Milwaukee Brewers: Could Sir Didi Gregorius fit with the Crew?

The Milwaukee Brewers will be looking to find a replacement for their two departing second baseman.

Fellow writer David explored the major offseason needs of the Milwaukee Brewers. He did a follow up on the second base market as well. One important thing David mentioned is exactly how weak the second base market is.

Those two pieces sparked an inner monologue about filling the void at second. That is where the idea of New York Yankees shortstop Sir DiDi Gregorius came to mind.

Gregorius has the number one prospect in baseball, Gleyber Torres, breathing down his neck for the shortstop reigns. If everyone is being honest, Torres may have taken over the job at the tail end of this season if not for a season ending injury. A play at the plate ended with the need for Tommy John.

Prior to that, Torrres hit .309 through 23 games in Triple A. He can play, and he will bully Sir Gregorius right out of the spot very, very soon.

While the Yankees might like the idea of Gregorius as a backup to their infield, he is coming off of his best season thus far. That gives him value. Another aspect to his value is that he will be under team control until 2020. He will be arbitration eligible for the next two seasons.

His .287 batting average is the highest of his career. Well, except his eight game debut in 2012 where he showed an even .300 batting average. 2017 was a very solid year for Gregorius. And he undoubtedly is a huge reason that his team is still playing baseball right now.

Don’t worry, I didn’t forget about Orlando Arcia. This is not a connection to a shortstop. This is a connection to a middle infielder with a dwindling role at his current club. The suggestion is moving him to second base, which is where he fits with the Milwaukee Brewers.

One thing to like about Gregorius is, as his Twitter account suggests, he is knighted. That’s right, he is kind of a big deal. It happened in 2011. The Netherlands baseball team won the IBAF Baseball World Cup and lieu of payment, each member of the team was knighted. The team included other solid middle infielders such as Andrelton Simmons and Xander Bogaerts.

However, as cool as that is, it doesn’t speak to his baseball fit with the Milwaukee Brewers. But what does is the very brief amount of experience at second base. Over the course of his career in the MLB, Gregorius has only 11 games to speak of at second. While that is underwhelming, he has nearly the same range factor a second that he does for shortstop through quite a bit more games.

His minor league career offers a larger, but not by that much, sample size into experience playing second. He played 42 games there. But the thing is that Gregorius posted a higher range factor and fielding percentage as a second baseman than as a shortstop.

To be fair, this is 42 games vs. 452. So I realize trying to argue this holds almost no merit. But the argument is not that he is a better second baseman. What I am trying to point out is that he can play second. There is reason for the Yanks to put him on the trading block. And if they do, he fits with the Milwaukee Brewers as a second baseman.

Next: Lewis Brinson 2017 season in review

Due to the fact that New York is still alive in the post season their rumor mill is fairly silent. However, once the playoffs end, expect teams to make inquiries about Gregorius. Rumors should start to fly because of the talented youngster waiting in the wings. And honestly, he seems like a pretty good fit into the Milwaukee infield.