Buy or stand pat? Surprising Brewers weigh trade deadline
MILWAUKEE — The Milwaukee Brewers’ biggest fan calls team owner Mark Attanasio regularly and wonders occasionally what moves one of baseball’s most surprising teams might make at the trade deadline.
Former team owner and baseball commissioner Bud Selig is getting inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame on July 30, a day before baseball’s nonwaiver trade deadline. For the first time in a couple seasons, the Brewers are in contention.
Should they be buyers and potentially veer from a long-term rebuilding plan? Or stand pat but hold on to the best pros- pects in one of the league’s top farm systems?
“With (Selig) it’s more, he wants to be on the inside knowing what we’re doing, what are we thinking,” Attanasio said. “So he wouldn’t know the prospects. ‘Is that guy the Cubs traded (away) really that good?”’
It’s up to Milwaukee’s current regime to figure out.
The surprising Brewers are trying to hold off the defending World Series champion Cubs, the Cardinals and the Pirates in the National League Central after holding a 5 ½ - game lead at the All-Star break.
A wild-card berth is also in play with Arizona and Colorado struggling out West in recent weeks, meaning Milwaukee still has a potential path to the playoffs even if the Cubs awaken from their seasonlong slumber.
If anything, the Brewers probably won’t be selling at the July 31 non-waiver trade deadline, and that in itself is a big surprise for a team in just the second full season of a rebuild.
For Attanasio, the best way to move forward changes on an almost daily basis.
“You don’t know what it is, because it’s dynamic. It’s not a static process,” Attanasio said. “And by the way, there (are) games to be played, so between now and the trade deadline, teams that ... think they’re not sellers could become sellers.”
Milwaukee was a seller at the deadline the previous two seasons, moving pieces including catcher Jonathan Lucroy and outfielder Carlos Gomez.
There are painful memories from the last time the Brewers were in contention in 2014. Back then, Milwaukee led by 6 ½ games on July 1 before collapsing down the stretch.
Much has changed since, from the clubhouse to the front office. Left fielder Ryan Braun is the only everyday player remaining from the 2014 team.
Craig Counsell took over as manager after Ron Roenicke was fired in May 2015; David Stearns took over as general manager after Doug Melvin retired at the end of the 2015 season.