Brewers pick up Wong's option.

[Outlander]

There really isn't any indication Wong will be the DH but wouldn't be opposed to it. Same money as McCutchen and he would at least be the correct side of the platoon.

[Brewcrew82]

15 minutes ago, Robocaller said:

The evidence is that he has gotten progressively worse at fielding and that Turang is better at fielding. Not saying he'll DH 82 games, like McCutchen did, but I suspect he'll DH more than half that, unless Turang doesn't perform (or they make other trades/acquisitions among INF). As much as we'd like it, Yelich isn't going to be DHing all the time.

He hit fine in the second half. He was a horror in the field in the first half.

 

No, Yelich won't be DHing all the time, but I do think Rowdy Tellez will be seeing time there as well. Wong has never DH'd for the Brewers, and there's no reason to think that will start now. He's the starting second baseman against RHP and will be on the bench against LHP. 

[Robocaller]

5 minutes ago, Brewcrew82 said:

No, Yelich won't be DHing all the time, but I do think Rowdy Tellez will be seeing time there as well. Wong has never DH'd for the Brewers, and there's no reason to think that will start now. He's the starting second baseman against RHP and will be on the bench against LHP. 

I'm not the first person on this site to mention him DHing; one of his proponents did earlier this offseason. He does have one appearance as a DH for the Brewers.

 

[Hopper]

2 minutes ago, Brewcrew82 said:

 He's the starting second baseman against RHP and will be on the bench against LHP. 

Why must everyone of your comments be phrased as factual?

You have no way of knowing this.  I think he will see his share of at bats against LHP, as long as he is still on the team of course.  I also do not think we signed him to trade him.  We signed him because it will be hard to replace his offense at his position, and I think that they view his struggles on defense as a blip that will be corrected in 2023. No way he went from gold glove caliber to a guy people wanted benched in the span of a half season.

[Brewcrew82]

21 minutes ago, Hopper said:

Why must everyone of your comments be phrased as factual?

You have no way of knowing this.  I think he will see his share of at bats against LHP, as long as he is still on the team of course.  I also do not think we signed him to trade him.  We signed him because it will be hard to replace his offense at his position, and I think that they view his struggles on defense as a blip that will be corrected in 2023. No way he went from gold glove caliber to a guy people wanted benched in the span of a half season.

Why must every one of your comments be a complaint about other posters? Just quit it already. 

As for the actual content of my post, it's quite simple. As the season wore on, Wong almost always sat against LHP due to his sharpening splits. There's absolutely no reason to think that Counsell will shift gears suddenly, especially when Brosseau, Urias, Turang are all either right-handed hitters and/or hit LHP very well. 

[Brewcrew82]

26 minutes ago, Robocaller said:

I'm not the first person on this site to mention him DHing; one of his proponents did earlier this offseason. He does have one appearance as a DH for the Brewers.

 

Yes, we should all view Wong's one appearance at DH for the Brewers as indicative of how the team is likely to deploy him this season. 

[DougX57]

I was not surprised by picking up the option as it came down to 8 M  and he did have a good year hitting and his fielding not so much.. SOOOOO why   and what will happen now.. I think spring training will be a test for Turang to see if he is ready and then it could be a trade for wong?  I love the off season

[jay87shot]

Interesting, Wong is worth the 8 million however I really though that Attenasio's comments over the weekend hint at us freeing up salary and then making some trades. 

Does this make a Willy trade more likely or just make Turang wait longer (Turang trade?)

I haven't read much of this thread but I know it's been brought up elsewhere of picking up the option and then trading him. I doubt that happens but he is a 3+WAR (with more upside if his defense comes back) player so he would probably net us a solid reliever or decent mid-level prospect in a trade.

[MrTPlush]

24 minutes ago, DougX57 said:

I was not surprised by picking up the option as it came down to 8 M  and he did have a good year hitting and his fielding not so much.. SOOOOO why   and what will happen now.. I think spring training will be a test for Turang to see if he is ready and then it could be a trade for wong?  I love the off season

I doubt they would take him into spring training and let that decide for them to trade Wong. If they opt to trade him for whatever reason it will be in the true off-season…not once everyone has their team set and we have to scramble to find a trade partner.

In the Wong option debate thread I did mention pretty hard about the possibility he could just end up at DH. Not sure he will just start the year like that, but if Turang comes up at some point and hits well I could definitely see them shifting Wing to mostly DH. Wong defense isn’t that great anymore, but he was still our 2nd or 3rd best hitter in the entire team last year. His stat line will look good regardless of where he plays. Heck they could just have Turang take his shot and if he blows just slide Wong from DH to the main 2B again. 

At the end of the day I figured this was a no brainer because either A) he is our starter at 2B or B) he is the best DH we are going to find for 1/$8mil easily

[DougX57]

I read about why wong had a rough year on the field and I think he will bounce back if they keep him.. Turang had a pretty good AAA season and it will be interesting to see him in Spring training

[sveumrules]

3 hours ago, Axman59 said:

I don't believe this team will ever be "all in."

What series of moves this offseason & opening day payroll for 2023 would constitute “all in” for you?

For me it seems like $150M is a long shot & thus would constitute “all in” territory, though it feels like even on the off chance Mark A did green light a budget in that neighborhood many fans would still be underwhelmed, depending on what moves were made to get there of course.

[sveumrules]

1 hour ago, wibadgers23 said:

Wong as DH? Now that would be bizarre.

Wong had a 116 wRC+ last year, league average wRC+ for DH was 101.

Supply hasn’t quite caught up to demand now that there are twice as many DH spots to fill, with only three guys (JDM, Cruz & Ohtani) cracking 500 PAs at DH.

Lots of ugly DH performances to go around with Cruz (505 PAs | 85 wRC+), Cabrera (430 PAs | 79 wRC+), Franmil (422 PAs | 78 wRC+), Voit (405 PAs | 84 wRC+), Cutch (360 PAs | 84 wRC+), Blackmon (356 PAs | 93 wRC+), Ozuna (297 PAs | 75 wRC+), Jesus (240 PAs | 76 wRC+) and even Yelich (153 PAs | 76 wRC+) doing most of the heavy lifting to bring the positional average down.

[rickh150]

Trade chip first and foremost….

[CheezWizHed]

Mid-season, I was sure Wong wouldn't have gotten the the option picked up, but he looked completely different the last couple months.  Hopefully that continues. Perhaps those nagging injuries he had all season were sapping him more than we thought. 

But even if he repeats last year, its worth the $10M.  The goal is to obtain as much talent for the money you can. 

As for Turang, there are still plenty of ABs for him in his first year.  Wong probably will sit some vs LHP, plus he could play 3B and SS at times. Or maybe even move Adames to 3B and start at SS. The old days of one player starting every day  (or most) at a position is really only reserved for the stars.  

[JohnBriggs12]

8 hours ago, Hopper said:

How so?

He could be our super sub, and dirt cheap.  

I'd move Adames to 3rd, let Turang debut at his natural position and make Urias the super sub.  That way Turang could ease into the lineup starting 3-4 games per week.

[endaround]

Steamer projections which all seem reasonable.

Adames: wRC+ 111

Wong: wRC+ 106

Urias: wRC+ 109

Turang: wRC+ 93

Peterson: wRC+ 95

Brosseau: wRC+ 91

Basically no reason to makes space for Turang.  His value has always been a decent bat for SS with defense that can make him an average SS. 

Turang needs to be traded. He's not too old (23 next year) but a 3rd year at AAA will likely drive down his value. Yes you can try to make him a sub but to what end? You can get bench players for cheap and you lose out on much of his value by wasting a cheap year on the bench.

 

[jay87shot]

19 minutes ago, endaround said:

Steamer projections which all seem reasonable.

Adames: wRC+ 111

Wong: wRC+ 106

Urias: wRC+ 109

Turang: wRC+ 93

Peterson: wRC+ 95

Brosseau: wRC+ 91

Basically no reason to makes space for Turang.  His value has always been a decent bat for SS with defense that can make him an average SS. 

Turang needs to be traded. He's not too old (23 next year) but a 3rd year at AAA will likely drive down his value. Yes you can try to make him a sub but to what end? You can get bench players for cheap and you lose out on much of his value by wasting a cheap year on the bench.

 

How can you project a rookies wRC+, thats way to difficult. Turang played 44 games in AAA in 2021 as a 21 year old not 2 full years and his shown great improvement every year, trading him would be a mistake. He is our only decent MI prospect and he is just starting to develop power (something like 10 of his 13 HR's in 2nd half). Keeping Turang in AAA a little while doesn't hurt his value if the plan is to keep him. Worst case he has to play in AAA 1 more year and then takes over when Wong leaves after the year.  

[monty57]

I thought the Brewers might try to save some money by letting Wong go, but he is worth the $10M contract. However, his 135 wRC+ vs RHP and 37 wRC+ vs LHP in 2022 pretty much mandates a platoon. Pairing him with Brosseau (career 127 wRC+ vs LHP, 84 wRC+ vs RHP) seems like a pretty solid 2B combo... at least on the offensive side.

There's way too much offseason left to make and definitive statements on how our team will look on opening day '23. This adds a bit of clarity, but there's a lot left to do. Right now, it's Tellez at 1B, Wong/Brosseau at 2B, Adames at SS and Urias at 3B, and I'd guess Yelich and Renfroe will get a lot of the DH PAs with Frelick and Mitchell playing in the field on most days.

My bet is that there will be a lot of moves to shake that up.

[sveumrules]

1 hour ago, jay87shot said:

How can you project a rookies wRC+, thats way to difficult. Turang played 44 games in AAA in 2021 as a 21 year old not 2 full years and his shown great improvement every year, trading him would be a mistake.

Projecting a rookie’s wRC+ is incredibly difficult, the error bars are even wider than projecting established MLB players, but thousands of players have gone from AAA to MLB for front offices and projection systems to at least get a rough baseline.

I’d say 93 wRC+ for Turang’s rookie season is fair. Anything approaching a 110 wRC+ would be pretty impressive with Brice posting a 108 mark in AAA last year, I think most would take something around a league average 100 mark as a solid debut, but also wouldn’t be surprised if he ended up down in the 70’s or 80’s with memories of Arcia still lodged in our collective subconscious.

I’d prefer not to trade Turang, but if Adames is extended Brice becomes a more plausible trade candidate for me.

A’s were terrible at MIF and OF last year. Between Turang, Frelick, Wiemer, Mitchell and Esteury we could offer them some combination of three MLB ready guys to plug in from day one in exchange for Murphy.

[SF70]

25 minutes ago, monty57 said:

I thought the Brewers might try to save some money by letting Wong go, but he is worth the $10M contract. However, his 135 wRC+ vs RHP and 37 wRC+ vs LHP in 2022 pretty much mandates a platoon. Pairing him with Brosseau (career 127 wRC+ vs LHP, 84 wRC+ vs RHP) seems like a pretty solid 2B combo... at least on the offensive side.

There's way too much offseason left to make and definitive statements on how our team will look on opening day '23. This adds a bit of clarity, but there's a lot left to do. Right now, it's Tellez at 1B, Wong/Brosseau at 2B, Adames at SS and Urias at 3B, and I'd guess Yelich and Renfroe will get a lot of the DH PAs with Frelick and Mitchell playing in the field on most days.

My bet is that there will be a lot of moves to shake that up.

 

26 minutes ago, monty57 said:

I thought the Brewers might try to save some money by letting Wong go, but he is worth the $10M contract. However, his 135 wRC+ vs RHP and 37 wRC+ vs LHP in 2022 pretty much mandates a platoon. Pairing him with Brosseau (career 127 wRC+ vs LHP, 84 wRC+ vs RHP) seems like a pretty solid 2B combo... at least on the offensive side.

There's way too much offseason left to make and definitive statements on how our team will look on opening day '23. This adds a bit of clarity, but there's a lot left to do. Right now, it's Tellez at 1B, Wong/Brosseau at 2B, Adames at SS and Urias at 3B, and I'd guess Yelich and Renfroe will get a lot of the DH PAs with Frelick and Mitchell playing in the field on most days.

My bet is that there will be a lot of moves to shake that up.

I know Brosseau rakes vs LHP, but the thought of him playing in the field anywhere but 1B isn’t a pleasant one. 

[sveumrules]

7 minutes ago, SF70 said:

 

I know Brosseau rakes vs LHP, but the thought of him playing in the field anywhere but 1B isn’t a pleasant one. 

Yeah, Brewers didn’t play Brosseau a single inning at 2B last year.

If they didn’t see him as viable there with shifts in play, I don’t think they’d want to give him too many innings now that second base will go back to requiring a lil more defensive acumen.

[Jim French Stepstool]

3 hours ago, monty57 said:

 

There's way too much offseason left to make and definitive statements on how our team will look on opening day '23. This adds a bit of clarity, but there's a lot left to do. Right now, it's Tellez at 1B, Wong/Brosseau at 2B, Adames at SS and Urias at 3B, and I'd guess Yelich and Renfroe will get a lot of the DH PAs with Frelick and Mitchell playing in the field on most days.

My bet is that there will be a lot of moves to shake that up.

This. I was leaning towards thinking they would let him walk but I figured it was like 60-40, nowhere near a slam dunk either way. Reason being this just feels like a very free-flowing offseason as far as which direction they could go with the roster. This thread contains a whole bunch of different ideas, and I think they all have some merit except for Turang remaining in AAA. That includes the one about Wong eventually being dealt.

Stay tuned, I guess.

[monty57]

3 hours ago, sveumrules said:

Yeah, Brewers didn’t play Brosseau a single inning at 2B last year.

If they didn’t see him as viable there with shifts in play, I don’t think they’d want to give him too many innings now that second base will go back to requiring a lil more defensive acumen.

He played 2B for the Rays, accumulating 404 innings from 2019-2021. The Brewers used him at 3B, with Urias moving over to second against lefties, and I'm fine with that as well. Both of them appear to be better at 2B then 3B.

At 2B over those 404 innings, he has a -3.2 UZR/150, 2 OAA, 1 RAA. In 649.1 innings at 3B, he's got a -5.0 UZR/150, -5 OAA, -4 RAA. All of these are according to Fangraphs.

[monty57]

32 minutes ago, Jim French Stepstool said:

This. I was leaning towards thinking they would let him walk but I figured it was like 60-40, nowhere near a slam dunk either way. Reason being this just feels like a very free-flowing offseason as far as which direction they could go with the roster. This thread contains a whole bunch of different ideas, and I think they all have some merit except for Turang remaining in AAA. That includes the one about Wong eventually being dealt.

Stay tuned, I guess.

It will be interesting to see what they do with Turang. He's a natural SS, so he's heir apparent when Adames is gone, which will probably be after the '23 season or at next year's trade deadline if they're out of it.

With that in mind, the team should only be concerned with what's best for his development, and how they can maximize his value to the team. Therefore, if he doesn't get a starting MLB job, I'd probably send Turang to AAA so he gets everyday playing time, but I think the team's m.o. will lead to them using him as a utility guy.

No one knows for sure if he'd develop better as a MLB utility guy or as an everyday guy at AAA, but I hate putting players in a role they're not accustomed to, and I hate using up a year of service time for a quality prospect in a bench role.

[SF70]

31 minutes ago, monty57 said:

He played 2B for the Rays, accumulating 404 innings from 2019-2021. The Brewers used him at 3B, with Urias moving over to second against lefties, and I'm fine with that as well. Both of them appear to be better at 2B then 3B.

At 2B over those 404 innings, he has a -3.2 UZR/150, 2 OAA, 1 RAA. In 649.1 innings at 3B, he's got a -5.0 UZR/150, -5 OAA, -4 RAA. All of these are according to Fangraphs.

His 3B defensive metrics, while still negative, outperform my eye-test . I see stiff hands and poor footwork with inconsistent throws to first.