Pat Borders, possibly the second-best catcher in the organization before the deal, has been traded to the Mariners:
Borders, a veteran of 1,060 games over 16 major league seasons, was signed to a minor league contract by the Brewers over the winter. In 26 games with Class AAA Nashville of the Pacific Coast League, Borders was hitting .245 with three homers and 14 RBI.
"Pat Borders is a veteran and his leadership will be missed by our organization," Brewers general manager Doug Melvin said. "But we did not want to prevent him from this major league opportunity."
It would be nicer to know that Pat Borders -- as minimal a contribution as he might make -- was available at AAA in case Miller went down or Moeller figured out how to hit even less. On the other hand, this may move Vinny Rottino a notch up on the depth chart at catcher, which is intriguing to me. Anybody know how the Rottino-behind-the-plate experiment is going?