Brewers: 3 Extension Candidates Not Named Christian Yelich

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As spring training nears, so does the time when numerous players sign contract extensions with their organizations. Who could be extension candidates for the Brewers, besides the obvious.

By now, everyone in the state of Wisconsin wants to see the Milwaukee Brewers sign a contract extension with Christian Yelich and make him a Brewer for the rest of his career. If there’s any player that fans and front office personnel alike want to sign long-term, it’s Yelich.

However, that appears unlikely to happen this year, given the money he would ask for, the current payroll situation, and his current contract. There’s no rush right now, and it would make the most sense to wait until next offseason to begin extension talks with Yelich.

But that doesn’t mean there aren’t other players worthy of contract extensions that could see offers come their way this spring. Let’s look at three extension candidates not named Christian Yelich.

1. Brandon Woodruff

In 2019, Brandon Woodruff emerged from the chaotic mess that was the original starting rotation and had a great deal of success. Woodruff set himself apart from the group and established himself as the best starting pitcher on the team.

Woodruff posted a 3.62 ERA in 22 starts with a 10.6 K/9 and a 1.14 WHIP. His stuff is electric, with a fastball hitting triple digits from time to time, and a wipeout curveball to go along with a solid changeup. Bryce Harper compared him to a young Matt Harvey, with exploding stuff and being a really good all around pitcher.

Despite not getting more than 50 innings in the big leagues in each of 2017 and 2018, Woodruff made a huge impression in his 22 games in 2019. He’s the real deal out there on the mound and appears to be the ace of the club moving forward.

That makes right now a good time to sign him to a contract extension.

He doesn’t have the super long track record to immediately push himself into the “$20MM a year” category, but he can start earning some decent money and get paid closer to what he’s actually worth.

Let’s take a look at two other similar pitchers who signed extensions last spring: Aaron Nola and Blake Snell. Aaron Nola had three full seasons under his belt and was coming off an All-Star year and a 3rd place finish in Cy Young voting entering what would be his first year of arbitration. Instead, the Phillies signed Nola to a four-year, $45MM contract extension with a club option for the fifth year, potentially buying out two years of free agency.

Blake Snell was a year away from arbitration when he signed his five-year, $50MM contract extension with Tampa Bay last spring. Coming off a Cy Young winning season, the Rays bought out all of his arbitration years and one year of free agency, at the average cost of $10MM per season.

Brandon Woodruff is one year away from arbitration, like Snell, but Woodruff is a Super-Two player, meaning he has four years of arbitration to go through. The Brewers have control over Woodruff through the 2024 season at the moment. If they were to sign Woodruff this spring, it would need to be at least a six year contract to buy out one year of free agency.

Still, Snell got that big contract coming off a Cy Young winning year where he led the league with a 1.89 ERA in 31 starts. Woodruff is coming off a good season, but not that good. That means an AAV of $10MM is likely a little too high for Woodruff to reach at the moment.

Woodruff could put himself into that category or higher if he has another strong season in 2020 and continue his upward climb. If the Brewers wait to sign an extension with him, his cost could go up and make it more difficult to keep their homegrown ace around long-term.

While he will earn close to league minimum in 2020, Woodruff will be in line for a big payday in arbitration. By choosing to extend him, the Brewers will eliminate one variable in their payroll picture. By signing, Woodruff can reach his payday quicker and avoid another year of near-league minimum salary and long arbitration battles.

WASHINGTON, DC – OCTOBER 01: Keston Hiura Milwaukee Brewers (Photo by Will Newton/Getty Images) /

2. Keston Hiura

He had quite the rookie season in 2019. With the struggles of the Brewers corner infielders in the early part of the season, Mike Moustakas moved back to third base and paved the way for Keston Hiura’s call up to the big leagues. He did not disappoint.

The most hyped hitting prospect to come through the Brewers farm system since Ryan Braun back in 2007, Hiura was as advertised. He hit .303/.368/.570 with 19 homers and a 138 OPS+ with defense that occasionally made you want to pull your hair out.

Obviously, the Brewers will gladly take those defensive shortcomings at second base in exchange for a player with those kinds of offensive numbers. In 2020, Hiura will be the big bat that is in charge of protecting Christian Yelich in the lineup. Those two are the new 1-2 punch in the Brewers lineup and Hiura is key to the Brewers offensive barrage moving forward.

This is a guy the Brewers are clearly high on and do not want to see leave anytime soon. That’s why signing him to a contract extension now makes some sense. His track record isn’t very long, and they believe he’s an ascending player they want to build around.

This has happened a lot in recent years with big league clubs signing long-term contract extensions with their top prospects just as they come up to the big leagues and buy out a year or two of their free agency in exchange for a quicker payday. It’s the reason Christian Yelich’s contract is what it is right now. Guys like Eloy Jimenez, Brandon Lowe, Ronald Acuna, and Ozzie Albies were all very young players with around a year or less of MLB service time and signed contract extensions between 6-8 years.

The Brewers have six more seasons of team control over Hiura, but a seven or eight year contract totalling maybe around $50MM, give or take a few million, is something that I could see both sides agreeing to.

Acquiring players like Hiura once they are already in the big leagues is very expensive. The least expensive way to get these kinds of players is to draft and develop them yourselves and try to sign them to contract extensions when there are no other bidders driving up the price. This is the route the Brewers should take.

PITTSBURGH, PA – SEPTEMBER 17: Omar Narvaez Seattle Mariners (Photo by Justin K. Aller/Getty Images) /

3. Omar Narvaez

Frankly, outside of Yelich, Woodruff, and Hiura, there aren’t too many great candidates for contract extensions. A lot of veterans are signed on one-year contracts and most are coming off poor seasons with the Brewers hoping for a bounceback, which means at this stage of the game, it’s too early to determine who to bring back for more seasons.

One player who’s different from that group is Omar Narvaez. The Crew acquired him from Seattle just a few weeks after Yasmani Grandal signed with the White Sox. Narvaez is in his first year of arbitration, having settled with the Brewers at $2.725MM for 2020. He’s under team control for three seasons, through the 2022 campaign.

With the closest catching prospects having spent last season in High-A, the Brewers are a bit further away from their catcher of the future. Mario Feliciano and Payton Henry could end up proving worthy of the starting job one day, and likely before Narvaez’s currently scheduled time in Milwaukee is up.

But Narvaez is just 28 years of age and could still be a very good catcher for the next 5-7 years, not just the next three years the Brewers have him for. If you’ve got a good catcher, common sense says to keep him.

A left-handed hitter, Narvaez is one of the top offensive catchers in the league, blasting 22 homers last year and hitting .278/.353/.460 with a 120 OPS+ with the Mariners. For comparison sake, Grandal hit .246/.380/.468 with 28 homers and a 119 OPS+. Narvaez has just slightly lower power, draws fewer walks, but gets more base hits.

The issue with extending Narvaez already is that he has a lot of work to do defensively, particularly with framing, and while the Brewers are confident they can help him improve in that area, it’s too early to tell if that’s going to work.

It’s probably too early to extend Narvaez with the defensive flaws that he has and the Brewers will need at least a full season to determine if he’s improved enough to merit a contract extension. While it probably won’t happen this spring, an extension for Narvaez should not be ruled out down the road.

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The Brewers may or may not choose to start extension talks with any one of these three players this spring. If they do, Woodruff and Hiura make the most sense to sign to deals.

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As spring training nears, so does the time when numerous players sign contract extensions with their organizations. Who could be extension candidates for the Brewers, besides the obvious.

1. Brandon Woodruff

2. Keston Hiura

3. Omar Narvaez

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