Aaron Rowand

[TooLiveBrew]

Ok, I can agree it's overstatement, but I wholly disagree that Rowand fits anything for us, especially given his likely price tag. What he brings is defense in the outfield, not an area we need to improve very much. Moving Hall out of CF to either corner spot drops his value like a stone, and Rowand isn't the kind of hitter the Brewers are seeking to add. I find it impossible to believe that he will be a Brewer next season.

 

How do you see him as a "fit"?

[Roscoe Chill]

How do you see him as a "fit"?

 

Have you seen the list of free agent outfielders? Position player wise, where else are the Brewers looking to fill holes?

 

Like I said, you may be right, but if they don't go after Rowand, I don't want them to go after a single free agent, other than maybe relievers. And sad to say, I don't think that trading Claudio Vargas and Chris Capuano is going to get back enough positive turnover on the roster for the team to improve much. And some would say trading Vargas and Capuano is stupid. So, I mean really, what do they do? Hope Sheets can stay healthy, hope Weeks puts together a full season just like the last few weeks, hope Hall plays like he did in 2006, and hope Fielder and Braun can repeat their '07 seasons?

[Roscoe Chill]

Furthermore, Rowand was tied for 21st in OBP in the National League...so I guess I don't really understand when people dismiss him as not the type of player the Brewers are looking for. Everyone is overpaid. The Brewers have a luxury of having superstars playing for peanuts for a few years, and after that they are gone. I'd like to see them win a championship, and if that means adding guys like Jeff Suppand and Aaron Rowand for more than they are worth but fill a role with a championship team, that's fine with me.

[sbrylski]

I agree, I just (HR Chris Young!) looked over the list of OF OBP leaders. Not only are they few FAs, nobody solid is even really on the trade block. Rowand ain't a sure thing in terms of his offensive output, but the potential is there, and defense doesn't slump. I'd take him, but I sure would prefer a 3 year deal to a 4 or 5.

 

I'd also then platoon Hall and Gross in LF, and let Hall super-sub verse RHP in the IF. Should still get him 5 starts per 6 games and 500+ PA.

[TooLiveBrew]

How do you see him as a "fit"?

 

Have you seen the list of free agent outfielders? Position player wise, where else are the Brewers looking to fill holes?

 

Like I said, you may be right, but if they don't go after Rowand, I don't want them to go after a single free agent, other than maybe relievers. And sad to say, I don't think that trading Claudio Vargas and Chris Capuano is going to get back enough positive turnover on the roster for the team to improve much. And some would say trading Vargas and Capuano is stupid. So, I mean really, what do they do? Hope Sheets can stay healthy, hope Weeks puts together a full season just like the last few weeks, hope Hall plays like he did in 2006, and hope Fielder and Braun can repeat their '07 seasons?

Why does a poor crop of FA OFers change the fact that Rowand is not a wise signing? Because he's the least bad makes him acceptable? I think you underestimate DM & Co.'s ability to flip deals when you say we won't get much for a trade of a SP - we got Gross as a throw-in in the Overbay trade. I don't want them to pursue any FA's either, NDOGG, save perhaps a reliever, but even that's risky territory. Honestly, I just want them to retain Mench (who has done exactly as advertised against LHP), and have Gross/Mench in LF, with Dillon around to fill in. Bill Hall's defense improved noticeably in CF as this season progressed - his first ever as an OFer. His D will be better in 2008 & beyond. His offense will likely rebound as well, take a look at his peripherals from 2007 - no real cause for 'let's scrap him as a starter/CFer' concern.

 

Furthermore, Rowand was tied for 21st in OBP in the National League...so I guess I don't really understand when people dismiss him as not the type of player the Brewers are looking for.

 

No offense intended, but if you look at his stats beyond arguably the best year in his career, you'd understand why people critique his approach. I mentioned earlier that his OBP is entirely BA-driven.

 

2002 (age 24 season) - .258/.298/.394/.692 ... OPS+ = 80

2003 (25) - .287/.327/.452/.779 ... 104

2004 (26) - .310/.361/.544/.905 ... 126

2005 (27) - .270/.329/.407/.736 ... 93

2006 (28) - .262/.321/.425/.746 ... 87

2007 (29) - .309/.374/.515/.889 ... 125

 

Additionally, from 2004-07 he's averaged roughly 3.5 pitches per plate appearance. Basically the point on Rowand is that if he's not hitting at or over .300, his OBP is disappointing (unlike a player like, say, Weeks). The Marcels Projections on Rowand for 2007 (which basically take career production and 'normalize' it - project a typical season from said player utilizing park factors, major-league averages, etc.) show what he's much more likely to offer than two years in which he managed to bat over .300 -

 

.277/.335/.448/.783

 

Since Marcels weigh recent years heavier, if you want to crunch in his 2007 stats, what you have is what I think he is - a guy that's going to be around .775-.825 OPS, yet we'd have to pay (at least) $10 mil.+ / year for him, and likely offer at least four years. If you want that at the expense of being able to retain as many of our young stars as possible, cool. I just would prefer to stick with who we've got in-house (or via trade) as opposed to throwing money at the problem and hope that when the dice come up, we get the Rowand of 2004 & 2007, and not the guy for the rest of his career. Rowand's ISO has been below .170 in every season save '04 & '07. Hall's ISO in 2007 was .170.

 

I think he's likely to end up with a 5 year deal, and roughly $60 mil. I may be wrong by a year in either direction, and the money may not be quite that high, but that's still too much to tie up in what, on his career, has been merely an average player. As I said earlier, this team can really only sustain one Suppan-esque contract, and we've already got that.

[Roscoe Chill]

I mentioned earlier that his OBP is entirely BA-driven.

 

Who cares?

[Team Canada]

Because his point is that if the avg regresses, then so does his OBP, and you end up with a mediocre player instead of a good one.

[endaround]

I mentioned earlier that his OBP is entirely BA-driven.

 

Who cares?

Anybody who watched Bill Hall this year. If Hall hit .270 he'll be great. If he hits below .260 he'll be poor. A .265 hitter could easily do either.

 

[Roscoe Chill]

All right, let me get this straight. People on this board come around and say for sake of one argument..."the difference between batting .260 and .270 is like one hit a week" (paraphrasing), and then for another argument come out and say that what is now being said about OBP being BA driven...I just think it's a tad overscrutinized. I mean, people on this site actually stated that Matt Holliday wouldn't be too much of an improvement over Jenkins and Mench, so I guess I don't really care if some people around here say that Rowand wouldn't either.

 

The bottom line is if you dropped Aaron Rowand in to the 2008 lineup and kept Bill Hall and Ryan Braun in there too, wherever you put any of these guys, it would help the Brewers in their quest for a playoff berth. The question is how much would Rowand get, and if Rowand is all of a sudden going to become a bad player just because he's 33 instead of 30 (in a few years). And this team needs to improve defensively too right?

 

If I had to bet, I would bet that Rowand doesn't end up with the Brewers, but there aren't many free agent fits, so it's definitely a possibility.

[dadofandrew]

Rowand does not add much offensively to the '08 team (compared to the '07 version with the LF platoon), though he would be an upgrade defensively. I like him, but not for the money he'll get.

[PeaveyFury]

Moving Hall out of CF to either corner spot drops his value like a stone

 

The idea wouldn't involve moving Hall to LF, it'd be moving him to third and Braun to LF. As Al said, Rowand probably wouldn't be much of an offensive upgrade, but offense really wasn't the problem in 07, and it'd improve our horrid team defense immensely. As far as cost, if Rowand gets ~10 million per, it wouldn't be any more expensive than the 10.4 million we paid Jenkins/Mench in 2007.

[Roscoe Chill]

As far as cost, if Rowand gets ~10 million per, it wouldn't be any more expensive than the 10.4 million we paid Jenkins/Mench in 2007.

 

That's a great point. I think when we're on this board, some of us get too worked up over the cost and worth of players. That's just the market value nowadays, and we can either accept it, or be totally against all free agent pickups no matter who the player is, because the reality of it is, that all the players are overpaid once they reach free agency, except for the truly great players, and even that's debatable.

[dadofandrew]

Guys have off-years all the time. This is usually a good time to swoop in and get a bargain. You can find quite a few SP's who were making a ton of cash who had similar stats to Cappy in either '06 or '07.

 

To me, the key is to project the future, not dwell on the past. I got more e-mail on the fact I said on Ramblings that Marquis should be our #2 target (after Suppan), and all I heard was he had a 6+ ERA. Well, if you look at it, other than a pair of games in which the Cards "punted" and left Jason into eat innings, his ERA was 5ish. Jason had a good start in '07, and finished almost exactly where you would expect, based on his career norms.

 

Guys who are expected to have a 4.50 ERA are well within range of having a 5ish ERA just because of bad luck, the difference is only a blooper or ground ball finding a hole about once every 2-3 starts. Cappy's secondary numbers have not declined to speak of, and some have even improved.

[PeaveyFury]

I think the days of the Brewers being able to get significant upgrades for little to nothing in free agency are long gone, both due to the success of the team, the talent level of the roster and the market. Considering that we're a contender, we no longer have the luxury of being able to throw guys like Podsednik, Wise, Doug Davis, Turnbow, etc on the 25-man in April and watching them develop into starters. Guys will still be available on minor league deals and such, but we're good enough that to upgrade the roster, we're going to have to give a guy 10 mil per.

 

That said, if Rowand can do what Mench/Jenkins did offensively, upgrade the defense greatly, and at about the same price, it also opens up a 40-man roster spot and more importantly, a 25-man spot for another guy who can contribute in some fashion (Dillon, Rottino, whomever).

 

I think this would be worth exploring for sure.

[PeaveyFury]

You can find quite a few SP's who were making a ton of cash who had similar stats to Cappy in either '06 or '07.

 

And in another thread you thought Cappy would get 7 million per year in the open market. I think NDOG's point is that giving a guy who is expected to put up a 4.50-5 ERA and has been trending downward in some respects 21 million over three years isn't exactly a buyer-friendly market. In the past (pre-2006), a guy like that would have gotten maybe 9 mil over those three years.

[endaround]

I think the days of the Brewers being able to get significant upgrades for little to nothing in free agency are long gone, both due to the success of the team, the talent level of the roster and the market. Considering that we're a contender, we no longer have the luxury of being able to throw guys like Podsednik, Wise, Doug Davis, Turnbow, etc on the 25-man in April and watching them develop into starters. Guys will still be available on minor league deals and such, but we're good enough that to upgrade the roster, we're going to have to give a guy 10 mil per.

 

That said, if Rowand can do what Mench/Jenkins did offensively, upgrade the defense greatly, and at about the same price, it also opens up a 40-man roster spot and more importantly, a 25-man spot for another guy who can contribute in some fashion (Dillon, Rottino, whomever).

 

I think this would be worth exploring for sure.

Except I expect Rowand to get much more than that. Byrnes is getting $10 million a year with a complete no trade clause as well. Here is what Byrnes did this year:

.286/.353/.460

Here's Rowand:

 

.309/.374/.515

 

And he's a good CFer.

 

Calos Lee last year: .300/.355/.540

[PeaveyFury]

I think that's fair, end. I'm very interested in Rowand, but the price is obviously a factor to some degree. If it's much over 10 mil, it's probably out of what the Brewers can/will pay.

[Roscoe Chill]

Well yeah, I'm not on board with the Brewers paying Rowand an absurd amount of money over an absurd amount of years. I just don't quite understand people saying he doesn't fit in to the current makeup of the club.

[PeaveyFury]

I guess the question becomes what an absurd amount of money is.... I'd do 4/40 for sure, but would that get it done?

[dadofandrew]

Peavey, I will not disagree the money given the pitchers you described is high, but that seems to be the going rate.

 

As for Rowand, his '07 numbers are substantially higher than his career, and he'll be 30. Expecting him to duplicate his 2007 season is a recipe for being let down.

[sbrylski]

If Rowand is our best FA option yet for the OF yet still an offensive downgrade, and he's due to get a $12 mil contract for 4+ years, why not just pick up Jenkins' 1 year, $9 mil deal?

[PeaveyFury]

I will not disagree the money given the pitchers you described is high, but that seems to be the going rate.

And the going rate for solid CF'ers on the open market is ~10 million per- that's exactly the point.

[Roscoe Chill]

And the going rate for solid CF'ers on the open market is ~10 million per- that's exactly the point.

 

Exactly...how come some players are risks because they are getting older, but others who are getting older and coming off bad seasons are "solid?"

[colbyjack]

I like Rowand and what he brings to any team. He's a tough guy that plays some pretty good D' in CF. I like the idea of bringing in someone like Rowand while moving Hall back to 3B and Braun to LF. That just makes a ton of sense and instantly improves the defense by leaps and bounds.

 

However, I don't like the fact that Rowand has only had two good to really good years. The rest of his seasons are awfully mediocre. There's nothing wrong with that unless you're talking about a 4-year $40 million investment as some have guessed that it would likely take to sign him. I also don't like the fact that his OBP is so reliant on his BA as others have noted. Doug Melvin said himself that he hoped to focus on OBP this offseason, and while Rowand had a good OBP this past year, he hasn't in the past.

 

I think someone else compared his potential signing to that of Jeff Suppan (and if not I mis-read something), which I agree with. Not the best, most ideal signing, but not a bad one either, even if the money doesn't seem right for what you're getting, it could be a move in the right direction to help the overall team.

 

The more I think of improving the team through CF, however that may be possible, moving Hall to 3B and Braun to LF, the more I like it.

[sbrylski]

Is Rowand that good at CF? I know its generally accepted that he is and fielding stats aren't great, but his RZR the last two years in CF is not good. In 2006, his .882 is good for 17th out of 21 qualified players, and in 2007 he only had an .861. That's 15th of 17th qualifiers and just slightly better than Hall's .846. What gives?