Welcome back to the last installment of our five-part trade deadline primer! To see what we’ve already done:
- In part one, we looked at positions of need and assessed the trade landscape.
- In part two, we looked at relief pitcher targets.
- In part three, we looked at starting pitcher targets.
- In part four, we looked at position player targets.
- I also published a piece with three players I would move for if I were the Brewers.
Today, we’re going to re-assess the landscape both for the Brewers and across the league. After all, it’s been a month since the first piece in this series was published, so let’s look at how things have changed.
Re-assessing the Brewers’ needs
In the original piece, I said that the Brewers’ needs were as follows:
- A high-leverage reliever, preferably a left-handed one
- A starting pitcher, either a “ceiling raiser” or an “innings eater,” depending on the goal
- A boost to the offense, probably a third baseman or outfielder
I would say that those needs are largely the same, but there have been some developments. The biggest change between
now and a month ago is the loss of Brandon Woodruff. With his shoulder injury prematurely ending his season, the new uncertainty around Kyle Harrison’s health, and the obvious steps the Brewers are taking to limit Jacob Misiorowski’s workload, the acquisition of a starting pitcher has become the Brewers’ primary need.
The type of starting pitcher is still a topic for debate. A smaller acquisition—a player like, for example, Brady Singer—wouldn’t necessarily raise Milwaukee’s postseason ceiling, but would give the Brewers a reliable player to pitch a whole bunch of innings between now and the end of the season, saving some wear and tear on Misiorowski, Harrison, and the team’s other young starters such as Logan Henderson, Shane Drohan, Robert Gasser, and—if he’s not bumped from the rotation—Brandon Sproat.
The headline-grabbing move is still out there, of course; the Brewers continue to be included in Tarik Skubal discussions, and there are several other potential moves that would give the Brewers a player who wouldn’t just take pressure off their young players but who would be expected to slot into the postseason rotation. (One player not discussed in the original piece because his team was too hot at the time: Sandy Alcantara, whose Marlins had lost nine in a row coming out of the All-Star break before winning on Monday.)
After the rotation concerns, the other areas of need are largely the same. Milwaukee could still use one more guy in the bullpen to give the team confidence after Trevor Megill and Abner Uribe; I’m knocking on wood as I write this, but if the Brewers don’t acquire another good bullpen arm and one of those two gets hurt before the end of the season, the bullpen is going to look extremely thin. The less aggressive approach in the bullpen would be to do a Nick Mears-type move, and look for a player with bad stats who the Brewers think is one small tweak away (and maybe a better defense) from being a good pitcher.
If Joey Ortiz, Cooper Pratt, and Luis Lara could all continue to hit like they have in July, then many of the team’s offensive concerns would be greatly diminished. But that’s one player who hasn’t earned much trust and two 21-year-old rookies, and those Dodger Stadium lights shine pretty darn bright in October. A boost to the offense would be huge, but as discussed in the piece linked above, finding a fit, regardless of the cost, is extremely challenging.
I will quickly address the CJ Abrams rumors. The Brewers were linked to Abrams over the weekend in a piece from The Athletic, and there’s no reason to think this report isn’t reliable. I’ve been dismissive of Abrams as a potential target because the Nationals are firmly in striking distance of the National League’s Wild Card spots and because Abrams is a 25-year-old star with two more years of team control.
But if the Nationals think they’re too far away—their pitching and defense aren’t very good—and they’d prefer to realign their timeline with James Wood (who has four more years of control to Abrams’ two), there’s a little bit of logic to at least being open to trading Abrams. Abrams is also rated as one of the worst defensive shortstops in baseball, which might create a challenging conversation for any team acquiring him; the Brewers would presumably want him to move to third (or maybe second, if they felt that Brice Turang could move to third, or maybe even the outfield) to mitigate that issue, but whether he’s open to that before he hits free agency is a question.
There’s also the prospect cost. The Nationals would certainly start negotiations by asking for Jesús Made, and there’s not a single young pitcher on the Brewers who isn’t named Jacob that would be off the table. Maybe there’s a deal that could get done that didn’t include Made, but certainly Luis Peña would be involved, plus likely two or three other top-ten Brewers prospects.
There is no doubt that Abrams would be a huge pickup. He’s a far better offensive player right now than anyone on the Brewers. But I remain extremely skeptical that the Nationals would consider moving him, and when they’re in that position, they have all the bargaining power.
Re-assessing the trade landscape
The biggest challenge regarding this year’s trade deadline has been determining which teams would actually be willing to sell. A month after I first wrote about this issue, there hasn’t been a whole lot of change on that front. As of Wednesday morning, only four National League teams were more than 2.5 games back of a Wild Card spot: the Reds, Giants, Mets, and Rockies. In the American League, there are only five: the Tigers, Blue Jays, Royals, Athletics, and Angels. Of those teams, the Tigers are only 3.5 games back, and the Blue Jays, who nearly won the World Series last season, are still hypothetically within striking distance at 5.5 games back. The Reds are only 4.5 games back in the NL.
In the AL, the Guardians hold the third Wild Card spot and the Twins, Astros, Mariners, and Orioles are all within 2.5 games. In the NL, the Pirates and Diamondbacks are tied for the third Wild Card while the Nationals, Cardinals, Padres, and Marlins are all within 2.5 games. Each NL division has a clear leader, but the AL Central and AL West are up for grabs.
This type of environment just doesn’t bode well for a lot of trade deadline action. Sure, a handful of teams will trade off the players who will be free agents after the season, but that pool of players just isn’t that big. And if you look at the teams who are closer to the “out of it” side of the spectrum, several—the Blue Jays, Giants, Mets, Reds, and Royals—likely believe they can compete next season, so they will be hesitant to trade anyone who could help them beyond this season.
This means the prices for trade targets is going to be high. It also means there remains, even less than a week out from the trade deadline, there is real uncertainty about whether certain high-profile trade targets are even available. Will the Tigers trade Skubal? Is Mason Miller actually available? We don’t know about Abrams or Alcantara. What about Alec Burleson? Andrés Muñoz? Jeremy Peña? Otto Lopez and Xavier Edwards?
These are the biggest potentially available names, and we still have no idea if any of them will move because too many teams are can justifiably say they’re still in it. Maybe some of the prices will rise so high that teams feel they can’t pass up a certain offer. Maybe all these teams fear the optics of trading a star player while their team remains in the hunt. Maybe the best players to get traded at this deadline have already been traded in the Connelly Early-Curtis Mead swap that Washington and Boston put together over the weekend. (Or maybe Curtis Mead’s fluky broken wrist in his first game with Boston will give teams another reason to be cautious about making big moves.)
It will be interesting to see what happens. By all reports, the Brewers are actively and perhaps aggressively seeking upgrades, and it sounds like the noise that’s coming out of the front office is that they really are looking for bigger upgrades than they have in past years. Maybe that’s true. But the market will dictate a lot, and Matt Arnold and company have a history of making measured, conservative decisions when it comes to trades. This doesn’t really seem like the right environment to make a big move, but maybe we’ll be surprised.
Gut feelings
The Brewers are almost certainly going to do something before the trade deadline. But I’m not going to be surprised if the big move we’ve all been waiting for never comes. Maybe the Brewers make one of the more high-profile, non-Skubal trades for a rental.
But I personally don’t see the major move. I’m not sure the Brewers have the players who are the right fit for Skubal; Logan Henderson’s good pitching of late has made most fans on this site hesitant to include him in a potential Skubal trade, and it’s not clear that, other than Henderson, the Brewers have the young pitching that they’d be willing to send to Detroit that would get the job done.
Luis Peña’s injury troubles—he was removed from last night’s Timber Rattlers game with a hamstring issue, the latest in a long string of ailments this season—have also complicated things. If we assume Jesús Made is untouchable and Peña is a distressed asset, there’s a question of who would headline a major, major deal.
This might be all for the best. In the somewhat annoyed words from a friend of mine who is a Twins fan, the Brewers will probably “do something more modest that ends up being the best deal of the deadline. And the Tigers will trade Skubal and then win the Central.”
In any case, my personal feeling as of right now is that the Brewers do a series of more minor moves—maybe a journeyman starter, maybe a decent reliever, maybe a depth offensive piece—and there will be fans that aren’t happy about it. Matt Arnold seems to understand that he has the pieces to swing a big trade if he wants to, but he’s also surely aware of when a big ask becomes too much. He didn’t get the Brewers to this point by being reckless with the team’s assets, and while I do think Arnold is willing to make a big move, I don’t see this as the time to do it.
I could also certainly be wrong! It should be an interesting week.
