Top Milwaukee Brewers Of The 2010s: Nos. 39-31

Our ranking of the Top 50 Milwaukee Brewers of the 2010s rolls on as we go through the 30s.

We made it through numbers 50 up to 40 and now find ourselves up into the 30s as we keep chugging along our way to ranking the best Milwaukee Brewers player of the 2010s.

How We Ranked Them

We created an initial list of the top players by combining their Fangraphs Total WAR from each year they were on the Brewers and ranking them from highest to lowest.

However, this wasn’t going to be a list of simply who had the highest WAR while they were here and that’s it. So we adjusted the list based on postseason contributions, overall quality of player, and general importance to the franchise.

Our list continues.

39. RHP Kyle Lohse

Kyle Lohse was an exciting signing for the Brewers when he came to the club shortly before the start of the 2013 regular season.

Lohse broke onto the Major League scene with the Minnesota Twins back in 2001, where he proved to be a solid, albeit not spectacular option in the rotation in his five plus seasons on the club.

When and where he made a name for himself, however, was in the National League, particularly on the St. Louis Cardinals.

In his several seasons in St. Louis, Lohse was among the better starting pitchers in all of baseball in run prevention when healthy. He was a standout on a 2008 team (2.8 fWAR, 3.78 ERA, 3.89 FIP) that struggled, but was even better in 2011 (2.2 fWAR, 3.39 ERA, 3.67 FIP) and 2012 (3.3 fWAR, 2.86 ERA, 3.51 FIP) when the Cardinals made back-to-back runs deep into the postseason.

He was never an elite pitcher at missing bats, but his ability to keep walks to an absolute minimum and limit home runs made him one of the best control pitchers in the Major leagues.

All of that success, particularly before he was set to hit the open market in the winter of 2012-13, led the Cardinals to extend a qualifying offer to him, which he rejected.

The Brewers ended up getting Lohse for quite a bit less per year (3 years $33 million, average $11 million per year) than he would have gotten had he taken the $13.3 million qualifying offer from St. Louis (even with $7 million in additional money deferred to 2016-18). The Brewers did have to forfeit their first round pick in the 2013 MLB draft (17th overall) as compensation for signing him though.

How did Lohse’s three years in Milwaukee play out? Let’s take a look at the stats.

2013: 1.6 fWAR, 3.35 ERA, 4.08 FIP

2014: 1.9 fWAR, 3..54 ERA, 3.95 FIP

2015:  -0.3 fWAR, 5.85 ERA, 5.12 FIP.

Total fWAR in Milwaukee: 3.2

As the stats show, Lohse’s first two seasons in Milwaukee went pretty well.

in 2013, he was, by some metrics, the Brewers best starting pitcher. However, weaknesses across the rest of the team, particularly on offense, saw the team win just 74 games in his debut season.

The following season, in 2014, Lohse played a pivotal role in leading the Milwaukee Brewers into contention for the playoffs. Milwaukee surged out to a hot start thanks to their solid starting pitching, and hot starts to the season from players like Jean Segura, Carlos Gomez, and Scooter Gennett.

Unfortunately, despite continued success from their rotation, including from Lohse, the team had two horrible losing runs in the second half of the season thanks to struggles in their offense and in their bullpen. Those horrible stretches saw them miss the playoffs after having been 19 games over .500 (51-32) on June 28th.

In his final season on the team in 2015, it looked like age finally caught up to him. The team collapsed early in the season and never recovered. Lohse was a part of the reason why they struggled, as his ability locate his pitches was lost and he got absolutely hammered for home runs as a result.

Though Kyle Lohse’s final season was quite poor, there’s no doubt that he made a substantial positive impact on the Milwaukee Brewers in his three seasons on the club.

His first two seasons in Milwaukee were exactly what the team wanted from him: He was a solid starting option who they could rely on to pitch a good game every five days. It’s not his fault that so many holes sprung up elsewhere on the roster during those seasons that ultimately kept the team out of the post-season.

What keeps Lohse from featuring higher on our list, however, was that he never got a chance to pitch for the team in the playoffs. He also never had a season in Milwaukee that was quite as good production-wise as another Brewers free agent signing who will be featuring on our list very soon. For as good as he was, he never quite hit the heights in Milwaukee that he did in St. Louis too.

The Brewers have signed a lot of pitchers in free agency to help bolster their rotation over the years. However, no starter they’ve signed over the decade was arguably as good as Kyle Lohse was for them.

He deserves his due credit for his production in Milwaukee, and is absolutely deserving of being on this list.

38. RHP Jhoulys Chacin

Next up is another successful free agent pitcher signing in Jhoulys Chacin, coming in at number 38 on our list.

In the winter prior to the 2018 season, the Milwaukee Brewers signed veteran starter Jhoulys Chacin to a two-year contract. He had a strong season with San Diego the year before, posting a 3.89 ERA in 32 starts. However, throughout his career, Chacin has been up and down, showing promise, but not being able to consistently show it.

Chacin ended up being a very important piece of this Brewers franchise.

2018: 2.6 WAR

2019: 0.1 WAR

Total WAR: 2.7

The 2018 season was a remarkable one for Chacin. He never misses a start, making 35 regular season appearances, including starting Game 163 against the Cubs for the division title. Chacin posted a 3.50 ERA in 192.2 IP that year and emerged as the ace of the staff. As the rest of the 2018 rotation battled injuries and ineffectiveness, Chacin was the lone consistent bright spot.

Many Brewers fans were hoping for one of the big free agent aces on the market that winter, with Jake Arrieta and Yu Darvish available, but Chacin was the one GM David Stearns chose and he ended up with the best 2018 season of all those free agent pitchers.

Chacin was trusted in some big games in the 2018 postseason, starting Game 2 of the NLDS, which the Brewers won 4-0 over the Rockies en route to a sweep of Colorado. He started Game 3 of the NLCS out in Los Angeles, which the Brewers also won 4-0 after he went 5.1 IP of scoreless baseball. Of course, he also started the very important Game 7 in that series, which, although the Brewers lost, it was hardly on his performance alone.

Chacin entered 2019 as the staff ace and was the easy choice to be the Crew’s Opening Day starter. However, the recent curse of the Crew’s Opening Day starters continued with possibly their worst cursed season yet. Chacin posted just 0.1 WAR in 2019 with a 3-10 record, a 5.79 ERA in just 19 starts, and 19 home runs allowed in just 88.2 IP with the Crew. He allowed only 18 home runs in the 192.2 IP the season before.

In the midst of that rough stretch this year, Chacin was injured, and then designated for assignment before he was ready to return. He became a free agent and signed with the Boston Red Sox to finish the season.

With his two-year, $15.5MM contract complete, it’ll go down as one of the most successful Brewers free agent signs in recent memory. Despite the struggles in 2019, Chacin provided plenty of surplus value over his $8MM salary in 2018, which more than made up for the underperformance of his 2019 season.

Despite only one good season with the Brewers, he was such an important piece of that 2018 squad that made it to within a game of the World Series that he lands at No. 38 on our list.

Next up: a frustrating, yet talented middle infielder.

37. SS/2B Jonathan Villar

Few players in Milwaukee Brewers franchise history were more exciting, yet extremely frustrating to watch play the game of baseball than Jonathan Villar. If this were a list of those kinds of players, Villar would easily be in the Top 3, possibly even number one.

Villar came to Milwaukee by way of a trade with the Houston Astros prior to the 2015 season. David Stearns had just been hired as the Brewers GM and had previously been the assistant GM with the Astros, where he knew Villar well. So he brought him over to Milwaukee, who was in the beginning stages of a rebuild and had consistent playing time for Villar, something he no longer had with Houston.

So the Brewers sent Cy Sneed, a minor league pitcher, over to Houston to make the deal and the Brewers had their new shortstop for the 2016 season.

As the Crew’s shortstop, Villar had an excellent 2016 season and introduced himself quite well to the Miller Park faithful.

2016: 3.0 WAR

2017: -0.4 WAR

2018: 0.8 WAR

Total WAR: 3.4

Clearly, Villar’s best season in Milwaukee was 2016. He hit .285/.369/.457 with 38 doubles, 19 homers, 79 walks, and a 117 OPS+ that year and did an excellent job as the Crew’s leadoff hitter. He stole 62 bases that year, which led all of baseball. He was also caught stealing 18 times, which also led all of baseball.

Villar’s baserunning escapades were some of the most exciting, yet equally frustrating parts of that 2016 season. He was always looking to take the extra base, ill-advised or not, he was going for it. When he made it, he looked like a genius. When he was thrown out by 15 feet, he looked like an idiot.

A strong defender, Villar posted 5 Defensive Runs Saved in 2016 as a shortstop. But there was an even better defender down in the minors in Orlando Arcia, who came up late in 2016 and took over the shortstop job. As one of the best prospects in all of baseball at the time, Arcia was an easy choice over Villar at the position.

Still, after a productive year, the Brewers saw enough of Villar that they offered him a contract extension in spring 2017, with about $20 million in guaranteed money over an unknown number of years. He turned it down to bet on himself. He lost that bet.

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Villar moved over to second base, where he was nowhere near as strong defensively, and he also began to struggle offensively there as well. In 2017 Villar had an awful year offensively, which led to him losing his starting role and fans to grow even more frustrated with him.

Fans and coaches will put up with the frustrating blunders so long as a player is still being productive overall, but his -0.4 WAR in 2017 showed he wasn’t being productive.

Still, he had shown so much promise in 2016 that there was hope he could get back to those ways in 2018 and that 2017 was just a fluke. While Villar improved offensively and defensively in 2018, he still wasn’t close to his 2016 levels and the team had run out of patience with their contention window now wide open.

When the Milwaukee Brewers acquired Mike Moustakas ahead of the July trade deadline, the writing was on the wall for Villar. A few days later, the Brewers acquired Jonathan Schoop and sent Villar as part of the package going to Baltimore.

And so ended a turbulent tenure in Milwaukee, with Villar losing playing time once again, and being sent to a rebuilding team, where he can try to establish himself once more. Villar was replaced by Schoop, who was also frustrating for Brewers fans, but not for his baserunning blunders. He didn’t get on base enough to have any blunders.

Now on to another exciting, yet occasionally frustrating Brewers player.

36. OF Keon Broxton

In December 2015, the Brewers made a deal with the Pirates, acquiring the rights to minor league pitcher Trey Supak and young outfielder Keon Broxton in exchange for first baseman Jason Rogers.

2016: 1.7

2017: 0.7

2018: 1.1

Career WAR: 3.5

Broxton was called up to the majors during the 2015, seeing action in seven games with Pittsburgh. The trade gave Milwaukee a young, speedy center fielder who could swipe bases and had power potential. His first year in Milwaukee, Broxton, then 26, was showing fans why the trade happened. In 75 games he put up a .242/.354/.430 split with a .784 OPS. He slammed nine home runs, 10 doubles and had 23 stolen bases.

Broxton took control of the centerfield position in 2017, and had a career season with 20 home runs and 21 stolen bases. The issue he had though was striking out, as Broxton had 175 K’s to just 40 walks.

Most of Broxton’s value came defensively as he was fantastic at running down fly balls and robbing home runs with incredible speed and strong instincts. He had accumulated quite the highlight reel of those catches. However, it takes more than just being a fantastic defensive center fielder to start every day on a contending team, which the Brewers found themselves to be after 2017.

His .220/.299/.420 split was worrisome to the organization, so the team signed former Brewer prospect Lorenzo Cain to come back and man centerfield. Broxton played sparingly in 2018, never really getting anything going as he only appeared in 51 games, mostly as a defensive substitute.

In January 2019, Broxton was traded to the New York Mets for minor leaguers pitcher Adam Hill, second baseman Felix Valerio and major league pitcher Bobby Wahl.

35. RHP Shaun Marcum

In December of 2010, Milwaukee Brewers GM Doug Melvin announced a trade that would send the Crew’s 2008 first round pick, Brett Lawrie, to the Blue Jays in exchange for starting pitcher Shaun Marcum.

While Marcum’s tenure in Milwaukee was a brief two years, he played a big role in the Brewers successful 2011 season. Unfortunately, he also played a big role in why they were unable to advance past the Cardinals in the NLCS.

Despite playing only 2 full seasons with the Brewers, Marcum made a positive impact. In 2011, he posted a 3.54 ERA and in 2012, despite battling injury, he finished with a 3.70 ERA. Here are his WAR numbers in seasons he was with the Brewers

2011: 2.8

2012: 1.2

Total WAR: 4.0

Marcum made 33 starts and pitched over 200 innings for the Brewers in 2011.  He was a major contributor to the Brewers winning the NL Central that year.

In the playoffs, Marcum struggled.  The Brewers lost all three games in which he started. In Game Three of the NLDS against the Diamondbacks, he gave up seven earned runs in 4.2 innings.  Against the Cardinals in Game Two of the NLCS, he gave up five earned runs in four innings, and then in Game Six he gave up four earned runs in just one inning of work, which led to a Brewers series loss. Those numbers resulted in a 14.90 postseason ERA and would be the only postseason appearances of his entire career.

In 2012, Marcum battled injuries and the Brewers faltered as a team.  Zack Greinke was traded at the trade deadline. Due to being injured, Marcum was not traded. At the end of the season, the Brewers and Marcum went their separate ways. He would pitch for the Mets in 2013, and then various levels in the Indians organization in 2014 and 2015 before hanging up his spikes.

One positive to take away from Shaun Marcum’s tenure in Milwaukee was that Brett Lawrie never developed into the major league ball player many believed he could have been, despite a few decent seasons in Toronto. While the Brewers only got 1.5 seasons of production from Marcum, he did help solidify one of the best Brewers starting rotations in the 2010s and helped them win the NL Central.

34. RHP Junior Guerra

Over the decade, the Brewers have had several players that were claimed off of waivers who have played important roles on the team. Junior Guerra falls square into that category, having contributed over the last four years as both a starter and a reliever.

2016: 2.5

2017: -0.9

2018: 1.6

2019: 0.3

Total WAR: 3.5

Prior to his arrival with the Brewers, Guerra had only seen three games of major league action in his career. Most of his experience outside of that had been in the minor league systems of the Braves, Mets, and White Sox, as well as six years across various international leagues including Mexican League and Venezuelan Winter League.

So Guerra’s success with Milwaukee becomes even more unlikely when you consider that he came to the Brewers as a pitcher on the wrong side of 30 who’d only played in three games at the Major League level, those being with the White Sox in 2015. And yet, David Stearns took a flyer on him with his first move as new GM of the Brewers, and the move paid off right away the following season.

Though Guerra began the the 2016 season at Triple-A, his stay there was brief and he was called up to the Brewers on May 3rd. His first two starts weren’t exactly awe-inspiring, giving up eight earned runs over 12 innings, but things settled down from there. Injuries limited him to just 20 starts, but Guerra finished 2016 with a very solid 2.81 ERA and 1.126 WHIP, both numbers leading the Brewer rotation.

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That season earned Guerra the nod as 2017 Opening Day starter. Unfortunately, he would become the next in a series of Opening Day starters to parlay the start into a disappointing season. Guerra actually got pulled from that start with a calf injury, one that force him to miss almost two full months. The result was just 14 starts over 21 games and a 5.12 ERA – from best ERA in the rotation to worst in the course of a year.

Guerra’s 2018 season started as a solid bounce back as one of the better arms in the rotation. His first 22 starts saw him compile a respectable 3.40 ERA and 1.29 WHIP. However, a 4.30 FIP suggested regression might be in his future and that’s exactly what happened. 18 earned runs over four starts between Aug. 15th and Sept. 2nd proved that theory correct and, with the Brewers in the middle of a division race, Guerra was moved to the bullpen for the remainder of the season.

A funny thing happened during that change in role, though. Guerra’s five bullpen outings at the end of the year were all scoreless. Between those and two more impressive outings in the postseason, it seemed like Guerra might have found himself a new home. In 2019, the Brewers kept him in the bullpen where he proved to be one of the team’s most consistent relievers last season.

Guerra pitched in 72 games for the Brewers in 2019 – second on the team behind Alex Claudio and tied for 8th in the NL. He finished the year with a 3.55 ERA and a 1.124 WHIP that qualified as the best mark of his career. His .191 opponents’ batting average was also the best mark of his career. All pretty decent numbers for a 34-year-old in his first full year out of the bullpen.

He had success as a starter, and now succeeds as a reliever. He got the final out in the Brewers playoff clinching win against the Reds because Craig Counsell wanted to give him that honor as Stearns’ first acquisition. He’s paid off in a big way and lands at No. 34 on our countdown.

33. LHP Brent Suter

Everyone knows this lovable guy as ‘The Raptor’, but Brent Suter has contributed a lot to the Brewers franchise in the three years he has been with the big league club. With his kind heart, funny personality, and skills on the mound, it’s no surprise that Suter was quick to become a fan-favorite.

Not only is he a great person, but he’s also a great pitcher. Here are his WAR numbers year-by-year since becoming a Brewer.

2016: 0.2 WAR

2017: 1.6

2018: 1.4

2019: 0.5

Total WAR: 3.7

The Milwaukee Brewers took Suter in the 31st round of the 2012 Draft. His first major league start was against the Seattle Mariners in August 2016. In his 2016 season with the Brewers, Suter posted a 2-2 record with 3.32 ERA. In 2017, Suter went back and forth between Triple-A and the Brewers, posting a 3-1 record, 4.32 ERA with the Sox, and a 3-2 record, 3.42 ERA with the Crew.

In 2018, Brent would spend the whole season with the Milwaukee Brewers, earning a spot in the back end of the rotation. He was pitching well, making 18 starts and had a 4.44 ERA. Most of the time, Suter could rarely make it past five innings because he started losing effectiveness as hitters caught up to his fast pace on the mound. But he began to have some outings where he made it six or seven innings and was really coming into his own. But then, a major setback.

In July, Suter would see his season come to an end with a torn UCL, becoming yet another athlete to receive Tommy John surgery. He would miss the rest of the 2018 season, where the Brewers made a postseason appearance, clinching the NL Central title, and would miss most of the 2019 season, returning in the month of September.

One thing that surprises athletes and spectators about Suter is how quick he is in between his pitches. Only reaching a maximum speed/velocity of 87.9 MPH, Brent Suter knows how to keep hitters off balance, and that’s by working quickly.

It’s safe to say that Brent Suter’s 2019 season, though only lasting about a month, definitely proved that despite being out for a long extended period of time, he could return to the mound and perform like he never left.

He ended his 2019 season with a 0.49 ERA, going 4-0 on the mound and earning the NL Reliever of the Month award. He left this decade on a high note.

31. 1B Jesus Aguilar

Although no longer apart of the franchise, in the two short years the Brewers had with Jesus Aguilar, they were surely seasons to remember.

Making his major league debut with the Cleveland Indians in 2014, Aguilar has been around for a while, but didn’t get much of an opportunity in the big leagues until the Brewers claimed him on waivers. Here are his WAR numbers broken down by year:

2017: 1.0 WAR

2018: 3.1

2019: -0.3

Total WAR: 3.8

The Indians would place him on waivers prior to spring training in 2017 as he was out of minor league options. Shortly after, the Milwaukee Brewers claimed Aguilar for their open 40 man roster spot. After Aguilar put out a strong performance in 2017 Spring Training, he earned a spot on the Brewers’ Opening Day roster. In 133 games, he posted a strong .836 OPS with 16 home runs and 52 RBI’s, with most of his appearances coming as a pinch hitter.

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Aguilar would continue 2018 with the Brewers, covering for Eric Thames when he suffered a thumb injury. He thrived in the everyday role, going on a huge hot streak that carried the team in the first half. With 23 home runs in the first half, he was invited to participate in the Home Run Derby, and was voted a 2018 All Star along with his teammates Christian Yelich, Lorenzo Cain, Josh Hader, and Jeremy Jeffress. Aguilar would finish his 2018 season with an .891 OPS, 35 home runs, and 108 RBI’s in 149 games played.

Handed the starting role at first base in 2019, Aguilar got off to a slow start offensively and couldn’t really bust out of it. Thames started to heat up, took the role for himself, and Aguilar was due for a change of scenery.

2019 would bring Aguilar’s tenure with the Milwaukee Brewers to an end when he was traded for RHP Jake Faria from the Tampa Bay Rays as the Brewers were in need of some pitching assistance. Aguilar didn’t get much playing time with the Rays and was not included on their postseason roster.

In the time Jesus Aguilar did spend with the Brewers, he became a fan favorite and knew how to hype up the crowd and be a cheerleader from the dugout for his teammates. He was a lovable guy who made the most of his opportunity in Milwaukee and had some big moments. All his contributions land him at No. 31 on our countdown.

Stay tuned as we continue our countdown later this week as we close in on the top spot.