Results tagged ‘ Francisco Rodriguez ’
Brewers Make Decision, Option Hitter
Following Wednesday’s loss to the Pittsburgh Pirates, the Milwaukee Brewers formally announced a trio of roster moves.
First, it was stated again that Francisco Rodriguez would have his contract selected before tomorrow’s game. This move required two additional moves to open a spot on both the 40-man and 25-man rosters.
Taylor Green, who will miss the entire season following hip surgery, was transferred to the 60-day disabled list from the 15-day DL. This opened a spot on the 40-man.
As for the 25-man spot, C/1B Blake Lalli was optioned down to the Nashville Sounds. He’ll have a chance to play regularly and hopefully heat his bat back up.
Rodriguez will join a well-used but mostly effective bullpen to provide another arm to hopefully collect outs.
During his 30-day evaluation window, Rodriguez pitched in four games – two each for High-A Brevard County and Triple-A Nashville – where he combined to post a line of:
4.0 IP, 0 R, 1 H, 3 BB, 7 K
The work against Triple-A hitters was against mostly guys with big league experience, for what it’s worth.
Regardless though, after a tumultuous exit from Milwaukee, K-Rod is back. How he’ll be welcomed depends in no small part on how he pitches.
Heeeee’s Baaaaaaack!
CBS Sports’ Jon Heyman reports that the Brewers have decided to call up Francisco “K-Rod” Rodriguez to the 25-man roster in advance of tonight’s game.
It was being widely reported that the team had until Thursday to decide but Heyman said that deadline was today in fact.
After pitching in consecutive games for the Triple-A affiliate Nashville Sounds, we shouldn’t expect Rodriguez to be available tonight necessarily but Ron Roenicke has stated in the past that Rodriguez can go even four days in a row if he has to. Even still, I have to believe a hitter heads down to begin with.
This move has not yet been announced by the team nor obviously would the corresponding roster move have been.
***UPDATE: Ron Roenicke told the media before pregame warm-up that Rodriguez is en route and if he makes it in time to be active, then they’ll announce the corresponding roster move.
Said Roenicke: “Frankie is on his way here, and we’ll wait to see if he can get here by game time. If he gets here, we’ll make a move. If not, we’ll do it tomorrow.”
As for his performance on the field since signing, Roenicke said, “I don’t know if he’s quite back to where he was last year, but he’s 90, 91 (on the fastball). Changeup’s been very good. We’ll see.”***
- Roenicke quotes courtesy Todd Rosiak of the Milwaukee Journal/Sentinel.
Stay tuned!
Roster News and Analysis of Tonight’s Lineup
Catching up on some items I haven’t blogged about but had more to say about them than just tweeting the blurbs, and then some thoughts about tonight’s lineup in Pittsburgh and what its impact could be.
Cue the puns. Puns for the win!
Stoking the Fiers -or- Tom’s Not Feeling So Terrific
Mike Fiers was recalled from the minor leagues — where he had been optioned on April 18th — to fill a spot in the bullpen vacated by LHP Tom Gorzelanny who succumbed to shoulder tendinitis in his pitching arm. Gorzelanny has been working a lot so far this year as he has been used in everything from LOOGy-friendly spots to straight set up duties. Gorzelanny had pitched 18 times in the first 31 team games, including back-to-back days on four occasions, but never three-in-a-row.
Fiers came back amid a sad familial situation which was documented in numerous places (including here by Brewers.com’s Adam McCalvy) and needn’t be rehashed here, though you should read it if you haven’t already. Fiers returned to a bullpen in desperate need of some innings covereage after consecutive short starts by Yovani Gallardo and Hiram Burgos in Cincinnati. He was stretched back out in the minors pitching for both Nashville and Brevard County and offers immediate relief in the long-man division.
Gorzelanny’s injury leaves Michael Gonzalez as the lone healthy left-handed pitcher in the Brewers’ bullpen, after they began the year with three (also Chris Narveson).
Konclusion Soon for K-Rod
Francisco Rodriguez was signed to a minor-league contract back on April 17th (read more on that here) and, as part of the agreement, began a 30-day evaluation period after which the Brewers would have to make a determination on whether they will add him to the 25-man roster.
Well, that deadline is rapidly approaching and to that end, Brewers general manager Doug Melvin is in Nashville tonight and tomorrow to watch K-Rod pitch. He’ll be looking for a return to something more closely resembling Rodriguez’ 2011 form rather than what he brought to the mound far too often in 2012.
The question though is simple. Can Rodriguez help this team win?
If he can, he’ll be here soon and then the decision is who heads back down to the minors. Given the situation, it wouldn’t shock me if it was Fiers so long as Figaro is rested between now and then and there are no more critically short starts between now and then. But in order to maintain length in the ‘pen and utilize options available, it could be Kintzler down for a short stint if necessary.
Braun and Weeks Sit, Probably Discuss Love, Life, Longballs
Ryan Braun is apparently dealing with a bit of a stiff neck again, similar to the injury that kept him out of the entire Arizona Diamondbacks series the first week of April. Though while it’s a similar injury, it’s not nearly to the severity now as it was then. Braun has been playing with it for a few games and just needed a day off to help rest it.
I would have to certainly hope he didn’t tweak it while helping several others in lifting a wall during a Habitat For Humanity “Blitz Build” event last week. Manager Ron Roenicke stated that Braun didn’t injure himself on the field though, so the charitable activity remains a possible cause.
As for Weeks, fans and media alike have been clamoring for Weeks to get (at least) a day to clear his head and hopefully allow him to get back to doing what his talent says he should be able to do. Weeks though is the kind of guy who will never go the manager and ask for a day off or accept if Roenicke offers a day off. Weeks told the media today that Roenicke has to just sit him if Roenicke thinks Weeks needs a break. Roenicke wanted to get Weeks out yesterday against long-time nemesis Bronson Arroyo but couldn’t. Weeks isn’t significantly better against A.J. Burnett, who pitched for Pittsburgh tonight, so it was another opportunity which Roenicke utilized.
Hopefully Weeks can make the most of it and break back out at the dish. In a pinch-hitting appearance tonight, Weeks struck out swinging off of a left-handed reliever.
As for filling out the lineup without Weeks and Braun, as I stated on my Monday segment on The Mike Heller Show on The Big 920 & The Big 1070 AM radio stations in Milwaukee and Madison, I liked moving Gomez up to 3 as it kept him in an RBI role. Beyond that, the bottom half of the lineup was a crapshoot. Betancourt and Lucroy both finished without a hit so the order mattered even less tonight than it otherwise would.
Still, the Brewers look to continue their success against Pittsburgh regardless of where they play as they work to get back into the win column and make something out of this road trip.
Brewers Announce Rodriguez Signing
The Brewers today have announced the signing of former and once again relief pitcher Francisco Rodriguez to a minor-league contract.
That the sides were talking was first reported by yours truly. Just prior to the announcement this afternoon, Adam McCalvy reported that Rodriguez was at Maryvale Baseball Park today for a physical as a part of those previously reported discussions.
Rodriguez was almost lights out as the setup man for John Axford after being acquired by Milwaukee over the 2011 All-Star break. His pitching was an integral part of the division championship that season.
The wheels came off for Rodriguez in 2012 as they did for most of the Brewers bullpen that season.
Rodriguez pitched for his native Venezuela in the 2013 World Baseball Classic and was largely ineffective his appearances.
The Brewers have 30 days to assign Rodriguez including his needed time to get ready in extended Spring Training in Arizona.
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UPDATE: Leave it to Jon Heyman to come through with the dollar amount.
K-Rod will get $2M plus in #brewers deal
— Jon Heyman (@JonHeymanCBS) April 17, 2013
Brewers Have Spoken To Agents of Veteran Relief Pair
Standard disclaimer.
That is to say that most rumors passed along need to be taken with the caveat that very little that from a transactional standpoint that is discussed in baseball actually happens in baseball.
In other words, the exact thing that I’m about to tell you has happened, but that’s all that has happened to this point. It may or may not progress from this point, but that’s why we pay attention.
(Also, I usually do my best to get confirmation before I pass something along, but do only have this from one person right now. That person has proven extremely reliable, but still, it’s only the one and you deserve to know that up front.)
The Brewers have been in contact with the respective agents for two veteran relief pitchers. The contact was described as a “touch base”, kind of a way to see where they were at in case the Brewers decided to make a formal offer. That’s what I was told yesterday.
Today, I’m told that an offer will be presented to one of the two pitchers (if it hasn’t been already) but based on the circumstances it’s unlikely that the pitcher will accept the offer, at least not at the current dollar amount. That’s because the circumstances I mentioned are that the same pitcher reportedly had a higher offer on the table from a different club and turned it down last week.
The pitcher who hasn’t received an offer (and I hope he doesn’t based on how his latest work in MLB went) is irrelevant today, in my opinion. He’s a former Brewer, but I’ll bring him back up if Milwaukee decides, for some reason, to make him an offer.
The other pitcher is also a former Brewers reliever, much more recently than his counterpart in fact. He was lights out for much of his first few months before succumbing to the same plague as the rest of the 2012 bullpen.
Yes, I’m talking about Francisco “K-Rod” Rodriguez.
Could Rodriguez come in like he did back in 2011 and provide a spark to the Milwaukee bullpen? Or would his lackluster performances from 2012 carryover into this year season? For what it’s worth, K-Rod looked pretty bad during the World Baseball Classic while pitching for his native Venezuela. That being said, there could be a number of innocuous reasons for those performances.
Will Rodriguez come back to Milwaukee though? It’s no secret that he relishes a chance to close games, something that the Brewers are currently relying on Jim Henderson for, but the other club that reportedly offered him more money had that role to offer as well. That doesn’t bode well for Doug Melvin and company, assuming the report I heard is 100% accurate. Then again, K-Rod surprised many people by accepting the Brewers’ offer of arbitration after the 2011 season as well.
Again, just something to keep in the back of your mind. He may sign, he may not. He may decline, he may not even officially respond. If he does decline, you can expect a denial from the Brewers who understandably wouldn’t want the guys in the current bullpen to worry unnecessarily.
Thanks for reading. If you didn’t pick up your grain of salt on the way in, the shaker is by the door. Help yourself.
Winter Meetings Preview: Milwaukee Brewers
The Winter Meetings aren’t officially underway just yet as I sit down to give my keyboard a workout this evening, but the Opryland Hotel in Nashville, Tennessee is set and baseball executives from across North America have checked into their rooms and have no doubt begun to follow up on things begun prior to departing for Music City.
Doug Melvin is there (along with his entourage) and has had plenty to say about what he expects out of the 2012 Winter Meetings. With appreciation to the Milwaukee Journal/Sentinel for the quotes themselves, I’ll be laying out some things Melvin said and analyzing what I think they mean for the Brewers heading through the rest of the off-season.
Before I do that, let’s recap the basics about what educated fans know already about the Brewers and their needs.
Bullpen
The bullpen was bad in 2012. In fact, it underperformed so incredibly that it alone could be labeled as a singular reason that the team failed to reach the postseason. Just a handful of losses flipped to wins and the Brewers would have had that opportunity to face the Braves in the first-ever National League Wild Card Game.
As a result of their collective struggles, the bullpen has been basically gutted. Gone are multi-year Brewers like Kameron Loe, Francisco Rodriguez, Tim Dillard, Mike McClendon, and Manny Parra. Along with them, first-year tryouts for Jose Veras and Livan Hernandez ended in free agency. Even short-term fixes like Vinnie Chulk came and went. The only guys left who pitched in the big league bullpen to end the regular season and are still a part of this organization are likely closer John Axford, likely setup man Jim Henderson, and the finally healthy Brandon Kintzler.
As we all know, the Brewers did announce a trade acquisition on Saturday when they dealt a minor-league outfielder for established relief pitcher Burke Badenhop. That addition still leaves three jobs to be filled. FoxSports.com’s Jon Morosi already tweeted earlier this evening about one of those open roles:
#Brewers are prioritizing a lefty reliever. Among the available free agents: Burnett, Choate, M. Gonzalez, Howell, Gorzelanny.
— Jon Morosi (@jonmorosi) December 2, 2012
Just some names to know.
Starting Pitching
The Brewers got good performances for the most part from the men who took the ball every fifth day during the year but there is a lot of flux possible in what was left at the end.
A return of all five starting pitchers from the 2011 NLCS team was seen as a rarity, not to mention that the Brewers only used six starting pitchers all that season. Now? Randy Wolf was released, Shaun Marcum is a free agent, Zack Greinke was traded, and Chris Narveson is coming off of shoulder surgery.
That’s the stuff of how question marks are made.
Yovani Gallardo is set to return atop the rotation but after that hasn’t yet been decided. As it stands right now, the Brewers have probably six arms vying for the open four spots in the rotation. Mike Fiers, Marco Estrada, Chris Narveson, Wily Peralta, Mark Rogers and, to a lesser extent in my opinion, Tyler Thornburg.
Doug Melvin has mentioned a couple of free agent starters by name this off-season already (Edwin Jackson and Ryan Dempster, for the record) but had some commentary on that front as well.
Offense
While the starting offense can be returned completely intact, the bench will need addressing and a couple of decisions need to be made.
Will Jean Segura begin the season as the starting everyday shortstop in Milwaukee or in the aforementioned city of Nashville as he gets a bit more seasoning in Triple-A? Who will take over as the backup infielders after the Brewers burned through a number of MLB veterans during 2012? Travis Ishikawa is gone, Alex Gonzalez is a free agent after being hurt most of the season, Mat Gamel should be healthy but missed a ton of at-bats and doesn’t really have a job at this point…and that’s just the infield.
In the outfield, Nyjer Morgan was released and Logan Schafer seems incredibly obvious to become the fourth outfielder with Milwaukee. After that, though, will they carry a fifth outfielder? If so, who will it be?
About the only spot on the field where there isn’t a question is behind the plate. Jonathan Lucroy and Martin Maldonado are healthy and coming off of strong seasons.
Excuse whilst I knock on some wood.
Okay. With that, let’s get to those quotes from Melvin.
The big quote is one about payroll. After setting a franchise record in 2012 with a payroll north of $100 million, the Brewers finished in the red, meaning that they actually lost money this year. (Part of that is because the fans didn’t show up quite as well as they had budgeted for, but wins bring attendance.)
Melvin said, “(The payroll is) coming down. We’ll probably look at (an opening payroll) of $80 million or thereabouts. We want to keep flexibility in case players become available.”
In other words, despite a large chunk of money coming off the books there should be no expectation of a dollar-for-dollar reassignment. That could limit how much the Brewers can do in free agency but it will almost certainly limit the magnitude of what the Brewers can do.
That assumes that Melvin sticks to his initial words, but more on that in a bit.
Melvin was clear in that the Brewers don’t plan to get involved on high-end (in terms of years or dollars) relief pitchers.
“We’re not looking at those kinds of guys. We’d probably be reluctant to go three years with anybody. We might have to do two. David Riske was our last three-year deal for a reliever. That didn’t work out,” said Melvin.
Would left-handed reliever Sean Burnett be a pipe-dream then? Burnett had to debunk a rumor that he was seeking a four-year deal but that doesn’t mean he isn’t looking for three.
The starting rotation was mentioned earlier and was brought up to Melvin as well. He stated that with how the contracts worked out with Jeff Suppan and Randy Wolf that the Brewers “wouldn’t go three years with a starter. You look at those contracts and they don’t usually work out. Look at all the free-agent players who have been traded the last few years. Free agency gets people excited, but it’s not as effective as people would like to think.”
Does that mean that following a report which I linked to on Twitter the other day that the Brewers are taking themselves out of the market for the aforementioned Jackson and Dempster, both of whom are believed to be seeking deals of a minimum three years? Perhaps.
Melvin stated that the Brewers will probably go with some of their younger players in the rotation but that he understands the dangers of trusting a small sample size.
As for the offense, Melvin admitted (as reported in this space) that contact was made between him and Josh Hamilton’s agent Michael Moye, but Melvin also said that, ”I don’t see (a big-ticket signing) happening. If it does, we’d have to be creative with something.”
Melvin added, “You never know how those things work out. I never thought we’d be able to get Aramis Ramirez last year (for what they signed him for). Things change. If major things happen, you have to be prepared to act quickly.”
In other words, Melvin is reminding everyone that you simply can’t use definitives when discussing transactions in Major Leage Baseball. Or, to go the cliched route…Never say never.
Finally, for the bench, Melvin said that they’re in the market “mostly for depth.” He stated that they “may have to go with some of our younger guys” but that “it’s always nice to have an experienced bat on the bench.”
And since a lot of you have reached out via social media as to why I haven’t pass along many rumors in the last few days, Melvin confirmed that he has made no offers to any free agents yet and, as of the time he said so out loud, he didn’t have any serious trade talks going either.
Then again, he’s in Nashville now at the Winter Meetings. It’s made for just those kinds of things.
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Stay tuned all week for reaction and analysis to anything and everything that I hear or read related to the Brewers. I’ll pass it along just as soon as I can.
My suggestion? If you aren’t on Twitter or you are and don’t follow me @BrewerNation…now’s one of the best times of the year to take the plunge. I can’t always blog right away but tweeting is much easier to do on the fly.
Transactions for Monday, October 29, 2012
The following transactions have been officially announced by the Milwaukee Brewers today:
- Mat Gamel has been reinstated from the 60-Day Disabled List
- Chris Narveson has been reinstated from the 60-Day Disabled List
- Alex Gonzalez has been reinstated from the 60-Day Disabled List
- Alex Gonzalez has elected free agency
- Francisco Rodriguez has elected free agency
- Shaun Marcum has elected free agency
- UPDATE: Infielder Hector Gomez* has signed a minor league contract with an invite to major league Spring Training
No free agent can sign with a new team until this coming Saturday (November 3rd) at the earliest.
If any other official transactions take place today, this space will be updated with the information.
* – Hector Gomez was outrighted off the the Brewers 40-man roster on October 19th.
How I’d Have the Brewers Finish Up the Season – Guest Blog
It’s been quite a while since someone wrote on the blog here other than me, the primary author. This was submitted by my podcast co-host for your enjoyment back near the beginning of August. My crazy schedule led to my forgetting to get it posted until now.
With that said, certain information is “as of writing” and should be taken as such (i.e. Izturis wasn’t yet traded).
By: Cary Kostka
The Brewers were selling in the days leading up the non-waiver trade deadline sending us all on a “what now” path for the rest of this season, as well as what to look for next season. Although this is largely seen as a step backwards for the organization, I see this as an opportunity for the team to be better down the road.
The Brewers have the next couple of months to evaluate their current roster and newly acquired players, and like most Brewer fans I have my own theory as to how the next couple of months should play out.
I broke it down into the following categories: starting pitching, bullpen, catching, infield, and outfield.
Starting Pitching:
The injuries we have seen over the course of the season have given us long looks at Marco Estrada and Mike Fiers, as well as a touch of Tyler Thornburg mixed in.
The Brewers acquired a couple of arms in the Zack Greinke deal, and a bullpen arm in the George Kottaras deal. But what will the rotation look like for now?
Below I have two rotations: one for August, and one for September. You will notice that the September rotation has six pitchers listed. This is not a mistake on my part…I see a 6 man September rotation as a great way to take a look at some additional young arms. With Shaun Marcum’s impending free agency and Randy Wolf’s option possibly not being picked up, the make-up of the 2013 rotation is in the air.
So, here are my projected rotations (not in any particular order) for the rest of 2012.
August rotation: Yovani Gallardo, Wolf, Estrada, Fiers, Marcum/Mark Rogers.
Marcum is still a question mark at this point, and him being moved to the 60-day DL means that he will not be available until the last third of August. He has been feeling good in simulated outings, so I would imagine he would be back in time for a late August start.
September rotation: Gallardo, Wolf, Marcum, Estrada, Fiers, Rogers/Wily Peralta.
Go to a 6-man rotation in September, and in the 6th spot, alternate starts between Peralta and Rogers. Peralta has been pitching much better lately for Nashville (5-2, 3.06 ERA in his last 10 starts).
With his arm fatigue, Thornburg would be best served spending September on the bench or in limited bullpen duty.
Bullpen:
What a thorn in the side of the 2012 season this bunch turned out to be. Let’s face it; the bullpen was a heaping load of mediocrity this year.
Try to deal K-Rod if you can…if not, park him at the ass end of the bullpen. I think John Axford will be fine, and a new bullpen coach will help here. The loss of veterans LaTroy Hawkins and Takashi Saito hurt him this year, as he leaned on both of them for advice and instruction (Hawkins in particular).
Below is how the roles should shake out for both August and September.
August:
Closer: Axford and Jim Henderson. Keep throwing Ax out there, but let Henderson continue to get work in as a closer.
Setup/General Relief: Whatever the situation dictates.
Lefty Specialist: Manny Parra Longman/mop-up: Livan Hernandez
September:
Same as August, except you add Rogers and Peralta to the bullpen mix when they are between starts. Park K-Rod and Hernandez on the bench, and let’s see what our newly acquired arms (Pena, Hellweg, and De Los Santos) can do. Thornburg could help here as well, but that depends on how his arm is responding to rest. I’d like to see how Rogers would do in the setup role.
Catchers:
Ok, so this one is easy.
Lucroy is back, but I say split his playing time with Maldonado 60/40. Catchers are the baseball equivalent to NFL running backs; they have short shelf lives due to constant wear and tear. There is no sense in “using up” Lucroy in a non-playoff season. Also, this gives Maldonado a great chance to continue his growth. This pair will be one of the best catching tandems in baseball next season.
Infield:
Corey Hart is here to stay as our first baseman at least for this season. With Aramis Ramirez entrenched at third, the big questions arise in the middle of the infield.
Rickie Weeks has had just shy of two months of production this year, and shortstop had been ok defensively but a black hole in the lineup, sans Cody Ransom’s innate ability to seemingly make every one of his few and far between hits a game changer.
My thoughts on this are to send Izturis packing…he is not a long term option, and the team would be better off if newly acquired Jean Segura was promoted and started. Jeff Bianchi would be called up on September 1st, and would see some time at short as well.
At second, we’re basically stuck. Would the team be able to find a place on the 25-man roster for Eric Farris? I’d like to see what he’s got, though he projects as more of a backup type player. I would like to see Taylor Green get more playing time to get a better feel for what he is capable of, or not capable of doing. I feel this is something the team needs to know going into next season.
Mat Gamel will be a question mark next season, and if Green shows he can hit, 1B could be a little less of a question mark in spring training, and would allow the team to confidently move Hart back to right. Hart has done pretty well at first, but next season will be the final year of his contract. It would be good to know our other options at that first.
I have heard speculation about giving Green more time at second, but that would be a mistake given his concrete boot like range at second.
Travis Ishikawa maintains his current role on the team.
Outfield:
Trade or waive Nyjer Morgan. He does not have a place on this team at all. I would much rather see Caleb Gindl or Logan Schafer get some MLB trigger time.
Ryan Braun is a lock in left (duh).
The mechanical adjustments Carlos Gomez made recently have upped his game to a new level. Make him the sole starter in center and see where this takes him.
Norichika Aoki has played great and is a lock in right. Call up Gindl as a reserve outfielder, as he has logged double digit games in all three OF spots. Schafer gets the call up on September 1st.
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So, Brewer Nation, what say you?
Who Has Asked About Whom, Including Greinke’s Phone Suitor
I don’t know, nor will I come close knowing, all the teams that will inquire about players currently on the Brewers roster.
I will follow along the rumors on the internet as best I can from the people that make money to spend time chasing down leads. I will relay that information to you as quickly as I can.
But from time to time I’ll also hear stuff on my own. I’m here right now to offer some of that.
For example, the Angels have called on Greinke, but they also have talked to Milwaukee about Corey Hart and George Kottaras.
Speaking of the Greek column, Kottaras has also had interest shown in him by the Mets and Indians. Probably others have inquired that I don’t know about, but I do know about them.
Furthermore, the Orioles, Tigers, and Giants have all picked up the phone to check on the availability Hart.
As for the Giants, it was reported that they asked about Francisco Rodriguez but I have a hard time imagining they’re still interested after the Phillies series.
There were rumors that the Yankees might inquire about Aramis Ramirez but as far as as I could find out, that conversation hasn’t taken place. At least not yet.
Zack Greinke, of course, is the hottest chip on the market for Milwaukee right now. He’s been linked to numerous suitors including one who kept Doug Melvin on the phone for “over an hour” trying to come up with creative offers. Nothing pending, at least as of a couple of hours ago, with them though.
What’s that? You want to know who bent the Brewers’ ear that long? Okay fine. It was the White Sox.
Many people don’t feel that they have enough of a system to get a deal done straight up with Milwaukee but they are said to covet Greinke badly. And if there’s one thing Kenny Williams is, it’s creative.
Stay tuned!
Monday’s Rumor Roundup
It’s been about a day and a half since the realization began to hit home that the 2012 edition of the Milwaukee Brewers are likely to fall short of their goal.
In a publicly-declared critical nine-game stretch of games, the team went 4-5 and fell to a season-worst 10.5 games back in the division. The Brewers also sit 7.5 games back of the brand new second wild card as play opens today.
After failing to make any kind of move forward, one must believe that the team will follow through on its unstated directive of working toward competing in the years hence. Doug Melvin made reference of the remarkable turnaround experienced by the World Series Champion St. Louis Cardinals last year when they came from over 10 games back in the Wild Card race to make the playoffs. Wisely, however, he also stated that it’s a different set of circumstances for the Brewers this year.
That all led me to open my ears, reach out to a couple of people, and start paying attention to a few things. Here is what I’ve learned so far…
Zack Greinke is a sought-after piece still, though many are waiting to see how he performs in his start in Philadelphia on Tuesday prior to coming near Doug Melvin’s current asking price. That asking price is an MLB-ready arm with less than 18 months of service time (so it doesn’t matter if he’s currently a minor-leaguer) along with a “high-end” prospect at either shortstop or first base.
This lines up roughly to what I expected a return could net Milwaukee. I’ve long thought that a return in potential of what the Cleveland Indians got from the Brewers for CC Sabathia in 2008. Now that was a three-piece deal and featured a different position for the second-best piece, but the amount of talent could be similar.
Moving on, there are plenty of other pieces that could provide value to other teams.
The ones I’ve heard made mention of are Francisco Rodriguez (relatively light though interest could pick up significantly if he pitches well over the next week), George Kottaras (three teams), Corey Hart (four teams), Carlos Gomez (one team).
Again, I’m not sure how willing Melvin is to move Corey Hart but it really does seem like doing so could net the team a decent return. I already have expressed my thoughts about packaging players together previously. It is interesting to note that one team crosses over on the lists of those that have expressed official interest in Hart and Kottaras.
It’s also a bit discouraging that a couple of other names haven’t popped up on the radars of the people I talked to, but Shaun Marcum is still injured and Nyjer Morgan has greatly underachieved this year. I’ll stay on it though.
I have been keeping up with the other rumors out there that are being reported. There is talk that if the Brewers decide to sell hard that the Dodgers would have interest in Aramis Ramirez (as mentioned by Tim Brown of Yahoo Sports). Ken Rosenthal put Randy Wolf’s name out there as someone that could be “in play”, though that choice of words doesn’t mean much to me because all it says is that it makes sense to move him but not that anybody has expressed interest.
Finally, for now, the Brewers have actually been talking to two teams about maybe adding a bullpen arm, believe it or not. I would like to think though that those were due diligence conversations in case the team did well over the nine-game stretch which was just completed.
Again, I’ll do my best to keep my ear to the ground and my finger on the pulse as things develop around the Brewers. Keep in mind though that I have a family and this baseball thing makes me no money so I can’t be on it constantly. If anything breaks though, I’ll be quick to analyze and give my opinion…but if you’ve followed along for a while you already know that giving opinion is not something foreign to me.
Bottom line: Stay tuned. A lot should happen, a little might happen, and of course nothing could happen.
Selling with things to offer makes for a fun situation at times but also a stressful one. Let’s temper our expectations a bit if for no other reason than we will be able to more thoroughly enjoy what return we do get.
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