Milwaukee Brewers: 3 Potential Trade Targets This July

The Milwaukee Brewers are near the top of the NL Central standings as we sit here in early May. It’s not too early to start looking ahead to potential July trade deadline acquisitions.

If you ask most Milwaukee Brewers fans, they would say there’s no shortage of needs to address with this team. To get to the promised land of the World Series, there are a couple additions that need to be made.

Even though it’s only May, some of those team needs are becoming obvious with more than two months to go until the deadline.

Arguably the most pressing need for this team will be in the bullpen. With Corey Knebel out for the season, the Brewers have lost one of their high-leverage relievers. No one else has really been able to step up into that role for the team, and it’s something that needs to be addressed if the Crew is going to continue to rely on that bullpen for their success.

Now the easy answer for a lot of people would be to just sign Craig Kimbrel, and while that does make sense, for the purposes of this article, we’ll look strictly at trade candidates.

There’s a number of trade candidates out there who are on bad teams but pitching in late-game situations. They would make a lot of sense to acquire.

Also, the bench could be another area the Milwaukee Brewers address during July, as is the case with most contending teams.

Without the August waiver trade period, all these acquisitions must be made before the July deadline, making the bench acquisitions similar to Curtis Granderson and Gio Gonzalez last year, moves that need to be made earlier.

Here are three potential candidates for the Milwaukee Brewers to acquire this July.

Will Smith, LHP, San Francisco Giants

Back in 2016, the Milwaukee Brewers traded Will Smith to the Giants as the Crew was in rebuild mode and the Giants were going for it. Afew years later, the tables have turned and the Brewers are now contenders and the Giants are rebuilding.

Despite their poor record, the Giants have a strong bullpen and are likely to trade a couple of members of that group at the deadline. One of the top members of that group is Will Smith.

This season, Smith has a 3.29 ERA so far, and has nine saves as the Giants’ designated closer. Smith has a 2.78 FIP, a 1.02 WHIP, and is looking good.

Last year, in his first season back from Tommy John surgery that took out his entire 2017 season, Smith posted a 2.55 ERA in 53 innings.

Smith has always been a reliable bullpen arm, even going back to his days in Milwaukee, posting a 3.28 ERA in three seasons with the Brewers.

With the Brewers having lost Knebel for the entire season, reacquiring Smith would give them that third dominant arm in the bullpen. Not to mention it would reunite Smith and DJ Jazzy Jeff aka Jeremy Jeffress. Smith and Jeffress had a close bond they developed during their time in Milwaukee. And both were traded on the same day in 2016. Jeffress is back, and bringing back Smith would put that dynamic duo on center stage once again.

Acquiring Smith makes perfect baseball sense, and it also makes for a great story, with Smith reuniting with Jeffress back in the city where both broke out to be high-quality big league relievers.

Smith would only be a rental, and will become a free agent at season’s end, meaning the acquisition cost will be much lower. With Knebel coming back next season, the Milwaukee Brewers could let Smith walk afterwards. Getting Smith back would be a win-win.

Shane Greene, RHP, Detroit Tigers

Another late inning relief option that will likely be available for trade in July is Shane Greene of the Tigers.

Greene, the Tigers’ closer, has 13 saves so far this season with a 1.69 ERA and a 0.75 WHIP in 16 appearances.

He posted 32 saves a year ago for Detroit, despite finishing with a 5.12 ERA. This year, his overall numbers look much better and hopefully he’s turned a corner. His K/9 ratio has increased to 11.3 so far this season, which would be a career high, and his 2.3 BB/9 is a career low.

The good/bad news about possibly acquiring Greene is that he does have another year of team control remaining through arbitration. If the Milwaukee Brewers were to acquire him, they would control his rights through the 2020 season. He’s making $4 million this year.

That means there would be a higher acquisition cost to pry Greene away from the Tigers in terms of prospects that have to be surrendered. But the extra year of control would make the Brewers bullpen that much more deadly in 2020 with Jeffress, Greene, Knebel, and Josh Hader all under contract and (hopefully) healthy.

His $4 million salary is also not a huge hindrance to the team payroll this year. It’s stretched thin and there may not be much room to add a lot of salary in July, but with probably somewhere around $2 million left on that deal in late July, that’s not going to break the bank for the Brewers.

Greene is just another option to give the Brewers that three-headed bullpen monster they’re looking for.