The Brewers would be a great team if they didn't have so many bad players

[adambr2]

The Brewers signed Braun to essentially a life time contract when he was just starting out. His career OPS of .893 is still higher than Yelich’s even counting his down years. There’s more than a few posters here who have advocated benching, releasing Braun despite having earned every penny he’s been paid. So the point with Hiura is, even if he was the next Braun and signed a life time deal posters would still criticize

 

No, they didn't. They signed him to a fantastic 8 year/40 some odd million deal when he was just starting out which carried him through age 31, which would have been a fantastic place to stop. Then signed him to an ill-advised, 5 year/105M extension on top of that in early 2011 a full 5 seasons before he would have even hit free agency, for his age 32-36 seasons.

[Jopal78]

Point being what? They committed to pay 140 million dollars for a player who has put up an .893 OPS, 340 homers. Good deal be it technically a lifetime contract or not.

[MrTPlush]

Point being what? They committed to pay 140 million dollars for a player who has put up an .893 OPS, 340 homers. Good deal be it technically a lifetime contract or not.

 

No, that is simply wrong. You cannot bunch up deals and say they committed 140mil for all that. They committed $40mil for a portion and then $100mil for a different portion. I don't get the fascination with trying to doll up bad contracts on aging players. Just because we made a killing on one deal doesn't mean that production can be apart of the bad deal we made later. They should have made a massive killing and then sent Braun on his way.

 

And really the Braun contract hasn't ended that badly it seems...not good...we shouldn't have done it, but he has stayed relevant for the most part when it comes to production. But lets not try to make it what it isn't. Heck at this rate he could probably get his option picked up if he can be good next year and find a way to play passable at 1B! Probably not getting it picked up as an OFer though.

[adambr2]

Point being what? They committed to pay 140 million dollars for a player who has put up an .893 OPS, 340 homers. Good deal be it technically a lifetime contract or not.

 

No, that is simply wrong. You cannot bunch up deals and say they committed 140mil for all that. They committed $40mil for a portion and then $100mil for a different portion. I don't get the fascination with trying to doll up bad contracts on aging players. Just because we made a killing on one deal doesn't mean that production can be apart of the bad deal we made later. They should have made a massive killing and then sent Braun on his way.

 

And really the Braun contract hasn't ended that badly it seems...not good...we shouldn't have done it, but he has stayed relevant for the most part when it comes to production. But lets not try to make it what it isn't. Heck at this rate he could probably get his option picked up if he can be good next year and find a way to play passable at 1B! Probably not getting it picked up as an OFer though.

 

I don't get it either. No one forced us to give Braun another 5/105 years out simply because we did so well on his first contract. The first contract was a great one and the second was a poor one. They are separate entities, you don't just combine them and say well done.

 

Should we do right by Lucroy and give him 4/80 in the offseason? We'll still come out ahead.

[Jopal78]

It is the same, Braun has earned every penny of the total sum he’s been paid and if you look around at comparable players like Matt Holliday, Alfonso Soriano, and the like, Braun’s stats are similar and his pay has been comparable.

 

The conclusion you can draw is the team signed an elite player for likely his entire career and paid a fair rate and the player performed largely as expected. Yet on this board people argue it was a bad deal. 100% of the people are never going to be satisfied at one time

[trwi7]

Yet on this board people argue it was a bad deal. 100% of the people are never going to be satisfied at one time

 

BECAUSE THEY WERE SEPARATE DEALS. We didn't give him a 13 year, $140 million contract from the get go.

[bill hAll Star]

I totally understand the complaints for Braun's 2nd deal being bad and would tend to agree.

 

That said, I'm wondering between this and the Cain discussions: what are you looking to spend this money on?

 

I am a fan of tanking if it applies. I also see that Mark doesn't want to and I think they've done a decent job at quicker rebuilds.

 

My question is, imagine that either there's a tank or whatever build path and the Brewers have amassed 6-7 good, young players and a handful of role players. These 12 players combine to make $35 million/year.

 

Here's the thing: Assuming the Brewer payroll is going to be between $100 and $130 million, given that the cost of those 12 players will rise as years go by, what can you sign? You may get the random, lucky Moustakas or Grandal opportunity that has come up in the CBA transition where that level player is a 1-year guy...

 

...But guess what you've saved that money for? To sign/extend someone like Ryan Braun at age 31 or a Lorenzo Cain which will become...BAD CONTRACTS.

 

Sure, maybe you could do a Verlander trade when he only has 2 years left (but just one) and pray that it works. But the market isn't Houston, we can't tank and have 7 great, young players, acquire Verlander and Greinke, and pay/keep all of them to be on a path to cross $200 million for 5 years.

 

I know the response will be, "why yes, but you can sign these good players that I will list here for 2-3 years" when those perfect deals that work out are few and far between. Even the Padres who have a very low salary for a bunch of studs coming up or just reaching the majors had to go out and pay for 5 extra years of Machado once he passes his prime. Even the Trout/Machado contracts when you have the off-chance of a premium player hitting free agency in his mid 20s, you are forced to pay 5 years too much.

[adambr2]

It is the same, Braun has earned every penny of the total sum he’s been paid and if you look around at comparable players like Matt Holliday, Alfonso Soriano, and the like, Braun’s stats are similar and his pay has been comparable.

 

The conclusion you can draw is the team signed an elite player for likely his entire career and paid a fair rate and the player performed largely as expected. Yet on this board people argue it was a bad deal. 100% of the people are never going to be satisfied at one time

 

So again, if instead of trading Lucroy in 2016, we had extended him as some wanted to do, for say 4 years/80M, putting us on the hook for 20M a year now through 2021, you'd be arguing that because the totality of the contract (12 years/97.25M) was a great deal, that would make the 4/80 still a great deal?

 

Do you really not see how silly that is?

[adambr2]

I totally understand the complaints for Braun's 2nd deal being bad and would tend to agree.

 

That said, I'm wondering between this and the Cain discussions: what are you looking to spend this money on?

 

I am a fan of tanking if it applies. I also see that Mark doesn't want to and I think they've done a decent job at quicker rebuilds.

 

My question is, imagine that either there's a tank or whatever build path and the Brewers have amassed 6-7 good, young players and a handful of role players. These 12 players combine to make $35 million/year.

 

Here's the thing: Assuming the Brewer payroll is going to be between $100 and $130 million, given that the cost of those 12 players will rise as years go by, what can you sign? You may get the random, lucky Moustakas or Grandal opportunity that has come up in the CBA transition where that level player is a 1-year guy...

 

...But guess what you've saved that money for? To sign/extend someone like Ryan Braun at age 31 or a Lorenzo Cain which will become...BAD CONTRACTS.

 

Sure, maybe you could do a Verlander trade when he only has 2 years left (but just one) and pray that it works. But the market isn't Houston, we can't tank and have 7 great, young players, acquire Verlander and Greinke, and pay/keep all of them to be on a path to cross $200 million for 5 years.

 

I know the response will be, "why yes, but you can sign these good players that I will list here for 2-3 years" when those perfect deals that work out are few and far between. Even the Padres who have a very low salary for a bunch of studs coming up or just reaching the majors had to go out and pay for 5 extra years of Machado once he passes his prime. Even the Trout/Machado contracts when you have the off-chance of a premium player hitting free agency in his mid 20s, you are forced to pay 5 years too much.

 

See now to me, this is a reasonable perspective. If you've got X amount of dollars to spend, not everything is going to neatly fit into a value box for you. You'll have to take some chances on your deals, some of them will pan out, some of them won't. But I'd certainly rather see the money invested back into the club rather than just pocketed.

 

Now I would probably argue that there are better uses for that money than signing guys in their 30s, especially years out, but given what Braun was at the time, and given where we were as a franchise and what we had come from, I guess I can understand the need from a PR perspective to keep the guy a Brewer for his career. I wasn't crazy about the deal at the time and obviously am even less so now, but I can at least understand it. In any event, while it's been an overpay, it certainly hasn't been a criminal misuse of payroll.

 

The Cain contract I guess is somewhat similar to that regard to the Braun extension. I cringe a little seeing that much money committed to guys in their 30's, but it's not like there are any top notch 25 year olds available in free agency, so you've got to use what you've got in the best way you think you can. And it certainly looked like a steal a year ago.

 

Personally, since you asked, I'd like to see more of that money invested in high end reliever arms, which are volatile but can typically be had on shorter contracts.

[Brew crew 92]

I totally understand the complaints for Braun's 2nd deal being bad and would tend to agree.

 

That said, I'm wondering between this and the Cain discussions: what are you looking to spend this money on?

 

I am a fan of tanking if it applies. I also see that Mark doesn't want to and I think they've done a decent job at quicker rebuilds.

 

My question is, imagine that either there's a tank or whatever build path and the Brewers have amassed 6-7 good, young players and a handful of role players. These 12 players combine to make $35 million/year.

 

Here's the thing: Assuming the Brewer payroll is going to be between $100 and $130 million, given that the cost of those 12 players will rise as years go by, what can you sign? You may get the random, lucky Moustakas or Grandal opportunity that has come up in the CBA transition where that level player is a 1-year guy...

 

...But guess what you've saved that money for? To sign/extend someone like Ryan Braun at age 31 or a Lorenzo Cain which will become...BAD CONTRACTS.

 

Sure, maybe you could do a Verlander trade when he only has 2 years left (but just one) and pray that it works. But the market isn't Houston, we can't tank and have 7 great, young players, acquire Verlander and Greinke, and pay/keep all of them to be on a path to cross $200 million for 5 years.

 

I know the response will be, "why yes, but you can sign these good players that I will list here for 2-3 years" when those perfect deals that work out are few and far between. Even the Padres who have a very low salary for a bunch of studs coming up or just reaching the majors had to go out and pay for 5 extra years of Machado once he passes his prime. Even the Trout/Machado contracts when you have the off-chance of a premium player hitting free agency in his mid 20s, you are forced to pay 5 years too much.

 

This brewers team has a much better core of high quality players to build around than 2015-16. Grisham Hiura Woodruff Houser is a strong group to build around.

 

Sign Grisham and Hiura to 8 year deals. That gives us a full 6 years with them before traded with 2 years control left, to get another re-tool going.

 

Plan A.)

Trade Cain Yelich Hader Davies Anderson Shaw Thames jeffress Guerra this offseason, if that’s too many players to trade, keep Anderson and Shaw and Thames And jeffress And Guerra Trade them at the deadline, that’s at least 7-8 top 100 players added to 1 or 2 already in the system, and while there is a dearth of position prospects, there is an abundance of pitching prospects that should be ML ready over the next 2 years.

 

Put Burnes Peralta in the rotation with Houser and let them develop.

 

Of the 7-8 top 100 prospects, 2 or 3 should be talented ML ready, and inserted to the lineup joining Hiura and Grisham and Braun. Including Braun the payroll should be less than 40 million. The following offseason trade Knebel, and with a still top 5 farm and young core up to 6-7 talented, add more of the ML ready prospects to the core, and or start trading for talented veterans. We should be highly competitive in 2021, with an Ace in Woodruff, and solid rotation with Houser and possibly Burnes or Peralta among others. Bullpen with Rasmussen Williams Wahl Black among many others. And with the accumulation of 8-10 top 100 prospects some of which will be stars joining Hiura Grisham. No Braun and a 2021 payroll under 40 million again. 2022 start the big time spending to win the series.

 

 

Plan B.)

Keep Yelich, Trade Cain and Hader And Shaw pay down Cain’s contract for a quality prospect to go with the 3 top 100 prospects from the Hader Trade. Use the money saved from the Cain contract to improve elsewhere. Payroll, without Cain’s contract would be ~ 90 million, leaving ~ 50-60 million to upgrade SS 3B CF pitching staff. ~ 19 million extra revenue for 2020, 9 million to every club(Fox National)and ~ 10 million(local Fox).

 

Of the prospects received 1 ML ready > insert into the lineup.

 

Bullpen, especially the 2nd half should be quite strong without Hader. Knebel after the all star break, Wahl, Williams Jeffress Black possibly Rasmussen and possible trade acquisitions among others. Woodruff Houser veteran trade acquisition Anderson Davies should make for a solid rotation. Upgrade at SS 3B Will help the offense, Freitas should hit 275-300. Improvement from Grisham and Hiura will also help the offense. This should be a contender, then at the deadline go for it big time. Not sure yet which way I’d go, back and forth on this one.

[OnTheBlack]

Or maybe the rebuild was too fast? Maybe a younger more talented core of players is the way to go with a below league average payroll. Maybe it’s the reason Attanasio hires him in the first place. Because, maybe he convinced our owner he could turn around this team quickly, and that’s the reason he got the job.

 

Imo, can’t win a World Series with astute waiver wire claims and cheap scrap heap pickups AND A BELOW LEAGUE AVERAGE PAYROLL.

 

This I will agree with and it was my main concern. You can get guys like Aguilar and Shaw pretty much whenever you want but there's a huge risk in relying on them because they were never really highly touted with great tools that you could consistently rely on. So you get a good couple years out of them and you expect them to continue and then they just fall off.

 

A scorched earth rebuild, while painful is probably more sustainable long term in a market like this than hoping to find a bunch of guys like Shaw and Aguilar to consistently contribute over a number of years.

 

I know we're in the extreme minority here, but I would be fine with a scorched earth rebuild. None of us knows for sure, but I'm guessing something that drastic is a Mark A decision, not Stearns. For all we know that could have been he plan until they had the unexpected success in 2017 already.

 

 

I thought that was clearly the plan. But then they found themselves a game away from the playoffs, Yelich and Cain were both available for....relatively cheap prices and there goes the Astros/Cubs rebuild.

 

I was all for that type of rebuild. But I think people are way to down on talent the Brewers have right now. I get nobody can count on Burnes after this year, but I'm still of the belief that he can be a contributor. They have a lot of young, talented pieces. They certainly have holes and problems, but even without something drastic, they should have a great pen, a really nice offensive core and some pieces for the rotation. Of course the "pieces" of that rotation they're missing are the toughest to find.

 

 

Honestly, if you could get some massive haul for Yelich and Hader and just start over, I wouldn't be 100 pct against that. I just don't think things are as bleak as this season would suggest. MOST things that could make or break this team, just simply went wrong this year.

[OnTheBlack]

Guy puts out roughly 30 mil more in payroll the year after making the NLCS because they're in theory close to winning it = not willing to spend money for a year or two to try to win.

 

66 million gross profit. Then add playoff revenue ON TOP OF THAT > another 10-20 million > now it’s not quite as impressive is it?

 

Who DIDN'T they sign that they should have?

 

Now according to you they had this super team. We all thought they had several really good young pitchers and then they DID go out and sign the top catcher on the market and they brought back Mouse.

 

So...who should they have gotten? You keep harping on the money and how Mark A won't spend it(Which is laughable, it's a valid point if you're a Braves fan, not a Brewers fan).

 

But where should they have spent the extra 40 million...for "just a year or two?"

[OnTheBlack]

Upgrade at SS 3B Will help the offense, Freitas should hit 275-300. Improvement from Grisham and Hiura will also help the offense. This should be a contender, then at the deadline go for it big time. Not sure yet which way I’d go, back and forth on this one.

 

 

Ok, and when the career minor league catcher DOESN'T hit ~.300 and every other thing doesn't fall into place, then you'd be on here screaming about how they gave an MVP in his prime and cheap and one of the elite relievers in baseball for all these prospects(of which, several will crap out...I'm still all for trading for prospects, but you seem to be counting on them all developing).

 

 

Aside from everything else we may not agree on, you go so over the top on some of these players. The aces for example. Yeah, you're sick of hearing it, but there's a point to it. You're doing the same thing right now with a 30 year old minor league catcher that you just assume will jump into the starting lineup and become an elite starter for us.

 

I'd like to see if Freitas can actually finally do something at the big league level, but I'm not just penciling him in as a one of the best big league catchers offensively.

[wntrtxn21]

I totally understand the complaints for Braun's 2nd deal being bad and would tend to agree.

 

That said, I'm wondering between this and the Cain discussions: what are you looking to spend this money on?

 

I am a fan of tanking if it applies. I also see that Mark doesn't want to and I think they've done a decent job at quicker rebuilds.

 

My question is, imagine that either there's a tank or whatever build path and the Brewers have amassed 6-7 good, young players and a handful of role players. These 12 players combine to make $35 million/year.

 

Here's the thing: Assuming the Brewer payroll is going to be between $100 and $130 million, given that the cost of those 12 players will rise as years go by, what can you sign? You may get the random, lucky Moustakas or Grandal opportunity that has come up in the CBA transition where that level player is a 1-year guy...

 

...But guess what you've saved that money for? To sign/extend someone like Ryan Braun at age 31 or a Lorenzo Cain which will become...BAD CONTRACTS.

 

Sure, maybe you could do a Verlander trade when he only has 2 years left (but just one) and pray that it works. But the market isn't Houston, we can't tank and have 7 great, young players, acquire Verlander and Greinke, and pay/keep all of them to be on a path to cross $200 million for 5 years.

 

I know the response will be, "why yes, but you can sign these good players that I will list here for 2-3 years" when those perfect deals that work out are few and far between. Even the Padres who have a very low salary for a bunch of studs coming up or just reaching the majors had to go out and pay for 5 extra years of Machado once he passes his prime. Even the Trout/Machado contracts when you have the off-chance of a premium player hitting free agency in his mid 20s, you are forced to pay 5 years too much.

 

This brewers team has a much better core of high quality players to build around than 2015-16. Grisham Hiura Woodruff Houser is a strong group to build around.

 

Sign Grisham and Hiura to 8 year deals. That gives us a full 6 years with them before traded with 2 years control left, to get another re-tool going.

 

Plan A.)

Trade Cain Yelich Hader Davies Anderson Shaw Thames jeffress Guerra this offseason, if that’s too many players to trade, keep Anderson and Shaw and Thames And jeffress And Guerra Trade them at the deadline, that’s at least 7-8 top 100 players added to 1 or 2 already in the system, and while there is a dearth of position prospects, there is an abundance of pitching prospects that should be ML ready over the next 2 years.

 

Put Burnes Peralta in the rotation with Houser and let them develop.

 

Of the 7-8 top 100 prospects, 2 or 3 should be talented ML ready, and inserted to the lineup joining Hiura and Grisham and Braun. Including Braun the payroll should be less than 40 million. The following offseason trade Knebel, and with a still top 5 farm and young core up to 6-7 talented, add more of the ML ready prospects to the core, and or start trading for talented veterans. We should be highly competitive in 2021, with an Ace in Woodruff, and solid rotation with Houser and possibly Burnes or Peralta among others. Bullpen with Rasmussen Williams Wahl Black among many others. And with the accumulation of 8-10 top 100 prospects some of which will be stars joining Hiura Grisham. No Braun and a 2021 payroll under 40 million again. 2022 start the big time spending to win the series.

 

 

Plan B.)

Keep Yelich, Trade Cain and Hader And Shaw pay down Cain’s contract for a quality prospect to go with the 3 top 100 prospects from the Hader Trade. Use the money saved from the Cain contract to improve elsewhere. Payroll, without Cain’s contract would be ~ 90 million, leaving ~ 50-60 million to upgrade SS 3B CF pitching staff. ~ 19 million extra revenue for 2020, 9 million to every club(Fox National)and ~ 10 million(local Fox).

 

Of the prospects received 1 ML ready > insert into the lineup.

 

Bullpen, especially the 2nd half should be quite strong without Hader. Knebel after the all star break, Wahl, Williams Jeffress Black possibly Rasmussen and possible trade acquisitions among others. Woodruff Houser veteran trade acquisition Anderson Davies should make for a solid rotation. Upgrade at SS 3B Will help the offense, Freitas should hit 275-300. Improvement from Grisham and Hiura will also help the offense. This should be a contender, then at the deadline go for it big time. Not sure yet which way I’d go, back and forth on this one.

 

You gut the team and HOPE that some of the prospects pan out and at least help the team. You want Burnes and Peralta in the starting rotation even though neither has shown even a semblance of being anything close to a starter in the big leagues. If you trade for talented vets you have to use some of the top prospects you aquired. The veterans will also have higher salaries. You have gained little and if few of the prospects pan out, you've guaranteed a long string of losing seasons.

[geargroy]

I totally understand the complaints for Braun's 2nd deal being bad and would tend to agree.

 

That said, I'm wondering between this and the Cain discussions: what are you looking to spend this money on?

 

I am a fan of tanking if it applies. I also see that Mark doesn't want to and I think they've done a decent job at quicker rebuilds.

 

My question is, imagine that either there's a tank or whatever build path and the Brewers have amassed 6-7 good, young players and a handful of role players. These 12 players combine to make $35 million/year.

 

Here's the thing: Assuming the Brewer payroll is going to be between $100 and $130 million, given that the cost of those 12 players will rise as years go by, what can you sign? You may get the random, lucky Moustakas or Grandal opportunity that has come up in the CBA transition where that level player is a 1-year guy...

 

...But guess what you've saved that money for? To sign/extend someone like Ryan Braun at age 31 or a Lorenzo Cain which will become...BAD CONTRACTS.

 

Sure, maybe you could do a Verlander trade when he only has 2 years left (but just one) and pray that it works. But the market isn't Houston, we can't tank and have 7 great, young players, acquire Verlander and Greinke, and pay/keep all of them to be on a path to cross $200 million for 5 years.

 

I know the response will be, "why yes, but you can sign these good players that I will list here for 2-3 years" when those perfect deals that work out are few and far between. Even the Padres who have a very low salary for a bunch of studs coming up or just reaching the majors had to go out and pay for 5 extra years of Machado once he passes his prime. Even the Trout/Machado contracts when you have the off-chance of a premium player hitting free agency in his mid 20s, you are forced to pay 5 years too much.

 

This brewers team has a much better core of high quality players to build around than 2015-16. Grisham Hiura Woodruff Houser is a strong group to build around.

 

Sign Grisham and Hiura to 8 year deals. That gives us a full 6 years with them before traded with 2 years control left, to get another re-tool going.

 

Plan A.)

Trade Cain Yelich Hader Davies Anderson Shaw Thames jeffress Guerra this offseason, if that’s too many players to trade, keep Anderson and Shaw and Thames And jeffress And Guerra Trade them at the deadline, that’s at least 7-8 top 100 players added to 1 or 2 already in the system, and while there is a dearth of position prospects, there is an abundance of pitching prospects that should be ML ready over the next 2 years.

 

Put Burnes Peralta in the rotation with Houser and let them develop.

 

Of the 7-8 top 100 prospects, 2 or 3 should be talented ML ready, and inserted to the lineup joining Hiura and Grisham and Braun. Including Braun the payroll should be less than 40 million. The following offseason trade Knebel, and with a still top 5 farm and young core up to 6-7 talented, add more of the ML ready prospects to the core, and or start trading for talented veterans. We should be highly competitive in 2021, with an Ace in Woodruff, and solid rotation with Houser and possibly Burnes or Peralta among others. Bullpen with Rasmussen Williams Wahl Black among many others. And with the accumulation of 8-10 top 100 prospects some of which will be stars joining Hiura Grisham. No Braun and a 2021 payroll under 40 million again. 2022 start the big time spending to win the series.

 

 

Plan B.)

Keep Yelich, Trade Cain and Hader And Shaw pay down Cain’s contract for a quality prospect to go with the 3 top 100 prospects from the Hader Trade. Use the money saved from the Cain contract to improve elsewhere. Payroll, without Cain’s contract would be ~ 90 million, leaving ~ 50-60 million to upgrade SS 3B CF pitching staff. ~ 19 million extra revenue for 2020, 9 million to every club(Fox National)and ~ 10 million(local Fox).

 

Of the prospects received 1 ML ready > insert into the lineup.

 

Bullpen, especially the 2nd half should be quite strong without Hader. Knebel after the all star break, Wahl, Williams Jeffress Black possibly Rasmussen and possible trade acquisitions among others. Woodruff Houser veteran trade acquisition Anderson Davies should make for a solid rotation. Upgrade at SS 3B Will help the offense, Freitas should hit 275-300. Improvement from Grisham and Hiura will also help the offense. This should be a contender, then at the deadline go for it big time. Not sure yet which way I’d go, back and forth on this one.

 

You gut the team and HOPE that some of the prospects pan out and at least help the team. You want Burnes and Peralta in the starting rotation even though neither has shown even a semblance of being anything close to a starter in the big leagues. If you trade for talented vets you have to use some of the top prospects you aquired. The veterans will also have higher salaries. You have gained little and if few of the prospects pan out, you've guaranteed a long string of losing seasons.

Drinking Brewer Kool aid. Yelich jumps out at you for being great but he would've been picked up by a contender if they knew he was MVP material and that's all folks. Great players don't come to Milwaukee sorry.

[Jopal78]

No I get it: in the minds of the fan boys every player should take an extreme team friendly deal, where the Brewers pay way under market. And if a player hits the skids for any period of time they should be instantly jettisoned. If the team struggles they should immediately rebuild by trading whoever they have for the top prospects in the game regardless if that’s realistic or not.

 

The whole point is: Ryan Braun is the best player the Brewers have had in the last 25 years and he’s likely to spend his entire career with the Brewers. His career numbers are great, yet there’s not an insignificant group here that suggests his second contract was a mistake, or an over pay, or that they should have let a franchise icon walk.

 

And keep in mind Braun signed that extension in April of 2011; the beginning of a two year run where he was the best player in the NL. Hindsight is easy

[FVBrewerFan]

Actually, nobody is bringing up Braun except for you. There's nothing to really talk about, he has one more year on his contract and we move on. What else is there to say? You think his last contract extension was a good deal, nobody else does. Of course he had his best two seasons then, he was in his prime and roiding.

[adambr2]

No I get it: in the minds of the fan boys every player should take an extreme team friendly deal, where the Brewers pay way under market. And if a player hits the skids for any period of time they should be instantly jettisoned. If the team struggles they should immediately rebuild by trading whoever they have for the top prospects in the game regardless if that’s realistic or not.

 

The whole point is: Ryan Braun is the best player the Brewers have had in the last 25 years and he’s likely to spend his entire career with the Brewers. His career numbers are great, yet there’s not an insignificant group here that suggests his second contract was a mistake, or an over pay, or that they should have let a franchise icon walk.

 

And keep in mind Braun signed that extension in April of 2011; the beginning of a two year run where he was the best player in the NL. Hindsight is easy

 

I have no idea what you're going on about in the first paragraph, but no one said remotely close to those things. Sometimes players get overpaid, sometimes they get underpaid, that's just the way it goes. I understand that. I'm just not in denial about it when it happens. Jeff Suppan was probably one of the most overpaid Brewers ever. Jonathan Lucroy and Carlos Gomez were probably the two most criminally underpaid Brewers ever.

 

Again, as I said before I was against the deal in 2011, because it was so early. That's not hindsight.

 

Pretty sure Prince Fielder was a franchise icon too, and they let him walk. Yes, sometimes you have to let great players walk. It's a business, not a charity club where you reward a player for his service and undervalue contract with a cool 105 million. And yes, a significant portion of the fanbase thinks the second contract was an overpay. That should not be a controversial thing, since it was.

 

Not significantly. It wasn't an albatross of a deal, and I said that myself as well. It just was a deal they probably wish they wouldn't have done. It's rather simple -- do you believe or do you not believe that Ryan Braun was worth $80 million dollars from 2016-19 and will be worth another 20 next year? Since you've dodged the Lucroy question, maybe you can at least answer that one?

 

If you can't say yes, then perhaps you should understand the perspective of the other camp on this.

[MNBrew]

Pretty sure Prince Fielder was a franchise icon too, and they let him walk.

Whoa. They "let" Prince get to free agency because HE decided he wasn't going to sign an extension, but they still made a very significant effort to re-sign then-FA Prince with a near-Brewers-record contract (5 years & into 9 figures -- uncharted FA territory in franchise history up to that time -- only to repeat the effort & fall short the next year w/ Greinke). Yes, they could've tried to trade him for comparable value, but they chose to keep him for the last year of arbitration-eligible/process salary as part of the "going for it" effort that ended 2 games short of the World Series -- and which yielded a great year by Prince. But to say the Brewers "let him walk" is simply inaccurate. . . . Walking was Prince's choice, not the Brewers, and happened in spite of the Brewers' huge efforts to keep him, thus involving no "letting" at all.

 

In hindsight, NOT paying Prince the Joe Mauer-like money/term he signed for was reasonably wise given that only 3 of the years were remotely worthy of that kind of money. 2 were injury-riddled, 1 was injury-missed, and, fortunately for Texas & Detroit, he graciously retired & walked away from the last 3 years of the deal.

[HiAndTight]

No I get it: in the minds of the fan boys every player should take an extreme team friendly deal, where the Brewers pay way under market. And if a player hits the skids for any period of time they should be instantly jettisoned. If the team struggles they should immediately rebuild by trading whoever they have for the top prospects in the game regardless if that’s realistic or not.

 

The whole point is: Ryan Braun is the best player the Brewers have had in the last 25 years and he’s likely to spend his entire career with the Brewers. His career numbers are great, yet there’s not an insignificant group here that suggests his second contract was a mistake, or an over pay, or that they should have let a franchise icon walk.

 

And keep in mind Braun signed that extension in April of 2011; the beginning of a two year run where he was the best player in the NL. Hindsight is easy

 

 

You're all over the place here. First of all, who said we should have let him "walk?" When was that even close to happening? And there are a lot of people who believe it was a bad deal.....because-it-was-a-bad-deal. The Rockies did almost the same thing with Tulo, a more valuable player in his prime than Braun. Was that a good deal for the franchise? Now lets imagine that Tulo had gotten busted for Roids and then lied about it so convincingly that he actually got a dirty test overturned with hints of anti-semitism by a guy just doing his job-and, therefore, they were unable to trade him. He fits your critera? That a good deal?

 

 

You love conflating two different issues. Should the Cards have given Pujols the 10 year 250 million dollars because he was the best player they've had in the last 25 years and would have likely spent his entire career with the Cardinals and his career numbers are great(as in all time great, not just Brewers great)?

 

You can't just bundle up all the contracts a team has given to a player and say, "player good, contract must be good."

 

And I don't have a clue what you're talking about how "the fan boys every player should take an extreme team friendly deal, where the Brewers pay way under market,"because just about everything thinks Braun's LAST contract was stupid.

 

But to be equally insulting, how about, 'I get it, player fanboys think that because a player signed a team-friendly deal, the team should then give him whatever amount of money he asks for and they're unable to differentiate between contracts.'

 

I don't know, I guess everyone else has already tried to explain to you they didn't sign him to a single 13-year deal and you're having a great deal coming to terms with that simple, indisputable fact. And then you somehow confuse that for the belief that people who DON'T think signing a guy 5 years before his contract is due to wanting everyone to take a below-market "fanboy" type deal.

 

We're just people who don't think future contracts should be dictated more by PAST production instead of likely future production. OH...silly isn't it!

[pacopete4]

#RyanBraunForever

[adambr2]

Pretty sure Prince Fielder was a franchise icon too, and they let him walk.

Whoa. They "let" Prince get to free agency because HE decided he wasn't going to sign an extension, but they still made a very significant effort to re-sign then-FA Prince with a near-Brewers-record contract (5 years & into 9 figures -- uncharted FA territory in franchise history up to that time -- only to repeat the effort & fall short the next year w/ Greinke). Yes, they could've tried to trade him for comparable value, but they chose to keep him for the last year of arbitration-eligible/process salary as part of the "going for it" effort that ended 2 games short of the World Series -- and which yielded a great year by Prince. But to say the Brewers "let him walk" is simply inaccurate. . . . Walking was Prince's choice, not the Brewers, and happened in spite of the Brewers' huge efforts to keep him, thus involving no "letting" at all.

 

In hindsight, NOT paying Prince the Joe Mauer-like money/term he signed for was reasonably wise given that only 3 of the years were remotely worthy of that kind of money. 2 were injury-riddled, 1 was injury-missed, and, fortunately for Texas & Detroit, he graciously retired & walked away from the last 3 years of the deal.

 

Walking is a mutual choice, a great majority of the time. Yes, they did make ill-advised efforts to re-sign Prince. But they did have their line in the sand. We'll never know how much of it was true earnest efforts to bring him back, and how much was PR type offers that they knew Boras would never accept, knowing they had to at least appear to be making an effort.

 

And Prince Fielder did not walk away from anything. He is still being paid every last penny on his contract to this day.

[Jopal78]

But isn’t that the nature of professional sports contracts? ie. Teams pay for anticipated production based upon prior performance? Even when teams were signing players to pre arbitration extensions they got burned at times.

 

As for Braun, I have no problem with his 2nd extension. There wasn’t any urgency to add more years to his contract but as previously mentioned he signed it at the start of his MVP season in 2011, and was even better in 2012. Certainly at that point to have such a player signed into perpetuity didn’t seem like a bad idea. Nobody here had an inkling he would get busted for steroids and lose a season’s worth of games in his prime to a suspension and chronic hand injury.

 

Braun has hit over 200 extra base hits including 85 homers since the beginning of 2016 and put up an OPS north of .820 over the same span. Is that worth 20 million dollars a year? In a vacuum, I’m sure anyone can point out a player making 20 million dollars or less they’d rather have. But Braun really isn’t over paid for being a 13 season veteran with his career numbers. Likewise, outside of a vacuum, the Brewers can’t really say he under performed in his 2nd extension, and given how other players flopped on long term contracts like Alex Gordon, Jacoby Ellsbury, Dexter Fowler the Brewers are more likely than not pleased with how the Braun contract has worked out for them.

 

Sure, its easy to look back in hindsight and say, they should’ve split that 20 million up across several different players and maybe they would’ve won more games, but that’s fan fiction. So if the team adds years to Yelich’s contract or signed Hiura to a pre arbitration extension in sure there will be plenty of folks who will have their pikes out calling for heads. There’s no pleasing everybody.

[trwi7]

But isn’t that the nature of professional sports contracts? ie. Teams pay for anticipated production based upon prior performance?

 

No? They pay for prior performance and hope that they can get a few years of that performance knowing the back-end of the deal is probably not going to be very good for the team.

[homer]

Pretty sure Prince Fielder was a franchise icon too, and they let him walk.

Whoa. They "let" Prince get to free agency because HE decided he wasn't going to sign an extension, but they still made a very significant effort to re-sign then-FA Prince with a near-Brewers-record contract (5 years & into 9 figures -- uncharted FA territory in franchise history up to that time -- only to repeat the effort & fall short the next year w/ Greinke).

 

They made a "significant" offer that, IMO, they knew he'd never take because the market was much greater. They did the same thing with Sabathia. "Well, we tried!" is a good line for the fanbase.