggle (or at least revert back to his career norms) based on his second half of the season last year, I was happy about the offensive lineup. I'll still argue that signing Moustakas and Grandal contradicted the approach with the pitching, I'm glad they were signed and without them we'd be in real trouble.

 

My grief goes back to the pitching decisions. I was completely shocked when we let Miley go and he signed for a very small contract (relatively speaking). Then we broke up our major strength of the bullpen to try out three young guys as starters. Normally this wouldn't be a concern, but the odds of those three being successful and take us to the next level this year were very slim. Now we had to have adjustments to move two of them out of the rotation, and due to other struggles, we are and arm or two short in our starting pitching. I understand letting the young guys get their shot, but not if you are going all in (which the Moustakas and Grandal one-year signings would indicate). It's a contradictory approach, which I would have rather gone all young and target next year or the year after, or made the big splash for 2019. Personally I'd have rather them go for it in 2019 as you never know how long our window is.

[Fear The Chorizo]

Again, the team’s record now isn’t really the issue. It’s how the team is playing. They have a lot of holes right now, more than last year. Management didn’t make the team better than last year, and I don’t believe they will do better than last year. We will have to wait and see how it really plays out, but if they don’t make the playoffs or don’t get far, people will be upset that management didn’t make moves to improve the team.

 

I think I'd like to see specifics on all these perceived roster holes to know that DS didn't actually make this years roster more talented. IMO heading into spring training this season, their roster was much better than what they had on the NLCS roster simply by adding Grandal and replacing schoop with moose for a full season.

 

Unless you are a prophet and stated back in March that shaw and jesus would hit like pitchers, knebel would blow out an arm and wahl would blow out a knee, chacin and Byrnes would be terrible, etc, your point is reinforced only by hindsight.

 

I'll clarify that my grief is with the decisions on the pitching side. Although I was fully expecting Aguilar to continue to struggle (or at least revert back to his career norms) based on his second half of the season last year, I was happy about the offensive lineup. I'll still argue that signing Moustakas and Grandal contradicted the approach with the pitching, I'm glad they were signed and without them we'd be in real trouble.

 

My grief goes back to the pitching decisions. I was completely shocked when we let Miley go and he signed for a very small contract (relatively speaking). Then we broke up our major strength of the bullpen to try out three young guys as starters. Normally this wouldn't be a concern, but the odds of those three being successful and take us to the next level this year were very slim. Now we had to have adjustments to move two of them out of the rotation, and due to other struggles, we are and arm or two short in our starting pitching. I understand letting the young guys get their shot, but not if you are going all in (which the Moustakas and Grandal one-year signings would indicate). It's a contradictory approach, which I would have rather gone all young and target next year or the year after, or made the big splash for 2019. Personally I'd have rather them go for it in 2019 as you never know how long our window is.

 

Understood, but puting the young guys in the rotation was in part predicated on not having much room for them in the pen assuming knebel and wahl were in the back end and pitching to their abilities. And Peralta never really contributed as a reliever last year. Woodruff and Byrnes were great in the pen down the stretch last year, but they both were rightly considered starters until proven otherwise at the start of this year .

 

The biggest pitching problem for this team has been the fact they don't have a dominant middle of the pen - if knebel was the closer it would have freed up hader to do his thing in the middle innings to preserve a bunch of leads through innings 5-7. Shifting hader to the closer role has snuffed out the bullpen strength. Add in chacins struggles early and the fact only one of the three young starters has pitched well enough to keep a rotation spot, and they've been chasing their tails all year. I get that losing miley hurts, but it wasn't like he was a 200 inning workhorse last season - the brewers do have a lot of pitching depth internally, they have to be counting on it to improve. I'd be shocked if they don't go after pitching via trade over the next month, too.

[torts]

I just want to say, I am 110% A-OK with a team that is the result of trading off all of our homegrown talent for another teams talent if that means we are winning. I want to root for a winning team, and honestly, I dont care who drafted who and where they were drafted.