Future 1B Options

[Eye Black]

Even as someone who doesn’t care for the Doug Melvin “competitive window cycle” theory for small market teams, I think this off-season is the time to trade the farm for an impact bat or two. I’d like to hang onto Ashby because I’m convinced he’ll be very good in the near future, but I wouldn’t hesitate to trade anyone else in the system for a true middle of the order bat. With the current state of the pitching, the next two years are probably the Brewers best chance at a World Series. With the DH likely coming to the NL, offensive contributors will be even more important.

[reillymcshane]

Even as someone who doesn’t care for the Doug Melvin “competitive window cycle” theory for small market teams, I think this off-season is the time to trade the farm for an impact bat or two. I’d like to hang onto Ashby because I’m convinced he’ll be very good in the near future, but I wouldn’t hesitate to trade anyone else in the system for a true middle of the order bat. With the current state of the pitching, the next two years are probably the Brewers best chance at a World Series. With the DH likely coming to the NL, offensive contributors will be even more important.

What kills is Yelich's cratering performance. No doubt the club figured he was that true middle of the order bat for at least a few more years. Just hurts to see him struggling.

[BuckyBrewer61]

I truly think we go into 2022 with Rowdy as our guy at 1B. We made that trade for a reason, and he gave us no reason to think he can't get the job done.

 

If he doesn't, we'll still have the trade deadline to get a 1B, or maybe Yelich will begin a transition during spring training, getting some reps there as well.

 

Rowdy has absolutely earned a roster spot for 2022 with his play in 2021.

 

That said, he has a career WAR of 0.7 in over 900 MLB PAs, and even with a nice 2nd half in Milwaukee had a WAR of -0.5 in 2021.

 

To this point in his career, he is Daniel Vogelbach with better defense. Not to say he can't improve, he's still early in his career and absolutely has shown encouraging stretches. If he's all we can afford given the glut of bad contracts in the outfield...I get it and I wouldn't be terribly upset about it. But I would be actively looking to upgrade the position if possible. I'd be much happier with him as a bench bat than as an everyday starter.

[jonescm128]

According to Cots, we have $71,027,000 tied up next year with only Cain, Yelich, Wong, Bradley, and Peralta under contract.

 

Hader, Woodruff, Narvaez, Suter, Vogelbach, Peterson, Burnes, Tellez, Adames, Urias, Houser, Gustave, and Lauer will all be at some stage of arbitration next year while we'll lose/need to replace Escobar, Norris, Anderson, Pina, Boxberger, and Strickland.

 

Olson is making $5,000,000 in year one arby, so he'll be in line for big raises over the next two seasons of control.

 

Financially, we're closer to the point of trading away arby-eligible players for prospects/pre-arby guys, than we are of trading prospects for expensive players.

 

It's fun to think of how we can keep our team together while adding other stars to the roster. I just don't think it's realistic. We need young, inexpensive guys to fill out the roster in order to be able to afford some of the older, more expensive guys.

 

Forgot about Garcia. We have to replace - or pony up some serious cash to keep - him.

 

I don't know if I am in the minority but I'd rather he walk. Is he worth $12M? A career year that he may never replicate for a guy with a career .756 OPS. I'd rather give Tyrone Taylor the ABs to see what he can do with regular playing time. Use that money to help cover the arbitration raises.

[jonescm128]

I truly think we go into 2022 with Rowdy as our guy at 1B. We made that trade for a reason, and he gave us no reason to think he can't get the job done.

 

If he doesn't, we'll still have the trade deadline to get a 1B, or maybe Yelich will begin a transition during spring training, getting some reps there as well.

 

Rowdy has absolutely earned a roster spot for 2022 with his play in 2021.

 

That said, he has a career WAR of 0.7 in over 900 MLB PAs, and even with a nice 2nd half in Milwaukee had a WAR of -0.5 in 2021.

 

To this point in his career, he is Daniel Vogelbach with better defense. Not to say he can't improve, he's still early in his career and absolutely has shown encouraging stretches. If he's all we can afford given the glut of bad contracts in the outfield...I get it and I wouldn't be terribly upset about it. But I would be actively looking to upgrade the position if possible. I'd be much happier with him as a bench bat than as an everyday starter.

 

I know this is a 1B thread but I would still be inclined to upgrade our OF, even with all the money tied up there. Do we really want to rely on a Yelich and JBJ rebound and a productive season from a 36 year old Cain?

[markedman5]

Luke Voit mentioned

 

https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2021/12/brewers-have-had-previous-interest-in-luke-voit.html

[brewerfan82]

Luke Voit mentioned

 

https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2021/12/brewers-have-had-previous-interest-in-luke-voit.html

Interesting idea regarding a Cain for Voit swap. I would certainly miss Cain's defense and clubhouse presence, but Voit would be a nice offensive addition with 3 years of control left.

 

2019-21 Stats:

 

Cain Contract:

 

Voit Contract:

 

So we'd get 5 years younger, gain a couple years of control, add an impactful bat, save $12M+ this year. We'd be getting thin in the OF, but maybe that gives Taylor a chance to take over CF and we'd have some money freed up to acquire some other depth as well.

 

All that said, I wonder what else we'd have to add to Cain in order to obtain Voit.

[SRB]

I wonder if Hicks's contract is viewed as being negative value at this point? Would be sad to see Cain go, but I would absolutely love to get Voit and Hicks, who perhaps irrationally is one of my favorite non-Brewers. He's got another four years on his contract (plus an option year), but in today's market he's an absolute steal even if frequently injured at <$10M per season. And we can afford to gamble on his health more than the Yankees, since Taylor is a credible stopgap in CF.

 

2B Wong

CF Hicks

LF Yelich

1B Voit

DH Tellez

RF Renfroe

3B Urias

SS Adames

C Narvaez

 

Suddenly that's actually a pretty good offense!!

[brewerfan82]

Looks like the BTV site (for whatever it's worth) considers Hicks even more negative value than Cain:

 

 

 

So maybe you're onto something there. It is a long contract that goes through his age 35 year, but as you mentioned it's probably low enough on a year by year basis to stomach if things go south. And the payroll still ends up lower for 2022 swapping Cain for Voit and Hicks.

 

 

 

It would be pretty amazing if DS/MA were able to swap Cain/JBJ for Voit/Renfroe/Hicks and end up with a lower payroll than they started with. And we would have a lot of good options for 1B, OF, and DH...

 

2019-21 vs. RHP (incl. Cain and JBJ for comparison):

 

2019-21 vs. LHP (incl. Cain and JBJ for comparison):

Edited December 12, 2021 by MrAllen

[JosephC]

I had been thinking about Voit as a possibility, but the more I looked, the less I liked him. Don't have any issue with his bat, but the guy is injured just way too much. It's so significant that there was a considerable amount of speculation that he could be non-tendered by the Yankees.

[SRB]

Here's hoping the Yankees only view Voit as having +3.1 surplus trade value like the BTV system.

 

(Can't say I understand that one. .368 wOBA/133 wRC+ in 1270 PA over his career, and those numbers are supported by his batted ball data and career xwOBA, suggesting he will comfortably outhit projections as an everyday 1B. One of the clearest offensive upgrades we might have a realistic shot at this winter.)

[JosephC]

Looks like the BTV site (for whatever it's worth) considers Hicks even more negative value than Cain:

 

That's because he is hurt all the time. Over the last five years he's only played in 370 out of a possible 708 games, that's only 52%. If one just takes the last three years, it's 145 out of a possible 384 games, just 38%. Over the last three years he's slashed .223/.338/.410/.747...but last year he was at a miserable .194/.294/.333/.627 (only 126 plate appearances). He has four consecutive years of posting a negative DRS. Baseball Savant has his sprint speed dropping from 28.5 to 28.2 to 27.6 to 27.5 to 26.9 over the last five seasons. He now rates as a below average running for all positions, which I guess would make him one of the slower centerfielders in the league. Not to mention everything I read on him made it sound like he had the look of a rapidly declining player last season.

 

I think the Brewers would probably be a lot better just paying Cain the 18 million next year and be done with it, rather than sink 41 million in future funds to Hicks.

[DuWayne Steurer]

We literally just celebrated getting out from under ONE year of JBJ's contract. Taking on Hick's contract, just to get rid of Cain, and add Voit makes no sense. Cain is still semi-useful when he's on the field. A move like this feels like the proverbial shuffling deck chairs on the Titanic. Pay Cain his 18 mil this year, hope he can play 80 to 100 games, hope he's still a 2.0 WAR or so guy for those 80-ish games, and move on.

[nate82]

I would rather pay Cain to stay home than take on Hick's contract.

[SRB]

I don't think anyone is proposing a straight Cain for Hicks swap.... The idea is to secure a huge upgrade at 1B without throwing in significant prospect capital and while bringing back a "contract dump" guy that still has 4-5 WAR upside. It would be a very good trade.

[DuWayne Steurer]

Voit has never put up a WAR over 2 (understandable, since he's never played a full season), so we're going to essentially pay Hicks 40 million for the next four years to get the rights to an average-ish first baseman, while not having to pay Cain for one year@ 18 million. Let's not forget Voit is entering his age 31 season. His 162 game average WAR is 2.2. He's average.

 

I'm not against going after Voit. I'm not against trading Cain, I just can't fathom paying Hicks for four years to be mediocre to really bad, be injured 65% of the time, right after we had the good fortune to get out from under JBJ's contract, and get a decent player in the deal.

[SRB]

Voit has never put up a WAR over 2 (understandable, since he's never played a full season), so we're going to essentially pay Hicks 40 million for the next four years to get the rights to an average-ish first baseman, while not having to pay Cain for one year@ 18 million. Let's not forget Voit is entering his age 31 season. His 162 game average WAR is 2.2. He's average.

 

I'm not against going after Voit. I'm not against trading Cain, I just can't fathom paying Hicks for four years to be mediocre to really bad, be injured 65% of the time, right after we had the good fortune to get out from under JBJ's contract, and get a decent player in the deal.

 

Somewhat selective use of stats there, but anyways I doubt the Yankees would entertain this trade in the first place.

 

In 1270 PA in his career Voit has a .368 wOBA and 133 wRC+, or roughly >3 fWAR per full season. That makes him arguably a top 10 firstbaseman if healthy and absent major regression. So far in his career he's hit roughly equivalent to Pete Alonso.

 

Even just an average 1B is not so easy to find, as demonstrated by the Brewers over the last few seasons. If we have to field both a 1B and fulltime DH next season, I'd be willing to give up quite a bit to get that kind of offensive production. The equivalent on the free agent market, a guy like Anthony Rizzo, will cost us more $ than taking on Hicks's contract and without the added high-reward player of Hicks himself.

[TURBO]

Hicks is a walking injury. I don't want to pay guys that we know are going to miss half their games. Cain is bad enough, why on earth would we want another guy for the next 4 years that we just hope can play in half the games?

 

I'd like to stay away from guys like that when dealing with tight purse strings.

[wntrtxn21]

Voit has never put up a WAR over 2 (understandable, since he's never played a full season), so we're going to essentially pay Hicks 40 million for the next four years to get the rights to an average-ish first baseman, while not having to pay Cain for one year@ 18 million. Let's not forget Voit is entering his age 31 season. His 162 game average WAR is 2.2. He's average.

 

I'm not against going after Voit. I'm not against trading Cain, I just can't fathom paying Hicks for four years to be mediocre to really bad, be injured 65% of the time, right after we had the good fortune to get out from under JBJ's contract, and get a decent player in the deal.

 

Somewhat selective use of stats there, but anyways I doubt the Yankees would entertain this trade in the first place.

 

In 1270 PA in his career Voit has a .368 wOBA and 133 wRC+, or roughly >3 fWAR per full season. That makes him arguably a top 10 firstbaseman if healthy and absent major regression. So far in his career he's hit roughly equivalent to Pete Alonso.

 

Even just an average 1B is not so easy to find, as demonstrated by the Brewers over the last few seasons. If we have to field both a 1B and fulltime DH next season, I'd be willing to give up quite a bit to get that kind of offensive production. The equivalent on the free agent market, a guy like Anthony Rizzo, will cost us more $ than taking on Hicks's contract and without the added high-reward player of Hicks himself.

 

The big question that goes unanswered: the Yankees don't have a 1B with Rizzo being a FA. There are rumors of them desperately seeking a 1B by trade. Yet they have said they are looking to deal Voit. Why are they trying so hard to jettison this equivalent of Alonso? If Voit is everything you think he is, why aren't the Yankees just inserting him at 1B? Regardless of which way he bats, if he is that good he should be their starting 1B.

[brewerfan82]

The big question that goes unanswered: the Yankees don't have a 1B with Rizzo being a FA. There are rumors of them desperately seeking a 1B by trade. Yet they have said they are looking to deal Voit. Why are they trying so hard to jettison this equivalent of Alonso? If Voit is everything you think he is, why aren't the Yankees just inserting him at 1B? Regardless of which way he bats, if he is that good he should be their starting 1B.

Valid question, but I would suggest that Voit is less valuable to the Yankees than he might be to other teams because of their available resources. Voit, if healthy, could be a very good player, and at less than $10M, he would be very valuable to a team like the Brewers if he can stay on the field. For the Brewers that may be a better gamble than spending more money for a more reliable player with a lower ceiling. However for they Yankees, they could spend the extra resources to get an upgrade and a more sure thing (like a Freeman or Olson), whereas the Brewers may not have the same resources available to do so.

[Austin Tatious]

Gosh I hope we are smarter than acquiring Hicks. Stick with Cain and here comes Mitchell in 2023 with Taylor around in case he isn't ready.

 

That Hicks contract is so bad that we would need good assets to take him on. That is much more money than JBJ's deal.

[markedman5]

Gosh I hope we are smarter than acquiring Hicks. Stick with Cain and here comes Mitchell in 2023 with Taylor around in case he isn't ready.

 

That Hicks contract is so bad that we would need good assets to take him on. That is much more money than JBJ's deal.

 

Not sure why people started to include Hicks in the discussion……the article only mentions Cain as possible insurance for Hicks from the Yankees perspective……the discussion was that the Brewers inquired about Voit ….nothing about Hicks in the deal.

 

https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2021/12/brewers-have-had-previous-interest-in-luke-voit.html

[brewerfan82]

Yeah, I think it was one of those situations where you cut your hair too short in one place and then overcompensate cutting it too short in another place and go back and forth until you have no hair...

 

The initial reference to Cain and Voit was too lopsided in the Brewers favor due to Cain's contract, so the idea of Hicks came up as a way to even it out without the Brewers giving up additional assets. Of course, once you add Hicks in, it becomes too lopsided the other way, so the Yanks would probably have to add more talent from their end to even it out, and at that point we're getting too complicated for it to ever happen.

 

But all that said, it generated some interesting discussion. Hopefully another vague rumor pops up soon so we have more discussion fodder to play with

[SRB]

I really don't get why people think that Hicks contract is a huge albatross. It's a very team friendly deal for a guy with All Star potential that already factors in his injury issues with a low AAV. If he wasn't coming off a down 2021 (only 126 PA in which he underperformed his xwOBA by 55 points!) he would have no trouble getting something similar on the open market.

 

The big question that goes unanswered: the Yankees don't have a 1B with Rizzo being a FA. There are rumors of them desperately seeking a 1B by trade. Yet they have said they are looking to deal Voit. Why are they trying so hard to jettison this equivalent of Alonso? If Voit is everything you think he is, why aren't the Yankees just inserting him at 1B? Regardless of which way he bats, if he is that good he should be their starting 1B.

 

I've seen this reasoning in a few threads recently. Isn't this basically an argument against ever making any trade? (the other teams is giving up the players we are acquiring, thus those players must be bad)

 

I think the Yankees are trying to rebalance their offense a bit because they are dominated by a bunch of similar power-first guys who strike out a lot. By contrast, we sort of need a power bat in the lineup. That being said, I doubt the Yankees are going to move Voit unless they are concurrently working on a deal for Olson, Rizzo, or even Freeman.

[monty57]

I've seen this reasoning in a few threads recently. Isn't this basically an argument against ever making any trade? (the other teams is giving up the players we are acquiring, thus those players must be bad)

 

Not really. The Rays were willing to trade Adames because they had Franco ready at AAA. Players are often traded because they're getting close to free agency. There are lots of reasons teams decide to trade players.

 

The Yankees have money, and are probably looking to sign a free agent first baseman. I think wntrtxn21's point was a valid response when Voit was compared to Pete Alonso. If Voit is really that good, why are the Yankees trying to trade him so they can sign someone else? My guess is that they're looking to make a run at Freeman, who is an upgrade to basically everyone, so if they're looking to sign him to a mega-deal, then clearing some salary would make sense.

 

I'd just hope that the Brewers would be able to pick him up cheaply because the Yankees just want to get rid of him and clear some payroll. In that sense, it would be kind of like the Adames trade where we'd get a good player who just happened to not be as good as the guy the opposing team is replacing him with.

 

The injuries are certainly worrisome, so I wouldn't want to give up too much, but if we could get him cheaply he'd be worth the risk. He has a ton of upside, but it would get very frustrating if the injury issues persist.