Good time to sell, bad f.o. to do it

[bmags]

From Rosenthal

Quote

Rebuilding might be the new market inefficiency. Only the Oakland A’s and Washington Nationals were in that mode last season. The Colorado Rockies, Pittsburgh Pirates and Kansas City Royals might have looked like it, but didn’t necessarily see themselves that way.

A relatively thin free-agent class presents opportunity for a team willing to sacrifice its present for the future. And the Milwaukee Brewers, after losing manager Craig Counsell, seemingly are willing to deploy such a strategy.

Executives at this time of year are always careful to tell reporters they are fielding calls on their players rather than shopping them. In that sense, the Brewers would say they are acting no differently than any club. But industry sources tell a different story.

Those sources, briefed on the Brewers’ discussions but not authorized to discuss them publicly, say the team is open to moving virtually any player on its roster. The process effectively has begun, with the Brewers sending outfielder Mark Canha to the Detroit Tigers for a pitching prospect. A continued teardown, considering the Brewers’ current position, would not be without logic. It might even be the proper course.

The Brewers possess a promising core of young position players, with more on their way. Their formidable pitching staff, however, is in a precarious state. Right-handers Corbin Burnes and Brandon Woodruff are under club control for only one more season, closer Devin Williams for two more. And the Brewers might not even offer Woodruff a contract, knowing he might be out for most or all of next season after undergoing shoulder surgery.

One of the reasons I was extremely positive on the first teardown and was hopeful for Hahn, is that our timing was extremely good compared to say, the Tigers.

We moved our players first at a time when a handful of the most competitive teams all had top ten farms (Red Sox, Cubs, Astros, Dodgers), and on top of that it was an arms race with very few impact arms found via FA (2017 offseason maybe Ivan Nova was the best pitcher signed, maybe i'm missing something. Charlie Morton to Braves maybe)

Well - the pitching is better this year but the position player market is atrocious. 

The Brewers, an org able to be consistently competitive despite making $50 a year, see this and are able to think "huh maybe we should take advantage"

The White Sox very well could crush this market unloading Robert. There's nobody truly like him and he's cheap. I don't even want them to, but I'm not sure there will be an opportunity quite like it again. 

OTOH, we have Chris Getz as our sole decision maker and he hired a very affable man for pro scouting. So we don't know.

[Dick Allen]

I would hate for one of the first trades Chris Getz ever makes would be trading Robert. You can't mess that up like the Marlins did with Miggy. Let's see what kind of driving skills he has before giving him keys to the Lambo.

[bmags]

4 minutes ago, Dick Allen said:

I would hate for one of the first trades Chris Getz ever makes would be trading Robert. You can't mess that up like the Marlins did with Miggy. Let's see what kind of driving skills he has before giving him keys to the Lambo.

Well I guess my point is this. Probably the most valuable play he could pull with the league where it's at is to sell. But we are at a particularly bad point as an org to do it. There is no trust from fans in this front office, the guy apparently sucked up to Reinsdorf saying he knew how to make a winner, et al.

So we're stuck not wanting them to do the thing that probably would be the best thing to do because they are dumb