Brewers deal Chase Anderson to Blue Jays for minor league 1B Chad Spanberger

[MVP2110]

So where does this put our payroll currently?

[Ron Robinsons Beard]

Bob Nightengale indicates that the Brewers were not planning on exercising Anderson's option. That surprises me a bit, as solid pitching is hard to come by. That does make the fact that they acquired something of value for him that much better, though.

[MrTPlush]

How long before Jordan Lyles is signed?

[Ron Robinsons Beard]

How long before Jordan Lyles is signed?

 

He'll sign with the Marlins. We'll see him again come Aug. 1

 

In seriousness, I would certainly hope that Lyles is part of the plan for next year's rotation. He's likely not as good as his 2019 numbers as a Brewer indicate, but there's still a lot of wiggle room there to be a solid starter moving forward.

[Eye Black]

Not really as he wasn't even in the Blue Jays top 30 but also didn't expect much for Chase.

 

So because he wasn't in an arbitrary Top 30 list, it means he isn't a prospect? Dude was drafted in the 6th round two years ago. I mean, he's not some sort of otherworldly get, but there is value there.

Well he did make the Jays Journal preseason top 30 list.

 

Baseball Trade Values had Chase Anderson's value at $0.0 and Chad Spanberger's value at $0.2 million ($200K), so according to their valuation system the Brewers scored a net gain on the trade.

[Jaylyn]

Good trade. I was not in favor of bringing Chase back at that price. Thought they would just cut ties and move on, getting Spanberger back is a plus. Good luck Chase, now watch him go win the AL Cy Young next year!

[Lathund]

I wasn't expecting the Brewer to pick up the option, so not very surprising. Hard to justify that pricetag when he's someone who either can't or isn't trusted to go beyond 5 innings (Sometimes not even that). Good luck to Chase, seeme like a good guy who had some good games as a Brewer.

[Madhawk23]

Yeah, I'm absolutely on board with this move. Use some of this money saved by not signing Chase to go out and sign Lyles (still hard to know how much Lyles would cost us), and maybe you'll still have a little extra left over then that you can use towards another F/A signing? It's been very clear over the past two years that Stearns/CC did not really trust Chase much, so I feel like the writing was on the wall for awhile that we weren't going to be picking up his option. Now, we don't have to pay the 1M buyout either - and again, we can hopefully use that money saved to go find guys that they would trust.

[reillymcshane]

Not surprised at the move. The $8.5M salary wasn't huge, but you can probably get another back-of-the-rotation arm who is just as good for less.

[Ron Robinsons Beard]

The interesting (and perhaps sad) question now isn’t whether Spanberger will be on the Brewers’ Top 30 list, but how high he’ll be.

[Madhawk23]

The interesting (and perhaps sad) question now isn’t whether Spanberger will be on the Brewers’ Top 30 list, but how high he’ll be.

 

Ha. Yes, I had that unfortunate thought cross my mind as well. A sad reality for the current state of our farm system. I would imagine that he'd at least slide into the low to mid 20's somewhere?

[jerichoholicninja]

 

Think I prefer Vlad Sr.

 

What were you expecting for Chase Anderson? Spanberger is at least an actual honest-to-goodness prospect.

 

I was expecting nothing and we got nothing. Wouldn't be surprised if Spanberger is out of baseball in two years. I'll take the extra $8.5M though.

[Ron Robinsons Beard]

 

Think I prefer Vlad Sr.

 

What were you expecting for Chase Anderson? Spanberger is at least an actual honest-to-goodness prospect.

 

I was expecting nothing and we got nothing. Wouldn't be surprised if Spanberger is out of baseball in two years. I'll take the extra $8.5M though.

 

This is going to be a fun thread to revisit down the road when Spanberger is putting 40 bombs into the stands for the Brewers.

 

 

 

Or you’re gonna be 100% right.

[MrTPlush]

The interesting (and perhaps sad) question now isn’t whether Spanberger will be on the Brewers’ Top 30 list, but how high he’ll be.

 

Way better than it used to be...I remember a time any scrub we nabbed that even sniffed prospect status was pushing Top 10.

[long ball]

Not surprised at the move. The $8.5M salary wasn't huge, but you can probably get another back-of-the-rotation arm who is just as good for less.

 

This is basically my feelings on it.

 

I would've leaned toward declining his option so getting an org depth player in return is about what i'd expect.

 

Can probably re-sign Gio and Lyles for less than $10mm combined in 2020.

[KeithStone53151]

For starters, i highly doubt bob nightengale has any idea what the brewers intentions were with Anderson's option. He's guessing, the brewers keep things too close to the vest for him to know that.

 

I feel similar to most of you. I like the idea of upgrading from anderson and re-allocating that payroll elsewhere. While on paper this pickup doesn't look great, i see a 1b that improved his defensive profile that has plus power but a very reasonable k rate. That tells me last year he either made bad contact a lot or was unlucky...or both. I guess bottom line is, i don't think this guy is simply aaa fodder... there's at least some mlb potential here

[RollieTime]

This guy has potential. Obviously has some good pop in his bat, doesn’t strikeout at an alarming rate like so many guys do these days, and takes some walks. Maybe he was just unlucky this season or was playing hurt? Really like the move of clearing that money while getting an intriguing prospect.

[reillymcshane]

Not surprised at the move. The $8.5M salary wasn't huge, but you can probably get another back-of-the-rotation arm who is just as good for less.

 

This is basically my feelings on it.

 

I would've leaned toward declining his option so getting an org depth player in return is about what i'd expect.

 

Can probably re-sign Gio and Lyles for less than $10mm combined in 2020.

Precisely.

[jjgott]

For starters, i highly doubt bob nightengale has any idea what the brewers intentions were with Anderson's option. He's guessing, the brewers keep things too close to the vest for him to know that.

 

@Haudricourt 6 minutes ago

Stearns said Anderson decision came down to not wanting to exercise the option but also avoiding a possible arbitration hearing.

[KeithStone53151]

For starters, i highly doubt bob nightengale has any idea what the brewers intentions were with Anderson's option. He's guessing, the brewers keep things too close to the vest for him to know that.

 

@Haudricourt 6 minutes ago

Stearns said Anderson decision came down to not wanting to exercise the option but also avoiding a possible arbitration hearing.

 

Fair enough. It takes Haudricourt or a few other media guys saying the same thing for me to buy it. I'm a bit surprised Stearns was so open with that information, that's not typical for him.

[clancyphile]

I'll admit, Chase was a bad fit in a juiced-ball era. Spanberger could be Eric Thames level, and he has some tie to figure it out. He did jump from full-season A to AA. It will either work or it won't.

[MadScientist]

This guy has potential. Obviously has some good pop in his bat, doesn’t strikeout at an alarming rate like so many guys do these days, and takes some walks. Maybe he was just unlucky this season or was playing hurt? Really like the move of clearing that money while getting an intriguing prospect.

Pop without striking out a ton is a pretty good starting point. AA is known to be a big jump, plus the leagues are not the best for batters. This year should be a big indication as to whether he can adapt and progress up, or is likely to stagnate and be cut eventually.

[Smichaelis9]

I think there could be a little more to Spanberger than people are thinking. He was in the Baseball America Blue Jays top 30 lists prior to each of the last two seasons. They say he has 70 raw power, yet he hasn’t had insane K rates at any level (topped out at 24.4% in his first AA stop this year). The issue seems to be derived much more from a crazy 45% ground ball rate. If a guy with that much raw power could learn to elevate the ball a bit more there could definitely be something there.

 

His spray chart is also quite interesting, seems to have decent ability to hit to all fields and with some power.[attachment=0]59452260-8956-4981-9DA3-585DDA83E5CB.png[/attachment]

 

I think this is about as much as we could have hoped for in a return for Chase...

[Ron Robinsons Beard]

This guy has potential. Obviously has some good pop in his bat, doesn’t strikeout at an alarming rate like so many guys do these days, and takes some walks. Maybe he was just unlucky this season or was playing hurt? Really like the move of clearing that money while getting an intriguing prospect.

Pop without striking out a ton is a pretty good starting point. AA is known to be a big jump, plus the leagues are not the best for batters. This year should be a big indication as to whether he can adapt and progress up, or is likely to stagnate and be cut eventually.

 

If anyone wants to see how difficult hitting is in AA, take a look at how Keston Hiura's numbers plummeted once he started playing at Biloxi in 2018. That .755 OPS sticks out like a sore thumb.

[trwi7]

He was in the Baseball America Blue Jays top 30 lists prior to each of the last two seasons.

 

This tells me nothing.