Brewers' Offense

[PeaveyFury]

You cannot spend $14M on a OFer and say "well he was just signed to be the 4th OFer."

 

That is either an embarrassingly bad use of resources or expectations were much higher than a 4th OFer.

 

What starting spot did you think he was being handed when signed?

 

Competing for the starting spot of the $10 million corner OF that Stearns signed that also didn't hit which is probably why Stearns felt the need to spend a ton of money on Bradley in the first place.

 

I'm not sure you chose the right OF. If you thought Bradley was insurance for anyone, it was almost certainly Cain for obvious reasons.

[MrTPlush]

Vogelbach barely made the team and was supposed to be a bench bat only, Bradley Jr was brought in to be the 4th outfielder, and Shaw was supposed to platoon in a four man 3B SS platoon with Urias, Arcia, and Robertson.

 

Daniel Vogelbach would have never been a Brewer if Stearns didn't create such a horrid 1B situation last year.

 

Bradley Jr. was brought in to get pretty much just as many ABs as any other outfield...except maybe Yelich. He isn't a true 4th OFer.

 

You can say these guys weren't intended to be major contributors, fine, but really it is just another example of how bad Stearns has been at his job of finding reliable positional players because these bench bats keep finding their way into the starting line up on a daily basis even though they aren't playing very well themselves.

 

I don't think firstbase was supposed to be a horrid situation, Huira was counted on as the second best bat in the lineup. Unfortunately that has been a complete disaster, worse than even the biggest pessimist could have predicted. Travis Shaw playing everyday at 3b and putting up a .720 ops isn't really a huge problem. In the outfield we've had massive injuries. If Yelich were in the lineup everyday you could live with a part time centerfielder next to him with a below average bat.

 

Bottom line, if you would have told me before the year that we'd have a bottom 5 in all of baseball offense with Yelich injured and Huira demoted to AAA I would have believed you.

 

Well, people hoped Hiura would rebound...but that was far from assured. He was considered the second best bat coming into the season because the rest of the supporting cast we that dismal and people were (in my opinion) a bit to optimistic with him. Knowing the risk of Hiura coming into this season an insurance plan of Vogelbach was kind of disappointing to me. In reality it is even more depressing than expected.

 

Travis Shaw putting up .720 at 3B wouldn't be bad in a good offense, but it is pretty bad when that makes you a middle of the order bat. When we signed Shaw I thought him having a year like last year wouldn't be bad (.717 OPS) so I am not overly upset with him...its what I expected with some upside. Hard to really fault him the rest of the team is that bad.

[MrTPlush]

That's the definition of quibbling over semantics.

 

Have to explain it somehow when someone infers Jackie Bradley Jr. wasn't expected to be a big contributor because he was 4th on the OF depth chart. His 400+ PAs he was likely to get or his massive salary should be enough to explain how big of a contributor he was expected to be.

[PeaveyFury]

That's the definition of quibbling over semantics.

 

Have to explain it somehow when someone infers Jackie Bradley Jr. wasn't expected to be a big contributor because he was 4th on the OF depth chart.

 

Didn't see that stated anywhere. The issue seemed to stem from someone's claim that Bradley wasn't the 4th OF on the depth chart, when, in fact, he was.

[monty57]

I think Bradley became more necessary when Cain said his exercise regime over the past year has been "mostly chasing after his kids." That's proven itself out so far in that Cain has missed most of Spring Training and most of the season with various injuries, not to mention all the time Yelich has missed. Bringing in Bradley to cover for the possibility that Cain wouldn't be effective and/or that Garcia wouldn't rebound made some sense. That Bradley has hit far worse than he has ever hit in his career probably wasn't something Stearns could/should have foreseen.

[adambr2]

Are we really trying to rationalize that Bradley wasn't a bad signing because we intended for him to be the 4th OF?

 

I guess we could have given Lucroy $14M to be the backup catcher, but just because we didn't intend for him to start wouldn't make it not a terrible deal.

 

I am a little shocked that anyone is trying to excuse the Bradley signing on the pretense that we signed him as insurance, not with the intention of being a major contributor. That makes lighting 14 million dollars on fire for him look worse, not better.

[PeaveyFury]

Are we really trying to rationalize that Bradley wasn't a bad signing because we intended for him to be the 4th OF?

 

I guess we could have given Lucroy $14M to be the backup catcher, but just because we didn't intend for him to start wouldn't make it not a terrible deal.

 

I am a little shocked that anyone is trying to excuse the Bradley signing on the pretense that we signed him as insurance, not with the intention of being a major contributor. That makes lighting 14 million dollars on fire for him look worse, not better.

 

To be clear, maybe that's what the initial poster you were responding to was arguing, but I didn't intend to offer any opinion on the value of Bradley's contract.

[DuWayne Steurer]

I've tried defending JBJ for most of the season, and I still think his bat is gonna come around and he'll end up throwing up an OPS around .700-ish and obviously play great defense, but as others have said, for a team with the Brewers resources to pay what they're paying JBJ to be a 4th OF/insurance guy, or whatever he is, it's just not a great allocation of resources.

 

And if a dude gets 450-500 at bats, he's a "starter". Arguing the semantics of that is like looking at an NFL stat page and seeing a WR who got 85 catches, but is only listed as having 3 starts, because they started every game in a jumbo package on their first series with 2 TE's and 2 RB's.

 

They're paying JBJ to be a 'starter', whether it's 45 games in each spot in the outfield, or 120 games in center, or whatever. He's a starter.

[MrTPlush]

That's the definition of quibbling over semantics.

 

Have to explain it somehow when someone infers Jackie Bradley Jr. wasn't expected to be a big contributor because he was 4th on the OF depth chart.

 

Didn't see that stated anywhere. The issue seemed to stem from someone's claim that Bradley wasn't the 4th OF on the depth chart, when, in fact, he was.

 

And this last offseason he brought Vogelbach, Bradley Jr., and Shaw on to be big contributors and 2/3 have been disaster so far. Shaw has had big hits, but even he is barely keeping his OPS over .700.

 

I expect some dumpster diving to some extent, but Stearns is having to do it at too many spots on the field and almost every one of those attempts is a total failure. Then the rare time he invests a bit more capital into someone he just gets so little (Garcia in 2020, Narvaez in 2020, Bradley Jr. , and Cain every year except 2018). Hopefully Garcia/Narvaez provide something this year, but jeez...he has got to be better at finding offense.

 

Vogelbach barely made the team and was supposed to be a bench bat only, Bradley Jr was brought in to be the 4th outfielder, and Shaw was supposed to platoon in a four man 3B SS platoon with Urias, Arcia, and Robertson.

 

 

To me that would be inferring a 4th OFer is not a big contributor, which may be the case often times, but I don't think that was the plan for Bradley Jr. at his salary. I usually don't think of a 4th OFer as a huge part of a team...but then again they usually aren't signed in FA at the price tag we gave Bradley Jr.

 

Though to be fair, when they are signing him he wasn't automatically the 4th guy. He could have easily ended up being the 3rd guy ahead of Garcia (who was terrible last year compared to Bradley Jr.) or even second best ahead of both Cain/Garcia.

[brewers888]

The fact is the Brewers offense was atrocious in 2020 and the answer for Stearns was to sign Wong and Bradley neither of whom are known for their prowess with the bat. Wong was a good signing since going from the defense of Hiura to Wong is as big of an improvement as there could possibly be so no arguments there even if Kolten only ends up being average offensively.

 

Bradley getting paid 14 million on defense alone is and was inexcusable. Expecting Yelich and to a lesser extent Hiura to lead the offense wasn’t crazy but best case scenario would leave us short offensively.

[Lathund]

I'm as harsh a critic of JBJ as anyone, and I was defending Grisham when he was panned as a bust on here by many, just to give some pretext to the following; Can we stop treating trades and contracts as ironclad failures (or successes for that matter) when we're 10-15% into their duration, or less? JBJ has a .610 career April OPS, and a .726 overall OPS. Which isn't amazing, but along with his defense makes him an average to above average regular. Point is, he is a notorious slow starter. So with that in mind, let's perhaps give it more than 1 month before talking about lighting money on fire.

 

As for the Grisham/Urias trade; It's been 3 months of baseball since the trade, and including this year Grisham and Urias have 5 years of team control, Lauer has 4 (And Davies is an impending free agent). Grisham certainly looks like the winner so far, but it's also been roughly half a season out of the combined 2-6 seasons they had at the time of the trade. A lot can happen still. But then again, fans (including myself oftentimes) tend to lack the insight into the huge degree of randomness in this game, and the time horizon needed to evaluate just about anything because of it. Instead getting wrapped up in individual at bats, or games, or series or even months.

 

This offense has some issues for sure. But a game like yesterday is one where the exact same at-bats wins us the game 9 times out of 10, despite any RISP issues. Come the end of the season, this offense will still most likely still be below average (But a lot closer to average than now), but along with one of the better pitching staffs in the league and a very good defense it will be enough for a playoff spot. That's with or without Andy Haines, with or without trading for Trevor Story or Kris Bryant or whoever.

[brewers888]

Also for the millionth time why is Haines still employed by this team.

[Ron Robinsons Beard]

At the end of the day, Jackie Bradley's career .OPS is .726. If he was performing anywhere close to that level right now, no one would be complaining. I don't think it is fair whatsoever to blame Stearns when a guy with more than 3,400 plate appearances in his career starts the season so significantly below his career norms. Nothing in Bradley's past several seasons indicated this level of falloff for a player who just turned 31.

 

Fortunately, nothing can be derived from 114 ABs.

[MrTPlush]

At the end of the day, Jackie Bradley's career .OPS is .726. If he was performing anywhere close to that level right now, no one would be complaining. I don't think it is fair whatsoever to blame Stearns when a guy with more than 3,400 plate appearances in his career starts the season so significantly below his career norms. Nothing in Bradley's past several seasons indicated this level of falloff for a player who just turned 31.

 

Fortunately, nothing can be derived from 114 ABs.

 

So what...Stearns can never be wrong as long as he doesn't give a $100mil contract to a career 5.00 ERA pitcher? Stearns has a laundry list of guys he has signed the last two years who have been absolutely atrocious. We don't need to cherry pick which players he should or should not get blame for honestly. One just needs to look at the big picture and see he has failed massively to put together an offense. He needs to be able to evaluate guys and see they are about to regress/disappoint or he needs to be able to see a guy on the brink of success when it isn't obvious on past results. If everything was predictable the highest payroll teams would win the World Series every single year.

 

He won't be perfect and will have his fair share of bad signings...but the last two years is either really bad talent evaluation and use of resources or he is a really really unlucky man. Or maybe all of those things in one package. Not saying Stearns sucks, but his ability to get an offense together has been really a total disaster the last few seasons.

[SeaBass]

What other moves did signing JBJ prevent at the time it occurred on March 8, 2021?

 

Complain about Stearns not using that money earlier, that's fair, but I'd rather not read about how it's tied to JBJ unless you have a better move you were advocating for on March 8th.

 

I'm not looking for hindsight and I haven't seen any "I said at the time I wanted them to sign so and so instead." I only see "he makes $14 million" or whatever his contract is. Awesome, he costs a lot of not your money, where else should it have gone? Maybe I've just missed the alternate examples but I feel like I should have seen them if they existed.

[Warning Track Power]

At the end of the day, Jackie Bradley's career .OPS is .726. If he was performing anywhere close to that level right now, no one would be complaining. I don't think it is fair whatsoever to blame Stearns when a guy with more than 3,400 plate appearances in his career starts the season so significantly below his career norms. Nothing in Bradley's past several seasons indicated this level of falloff for a player who just turned 31.

 

Fortunately, nothing can be derived from 114 ABs.

This. But this goes back to the 2020 Brewers as well. Narvaez and Garcia were so bad in 2020 compared to their historic production and now JBJ seems to be going through it in his first season in Milwaukee as well. While 2020 was only 60 games, it has to be concerning that the trend for FAs coming to Milwaukee under Haines is god awful production to begin their Brewer careers.

[PeaveyFury]

Yep. When player after player comes in an underperforms career expectations, it's not the GM's fault.

[adambr2]

I've tried defending JBJ for most of the season, and I still think his bat is gonna come around and he'll end up throwing up an OPS around .700-ish and obviously play great defense, but as others have said, for a team with the Brewers resources to pay what they're paying JBJ to be a 4th OF/insurance guy, or whatever he is, it's just not a great allocation of resources.

 

And if a dude gets 450-500 at bats, he's a "starter". Arguing the semantics of that is like looking at an NFL stat page and seeing a WR who got 85 catches, but is only listed as having 3 starts, because they started every game in a jumbo package on their first series with 2 TE's and 2 RB's.

 

They're paying JBJ to be a 'starter', whether it's 45 games in each spot in the outfield, or 120 games in center, or whatever. He's a starter.

 

Yeah, pretty much this. They paid JBJ what they paid him to be a major contributor. You can call him whatever you want, but to say he's a 4th OFer is clearly misleading even if technically true.

 

And while I don't blame Stearns that JBJ has a .558 OPS, I do question whether 14 million on a career .726 OPS defensive centerfielder was a worthwhile investment.

 

I don't totally agree with others though that you can't blame the GM when you sign a guy and he performs under his career averages. Isn't that kind of their job? Talent evaluation and trying to project who might outperform and underperform projections? If it was just as simple as writing a check and hoping a guy matches his career averages, any schlub could do it.

 

Conversely, we didn't acquire Wade Miley and say, "can't give credit to the GM when a guy outperforms his career averages." We said "awesome acquisition," as we should have. Same thing in reverse.

[brewcrewdue80]

Going back to Grisham trade. Brewers had Cain, Yelich, Braun in the OF for 2020 a full season before pandemic. The team got the worst SS production from Arcia. Urias was a former top 30? Prospect in the minors. Grisham just re-entering the top 100. What happened next nobody was going predict. Ideally the team improved at SS long term over Arcia...tbd. Tristan Lutz another 1st rd OF was preparing to play AA for 2020. Who ideally replaces Braun in the OF. Yelich broke that kneecap to end 2019. MVP in NL had he not. Cain signed for 3 more seasons after a Gold glove in 2019. Grisham was blocked, Urias was not. The attempt was to put out a better SS product for 2020. Pandemic happened. Cain opted out. Urias had an injury and covid. 60gm season. Lauer was cheaper and had more team control for a pitcher that resembled Davies outside of Coors Field.

The Pandemic has really made Stearns moves look awful after something he has no control over.

As for offense today, there's no Yelich post-MVP adding to the offense. Garcia was a temporary fix over a Tyrone Taylor 4th OF backup with an easy to move contract. We were big-marketed on FA signings like. Donaldson. The mistake I can truly go on is extending Yelich without a post injured kneecap season to see the effect it put on him. Donaldson would have been the money I used what Yelich money he invested in. If having a full 2020, Lutz is likely in our OF over Garcia. Urias is well ahead the curve than where he resides. Cain/JBJ wouldn't be happening. Hiura may have spent time in minors already and solved the problem at the plate over the offseason. Etcetera. The good on 2020 is Burnes became elite. Airbender became a reality.

Yes offense is bad but having your near B2B MVP become the next Braun post PED scandal immediately can't be prepped for. You took a guy who's bat was over 50runs of value 2Straight seasons. To getting 6runs of value in 96 team games. 1/3rd a run a game of offense gone plus whatever the negative replacement. It's all a bunch of bad luck. Mixed with a few bad decisions, and a manager changing his managing style.

[xisxisxis]

Going back to Grisham trade. Brewers had Cain, Yelich, Braun in the OF for 2020 a full season before pandemic. The team got the worst SS production from Arcia. Urias was a former top 30? Prospect in the minors. Grisham just re-entering the top 100. What happened next nobody was going predict. Ideally the team improved at SS long term over Arcia...tbd.

Where's Ryan Braun today? Why did they sign Avifail Garcia if they had a set OF going into 2020? Braun was likely done for 2021 or in need of a change in his role where Grisham could have been the everyday replacement. Trent Grisham has now hit 3.6 WAR for his Padres career and Luis Urias is sitting at 0.1. Add in the +1.3 WAR from Davies over Lauer and no indication that Lauer can get anyone not in a Dodgers uniform out, there is a huge hole of performance for the Brewers to see any win from that trade. Sure it's early, but most teams don't come back from a 10 run deficit and that's what this trade looks like now...

[SoCalBrewfan]

Sometimes the reasoning behind a trade is sound and it still doesn't work out, and it's generally easier to be certain about things that have already happened. I think looking at the parts of that trade at the time it was made, it seemed like both teams might be getting things they needed...Urias got on base like crazy in the minors and had the 70 hit tool according to some. Grisham had made some noise in the year before, but he was one of a few OF we had that looked promising and there was perhaps some reason to wonder whether his big leap forward was a sure thing and not a fluke. I don't believe that the playoff goof was a factor,

 

Our guys have been worse than expected, though I still have some hopes for Urias, and Grisham has been better (did anyone see him as a gold glove CF?!), but it's not hard to imagine things going differently.

[owbc]

The 2021 Brewers have -1.3 wins above average at 1B, -0.6 at 3B, -0.6 at SS, and -0.3 at CF. They are fine everywhere else (league average or better).

 

Out of those 4 positions, the only one I really worry about is 1B. Hiura has been a complete and total failure. Vogelbach at least provides replacement level production, but if you're not going to get a .750+ OPS at 1B you need to make it up at one of the other corner IF or OF spots. And with Yelich out that isn't happening.

[adambr2]

The 2021 Brewers have -1.3 wins above average at 1B, -0.6 at 3B, -0.6 at SS, and -0.3 at CF. They are fine everywhere else (league average or better).

 

Out of those 4 positions, the only one I really worry about is 1B. Hiura has been a complete and total failure. Vogelbach at least provides replacement level production, but if you're not going to get a .750+ OPS at 1B you need to make it up at one of the other corner IF or OF spots. And with Yelich out that isn't happening.

 

Well, that's half your positions. That's a lot of holes. I get not being concerned too much about CF but I don't know how you're not worried about SS and 3B given that Urias still has shown no sign of being an adequate starting SS and Shaw is much more suited to a bench role.

[trwi7]

The 2021 Brewers have -1.3 wins above average at 1B, -0.6 at 3B, -0.6 at SS, and -0.3 at CF. They are fine everywhere else (league average or better).

 

Out of those 4 positions, the only one I really worry about is 1B. Hiura has been a complete and total failure. Vogelbach at least provides replacement level production, but if you're not going to get a .750+ OPS at 1B you need to make it up at one of the other corner IF or OF spots. And with Yelich out that isn't happening.

 

Well, that's half your positions. That's a lot of holes. I get not being concerned too much about CF but I don't know how you're not worried about SS and 3B given that Urias still has shown no sign of being an adequate starting SS and Shaw is much more suited to a bench role.

 

I wish I could have set up conversations about my report card this way. Yeah, math and English suck but look at science and social studies.

[brewcrewdue80]

Going back to Grisham trade. Brewers had Cain, Yelich, Braun in the OF for 2020 a full season before pandemic. The team got the worst SS production from Arcia. Urias was a former top 30? Prospect in the minors. Grisham just re-entering the top 100. What happened next nobody was going predict. Ideally the team improved at SS long term over Arcia...tbd.

Where's Ryan Braun today? Why did they sign Avifail Garcia if they had a set OF going into 2020? Braun was likely done for 2021 or in need of a change in his role where Grisham could have been the everyday replacement. Trent Grisham has now hit 3.6 WAR for his Padres career and Luis Urias is sitting at 0.1. Add in the +1.3 WAR from Davies over Lauer and no indication that Lauer can get anyone not in a Dodgers uniform out, there is a huge hole of performance for the Brewers to see any win from that trade. Sure it's early, but most teams don't come back from a 10 run deficit and that's what this trade looks like now...

Grisham wouldn't have played enough for 2020 to produce value in the mind of Stearns pre-pandemic. Mentioned Lutz as a possible callup for 2021. Garcia essentially being a placeholder when that money wouldn't have gone to use for a SS upgrade. How to upgrade SS. Get Urias. Davies will be a FA after this season, Lauer will have 3 more seasons. 2020 was 60 games.

Again the point in that trade was to be better at SS, controlled cheaply. It's not the WAR Grisham puts up over Urias as comparisin, but the WAR Urias puts up over Arcia's 2019 WAR vs Grisham's WAR. But again Pandemic happened, Urias's injury/Covid, 60game season. Stearns had to use resources to find an improvement at SS. OF is/was something he could cover with money and stay relevant there.

Point here is the trade had a reason. 2020 improvement at SS, a low cost SP for back end of rotation, competing more with your starting position players vs backups(Grisham would have been) pandemic threw logic and reason behind the trade out the window in 2020 and here we sit.