I understand the point of the baseball players union, I really do. It was formed when conditions for players was bad. Low pay, crappy team conditions, everyone was unionizing. Unfortunately the players union has kind of gone a little far in the past 20-30 years and they currently have literally all of the power in the Management (owners) vs Union (Players) relationship. Baseball is nothing without it's stars and they know it and teams would lose a very gigantic amount of money if the players went on strike again, so the owners capitulate. Plus the players union has the backing of the Federal Government (which should realistically have zero say in this manner but thats a different topic entirely)
The '94-'95 strike was THE chance for baseball as an organization to clean up what was about to happen. Since the Players Association basically won the strike, small town teams have been part of a boom/bust cycle (some teams mostly bust) which I'll describe here:
starting from a bad team:
1) Team is bad for a few years and has high draft slots while the team stinks. During this period attendance is low because the team is bad and it generally happens in a small market.
2) 3 or 4 players on that team (generally speaking high draft picks) all come to the majors within a couple of years of each other under team friendly contracts and start to perform well. Excitement builds for the team in the local fanbase and additional revenue comes to the team.
3) The team makes their "run" at the playoffs. the increased revenue means they can bring in a few key free agents (usually pitchers) and the team goes into a "win now" mentality trading away whatever other minor league prospects they have to try to reach the postseason.
4) Team starts to underperform because they cannot sign big name free agent targets (mostly pitchers) and cannot generate enough revenue to sign more than maybe 1 or 2 homegrown players to long contracts.
5) As the team starts struggling, attendance drops and the team faces a harsh reality. Mediocrity for the foreseeable future with middling draft picks and a bad farm system (caused by trades for "win now") or trade the stars they signed for prospects and tank a few seasons starting the whole cycle over.
Some teams never complete this cycle out of ineptitude. The Pirates have been especially bad for a long period of time now (20 years!), but this blame can entirely rest on a pretty bad scouting network on the team. They hit on McCutchen, one of my favorite players, but have so far missed on nearly everyone else (Neil Walker is their only other 1st round player thats hit the majors thats any good whatsoever and he's not good.....that tells you something right there)
Some teams are at the tail end of this cycle. The Brewers, Twins are two very good examples of this happening. Bloated contracts for players the team cannot afford to keep during what is likely to be a rebuilding process.
Teams on the rise of the process: Royals, Diamondbacks, Indians, Nationals. They have strong farm systems and/or a good core of young players to build a championship run around.
Tampa Bay is the only real team in the middle of the process, though the Orioles are kind of in the middle (though their pitching is suspect at best)
Why is the process bad for baseball?
This entire process revolves around teams hitting on prospects within the first round or 2 in order for it to lead to something in the future. Specifically it HAS to hit on at least one absolute star on the team to work out (i.e. hitting on Corey Hart is nice, but not as nice as Braun AND Fielder at the same time). The Nationals have Strasberg. The Diamondbacks have Upton (and Skaags/Bauer in the minors who im convinced are aces on almost any staff in the majors someday). The Royals have Hosmer (current struggles aside) and Moustakas. The indians are kind of a mystery to me as it's really Carlos Santana, but they are offensively an all around good club.
You also have to hit on homegrown pitchers. This is how the Brewers have done it (Gallardo), Tampa (too many to name!), Nationals (Strasberg/Zimmerman). This has to be at the same time.
And here is the problem with the process and why it's so maddening as a baseball fan, and Brewers fan in particular. This is what small market teams have to do in order to compete. This is why the owners voted a staggering 25-3 for a salary cap during the 1994-1995 strike (presumably the teams with the most income are the only ones to vote against). It's hard to do hit on players this often.
Lets take a look at the first round players drafted for the years 2000-2005 and see which ones are currently considered anything close to "stars":
2000: Adrian Gonzalez (Marlins), Chase Utley (Phillies), Adam Wainwright (Braves)
2001: Joe Mauer (Twins), Mark Teixeira (Rangers), David Wright (Mets, compensation pick)
2002: Zack Greinke (Royals), Prince Fielder (Brewers), Nick Swisher (A's), Cole Hamels (Phillies), Matt Cain (Giants)
2003: Rickie Weeks* (Brewers), Carlos Quinton (Diamondbacks), Adam Jones (Mariners, compensation pick)
2004: Justin Verlander (Tigers), Jared Weaver (Angels)
2005: Justin Upton (Diamondbacks), Ryan Zimmerman (Nationals), Ryan Braun (Brewers), Rickey Ramero (Blue Jays), Troy Tulowitzki (Rockies), Andrew McCutchen (Pirates), Jay Bruce (Reds), Jacoby Ellsbury (Red Sox)
* My Rickie Weeks hatred is well known but I'll include him on the list
Thats 24 picks in 6 years (average 4/year with average picks per year of about 32 with compensation round or somewhere around a 12.5% chance.
Teams have about a 12.5% chance of hitting on a draft choice in the first round. The numbers go down drastically after the first round. If you are one on the struggling small market teams these picks mean pretty much everything to your chances for success in the future. Even inside the top 10 picks the success rate is an abysmal 20%. And this is what small market teams have to do to compete!
Long Term health of baseball
Many "baseball people" point to TV ratings for a Red Sox/Yankees matchup in the playoffs vs a Brewers/Diamondbacks (as an example) and say that the Red Sox/Yankees matchup is what MLB wants. and it's true......in the short term. But it's not good for the long term health of baseball. What is good for the long term, and MLB attendance/popularity overall is to have a reasonable expectation of being able to compete across the board. Every franchise should have these swings in their team, and only those who draft and scout well should be immune to this.
People need to be honest about this topic and realistic. Does it make sense to anyone that a sport can be so heavily based off money? (note, this is NOT in any way paralleled to the "free market" because baseball has an agreement of monopoly privilege with congress). Baseball is the only sport not truly covered under anti-trust laws, therefore has no actual competition aside from other sports.
Over the course of the last decade, which teams have been the most competative nearly every single year?
Yankees
Red Sox
Angels
Phillies (last 5-7 years)
2 of those teams: regularly top 3 (Yankees always the top), Yankees, Red Sox, Phillies currently are the top 3 and the Angels almost always top 10
This is what money buys, consistently being able to compete over a long period of time.
number of first round picks these 3 teams have truely hit on? 2 (Ellsbury/Weaver)
number of first round hits that are currently on these teams? 7 (out of the 24 or almost 30%)
This is not good. Baseball is for all intents and purposes, putting most of the best players onto a few specific teams and leaving maybe one star, who happened to sign a long term early deal with the club that drafted them (in my eyes, a mistake on their part with the current system)
Well what about this year!? is something people will mention. Right now The Red Sox are in last, Yankees in third (of 5), Phillies in last (Angels in second to last). A lot of this can be attributed to a few things:
Angels: Pujols has not been playing very well, neither has Dan Haren. Thats $45 million or so in payroll not playing like that amount of money. if they play better, the team is at worst in second place in the division.
Phillies: Injuries and players getting old. Howard is out, utley is out, Rollins is getting older. Plus they play in the most competative division in baseball right now and are only 4 games from first. Eventually their hitting will catch up to their pitching and they will be in first
Yankees: Injury/pitching concerns (Pineda out for year), Orioles playing out of their minds. They will right the ship, they always do. They will make a trade at the deadline and make the playoffs as either the division winner or a wild card
Red Sox: Injuries. Youkilis (back with team), Crawford, Ellsbury, Bailey, Lackey, Dice-K, Cody Ross. They are playing Adrian Gonzalez in right FFS!
How the union screwed up baseball
Lack of a salary cap. When players went back to playing in 1995 and the new contract didnt have a salary cap system in place, they basically damned the smaller market teams to the boom bust cycle. And this exact thing has been happening for nearly 20 years now. This is of course in the players favor, salaries have gone waaaaaaaay up since the strike. $1.07 million in 1995, $3.44 million in 2012. or 321% increase.
What does this do? It drives away players to teams that are ready, willing, and able to pay the lofty amounts for free agents. Small teams cannot take the possibility of a pitcher who could make $20 million+ per year either underperforming or getting hurt. It basically screws their team. They cannot pay possibly more than 1 player that kind of money at all because of the same reason. Plus, if the big teams find that they really want a player, they can always just outbid the other teams, or offer longer contracts for the same amount because if there is an injury, they can soak up the difference and get someone else in free agency.
How I would fix it
The owners should have never signed the new CBA. It does nothing for about half or more of the teams. The new "harsher" luxury tax hits mean almost nothing to teams like the Yankees, Red Sox, and Phillies. These are teams estimated to be worth upwards of over $2 billion and have a HUGE fanbase. Meanwhile smaller teams get a little bit of cash meant to help them compete that ultimately means nothing. if the Rays for instance get $25 million in luxury money, they could conceiveably sign say, Albert Pujols, but then have almost noone else on their team but homegrown talent and thus, nothing is accomplished because they don't have a revenue stream to compete long term and sign other players.
What the luxury tax really does is mean small teams sign middling talent, because they have to in order to even attempt to compete. And they end up either mediocre or bad (and thus find themselves somewhere in the small market baseball team cycle).
The owners of the small market teams really need to just grow some balls. It's in their best interest LONG TERM to say no to the players union and to implement a salary cap. If it takes the players striking again, let them. And let this be the sole issue that the strike is about.
If the players had a strike over a salary cap, the fans of nearly every team in baseball will be on the owners side. In the last strike it was that way anyways and it took years for fans to return (but they did return, and in a huge way). But what the owners need to know, is that the fans in every baseball city would welcome balanced teams with balanced salaries (except Yankees/Red Sox/Phillies/Angels fans). You want to see baseball revived? Let the idea of a Pirates vs Royals World Series be something that people actually want to watch because the teams aren't just lucky but actually good.
Responses to common questions/complaints
1) Baseball has competitive balance. How many times have the these big market teams even won the World Series lately?
9 times out of the last 17 years (over 50% have been 4 of the largest spenders. but 13 times they have made the World Series. The number of times the highest spenders have made the playoffs however is very high. how many times have the Yankees missed the playoffs since the spending spree started?
2) You're a communist. Apparently you don't believe in the free market.
Actually I believe in the Austrian School of economics, which is the only truely free market system devoid of government control. Baseball falls outside of "free market" for 2 reasons.
a) It has laws through congress which makes it a virtual Monopoly. It has no competition in the realm of baseball in the US, because they are the only ones officially recognized as professional baseball. Summer ball, Winter ball, Arizona leagues etc all fall under the purview of MLB. Baseball also has many stadiums funded by local governments.
b) Baseball is allowed to make its own rules concerning it's own independent league. free market means no government interference, and actually if it was free market the baseball strike in 1994 would have probably ended with the players losing and a salary cap (and thus more revenue for every team as they would be more balanced in the long run). The current setup happened precisely because baseball is NOT a free market, and the labor union cried to congress.
3) You just hate the Yankees, if your favorite team could spend like the Yankees, you wouldn't complain.
Yes I would. I don't know how people can enjoy winning a game where the deck is stacked in their favor. I've never understood cheaters in things that are meant to be played for fun, and I don't understand wanting to have such a strong grip on competition in what is meant to be a fan enjoyed past time. If what you enjoy is watching your favorite team beat inferior competition based almost entirely on the size of the city it is in (or how old the team is) then you must really love the first week of the college football season (which i personally hate)
4) Look at the Rays, they are a model franchise. Or the Brewers!
They are an outlier and are going to crash in the near future. Once the Rays cannot sign more than one of their stars to long term contracts, their run is done. They are in the middle of their cycle, and trust me when they fall it's going to be noticeable.
The Brewers are right at the cusp of the end of the competitive part of their cycle and need to be smart with how they proceed. By all means keep Braun, but they can pretty much dump the rest of their roster (maybe keep Gallardo) to attempt to shorten their cycle by revamping their minors.
Saturday, May 26, 2012
Thursday, May 17, 2012
Post number 2 about the state of the Brewers
The Brewers are in trouble. Im not just talking this year, or next. I'm talking about the next 3-5 years. What is holding the Brewers back so much? A lot. There is a lot going AGAINST them in the foreseeable future.
The Brewers play in Milwaukee
I'm sorry to all of you guys out there that are diehard Milwaukee Wisconsin fans, but Milwaukee is small. It's the smallest market in the majors. it's one of the smallest in professional sports. It's just a fact of life.
A few things to consider in modern baseball, with the current money structure:
1) How many small market teams are relevant for extended periods of time (longer that 5 years)? Not many. The Cardinals are about the only team that has stayed competative over a long period of time not from a very large market, but they had Albert Pujols for most of the decade.
2) How often do small market teams get to the playoffs and/or win the WS then dump their team and suck the next year? Without looking it up I can think of at least 3 or 4 instances. But why does this happen? The team cannot generate enough money to pay its players. They trade long term team health for the short term win now mentality.
3) The fans are finicky. When the team doesn't win, the fans don't show up. This is a truism throughout most of baseball. The larger the city, the easier it is to maintain the seats full (Chicago has sucked for over 100 years and they sell out all the time). If the Brewers don't compete, people stop going to the park which means we have even less money to pay players.
4) Once the brewers stop winning they won't be able to pay players.
The Brewers team is in shambles
Currently our entire lineup has a lot of holes filled by stopgap players that are not going to help us in the future. To me here is the list of players that will not be of much help to the club in trying to compete (note: positional players not pitching which is harder to predict)
1) Rickie Weeks. I've never been a fan, but to be fair he had a good year last year. As of right now he's hitting about .170 and has about a 30% strikeout rate. he is pressing, but he has ALWAYS pressed. He's not a good defender either, which is an organizational weakness overall.
2) Aoki: bad signing. He wasn't going to help the club win games if Braun went down, and now he's basically a third center fielder when we had at least some outfield depth.
3) Aramis Ramirez. I never liked the signing, but it made SOME sense. unfortunately this one is blowing up in our faces right now and was unnecessary. Taylor Greene, our only truly good hitting prospect, should have gotten the callup. he cannot possibly be worse than Ramirez is right now and cost next to nothing. Instead the team has a player that will be hard to trade and costs a lot while the team is going nowhere.
4) Alex Gonzalez. we should have gone after Clint Barmes. He was cheaper and a better defender and very reliable. I don't bemoan this signing, but it is noteworthy that we HAD to sign someone because we lacked anyone in the minors to even consider bringing up.
5) Carlos Gomez. he tries to hit with too much power for a speed guy. a plus defender, but a bad hitter overall. I don't like guys you have to platoon to make them a worthwhile player. It takes up a valuable roster spot.
6) Nyjer Morgan. My mom would kill me for suggesting this, but Morgan is no longer needed on the club. He cannot get away with his antics if the team is not winning and it looks like he lost his stroke. Another guy thats necessary to platoon, another reason i dont like him. He also lost all of his speed (i.e. he doesnt steal bases anymore)
I list these players because they are not the future of the franchise. Unfortunately it's who we have right now and it's expensive.
The Brewers farm system is in shambles too!
Please, if you read this do not get me wrong. I know why the farm teams have a derth of talent. I get it. We successfully traded for Greinke and Marcum to make a Playoff run last year and i fully support it. The Brewers HAVE to do that if they ever want to win. Its how small markets survive.
But look at what we gave up for last year and you will understand where the Brewers stand.
Brett Lawrie for Shaun Marcum: Lawrie is considered a "special" talent. he is likely going to be a David Wright type of player (though not necessarily to his caliber) for a lot of years. I personally think that this was a bad trade by the Brewers if they could have gotten Greinke regardless of the Marcum trade. This trade paved the way though as it showed we were serious about winning now. What we gave up though was the 3B we could have used for the next 5-7 years or longer that would have been a cornerstone of the franchise (along with Braun)
Alcides Escobar/Lorenzo Cain (and others) for Greinke: Compaired to the Marcum trade, this one was a steal (but again, doesnt happen unless the Marcum trade happens). Unfortunately we did give up our next starting shortstop and Center Fielder for 5-7 years.
Here is the best way to describe how bad farm system is. 2 out of our top 3 rated prospects were drafted last year.
Here's another way to put it. We have season ending injuries to 2 positional players and are relying on Travis Ishikawa and Cezar Isturis to score us runs.
Were ranked 28th with our farm system.........
Going forward
If I was GM for the Brewers for the next 5 years this is what i would do:
1) Trade Trade Trade: The whole small market team thing ONLY works if we can get a good farm system.
a) If Ramirez gets hot, trade him immediately and put Taylor Green at 3B. We don't need Ramirez, he's not a long term solution. Getting Greene some consistant AB can only help the club. If he starts panning out, sign him to a long term contract.
b) Weeks: try to get whatever you can out of him at this point, which might not be much.
c) Marcum: trade deadline guy. He's not in our future either.
d) Greinke: I know people want to keep him, but I'm renigging on this. We need to get as good of a prospect as we can out of him if were going to retool for the future.
2) Draft some hitters for crying out loud! Hitters take the longest to get major league ready, pitchers can come up in their rookie season and be successful. We have been dreadful at drafting hitters. This years class looks really really bad though. There is no "cant miss" players coming up ready to be drafted, but we need to try to get as many valuable hitters as possible.
As it stands we currently do not have an in house answer that could actually help us win in the future for the following positions: 1B, 2B, SS, CF. RF (assuming Hart leaves which he probably will after his contract is up). We also currently have almost no power in the minors. we have speed, but without on base skills. we have a couple of on base guys, but who are terrible defenders.
3) Philosophy change. The Brewers overall need a change of philosophy on how they draft, pick up free agents and hand out contracts. Overall the team's front office has done a decent job the last couple of years, but a lot of that was based off a foundation created nearly a decade ago with the draft when the team was so bad, they overloaded on top tier hitters.
Its hard to mess up a team when within a few years you draft Prince Fielder, Ryan Braun, Yovanni Gallardo, Corey Hart and Rickie Weeks (though he has always underperformed). That team was assembled in pretty short order and laid the groundwork for the two playoff berths.
Baseball has unfortunately changed since then. Hitting is down, pitching is generally up. There are plenty of debates as to why this occurs (the most common is the end of the steroid era) but thats the trend as of right now. Were stuck in the same mode as before however with how we assemble our teams (be it drafting or free agency or trading).
We need to develop hitters in house. Hitters have the lowest success rate of being long term players, and as this year has taught us, not having hitting depth can ruin a franchise. We knew Fielder was leaving, yet we had no true replacement for him. The organizations soft spot for players like Carlos Gomez and Rickie Weeks to me is frustrating, and their lack of even a good attempt to have organizational guys to replace them when they struggle is not a good thing.
The Brewer need to make a concerted effort to draft on base guys and guys with speed and good defensive skills. Ultimately these are the things that consistantly kill the club. The best part of this approach is that it comes cheaply, meaning we can spend more on free agents, specifically pitchers.
The Brewers play in Milwaukee
I'm sorry to all of you guys out there that are diehard Milwaukee Wisconsin fans, but Milwaukee is small. It's the smallest market in the majors. it's one of the smallest in professional sports. It's just a fact of life.
A few things to consider in modern baseball, with the current money structure:
1) How many small market teams are relevant for extended periods of time (longer that 5 years)? Not many. The Cardinals are about the only team that has stayed competative over a long period of time not from a very large market, but they had Albert Pujols for most of the decade.
2) How often do small market teams get to the playoffs and/or win the WS then dump their team and suck the next year? Without looking it up I can think of at least 3 or 4 instances. But why does this happen? The team cannot generate enough money to pay its players. They trade long term team health for the short term win now mentality.
3) The fans are finicky. When the team doesn't win, the fans don't show up. This is a truism throughout most of baseball. The larger the city, the easier it is to maintain the seats full (Chicago has sucked for over 100 years and they sell out all the time). If the Brewers don't compete, people stop going to the park which means we have even less money to pay players.
4) Once the brewers stop winning they won't be able to pay players.
The Brewers team is in shambles
Currently our entire lineup has a lot of holes filled by stopgap players that are not going to help us in the future. To me here is the list of players that will not be of much help to the club in trying to compete (note: positional players not pitching which is harder to predict)
1) Rickie Weeks. I've never been a fan, but to be fair he had a good year last year. As of right now he's hitting about .170 and has about a 30% strikeout rate. he is pressing, but he has ALWAYS pressed. He's not a good defender either, which is an organizational weakness overall.
2) Aoki: bad signing. He wasn't going to help the club win games if Braun went down, and now he's basically a third center fielder when we had at least some outfield depth.
3) Aramis Ramirez. I never liked the signing, but it made SOME sense. unfortunately this one is blowing up in our faces right now and was unnecessary. Taylor Greene, our only truly good hitting prospect, should have gotten the callup. he cannot possibly be worse than Ramirez is right now and cost next to nothing. Instead the team has a player that will be hard to trade and costs a lot while the team is going nowhere.
4) Alex Gonzalez. we should have gone after Clint Barmes. He was cheaper and a better defender and very reliable. I don't bemoan this signing, but it is noteworthy that we HAD to sign someone because we lacked anyone in the minors to even consider bringing up.
5) Carlos Gomez. he tries to hit with too much power for a speed guy. a plus defender, but a bad hitter overall. I don't like guys you have to platoon to make them a worthwhile player. It takes up a valuable roster spot.
6) Nyjer Morgan. My mom would kill me for suggesting this, but Morgan is no longer needed on the club. He cannot get away with his antics if the team is not winning and it looks like he lost his stroke. Another guy thats necessary to platoon, another reason i dont like him. He also lost all of his speed (i.e. he doesnt steal bases anymore)
I list these players because they are not the future of the franchise. Unfortunately it's who we have right now and it's expensive.
The Brewers farm system is in shambles too!
Please, if you read this do not get me wrong. I know why the farm teams have a derth of talent. I get it. We successfully traded for Greinke and Marcum to make a Playoff run last year and i fully support it. The Brewers HAVE to do that if they ever want to win. Its how small markets survive.
But look at what we gave up for last year and you will understand where the Brewers stand.
Brett Lawrie for Shaun Marcum: Lawrie is considered a "special" talent. he is likely going to be a David Wright type of player (though not necessarily to his caliber) for a lot of years. I personally think that this was a bad trade by the Brewers if they could have gotten Greinke regardless of the Marcum trade. This trade paved the way though as it showed we were serious about winning now. What we gave up though was the 3B we could have used for the next 5-7 years or longer that would have been a cornerstone of the franchise (along with Braun)
Alcides Escobar/Lorenzo Cain (and others) for Greinke: Compaired to the Marcum trade, this one was a steal (but again, doesnt happen unless the Marcum trade happens). Unfortunately we did give up our next starting shortstop and Center Fielder for 5-7 years.
Here is the best way to describe how bad farm system is. 2 out of our top 3 rated prospects were drafted last year.
Here's another way to put it. We have season ending injuries to 2 positional players and are relying on Travis Ishikawa and Cezar Isturis to score us runs.
Were ranked 28th with our farm system.........
Going forward
If I was GM for the Brewers for the next 5 years this is what i would do:
1) Trade Trade Trade: The whole small market team thing ONLY works if we can get a good farm system.
a) If Ramirez gets hot, trade him immediately and put Taylor Green at 3B. We don't need Ramirez, he's not a long term solution. Getting Greene some consistant AB can only help the club. If he starts panning out, sign him to a long term contract.
b) Weeks: try to get whatever you can out of him at this point, which might not be much.
c) Marcum: trade deadline guy. He's not in our future either.
d) Greinke: I know people want to keep him, but I'm renigging on this. We need to get as good of a prospect as we can out of him if were going to retool for the future.
2) Draft some hitters for crying out loud! Hitters take the longest to get major league ready, pitchers can come up in their rookie season and be successful. We have been dreadful at drafting hitters. This years class looks really really bad though. There is no "cant miss" players coming up ready to be drafted, but we need to try to get as many valuable hitters as possible.
As it stands we currently do not have an in house answer that could actually help us win in the future for the following positions: 1B, 2B, SS, CF. RF (assuming Hart leaves which he probably will after his contract is up). We also currently have almost no power in the minors. we have speed, but without on base skills. we have a couple of on base guys, but who are terrible defenders.
3) Philosophy change. The Brewers overall need a change of philosophy on how they draft, pick up free agents and hand out contracts. Overall the team's front office has done a decent job the last couple of years, but a lot of that was based off a foundation created nearly a decade ago with the draft when the team was so bad, they overloaded on top tier hitters.
Its hard to mess up a team when within a few years you draft Prince Fielder, Ryan Braun, Yovanni Gallardo, Corey Hart and Rickie Weeks (though he has always underperformed). That team was assembled in pretty short order and laid the groundwork for the two playoff berths.
Baseball has unfortunately changed since then. Hitting is down, pitching is generally up. There are plenty of debates as to why this occurs (the most common is the end of the steroid era) but thats the trend as of right now. Were stuck in the same mode as before however with how we assemble our teams (be it drafting or free agency or trading).
We need to develop hitters in house. Hitters have the lowest success rate of being long term players, and as this year has taught us, not having hitting depth can ruin a franchise. We knew Fielder was leaving, yet we had no true replacement for him. The organizations soft spot for players like Carlos Gomez and Rickie Weeks to me is frustrating, and their lack of even a good attempt to have organizational guys to replace them when they struggle is not a good thing.
The Brewer need to make a concerted effort to draft on base guys and guys with speed and good defensive skills. Ultimately these are the things that consistantly kill the club. The best part of this approach is that it comes cheaply, meaning we can spend more on free agents, specifically pitchers.
Wednesday, May 9, 2012
Sorry for the long absence
I havent blogged in a while. Starting this blog was kind of at a weird time for me. Since my last blog I got married to my wonderful wife Nicole and went on my honeymoon to the West Coast. Anyone who has a chance should take the time to drive the Pacific Coast Highway if they can, it's a pretty great drive up the California coast in particular.
Anyways, back to business. Baseball is still here and I have a few topics to talk about.
1) Brewers are in a little bit of trouble. Narveson out for the year (rotator cuff). Alex Gonzalez out for the year (ACL). Mat Gamel out for the year (ACL). Carlos Gomez is also out with a hurt hamstring and Ryan Braun has an achey achilles tendon. All of these are gigantic blows to the team.
While I'm not giving up on the team, this significantly decreases their chances of repeating as NL Central champions and possibly pushes them out of the playoffs. I'm sure Doug Melvin is a realist and knows this as well. a Travis Ishikawa/Taylor Greene/Brooks Conrad platoon at first base alongside a Cezar Isturis/Maysonet share at shortstop is not a lot of offensive production as pretty much none of them would be starters on any other team. I don't see how they get out of that kind of hole with their players. They don't have a lot of help in the minors as of right now due to previous trades (Marcum and Greinke trades specifically)
My feeling on this is that by the trade deadline the Brewers are going to be heavy sellers. They can get a lot of value for a lot of their players in the form of prospects that they desperately need and at the same time they can get some of their minor leaguers some professional experience. If I was the GM here's what I would do:
a) Sign Zack Greinke if at all possible. If it's not trade him. This must be done first. Greinke wants to play for a winner and theres no way he will agree to stay if he sees the team selling off parts.
b) Trade Marcum. Were not going to be able to keep both Greinke and Marcum after this year. We want Greinke above Marcum for obvious reasons. If Greinke wont sign we might as well keep Marcum. Keeping either would maintain a competitive 1/2 pitching combination going forward.
c) Controversy number 1: trade Weeks. I've never liked Weeks. His career year has been slightly above league average which is decent for a second baseman but not for how much we pay. The Brewers desperately need people who can consistently get on base. Scooter Gennet i believe can be the guy to do it. The other option, start Scooter playing SS instead of second base.
d) Trade K-Rod. His signing was a "mistake". He wasnt expected to take arbitration as no GM in their right mind pays that kind of money to a set-up man. This ones easy to see coming if they are out of competition by July.
e) Controversy number 2: Trade Axford. Listen, I like Axford as a pitcher, but his value may never be higher if he continues to pitch well. And other teams will (mistakenly) give a lot for a closer like him. The easiest way to put this is this: Closers are simply NOT important. Historically, the team that leads going into the 9th wins something like 87% of the time. During most of baseball history there was no such thing as a closer. Relief pitchers should be used in high leverage situations based on the order of importance of the situation. I don't know exactly where "closers" comes from (a subject I'll try to learn about and explain later) but it's a weird phenomenon
The Brewers need minor league players more than anything else. Actually they need good minor league POSITION players more than anything. Specifically infielders
2) A Small rant for anyone who reads this. This point concerns trading in fantasy sports. so beware it's bitchy but great advice overall.
In order for a trade to happen in fantasy baseball some Key things need to occur. This is because it doesnt piss the other guy off, making them not want to trade with you again and it helps keep the league more balanced and fun.
a) The trade must be fair. Before hitting submit for the trade think this to yourself. If I had his team and He had mine, would I consider this trade at all? If the answer is no, don't hit submit.
b) Generally speaking, trade the same number of players. a 2 for 1 trade is almost never a fair trade. It looks fair on paper for the guy gaining the 2 players i.e. the production of those 2 players in some combination makes the production (or is slightly over) of the one player. but this doesnt mean it's fair.
Take this example (actual trade offer i received)
I trade Miguel Cabrera
I receive Carlos Beltran and Carlos Pena.
On the surface it seems like a fairish trade, but it's not. Carlos Beltran and Pena will defintly have more HR more RBI more SB than Cabrera. But here's the problem, it's not just them vs Cabrera. It's those 2 vs Cabrera AND the player i'd have to bench in order to play both of them (If i bench one it's more like a straight up trade for say Pena for Cabrera which would be terrible).
Furthermore there's another reason this specific trade is bad: Cabrera is a top 3 pick on every single draft I did. This is because of his year to year consistency. He's not always the best 1B (or 3B this year) but he's pretty much always top 5. Beltran and Pena are not consistant at all. No matter what their current start of the season production, you have no idea where they end the year. Beltran specifically is an injury risk. Cabrera is pretty much (barring unforseen random injury) .300 avg 100 RBI 100 runs 20-30 HR. History says thats his floor. Beltran hasnt hit those numbers in about 5 year (when he used to be a stolen base threat as well but before injury)
3) Trading hitters for hitters (or pitchers for pitchers or RB for RB or WR for WR or Goaltender for goaltender) is in general a bad trade unless its a multi player trade and gives both sides something they are missing. If a team needs pitchers offering him (like my last trade) Beltran and Pena for Cabrera isnt a good trade. It doesnt help his team at all. However if it was say Bourne and Beltran it would be more fair as it gives SB that the intiial guy doesnt have.
Anyways, back to business. Baseball is still here and I have a few topics to talk about.
1) Brewers are in a little bit of trouble. Narveson out for the year (rotator cuff). Alex Gonzalez out for the year (ACL). Mat Gamel out for the year (ACL). Carlos Gomez is also out with a hurt hamstring and Ryan Braun has an achey achilles tendon. All of these are gigantic blows to the team.
While I'm not giving up on the team, this significantly decreases their chances of repeating as NL Central champions and possibly pushes them out of the playoffs. I'm sure Doug Melvin is a realist and knows this as well. a Travis Ishikawa/Taylor Greene/Brooks Conrad platoon at first base alongside a Cezar Isturis/Maysonet share at shortstop is not a lot of offensive production as pretty much none of them would be starters on any other team. I don't see how they get out of that kind of hole with their players. They don't have a lot of help in the minors as of right now due to previous trades (Marcum and Greinke trades specifically)
My feeling on this is that by the trade deadline the Brewers are going to be heavy sellers. They can get a lot of value for a lot of their players in the form of prospects that they desperately need and at the same time they can get some of their minor leaguers some professional experience. If I was the GM here's what I would do:
a) Sign Zack Greinke if at all possible. If it's not trade him. This must be done first. Greinke wants to play for a winner and theres no way he will agree to stay if he sees the team selling off parts.
b) Trade Marcum. Were not going to be able to keep both Greinke and Marcum after this year. We want Greinke above Marcum for obvious reasons. If Greinke wont sign we might as well keep Marcum. Keeping either would maintain a competitive 1/2 pitching combination going forward.
c) Controversy number 1: trade Weeks. I've never liked Weeks. His career year has been slightly above league average which is decent for a second baseman but not for how much we pay. The Brewers desperately need people who can consistently get on base. Scooter Gennet i believe can be the guy to do it. The other option, start Scooter playing SS instead of second base.
d) Trade K-Rod. His signing was a "mistake". He wasnt expected to take arbitration as no GM in their right mind pays that kind of money to a set-up man. This ones easy to see coming if they are out of competition by July.
e) Controversy number 2: Trade Axford. Listen, I like Axford as a pitcher, but his value may never be higher if he continues to pitch well. And other teams will (mistakenly) give a lot for a closer like him. The easiest way to put this is this: Closers are simply NOT important. Historically, the team that leads going into the 9th wins something like 87% of the time. During most of baseball history there was no such thing as a closer. Relief pitchers should be used in high leverage situations based on the order of importance of the situation. I don't know exactly where "closers" comes from (a subject I'll try to learn about and explain later) but it's a weird phenomenon
The Brewers need minor league players more than anything else. Actually they need good minor league POSITION players more than anything. Specifically infielders
2) A Small rant for anyone who reads this. This point concerns trading in fantasy sports. so beware it's bitchy but great advice overall.
In order for a trade to happen in fantasy baseball some Key things need to occur. This is because it doesnt piss the other guy off, making them not want to trade with you again and it helps keep the league more balanced and fun.
a) The trade must be fair. Before hitting submit for the trade think this to yourself. If I had his team and He had mine, would I consider this trade at all? If the answer is no, don't hit submit.
b) Generally speaking, trade the same number of players. a 2 for 1 trade is almost never a fair trade. It looks fair on paper for the guy gaining the 2 players i.e. the production of those 2 players in some combination makes the production (or is slightly over) of the one player. but this doesnt mean it's fair.
Take this example (actual trade offer i received)
I trade Miguel Cabrera
I receive Carlos Beltran and Carlos Pena.
On the surface it seems like a fairish trade, but it's not. Carlos Beltran and Pena will defintly have more HR more RBI more SB than Cabrera. But here's the problem, it's not just them vs Cabrera. It's those 2 vs Cabrera AND the player i'd have to bench in order to play both of them (If i bench one it's more like a straight up trade for say Pena for Cabrera which would be terrible).
Furthermore there's another reason this specific trade is bad: Cabrera is a top 3 pick on every single draft I did. This is because of his year to year consistency. He's not always the best 1B (or 3B this year) but he's pretty much always top 5. Beltran and Pena are not consistant at all. No matter what their current start of the season production, you have no idea where they end the year. Beltran specifically is an injury risk. Cabrera is pretty much (barring unforseen random injury) .300 avg 100 RBI 100 runs 20-30 HR. History says thats his floor. Beltran hasnt hit those numbers in about 5 year (when he used to be a stolen base threat as well but before injury)
3) Trading hitters for hitters (or pitchers for pitchers or RB for RB or WR for WR or Goaltender for goaltender) is in general a bad trade unless its a multi player trade and gives both sides something they are missing. If a team needs pitchers offering him (like my last trade) Beltran and Pena for Cabrera isnt a good trade. It doesnt help his team at all. However if it was say Bourne and Beltran it would be more fair as it gives SB that the intiial guy doesnt have.
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