The Payoff (2011 Milwaukee Brewers)

A couples weeks back, Brewers GM, Doug Melvin, stunned the mainstream sportswriting world by landing the top pitcher in this year's trade market, Zack Greinke (I can't help but point out that I predicted this move a month ago, because it just made so much sense).  The Greinke acquisition, combined with an underrated trade for Shaun Marcum from the Blue Jays, represents what Melvin hopes will be among the crowning moves of a Championship strategy eight years in the making.

When the 50-year-old Melvin took over the Milwaukee front office in the fall of 2002, the Brewers were coming off a season in which the team had lost 106 games, far and away the most in franchise history.  That team was built around young men - Richie Sexson, Geoff Jenkins, and Ben Sheets, particularly -who are now retired (probably, Sheets may still get one more shot).  The '02 Brewers were a long, long way from contending.  Melvin realized as much and chose to take a longview, building from within through the draft and trading big league talents like Sexson and Eric Young for promising prospects.

Early in his tenure Melvin netted the core of the Brewers current roster - Prince Fielder, Rickie Weeks, Yovani Gallardo, and Ryan Braun - all drafted between '02 and '05.  Buoyed by young talent, but never with a payroll above $40 Million, the Brewers slowly made the climb back to .500, reaching that benchmark in '05 for the first time in thirteen seasons.  Melvin recognized, however, that the '05 team was still a long way from being a true contender.  Rather than trade from his increasingly deep farm system or squander his limited funds on a mid-tier free agent in a desperate, short-sighted run at the pennant, he deconstructed Milwaukee's most popular team in over a decade, allowing Jenkins and Carlos Lee to walk, and trading away Lyle Overbay and Doug Davis.

At the time these were unpopular decisions, in retrospect we see Melvin's prescience.  Jenkins was never the same player after leaving Milwaukee and was out of baseball entirely within three years.  Carlos Lee also relatively quickly became a shadow of his former self.  He remains a tremendous drain on the Astros payroll.  Lyle Overbay never matured beyond what Melvin saw from him in '04 and '05.  He was a huge disappointment during his five seasons with Toronto.  Likewise, Doug Davis' best season remains his '05 campaign, although he has been a decent innings-eater over the past half-decade...when he's been able to stay healthy.

While this minor dismantling meant it would take two more seasons for Milwaukee to get the winning record they'd be looking for since the early 90s, once they got there they were solidified as a team to be reckoned with for several years to come.  In 2008 Melvin finally got them to the promised land, as the team led by Fielder, Weeks, Braun, Sheets, and Corey Hart, and buoyed by the midseason acquisition of C. C. Sabathia, won 90 games and the NL Wild Card.  It was the Brewers first trip to the postseason since Harvey's Wallbangers took the AL Pennant way back in 1982.

The Sabathia trade marked a change of strategies.  Melvin traded away '07 first-rounder, Matt LaPorta, one of the top-rated hitting prospects in all of baseball at the time, in order to rent The Big Sleep, who delivered as much as anybody could've asked of him, going 11-2 for his new team, including several big wins on short rest down the stretch.   Melvin may have hoped that his carefully crafted homegrown roster would have enough the challenge the top teams in the league with needing expensive reinforcements, ala the Tampa Bay Rays, but after two mildly disappointing follow-up campaigns, in which starting pitching became a major Achilles heel, he has been forced to put all his chips on the table.

In order to get Greinke and Marcum, Melvin had to give up three more first-round picks - including highly acclaimed prospects Jeremy Jeffress and Brett Lawrie - as well as the young, slick-fielding shortstop, Alcides Escobar.  While Milwaukee's farm system is among the deepest in baseball, and the Melvin administration has rarely missed with their draft picks, this still represents a major drain on their talent pool and could have ramifications for the roster in 2012 and beyond.  Also, at the end of 2011 Fielder, Weeks, and Hart will all be eligible for free agency.  What all this seems to suggest is that this is the year the Brewers have chosen to go for it.  Ever since the ascension of Fielder and Braun, Milwaukee has had one of the most potent offenses on the senior circuit.  With the addition of a Cy Young winner and a promising young workhorse, now they may have the pitching to match.  Buster Olney tentatively predicts that the Brewers will have the third best rotation in the National League, behind only Philadelphia and San Francisco, the NLCS contestants of 2010.

Unfortunately, a few things still stand in the way of the Crew.  Foremost, their division.  In 2010, another long dormant franchise, the Cincinnati Reds, surged to the front of the NL Central, in much the same fashion the Brewers had in 2008, led by a deep young lineup.  There's little reason to believe they'll be any worse in 2011.  The St. Louis Cardinals, though aging and lacking depth, still have the fabulous foursome of Albert Pujols, Adam Wainwright, Matt Holliday, and Chris Carpenter.  To discount the ability of Tony LaRussa and Dave Duncan to mix and match around that quartet would be unwise.  The Cubs are a bloated mess of mismanagement and underperformance, but bounceback campaigns from Aramis Ramirez, Carlos Pena, and Carlos Zambrano could easily get them back to between 80 and 85 wins.  Even the Astros had a resurgent stretch after they cleaned house in the middle of 2010 and the Pirates have a youthful core that is only a few years away from making their opponents very uncomfortable.  Put all this together and you have what may well be the second strongest division in baseball (behind the AL East).  The Brewers will need to have a few good breaks in 2011 in order for Melvin's all-in hand to yield another trip to the playoffs from the dogfight in the NL Central.

What once was a weakness, the rotation, is now the Brewers strength.  The strong front four of Greinke, Gallardo, Marcum, and Randy Wolf will be aided by a relatively promising group of youngsters, including former first-rounder Mark Rogers, Manny Parra, and Chris Narveson.  However, some of the other aspects of the team are not as certain as they were in previous seasons.  The bullpen has a little more depth following the signings of Takashi Saito and Sean Green, but they are leaning heavily on second-year closer, John Axford, and 23-year-old setup man, Zach Braddock.  We are all well aware of the danger of banking on the consistency of sophomore relievers.

More worrisome, however, is a lineup that is shallower than it has been since early in Melvin's tenure.  The Greinke trade also saddled the Brewers with the Royals albatross, Yuneisky Betancourt, arguably the worst everyday player in the major leagues since 2005.  I have a hard time imagining Melvin would match Dayton Moore's incompetence by allowing the defensively and offensively challenged Betancourt to be Milwaukee's starter, but as yet there doesn't seem to be a clear replacement in the system.  40-year-old Craig Counsell will return as a primary utilityman, but coming off a season in which he posted the worst OBP of his career, he's not much of an upgrade over Betancourt.  Melvin might be tempted to take a long look at mildly promising younsters like Luis Cruz and Zelous Wheeler, or could be entertaining the idea of signing a cheap veteran like Edgar Renteria, Cristian Guzman, or Orlando Cabrera.  Another outside the box option may be converting Casey McGehee to shortstop in order to make room for the potent bat of Mat Gamel at third base.  This Brewers infield defense, already fairly abyssmal, might suffer even more, but Gamel is among the top hitting prospects in the National League and McGehee scuffled down the stretch in 2010.  He wasn't the same player from June onward, posting just a 767 OPS, more than a hundred points off his pace from the first two months.  As far as I'm concerned, any of these would be an upgrade over Betancourt, whose WAR since 2008 is -0.7.  That's right, according to FanGraphs, there are several players at AAA who almost certainly would've been better than Betancourt the past three seasons.  

Centerfield is also cause for concern in Milwaukee.  25-year-old Carlos Gomez, the fruit of the J. J. Hardy trade, is a defensive wizard, but in three full seasons in the majors has yet to look like anything more than an automatic out at the plate.  He hasn't been able to break the .300 mark in OBP in any year, which limits his ability to take advantage of his main asset, speed.  The best option to replace him, Lorenzo Cain, who showed considerable promise during a brief stint at the end of 2010, was a key piece in the Greinke trade, so Gomez's only competition comes from Brandon Boggs and Chris Dickerson, players cast off by their former franchises...probably for good reason.  Gomez's ability to develop into at least a replacement-level major-league hitter is perhaps the underestimated key to the Brewers success in 2011.

Finally, the Brewers have another sizable hole to fill at catcher.  Jonathan Lucroy was a hell of a hitter up through AA, but at AAA and in half a season in the bigs his OPS was just 628.  Veteran backups like George Kottaras and Wil Nieves would be lucky to manage even that much offense, so the Brewers need Lucroy or Angel Salome to rise to the challenge.  If Lucroy can find that combo of power and patience which allowed him to excel in the low minors in '08 and '09, the Crew will be considerably deeper.

On paper, I think it is reasonable to view Milwaukee as a serious threat to the Reds, but if the Brewers can't find at least a couple decent bats to slot into the back half of the lineup, it will be much easier for pitchers to work around the murderers row at the top of the order.  If Melvin intends to make a run at not only the division, but a NL Pennant as well, he better not be finished with his wheeling and dealing.  As mentioned before, the Brewers have plenty of budget to go after a veteran shortstop, especially considering such players would probably be enticed by Milwaukee's opportunity to contend.  At the end of this season the Brewers are likely in for a long rebuilding process, no matter how successful they are.  Melvin may consider unloading even more of the farm system to acquire somebody like Carlos Beltran, Grady Sizemore, or Kurt Suzuki, either now or closer to the trade deadline.  I don't expect him to be shy, his job may very well be on the line.    

The Auspicious Future of Brennan Boesch

On a Friday evening in April, following a barbecue, I sat down to watch a matchup between the Tigers and Rangers in a state of inebriation.  I found myself enamored of a hulking rookie who was making his debut as Detroit's designated hitter.  The 6' 4" lefty had an imposing presence at the plate, somewhat reminiscent of the once-great Pronk (a.k.a. Travis Hafner).  Not possessing the energy at the particular moment to look deeper into the prospects of young Brennan Boesch, who began his career by going 2-for-4, I unceremoniously added him to a number of my deeper fantasy squads in an act of drunken romanticism.  As far as the results of lowered inhibitions go, this was relatively harmless, but I will admit, two days later, when I got around to soberly browsing through Boesch's minor-league stats, I experienced a fleeting but nonetheless tangible flutter of regret in the pit of my stomach.

In at least two leagues I had spent a valuable transaction to procure Boesch, who hadn't posted a OBP above .320 since his first season in low-A Oneonta.  He had developing power, as his hulking body suggested, having hit 28 HR at AA in '09, but we have seen many, many players with Boesch's apparent lack of plate discipline struggle mightily upon reaching the majors.  I guessed, given playing time, that Boesch might be capable of 20-30 HR, but I also imagined, a la Chris Davis, he would be lucky to hit his weight (conservatively listed at 235 lbs.) and could be headed back to AAA in a matter of weeks.

To my considerable amazement (as with everybody else) Boesch is currently the frontrunner for Rookie of the Year in the American League.  He's hitting .337 with 10 HR, 36 RBI, and an astounding 1001 OPS.  That final number is enough to rank fifth in the American League among hitters with at least 175 plate appearances, trailing boppers like Miggy Cabrera, Justin Morneau, and Kevin Youkilis.  Even if a sharp decline is imminent, Boesch has already paid tremendous dividends for all who have owned him through the last couple of months, as only once has he gone as many as four contests without a multi-hit game.  His presence as protection for Cabrera and Magglio Ordonez has much to do with the Tigers hanging around in the AL Central, only a game and a half back of the Twins.

However, before you go judging this as an endorsement of instinctual scouting, I warn that such occasions are exceedingly rare.   A similar state of impaired judgment once convinced me of the imminent greatness of Kyle Lohse.  Almost certainly, Brennan Boesch cannot sustain his current pace of production, but the more serious question is whether he can continue to be a relatively cheap and functional run-producer, akin to Ryan Ludwick or Josh Willingham.  To answer this question, I call your attention to a pair of 2009 Rookie of the Year candidates who also came out of nowhere

Chris Coghlan began 2009 playing second base for the Marlins AAA affiliate in New Orleans.  He was a late first-round draft pick in '06, but at 24, he was becoming "old" for a prospect, and Baseball Prospectus, for one, projected him as a "utility infielder."  Much like Boesch, he began the season by setting fire to the Pacific Coast League, hitting .344 in his first 25 games with speed (9/10 SB) and power (.552 SLG).  Necessity prompted the Marlins to promote him in early May, turning him into an outfielder, and he went bonkers in the second-half, hitting at a .372 clip and becoming a favorite of the Baseball Tonight staff.  In retrospect, this performance was apparently unsustainable.  He had a .406 BABIP after the All-Star Break and slugged more than 100 points higher than he had in the minors.

Like many fantasy pundits, I shied away from Coghlan this spring, and as a result didn't have to to deal with five weeks in which Coghlan's OPS (422) was less than half of what it was in '09 (850) and he appeared dangerously close to demotion.  Since the middle of May, however, Coghlan has again caught fire (935 OPS).

Coghlan and Boesch are not similar hitters.  Coghlan has always been a top-of-the-order type, with good discipline, decent speed, and a high average, but very modest power.  Boesch was quite the opposite, until recently he was a pure swing-from-the-heels masher.  Their similarity lies in the fact that they both show evidence of being from that rare species of "late-bloomers."  Most prospects show a pattern of growth over the course of their professional careers.  It may be two steps forward followed by one step back, but given three or four seasons, you can see obviously incremental improvements in areas like power, discipline, and defense.  Coghlan and Boesch, on the other hand, stayed in a holding pattern until their mid-twenties, than made massive improvements over the course of a single calendar year.  Because of the inherently small sample size created by this phenomenon, it's difficult to tell whether or not they can sustain such production, but both are still young enough (25) that it seems feasible.  It will be important to watch how Boesch responds to his first slump.

Which brings us to Casey McGehee.  McGehee differs from Coghlan and Boesch in that he is older and never showed any signs of being a capable everyday player during his tenure in the minors.  The Brewers brought McGehee to the majors at the beginning of '09 as a utility infielder.  They never envisioned, at that point, that the rookie would be capable of hitting in the middle of their loaded lineup.  And at this particular moment, that judgment seems founded.  McGehee has hit just .177 with a 536 OPS in his last twenty games.  However, during the time when Coghlan was struggling, McGehee was tearing through the NL, racking up 41 RBI in his first 45 games.  His major-league production has been superior to his minor-league production in every single category, by in a long shot in most cases.  At no point did he bat .300 in the minors, yet hit well above .300 in his first 160+ major-league games.

When the league "adjusts," developing a book on the unexpectedly productive rookie, it is usually curtains (see Francouer, Jeff).  For players who are dependent on power, this is even more the case, as an already all-or-nothing approach swings further to the "nothing" side.  Since his recall, Boesch has shown a surprising willingness to use all fields and hit situationally.  When he encounters his first slump, however, he may trend backwards into a Rob Deer disposition.    

Fantastic Thoughts: "O-Dog would probably sign with your fantasy team, if you're willing to give him a three-year contract." (Second Base Preview)

I've been bemoaning it for months, but I'll be damned if it doesn't continue to infuriate me that Orlando Hudson doesn't have a job, in February, for the second year in a row.  He is, nonetheless, included on my list, along with fellow unsigned free agent, Felipe Lopez.

1. Chase Utley (Phillies)
2. Ian Kinsler (Rangers)
3. Dustin Pedroia (Red Sox)
4. Brandon Phillips (Reds)

Not long ago, the big question at second base was, "Who don't I take if I don't get Jeff Kent?"  The pickings were slim.  But in recent years, the field has gotten progressively better, led, of course, by Chase Utley, a perennial MVP candidate who should be among the top five players off the board and will cost you close to $40 in an auction.

Some will be surprised that I rank Phillips among the elite options, but I like the consistency of his across-the-board production and, at 28, I think his best season may still be in front of him.  He's been 20/20 for three years running and with more lineup protection has a legit shot at going 30/30 (as he did in '07), to go along with at least 80 R and 90 RBI.  Phillips is the picture of health, with 550+ plate appearances in each of the last four seasons.

5. Robinson Cano (Yankees)
6. Aaron Hill (Blue Jays)
7. Ben Zobrist (Rays) [also eligible at SS and OF in many leagues]

There is a very strong argument for passing on the elite guys and jumping on the second tier this season, as each of these options has the potential to perform at the elite level.  What keeps them out of the first tier is merely consistency.  Hill and Zobrist had breakout seasons in '09, but they need to prove themselves more than "one-hit wonders."  Personally, I think both are legit, as they showed consistent progression in both power and discipline throughout the minor leagues and in their first few big-league seasons.

Cano offers a slightly different quandary.  He put up the biggest season of an already impressive career in '09 directly following his atrocious '08 campaign, so many will wonder what to trust.  I think he's about to blossom into a batting champ.  Obviously, you can't complain about his situation, hitting in the middle of a loaded lineup at a ballpark built for left-handed hitters.  Cano will continue to see lots of good pitches and have plenty of run-producing opportunities.  Also, as good as his '09 was as a whole, he was even better in the second half.  In the final three months he hit .341 with a 925 OPS.

8. Brian Roberts (Orioles)
9. Dan Uggla (Marlins)
10. Ian Stewart (Rockies) [actually plays 3B, but eligible at 2B in most leagues]
11. Jose Lopez (Mariners)

These are your "category" options in roto leagues, each of whom excels at some aspect of the game, but could hurt you in others.  Roberts hit 16 HR last season, which was the second-highest total of his career, and drove in 79 runs, which was a career high.  I don't expect him to reach or exceed those totals in 2010.  However, he will once again be among the league leaders in runs scored, with excellent stolen base totals and a decent average.

The other three are inversions of Roberts.  Each has unusual power for the positions, but they are "all or nothing" kinds of hitters, who don't reach base often and don't offer much speed when they do.  Lopez will hit for a slightly higher average than Uggla or Stewart, but '09 was his first 25 HR season, where Uggla has hit 30+ for three years running.  Stewart is the high-risk/high-reward option here.  He's only 25-years-old and spent much of '09 as a platoon player, so there's plenty of room for improvement, but there's also room for a sophomore slump, as he's a free swinger with plenty of holes (see Chris Davis).  The Rockies just added Melvin Mora to their bench, suggesting that Stewart may only be one bad month from finding himself back in a platoon, and two bad months from Colorado Springs.

12. Howie Kendrick (Angels)
13. Gordon Beckham (White Sox) [also eligible at 3B in most leagues]
14. Rickie Weeks (Brewers)
15. Martin Prado (Braves) [also eligible at 3B and 1B in many leagues]
16. Casey McGehee (Brewers) [also eligible at 3B in most leagues]

This tier is all about "upside."  Unless you're in a very deep league, you'd prefer that none of these guys be your first-string middle infielder, but at a utility spot, or otherwise provide depth, they offer tons of potential.  One of the great tragedies of '09 was Rickie Weeks wrist injury.  In the seasons opening weeks he looked like he was headed for the monster season that his owners have been expecting for years.  Hopefully, that breakout is just on a ten month delay.  Be cautious though.  It can take a player more than a full season to re-strengthen he wrist after a major injury (see Derrek Lee and David Ortiz), so Weeks power, the quality which makes him so tempting, may not return until 2011.

McGehee replaced Weeks in Milwaukee and his performance (.301, 16 HR, 66 RBI) helped keep the Brewers in contention much longer than if they'd turned second base over to Craig Counsell.  As such, McGehee earned a starting position going into 2010, at third base.  I doubt, however, that he will be able to keep it.  McGehee's '09 numbers look extraordinarily flukish.  He never had an average above .300 or an OPS above 800 in the minors.  Maybe he "discovered" his stroke upon being promoted, but I'd bet that he's just as likely to "lose" it again.  The Brewers top hitting prospect, Mat Gamel, will be nipping at his heels, so he probably doesn't have much leash.  By midseason, McGehee will be a utilityman.

17. Placido Polanco (Phillies) [will be eligible at 3B early in the season]
18. Orlando Hudson (Nationals?)

A couple of oldies, but goodies.  If you need a stable presence, I would actually recommend taking O-Dog or Polly ahead of some of the guys in the previous tier, because though unspectacular, each is dependable.  Oddly, I might even argue that Polance has a little upside, at the age of 34, because he'll be hitting somewhere in the middle of the loaded Phillies lineup (I'm guessing either second or seventh).  I think he's a safe bet for .300-80-10-80-5, which isn't exactly mouth-watering, but is solid production from a guy who you can get as your third or fourth infielder.

My passion for Hudson is well-documented, but I'll simply remind everybody that he was damn good in the first half of '09 (All-Star worthy, in fact) and not nearly as bad as people think in the second half.  Recent rumors have him headed to D.C., which would be a good fit for his fantasy owners, as he'd be a lock for everyday at-bats and would probably hit near the top of the order, right in front of Z-Pack and Big Donkey (Ryan Zimmerman and Adam Dunn).