The Brewers have officially struck a deal with the Rangers to acquire lefty Alex Claudio, according to Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic (Twitter links). Texas will receive Milwaukee’s competitive balance pick in the deal, which will deliver the club a draft choice in the range of the 40th overall selection (with the final order yet to be fixed).
Claudio, 26, has made the most of his arsenal with impeccable command and an uncanny ability to generate groundballs and limit dingers. Over his five seasons of MLB action, the southpaw has averaged 6.2 K/9 against just 1.9 BB/9 with a hefty 62.5% groundball rate.
While he never seemed likely to hang onto the closer’s role he briefly occupied in 2017, Claudio has mostly been an effective relief arm. His lifetime 3.20 ERA, though, reflects a string of productive seasons that was followed by a 4.48 mark in 2018.
The Brewers will hope that most recent set of results was unduly influenced by a .366 batting average on balls in play. Claudio did allow more hard contact than usual (36.0%), but Statcast also felt he was unfortunate to carry a .352 wOBA, with the system crediting him with a .315 xwOBA. Though he doesn’t get many strikeouts, Claudio managed an 11.4% swinging-strike rate in 2018.
Though the Milwaukee relief corps already features one of the game’s most exciting lefties in Josh Hader, he’s utilized as a high-leverage asset. Claudio will presumably serve in more of a specialist role. He has held opposing lefties to a .191/.220/.278 slash over his career.
The Brewers will take over Claudio’s anticipated arbitration salary, which MLBTR and contributor Matt Swartz project at an affordable $1.3MM. He’ll remain controllable for two more campaigns in the future as well.
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.
This could be an under the radar pick up
Oh hell yea it is, I didn’t realize other then 2018, how good this guy has been
I will save everybody from reading any further….
JD is an idiot
There you go, that is all anybody will post anyways.
I feel ya. I can’t believe we’d trade away this guy. What in the hell did we get back!!! Nothing that would be worth it I bet
I was going to call for his termination but this will suffice.
My post was full sarcasm as I knew it wouldn’t be long before you got here and the other trolls.
I’m not a troll, and I hate this trade.
Please explain to me what I’m missing and why it makes sense to trade Claudio now for pennies on the dollar, when you could just as easily hold onto him until the deadline and deal him from a position of strength.
The Rangers just gave away an asset … with no real impetus for doing so.
You definitely are not a troll and we typically agree. I posted below that I would rather take the shot on a lottery pick that could be something special over another “if we get lucky he will be a mid rotation” guy.
I also wonder if the guy we picked in the Rule 5 is slated to take his spot now….maybe?
Gallo was also selected 39th so it has been a good pick for us before….
Fair enough. I just don’t have any faith in this front office’s ability to find that difference-maker in the draft. This group has never had much success in that arena.
They’ve done really well internationally, but it’s been one bust after another in the draft.
Gallo was a solid pick. But that’s about the only high-round selection we can point to in the past 10 years that amounted to anything. After that, Brinson’s pretty much it, and he’s looking more and more like a bust as well.
Did you know that the Rangers have the 7th highest WAR from players drafted from 2010-2015? We just haven’t gotten that one superstar yet so to me that says we are due!
They’ve had better success later in the draft. It’s just been really frustrating how bad they’ve been in the first and compensatory rounds. I know this is true of all clubs, but to see some of the names they’ve passed on to take the guys they have the past decade is pretty sickening.
Believe me, I hope you’re right with that last sentence, though. I would love to draft that franchise player that we can build a championship core around. And I’d love nothing more than to be eating crow over my posts here in four or five years.
Well said ! It’s a Typical JD Move we are doomed with this guy in charge !!!
How was it sarcasm? It was a statement of fact.
Bet you miss the days when Ryan was apart of the Rangers and back 2 back WS. Was there when JD Fired Nolan. To me that was because JD felt INADEQUATE in the Big Boys pond
or it was because Nolan pushed to sign Bergman and Oswalt who were WAY passed anything of use. Nolan was not a good front office guy as far as baseball decisions. Great at the business side but not the baseball..
Turned a 30th round pick to a second round pick how is that they are rebuilding
I understand the logic but you can’t really compare where a guy was drafted to what you are getting back. Texas could find a gem with the draft pick they received by MLW is getting a proven big league arm under team control. Texas is building for the future and MLW is playing for now. I think it helps both teams in their current spots
Once a guy reaches the majors and proves effective at that level, his draft round is irrelevant.
The Rangers turned a major league asset with three more cheap years of control into a lottery ticket. Given their draft history under this front office, they might has well have just given him away.
I agree, Claudo’s trade was to get that draft pick. The only thing wrong is that Jon Daniels, in seeking that bird in the bush, has given away a lot of the young proven talent and now is trying to get back to the same talent level he’s traded, such as Keone Kela and Alex Claudio. JD or lets say the Ranger organization has real problems drafting and getting those players to the Big League. Oh well, we’ll get to watch AAAA ball this year. Exactly what has JD done to improve the club.
What’s the difference between him vs Jennings or Cedeno…?
Younger for 1, and Jennings had a problem with the long ball
Cedeno is a strikeout guy. Jennings and Claudio are control specialists.
Claud is on the team while the others are not.
He’s got a 62.5% ground ball rate and if the Brewers pen had one issue last year it was giving up the long ball.
Acquiring draft picks seems to be a more common thing. I love it
Even though baseball draft picks are a total and utter crapshoot.
Brewers pen was scary before and just got better.
lol you crazy he really not tyat good
You need to follow the Rangers a little more closer then.
I hate baseball.
Well, atleast you have Fortnite, I guess ?
Dude season 7 is so sick! Better than any of this stupid baseball stuff. Victory royale!
Where we landin boyyys 😉
It’s droppin’ actually. Where we droppin’ boys?
NOOOO!!!! i wanted the Marlins to trade Starlin for the CBA and int’l money. there goes that idea.
Looks like a good deal for the Brewers. Cards fan here, feeling a little jealous
Really don’t understand this but glad not to face him any more.
I hate this trade from the Rangers’ perspective. Given this front office’s draft history, the thought of giving away a cheap asset (and one of your only reliable bullpen arms) for another chance to screw up the draft turns my stomach. And … you’re selling low on Claudio to do it, trading him after literally the only poor season of his career.
This is a club whose top first-round draft pick in the past decade is a twice-traded center field prospect who may or may not have the bat to stick in the major leagues. And those early-round picks have as often as not been a disaster for this front office.
If you want to trade Claudio, fine. But to get nothing more than a lottery ticket out of the deal is beyond foolish IMO and speaks to this front office’s arrogance. JD and Co. have their strengths. The draft hasn’t been one of them. Instead of recognizing that limitation, they continue trying to “outsmart” everyone else in the room to the club’s detriment.
Houston fans said the same thing when they traded guys like Hunter Pence away and then launched their five year tanking mission.
claudio wasnt ne thing special when we have better bullpen options in minors
What better options are those?
Claudio is a proven major league reliever at a young age who has pitched and performed well in high-leverage situations and has three years of cheap control remaining. To suggest he’s not an asset or worth more than a draft pick is to undersell what he’s done throughout his professional career.
If the Rangers wanted to move him, they should have let him build his value back up and dealt him at the deadline, when clubs are desperate for bullpen help and might actually give up something of value. A draft pick ain’t it.
40th overall is damn close to a first round pick…….
That’s all, the Rangers needed to acquire a prospect as well. Wow.
Dummy Daniels. Probably the lease effective GM in any MLB front office.
Good thing he is only on a lease and we didn’t have to buy him!
Other than last year, this kid has pretty good numbers. Another nice move by Stearns. Essentially gave up nothing
He has an unorthodox delivery and his velocity will impress no one, but he’s a smart pitcher who has found success at every stage of his professional career.
As a Rangers fan, I hate this trade. To lose Claudio — one of the team’s only reliable relievers — for nothing more than a draft pick seems like a massive waste from my perspective, particularly when there was no pressing need to move him at all.
which makes no sense to me. Rangers management has no clue what they are doing. They essentially handed us a solid relief pitcher for nothing. He does not even need to be a super late inning guy, we have those. He can come in maybe the 5th-6th sometimes and cleanup some innings. Another Stearns kind of move. No publicity, not a name, but great talent. Hopefully he can follow the Shaw and Aguilar trend and thrive in a new environment with a contender
He was thriving in his old environment before last season. The dude was the Rangers’ pitcher of the year in 2017.
I really don’t get this one at all.
there is one good reason… rangers will be terrible the whole time he is controlled… 39th pick is actually a really good pick for a reliever who doesn’t miss bats and was not near as effective as he was prior to last season
All the more reason not to sell low on him now. He’s been effective his entire professional career. There’s no reason whatsoever to sell him for a magic bean on the heels of the only poor season he’s had as a major leaguer.
If you’re going to suck now and later, why move him at what is likely his lowest possible value? It’s just stupid.
And the No. 39 pick in a draft is a lottery ticket, nothing more. Especially with this front office, which has spent the past decade missing badly on high-round draft picks.
I am for the lottery pick over another “hopefully back of the rotation guy with 3rd potential” which is probably what the trade would have been. I also don’t think that people would pay too high for him because even though he is really effective, he doesn’t throw upper 90’s and everybody is so infatuated with a relief pitcher that throws in the upper 90’s.
I’d rather his innings than a draft pick, to be honest. If you’re not going to get anything more than that, you’d be better off keeping him the next three years IMO and hoping you’re ready to compete for a wild card spot by the end.
Nooo my all time fav
A time-line trade. Brewers pay the 1.2M (approx. on both ends) to Claudio instead of to the draft pick. Makes sense; Brewers need the body NOW, not 4 years from now.
Claudio makes Hader even more versatile now. Makes sense on their end. And on the Rangers’. Claudio’s skill set really isn’t needed there right now. And the pick (1st round supplemental) (somewhere from 35-40, depending) has value.
Alex’s production can be picked up as a minor fa signing, happens many many times each season. This gives away too much potential for a fungible asset. Fans undervalue these picks. It’s a shame when gm’s do too, they should know better.
Thank God you told me about his wOBA. My life wouldn’t be right without knowing his mundane advanced stats.
Love this trade for Texas. Claudio is a solid lefty but not crucial to the future. And you get a pick right outside the 1st round. Stocking up on high draft picks never hurts.
Why does Daniels always trade players who are relatively “buy low” vs buy high? Sold low on Darvish AND Hamels also.
He had no choice but to trade Darvish and Hamels when he did. Both were pending free agents. It was just bad luck that they struggled mightily heading into those respective deadlines.
You’ve got a point here, though. It just doesn’t make a lot of sense to me to trade Claudio now. He’s young, cheap and coming off the worst season of his career. It would make more sense to let him build his value back up and try to get something better than a draft pick in return.
I’m gonna miss seeing that Bugs Bunny changeup… This guy is a really fun pitcher to watch. Enjoy him Milwaukee fans, and NL fans in general.
I agree. And he’s one of the more versatile and mentally tough relievers the Rangers have had in recent memory, too. You could put him into any situation and feel confident the moment was never too big for him. I’ll miss having him in the bullpen, for sure.
I would have loved Profar and Claudio in Oakland
Great pick up by the Brewers. One of the better lefty relievers for a pick tat may or may not turn out to be major leaguer but we won’t know for at least three years. They were probably laughing in Milwaukee at their good fortune. Which means the Rangers braintrust is, well someone said it earlier.