What We Learned: More season reviews and arbitration projections

Brewers News & Notes

• Yesterday, Derek published his season review for the 2015 Brewers. While it was the worst Brewers season in over a decade, there is still plenty to look forward to next year based on how the team finished up 2015. Derek also asked you about how you felt following the 2015 season.
• MLB Trade Rumors released their projected arbitration salaries for 2016 yesterday. The Brewers currently have the fewest pending arbitration cases with only four arbitration-eligible players, and all will be facing arbitration for their first time. Jean Segura is projected to lead the cases with $3.2 million, with Wily Peralta right behind at $2.8 million. Will Smith, a Super Two case, is projected at $1.2 million, and Cesar Jimenez rounds them out at $1 million.
• Over on BP Milwuakee, Colin Anderle gives out their end-of-season awards, which covers many different things, from the most and least valuable players to the best sausage race highlight of the year.
• Are you afraid that the Brewers next opportunity to make the playoffs again is years away, even if they manage to improve the roster enough? Nicholas Zettel of Disciples of Uecker has some hope for you, noting that 48% of playoff teams fail to make the playoffs the next year, though the teams that do repeat tend to make it into the later rounds more often.
• Reviewing the Brew continued their offseason series of grading Brewers players, giving Khris Davis a B and Scooter Gennett a C-.
• Some of the success that Khris Davis found this season came from a great approach on the first pitch of an at bat. Ryan Romano of BP Milwaukee analyzes how Davis was so successful on the first pitch he saw in each at-bat.
• Over on The Brewers Bar, Enrique Bakemeyer takes a more positive look back at the season, going through the top 10 Brewers wins of 2015.
• Despite the losing season in which the Brewers were never really competing, attendance was still good for the Brewers. Jack Moore of BP Milwaukee notes that the Brewers were seventh in the NL and 13th in MLB in attendance, better than three playoff teams.

Postseason Update

Yesterday's Games

AL Wild Card Game
Astros 3, Yankees 0
Astros advance to ALDS

Today's Games

NL Wild Card Game
Cubs @ Pirates - 7:00 pm
Jake Arrieta vs. Gerrit Cole

Around Baseball

• Dan Haren's career may be over. Earlier, Haren confirmed that he will be retiring once the Cubs are done in the postseason, but with the Cubs unlikely to add him to the postseason roster, his career may already be done.
• After initial reports came out that the Giants were signing Cuban center fielder Eddy Julio Martinez, new reports are saying that Martinez will not sign with the Giants and remains a free agent.
• The Indians promoted GM Chris Antonetti to the role of president of baseball operations, and Mike Chernoff will take over the role of GM.
• The Marlins re-signed outfielder Ichiro Suzuki to a one-year, $2 million contract with an option for 2017.
• Mets starting pitcher Matt Harvey missed a mandatory workout on Tuesday after he lost track of time and ended up stuck in traffic. He is still on track to start game three of the NLDS, and manager Terry Collins said that Harvey will only be fined for missing the workout.
• The Rockies will retain manager Walt Weiss for the 2016 season. Weiss has one more year on his current contract.
• Investigations into daily fantasy sports have begun as New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman has launched inquiries into both DraftKings and FanDuel. Meanwhile, FanDuel announced that it has banned its employees from playing fantasy sports on other sites as a response to the current situation.
• Tonight's wild card game will feature Jake Arrieta facing Gerrit Cole for the starting pitcher matchup. Craig Edwards of FanGraphs says that this matchup is one of the best playoff matchups ever.