The Brewers are promoting top prospect Orlando Arcia prior to today’s game, the team announced overnight. Rays outfielder Oswaldo Arcia — Orlando’s older brother — first suggested as much by welcoming his younger brother to the Majors on Instagram.
[Related: Updated Milwaukee Brewers Depth Chart]
Arcia, 21, will take over as the Brewers’ shortstop, as MLB.com’s Adam McCalvy writes, thereby pushing Jonathan Villar over to third base. Arcia ranked seventh, 13th, 14th and 16th on the respective midseason rankings of the game’s top overall prospects from Baseball Prospectus, MLB.com, Baseball America and ESPN. Arcia draws huge amounts of praise for his defense at shortstop, his speed and his hit tool, giving him the potential to be a top-of-the-order hitter with Gold Glove caliber defense at a premium position if all pans out. He hasn’t exactly forced his way onto the roster with outstanding play at the Triple-A level like many top-tier prospects do, as he’s batted a modest .267/.320/.403 in a very hitter-friendly environment (the Pacific Coast League’s Colorado Springs). He’s extremely young to already have spent several months in Triple-A, though, and his perhaps underwhelming 2016 results clearly didn’t cause him to slip down prospect rankings much.
“The thinking is it’s time to get him started,” manager Craig Counsell tells McCalvy. “We’ve still got [58] games left, a good chunk of the season left, where we’re hopeful that it gives him good experience going into next year. I think it’s a little shot in the arm for us, a little boost for us, as well.”
If he’s in the Majors for good, Arcia will accrue 62 days of big league service in 2016 and fall well shy of Super Two status down the line. He currently projects to be controllable through the 2022 season and wouldn’t be eligible for arbitration until the completion of the 2019 campaign.
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.
Gotta love when top prospects are called up.
If he’s that good a prospect, I’m surprised they don’t pull a Bryant with him. Keep him down all of this year and the first two weeks of next. Especially as he’s not hitting the cover off the ball, and the Brewers are a small market low payroll team.
They have him under control until 2022 so it’s not that significant a move. Not supposed to be competitive until 2018 at the earliest anyways. I think this move was done more to appease the fan base than anything. Lucroy and Smith were both really popular with fans. Throw in the fact the Packers season starting soon and you’re looking at a lot of disinterested fans.
Than the Brewers fans don’t know baseball. If they knew the game they would wake up excited at all of the prospects they added yesterday, including the highway robbery they pulled for Smith, a barely above average relief pitcher
Let’s be honest here. Most fans of every fan base don’t “know baseball” to a certain extent. Plus, “know” is really a relative term when it comes to these type of things. Most fans are casual fans that don’t do a lot of research.
And how do you know Brewers fans don’t know baseball? Everyone I know was extremely pleased with the trades yesterday. Also, we always have very good attendance at home games, even for a bad team. Just because the team isn’t good doesn’t make the fans not good, too.
The casual fan doesn’t know baseball. They’re the ones that don’t understand the definition of rebuilding and are the ones wondering why the team doesn’t go and sign Prince Fielder to a mega contract. Every team in every sport has these sort of fans. Organizations cater to these fans through promotions and discount days. Baseball fans will go regardless how the team performs. This move was done to appease the casual fan base. Most everyone I know is super excited for the future and watching all these prospects develop. So for you to say Brewers fans don’t know baseball is just plain ignorant. Carry on though.
You said it was done to appease the fanbase. He said that if it takes something like this to appease a fanbase (which you yourself supplied as the reason for the move) then they don’t know baseball.
You continued on to say that parts of the fanbase don’t understand rebuilding. I’m confused why you are all bent out of shape when you say a move like this was done to appease the fanbase
Actually Bravo, you just proved his point. As you suggested “this move was done to appease the casual fan base”. Well the casual fan section of every team is larger than the diehards.
Actually I was just countering his statement that seemed to lump Brewers fans as not knowing baseball. Huge difference between casual fans and real fans.
He’s not the same type of talent as Bryant. His skill set also isn’t the kind that pays super well in arb or FA really. There is also the possibility that they bring him up to expose him to MLB pitching for a while and then send him back down to work on things.
His skill set doesn’t pay well? A good defensive SS with good hit skill and the possibility of developing pop doesn’t pay well? It’s quite possible he turns into a .300 hitter with 15-20 HR pop while playing gold glove D, those guys get tiny contracts.
I figured Stearns was planning something like this after trading 3 known faces off the 25 man roster. Yesterday they only called up 2 players leaving them with only 24 for last night’s game. I bet he planned on calling up one of the top prospects after the trade deadline in this scenario a long time ago, to ease the fanbase. Just sucks that none of them are tearing up AAA at the moment. Still can’t wait to see Arcia finally play!
The future begins tonight. Looking forward to seeing what this kid brings to the table. Also going to be interesting to see how Villar handles the move to 3B.
Really dumb move. You don’t start the clock early unless you have to. Arcias AAA numbers are weak and he is not ready.
Bad move Brewers. It could be Richie Weeks all over again in which a player never develops fully.
Yea….Rickie Weeks that had 155hrs in 10 full seasons. Looks like he never fully developed
You must not know much about his career. If he had learned proper plate discipline he could have been a star. Never could stop swinging at that outside slider breaking off the plate.
And you must not know much about his career. Weeks injured his wrist in 2009 and that obviously messed up the longevity of his career. Without the injury, he would have continued to be one of the top 2b in the entire league…..but I’m sure you probably knew that already.
Yeah because those are mutually exclusive… We don’t k ow how much the wrists mattered. Doesn’t change that he had contact issues because of pitch recognition.
No matter what YOU think about him, he GOT 100x further than you or anyone else here posting. Stick that in your “stathead”
Lol so what? Nobody said otherwise. The argument was thar he could have been even better than he was had he had more time to develop.
My issue with Weeks was I always felt he was miscast as a lead off batter. Almost by default Yost penciled him in at the top of the order whereas I think he may have been better off in the 5/6 spot, allowing him to take his hacks.
I didn’t know Rickie and Jemile had another brother named Richie?!
Lol. Autocorrect.
You just don’t get it. 2022 seems like a long way away until he’s a 28 year old superstar the Brewers can’t afford to sign.
So you start the clock next and let him walk when he’s 29 as opposed to 28? That year is a “such” huge difference. And let’s not forget about Isan Diaz or Gilbert Lara. All potential trade chips for when the team is competitive again. (Arcia included in that group)
It very well could be a huge difference. Arcia could very well provide more value @ 29 then he will in his first year. No one really knows though.
That 1 year can make a huge difference. The Brewers could have had Fielder an extra year back when he was still good if they had managed his promotion better. It would have kept the window open for another year, which is huge when you are looking at 2 or 3 year windows.
The Brewers biggest blunder during that window from 2008 to 2012 was hiring Ken Macha as manager.
Macha was only the manager during the 09 and 10 season. Brewers made it as wild card in 08 with Sabathia and in 11 they were in NLCS during Roenicke’s first year. Get your facts straight sir.
Ummmm try to comprehend what I’m saying. Their window was from 2008-2018. The biggest mistake was the hiring of Ken Macha that disrupted the momentum from the 2008 season. Comprehend much?
*2012
Yeah I comprehend. Sorry I can’t read minds. If you had said that in your post that would be one thing, but you didn’t. Thats on you buddy. Got it? Window open until 2018? Are you a Brewers fan or know baseball at all? Their rebuild should have started a year or two ago. Comprehend what I’m saying.
Note the asterisk in front of 2012 in my post above. Once again, comprehend.
@stathead “You just don’t get it. 2022 seems like a long way away until he’s a 28 year old superstar the Brewers can’t afford to sign.”
The Brewers could easily extend control to 2023 if they keep him from getting a full year of service time between this season and next (very likely).
Also, they probably want the coaching staff at the MLB level have a look at him to help with his development… Evaluating him at the MLB level may also help the team determine whether or not they want to trade Villar/other controllable pieces in the offseason to continue building the farm, or instead look towards 2019 as a realistic goal for contention and keep guys like him around.
It’s time to get him up and playing. The rumors already are that his numbers are down this year because he’s not playing as hard due to not wanting to get injured in the minors and a bit of indifference to still being there since his future role is already defined. That worries me because it may show attitude issues, but at the same time no reason to keep him down there going through the motions and possibly straining the relationship by playing the control game.
Unbelievable seasons by Jonathan Villar and Hernan Perez so far. Both looking like part of the future in Milwaukee.
Wondering where Hernan Perez gets to play though… Villar will man third as Arcia comes up to play short. I wouldn’t think they would want to relegate Perez to the bench, though, as he has been hitting third for them recently (and thriving). I didn’t know he had the kind of power he’s been showing recently.
RF. He’s played in the OF and done fairly well. Flores and Neiuwenhuis aren’t keeping him out of the lineup. Will also get time at 2B when Scooter is out of the line up. He’s turning into the super utility that every team needs to have these days.
He’s been playing a lot of RF this year, so they will most likely play him there.
Would it be out of the question to move him to first this offseason? If he can handle the transition defensively he is a more athletic defender than Carter with a more balanced offensive approach. Obviously not as much power potential but you can still keep Carter as a huge bench bat.
I honestly see Scooter being moved this offseason. There was talk about him going to the Nats in the offseason so I wouldn’t be surprised to see him moved. It makes sense with the influx of middle IFers they have in their system now.
I like the move. We have such a deep minor league system now that starting the clock on one of 8 and counting players in the top 100 prospects isn’t the end of the world. Also I am not sold on him the way I am on other players. To me in more excited about hader bickford, brinson etc…hope he’s as good as advertised
Even if his power doesn’t come around due to his defense and good bat control he probably has a floor of becoming Alcedes Escobar with a little more pop. I’m more excited about Brinson, but that’s probably still a year or two out thanks to the injury riddled year he’s had this year.
So where does Perez play? Seems like moving Villar to 2B would be more beneficial
Villar seems to be their long term plan at 3B, no need to move him to 2B just to move him back to 3B to start next year. Need to let him try to get comfortable over there and see how he handles it. Perez will be a utility guy, getting some starts at 2B, some in the OF, and with Lucroy gone probably the occasional start at 1B when Carter needs a day or goes into one of his deep slumps.
Honestly this should of happened already, but with it happening today it just shows Stearns hasn’t a clue and MA loves money. Clearly this isn’t the only organization with an owner that cares more about the bottom dollar then the product, and a GM that wants to gut everything and start from scratch with their own vision. The only problem I have is both those 2 guys have spent the last 12 months trying to convince everyone that’s not who they are. Remember this is “retooling not rebuilding”. The BS flag has got to be waving now. This organization has prospects not in their top 30 that could be in other teams top 10’s. This team wasn’t far away from competing, and they were clearly playing to well this year for the FO. There is 3 or 4 players who all should of been called up b4 Arcia. Wren, Reed, Suter, and Magnifico all should be fighting for PT right now. 3/4 of those players should have been up b4 all star break.
I wasn’t upset they moved Lucroy. Lucroy and his selfishness is the reason this team didn’t win more and make at least 1 more championship run. When the team collapsed in 2014 it was bc management decided lucroys personal achievements were more important then the teams achievements. the worst part of that debacle was listening to the manager and Lucroy both claim he’s a team player then force us to watch Maldonado play 1B while Lucroy catches. I do understand you can’t break a record for most doubles by a catcher when you’re playing 1B, but don’t tell me it’s about the team when we’re watching back up short stops and catchers play 1B so Lucroy can catch.
My main gripe with the team this year is them giving up 5+ War(to date) in players like Segura, K-Rod, Davis, Etc… Then putting guys like Flores, Anderson, and Walsh on the field this year with their -3+War(-1.5 for Flores alone) if you factor just that in to this team and don’t include guys they gave up like Wagner, guys they didn’t call up who could’ve helped, the fact they’re still 30mil under last years payroll and they didn’t sign anyone that could play CF last offseason. This team could of easily been 10 games better then they are right now. 10 games puts this team 1 game up on Stl right now. This team was way to good to disassemble, the fact that they disassembled it after they already had a top 10 farm system is beyond stupid. This team wasn’t that far off, now they’re 2-3 years away from being competitive and that’s only if all these prospects pan out. Even if they all do play up to their potential they’re still gonna have CF’ers and SS’s playing corner positions which was this teams downfall after last rebuild. They still currently have 2 rookie pitchers on the team who are both in the top 30 in mlb era, plus 1 guy in Nelson who still has 4 years left who’s also in the top 30. That leaves 2 rotation spots open for the next 4-6years, and those 2 spots are only open if Peralta and Jungman never regain form. They already had 5 really good pitching prospects who will all be ready by 2018. You could argue Lopez and Hader could be up now. Some will talk about their #’s at Colorado Springs l, but that’s just foolish to even mention. Look at Guerras #’s this year at Colorado Springs and he’s a sub 3.00 big league pitcher. That’s why it’s so crazy they haven’t given Suter a shot yet. He’s got better #’s at Colorado Springs then even Gueraa had.
This team is stacked for the future, this team was good enough to win now, the FO didn’t want to win now bc that would of hurt their draft standing. To me that’s totally unacceptable. I will stand by a rebuilding team that loses games now, but I won’t stand by a team thats trying to lose games now. Even if that team is calling up their top prospect to sugar coat the BS their putting out on the field.
Oh my goodness, you are just dumb.
Go find another team. STEARNS was there from the beginning when Luhnow started the rebuild in Houston. He got Villar/Carter For practically Nothing. BUT, you seem to know more than he does, right? Fans like you, give good ones a bad name
I am not saying Stearns sucks, I’m not saying all his moves have been terrible, I don’t think the deadline moves were bad either, personally I have wanted Lucroy to be dealt since 2014. If anything I agree totally with what u just said, and that’s exactly my point. A team can have too many prospects, and this team now has too many top prospects. Why do you think he was able to get Carter and Villar for nothing? Bc the Astros have mlb talent at both their positions and they have top prospects at both positions. When that happens teams have to give up good players for nothing. A lot of the players on Milwaukees top prospect lost will never have more value then they do now, why give up Lucroy and Jeffress for another CF prospect. Where is he going to play? If he plays CF at A, AA, or low A he will decrease the value of Phillips, Ray, or Clark bc they will no longer be viewed as CF prospects. Pitcher is an entirely different animal, you can never have enough high end pitchers, but they will never have as much value in a deep organization bc there is too much talent above them to be promoted. My whole entire point is they gave up soo much MLB talent the last 8 months it’s embarrassing as a fan. To sit and watch guys like Flores with his -1.3 War play everyday and Weineheiss duck fly balls or take them off the chest is not what any fan of an organization should have to deal with. They could of very easily kept all the players with 2+ years of control and dealt all the ones with less and built up the farm enough for the future. The reason teams like the Astros Dfa or accept nothing in trades for players like Villar, Carter, and JD Martinez is bc they have so much depth they ruin their own players value. A lot of guys that are top/ good prospects that don’t pan out only don’t work out bc they don’t get regular playing time in the bigs. I do like Stearns, I think he’s brilliant, but this team was not light years away from competing. They could of easily signed someone to play CF last offseason and even a top end starter if they liked. Imagine if they would of shelled out 40mil this season to bring the payroll up near 100mil by signing David Price or Jordan Zimmerman and either Dexter Fowler or Ian Desmond. (I was so pissed they didn’t sign Desmond especially after they dumped Segura). I understand not signing Price or Zimmerman in a rebuild but guys like Desmond and Fowler is what a rebuilding team should spend money on bc they can be flipped mid season or offered a QO if they get back to their old form.
You think a team with
Price/Zimmerman
Nelson
Guerra
Davies
Garza(Peralta,Jungman, or a warm body)
Bullpen would of had
9th K-Rod
8th Smith/Jeffress
7th Thornburg
6th Knebel/Blazek
5th(when garza pitched)Barnes/Marinez
Lineup
Segura
Villar
Braun
Desmond/Fowler
Lucroy
Carter
Davis
Gennett
Pitcher
That easily could of been a team to compete for the playoffs. Even with them not signing a top pitcher or Desmond that still could of been a team that would of been more then just competitive. all that would of changed was pencil in Wagner at 5th starter and bump everyone up 1, and put Santana in for Desmond.
That’s all I’m trying to say. This team could of still been competitive while rebuilding, instead someone though it better to lose for 2-3 more years. It’s hard as a fan to watch players become stars on other teams when your team gave them away for peanuts. That’s what we will all be doing in 3-4 years. We may be a good team then, maybe even a playoff team, but is it worth 3 years of watching this garbage for the chance bc it’s not a guarantee. milwaukee isn’t Houston or Chicago, this rebuild can’t go the same way as they did, bc this team is never going to go out and purchase top international player like Houston or Chicago, they won’t ever go out and sign guys like Heyward or Lester, and no one is really accepting that fact right now. Everyone is just talking about how great those 2 teams are and how nice it is to see Milwaukee following their model for rebuilding… The problem is Milwaukee isn’t, can’t, and won’t follow that model.
I love this logic.
A. Sign David Price or Jordan Zimmerman!!! And then follow it with
B.. Milwaukee can’t sign top international prospects!
So they can sign David Price and other top free agents, but not a 17 year old kid out of Central America?
Sure.
Gilbert Lara aside, right? Didn’t they also sign one of the Red Sox’s players whose contracts got voided?
Got it.
“This team wasn’t far away from competing” and that’s where you lost me. This team wasn’t far from being competitive, but they were light years from actually competing for a championship. Stearns is going to do this rebuild just how the Astros did it. People can yell all they want that Atanasio cares more about money than winning, it’s just not true. He had the Brewers payroll the highest it’s ever been and near league average a couple years ago despite being a small market team with a horrible TV contract. What sense does it make to over-spend on average players and be and average team instead of giving young guys a shot to see what they can do?
Hey they were a 12-13 in July.!! Why break up that club? /sarcasm
Stearns is great. I disagree with the Arcia promotion but I always like to hold guys down until they are proven ready. Small market teams need those cheap control years.
I forget where I read it yesterday, but someone quoted a scout who had recently watched Arcia and said looked “bored” with that level. I’m all for challenging prospects. I’ve got no issue with him coming up. It’s not like he wouldn’t be here when rosters expand in a month anyhow.
Sounds like an attitude issue… Being bored while putting up a. 720 ops? OK… Maybe you should work on hitting f and not be bored?
From Baseball America: “Scouts noticed a discernible change in his attitude since he started moving up the prospect ranks, not unlike brother Oswaldo during his ascent. Despite that, he was still one of the top 15 prospects in the game, thanks to his sterling glove work, for which he gets unanimous strong reviews”
Also this: “The Brewers want to know what they have in Arcia going forward, so this won’t be a short-term audition unless the maturity issues crop up and force their hand”.
Interesting. Let’s hope this isn’t an issue going forward.
He’s garbage..enjoy ur coffee