Milwaukee Brewers: Is The Crew in on Yu Darvish?

The free agent market has been at a standstill to this point in the off-season. The Milwaukee Brewers have holes to fill in the rotation, and there are still plenty of available options.

One of those available options for the Milwaukee Brewers is RHP Yu Darvish. The former Texas Ranger, and Los Angeles Dodger, has not lived up to the hype since coming to MLB. The amount of money it cost Texas to sign him suggested he would be an ace. However, his stats show him as a number two pitcher, at best.

Darvish sports a 3.42 ERA over his five seasons in MLB. In 832 1/3 innings pitched he has a very good 11.0 K/9 to go along with a respectable 3.3 BB/9. Those are definitely good numbers, but not more than $60 million dollars worth of production.

Darvish might be the top arm available in free agency right now and stands to cash in this winter. Five teams have been publicly connected to Darvish this off-season, none of which is Milwaukee, but according to Darvish there could be a mystery sixth team in on him. He whipped the Twitterverse into a frenzy this week with this tweet.

Is Milwaukee the mystery team?

With Jimmy Nelson missing a big piece of this season, there is definitely a fit for Darvish in Milwaukee. Heading into Spring Training the Brewers have at least two, maybe three, spots open in the rotation. The biggest hurdle in signing Darvish comes down to dollars and cents.

The Milwaukee Brewers are a small market team, and Darvish has big market money demands. The New York Yankees have reportedly offered Darvish a contract, and the Brewers stand little chance of signing him if the Yankees are involved.

According to Mlbtraderumors, Darvish is expected to receive a deal upwards of 6 years $160 million. That all but prices him out of the Brewers range. The largest contract in Brewers history is the $105 million deal given to Ryan Braun.

It’s unlikely that the Milwaukee Brewers are in on Darvish. His contract demands are too high for The Crew to take that chance. Darvish isn’t the pitcher that will push this team over the top and into contention.

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Milwaukee should save that money for the pitcher that will lead this team into the future. When Nelson gets healthy this rotation will be better than the Brewers have had in some time. It’s not a make or break season for this team, so there’s no reason for David Stearns to panic. The Brewers don’t need this $100 million pitcher to get to where they want to be. To get there, all they need is patience, and little luck.