2020 ZiPS Projections: Milwaukee Brewers

After having typically appeared in the hallowed pages of Baseball Think Factory, Dan Szymborski’s ZiPS projections have now been released at FanGraphs for eight years. The exercise continues this offseason. Below are the projections for the Milwaukee Brewers.

Batters

There’s been quite a bit of turnover in the Brewers’ starting lineup, but the team has avoided opening any serious holes.

ZiPS was a fan of Orlando Arcia, but it’s hard to avoid the fact that he’s backslid developmentally at ages when he should have been breaking out. Even worse than not improving offensively, Arcia is probably a worse hitter than he was two years ago. Add to that that his glove hasn’t matched up to his minor league reputation, and good on the Brewers for seemingly moving on to Luis Urías, who ought to be a significant improvement.

There will need to be a fair amount of juggling at left field and first base, with Ryan Braun getting a lot of playing time at both positions, though the exact mix is unknown at this point. Lorenzo Cain is at an age when serious decline becomes a significant risk every year, but as long as his defense and high BABIP survive, he won’t lose too much value if other things start to fade.

Christian Yelich is, of course, this lineup’s centerpiece. The Brewers went on a blazing hot run to make the playoffs after Yelich’s injury last summer but it would be a mistake to think they could survive too long without him. I would have liked to see Travis Shaw get an opportunity to bounce back in Milwaukee, but given their status as serious contenders, and the uncertainty about how good Shaw is right now, it’s understandable that the Brewers didn’t want to bank on him. I’m not sure how Ryon Healy makes this roster right now.

Pitchers

The Brewers have survived — and thrived — without much in the way of elite starting pitching. But they’ve scrimped and scrounged and put together rotations that run deep in their adequacy, and ZiPS doesn’t see that changing this season.

There’s one huge exception here, and it comes in the form of Brandon Woodruff. The team’s been cautious with him, and he missed time in 2019 due to an oblique injury, but if any pitcher on this staff becomes an ace, he’s the one to bet on. Woodruff’s two-seamer and improved changeup give him a deep enough repertoire to go deep into games, and his ZiPS-projected WAR of 2.2 is only that low because the system is only projecting 122.2 innings.

Josh Lindblom has had an interesting career path. It looked a lot like he was going to establish himself as a full-time reliever in the majors in 2011 and 2012, and struggled when put back into the rotation. He found his way to Korea for four seasons with a temporary return to the States in 2017 with the Pirates. Lindblom blew up in his second Korean stint, winning the Choi Dong-won Award, Korea’s Cy Young equivalent, the last two seasons. ZiPS think he’s improved enough to be yet another solidly average pitcher for the Brewers. Don’t get too excited about Lindblom’s 2019 2.50 ERA in Korea; the KBO was somehow able to do what small, mom-and-pop Major League Baseball couldn’t and switch balls to keep the league’s offense under control.

I was disappointed no major league team took a look at Jay Jackson, who has since signed with Hiroshima. A former Cubs prospect from waaaaay back, Jackson finally clicked as a fastball-slider reliever and resurfaced with the Brewers in 2019. He allowed too many walks in the majors, but a pitcher who can throw in the mid-90s and strike out 14 batters a game in the majors is worth exploring. Six homers in 30.1 innings in the majors is too many, but Jackson survived the Pacific Coast League allowing just a single homer.

Prospects

It’s kinda weird how little came of the team’s minor league outfield depth a few years ago. Lewis Brinson has been a major bust for the Marlins and truth be told, Corey Ray‘s not looking much better, even if you give him a lot of leeway due to a finger injury. Ray has now hit .235/.311/.406 in just under 400 minor league games, and he’s not going to be Harrison Bader or Kevin Kiermaier in center field. Brett Phillips’s prospect status is long over; he may not even get a full-time chance with the Royals with Alex Gordon back in the mix. There’s more hope for Trent Grisham, who finally started hitting in 2019, but if that continues, it will be with the Padres.

ZiPS agrees with Eric Longenhagen and Kiley McDaniel’s final farm rankings from 2019, and doesn’t see a lot of help from the minors now that Keston Hiura has graduated. There’s not a lot of depth for the major league squad this summer, which I believe is part of the reason Milwaukee’s been filling out the roster with veterans like Healy, Logan Morrison, and Ronny Rodríguez.

Outside of Clayton Andrews, there aren’t any fringe prospects in the organization who ZiPS finds particularly compelling. Andrews has an unusual package of skills as a soft-tossing lefty who is a little bit taller than Tyrion Lannister. A small lefty who doesn’t throw hard isn’t that strange, but Andrews was also a plate discipline machine in college, walking 52 times against just 11 strikeouts between his JuCo and Long Beach State. How many pitching prospects do you know who appeared in more professional games as an outfielder (74 vs. 58)? Andrews has hit .333/.391/.381 in 69 plate appearances in the minors and is well-regarded defensively in center field. I’m not sure there’s a role in the majors for a fifth outfielder who can get batters out with a 70 mph changeup, but I really hope such a possibility exists because I like players who break molds.

One pedantic note for 2020: for the WAR graphic, I’m using FanGraphs’ depth charts playing time, not the playing time ZiPS spits out, so there will be occasional differences in WAR totals.

Ballpark graphic courtesy Eephus League. Depth charts constructed by way of those listed here.

Players are listed with their most recent teams wherever possible. This includes players who are unsigned, players who will miss 2020 due to injury, and players who were released in 2019. So yes, if you see Joe Schmoe, who quit baseball back in June to form a ska-cowpunk Luxembourgian bubblegum pop-death metal band, he’s still listed here intentionally.

Both hitters and pitchers are ranked by projected zWAR — which is to say, WAR values as calculated by me, Dan Szymborski, whose surname is spelled with a z. WAR values might differ slightly from those which appear in the full release of ZiPS. Finally, I will advise anyone against — and might karate chop anyone guilty of — merely adding up WAR totals on a depth chart to produce projected team WAR.

ZiPS is agnostic about future playing time by design. For more information about ZiPS, please refer to this article.