I remember Mueller as the great hope for the closer role. Local kid, threw very hard, another young phenom like Yount. Enter Rollie Fingers.
@PackerRick posted:Even worse is that he's a liability in the field because of his weak arm. Any single scores a runner from 2B and any flyball scores a runner from 3B. He's basically been reduced to a contact hitter but he Ks too much to be called that. The Brewers have 4 really good young outfielders that could start next season in the bigs and I'm not sure where that leaves Yelich. At some point they have to make a decision because they can't play him for another 5 years. His contract is much worse than the deal the Packers had with Rodgers, at least he could still play.
You make some critical points. At this point, Yelich doesn't do anything well other than run the bases. If you choose a guy to put on second to start an extra inning game, he'd be your choice.
He has a terrible throwing arm, so you'd take him out in late innings and put in a defensive player in a playoff game.
He is almost completely unplayable against left-handed pitchers at this point (he has one extra base hit in 62 plate appearances against lefties this year and a 537 OPS).
He's a minimum salary veteran player making 26 million a year. He doesn't have the worst contract in baseball (Anthony Rendon), but it allows Attanasio to say he's tried paying guys in the past and doesn't want to do it again.
The other intangible thing is that the Brewers really don't have any position players that are exciting to watch. Owen Miller is a good story, but there is no one you want to buy a ticket to go watch. I guess you might go watch Corbin Burnes before he gets shipped out of town, but other than that the whole team is just "meh." Devin Williams starts to get expensive after this year as well.
The long-range trends are starting to get ominous for the Brewers. An owner going into cost-cutting mode with a 25 year old stadium that needs significant repairs, a team that is frankly pretty boring to watch, and likely headed towards shipping their 3-4 best players out in the next 1-2 years to avoid paying them (Burnes, Woodruff, and Williams).
They'll need to package Yelich with Burnes to one of the deep pocket teams this summer. Will probably reduce what they get for Burnes, but getting rid of Yelich's contract will be worth it.
Any trade with Yelich will probably require the Brewers to pay a good portion of his salary. They have no leverage with this guy and giving away Burnes to get rid of Yelich will not sit well with the fans. If you trade a guy like Burnes, the return has to at least create optimism with the fans.