The Milwaukee Brewers entered the 2011 season with some of the biggest expectations in team history. Behind a strong 1-2 punch of Zack Greinke and Yovani Gallardo (not to mention Shaun Marcum), the team finally had a pitching staff strong enough to match their offense. Things haven’t gone exactly as planned for the Brewers, however. Greinke made his first start for the team last night, while Gallardo has struggled in seven starts. While Greinke should be fine as long as he’s healthy, it’s tough to pinpoint whether Gallardo will turn things around this season.
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Almost exactly one year ago, the Philadelphia Phillies signed Ryan Howard to a five year contract extension that was, shall we say, not exactly well thought of. The Phillies already had their slugging first baseman under team control for the current season and an additional one, but chose to give him a long term deal that locked up his age 32-36 seasons anyway.

Little did we know that this extend-a-guy-who-doesn’t-need-an-extension idea was going to turn into a full fledged trend. The Rockies took it to another level over the winter, giving Troy Tulowitzki a six year deal that, combined with his current contract, will keep him in Colorado through 2020. While I thought that deal exposed the Rockies to a lot of risk, Tulowitzki is in the best-player-in-baseball conversation, and locking him up now did give them a chance to keep an elite player around – an option that might not have been possible had they waited for him to have another MVP type season or two.

Now, we have the Ryan Braun extension, which borrows some from each of the first two moves. Like Tulowitzki, the Brewers chose to sign Braun through 2020, despite the fact that he was already under contract through 2015. Like Howard, they locked up a big time power hitter’s age 32-36 seasons. Braun simply isn’t as good as Tulowitzki and he got nearly the same amount of money, so it’s easy to say that this extension for Milwaukee is worse than the deal Colorado made. But, is it worse than the roundly mocked deal that Philadelphia made?

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The news this afternoon broke seemingly out of nowhere. Ryan Braun had just signed a five-year, $105 million extension that locks him in through the 2020 season. If it feels as though we just experienced a similar situation, it’s because we did. The Rockies signed Troy Tulowitzki to a six-year, $119 million extension in November even though he was under contract through 2014. Similarly, Braun’s current contract with the Brewers runs through 2015.

Before we dive into what this means for the Brewers, I suggest taking a moment to re-read Dave’s article on the Tulowitzki extension. It helps put in perspective part of the Brewers’ motivation for enacting this deal now and not a few years down the road. If they’re not betting on significant inflation affecting the market in the next four years, then their motives become a bit more questionable.

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Suppose you’re the manager of the Milwaukee Brewers. You’re at home against the Chicago Cubs, and going into the bottom of the eighth inning, you’re up 5-0. So you’re feeling pretty good about yourself. On the other hand, your closer John Axford has been awfully shaky lately, and you’d probably love to scratch across an insurance run. With one out, Mark Kotsay walks, and you have Carlos Gomez on the bench. Would you let Gomez loose on the bases and see if he could make it around the bases with some old-fashioned National League speed?

Well, if you were Ron Roenicke on Saturday, April 9, that’s exactly what you’d do. Gomez came into the game and just abused Jeff Samardzija, stealing second base on the second pitch Samardzija threw to the next batter, Wil Nieves. When Nieves worked the count full, Gomez took off; it wound up being outside, and Gomez was standing on third and Nieves was on first. Samardzija managed to strike out the next batter, Jeremy Reed, but then he walked Rickie Weeks to load the bases, and walked Nyjer Morgan, which brought Gomez around to score. The Brewers won the game 6-0.

Now, we all know that there’s an unwritten rule that says that you don’t try to steal bases when you’re up by a lot of runs in late innings. Read the rest of this entry »

Make no mistakes: this is a good major league team. Most projection systems suggest Milwaukee will end up with around 84-86 wins, putting them in close contention for the NL Central crown with the Cardinals and Reds. When ranking their overall organization’s health, though, the Brewers’ depleted minor league system really brings them down.

Present Talent – 77.73 (15th)

Brewers Season Preview

Future Talent – 65.00 (four way tie for last)

Brewers Top 10 Prospects

Financial Resources – 75.83 (19th)
Baseball Operations – 76.82 (21st)

Overall Rating – 75.02 (22nd)

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Did any team make a bigger splash over the winter than the Milwaukee Brewers? During a winter when the team was expected to sell on star first baseman Prince Fielder and restock for the future, the Brewers did exactly the opposite, emptying the farm to add Zack Greinke and Shaun Marcum to a rotation desperately needing a shot in the arm. Even as the team still has some glaring flaws, these additions have the Brewers poised to compete for a return to the postseason.

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