Brewers: Winter Meetings Shopping List For David Stearns

Early December is one of the most exciting times during the MLB offseason. Even though the weather starts becoming colder, MLB free agent and trade rumors tend to heat up each year during the Winter Meetings.

Much like we all make Christmas lists to provide to our loved ones for gift ideas during the holidays, here in this article I am going to present my shopping list to the Milwaukee Brewers for this year’s virtual winter meetings.

Although it is a rather short list, it is a list that fulfills two of the Crew’s current needs!

Pursue INF Ha-Seong Kim

Many fans would agree that the Brewers have most obvious area that needs to be addressed is third base. This makes the number one player on top of my shopping list 25 year old KBO superstar Kim Ha-Seong.

After a delay in medical paperwork, Kim Ha-Seong was posted on December 7th, 2020 and now has a 30 day window to sign with a team. In the past, the Brewers have been aggressive in signing players from overseas with Nori Aoki, Eric Thames, and Josh Lindblom being the most recent signings.

Although he has primarily played shortstop over the last seven seasons, Ha-Seong Kim has the arm strength to play third base and possess a very good combination of power and speed offensively.

In a 144 game KBO game schedule, Ha-Seong has hit anywhere from 19 to to 30 home runs over the past six seasons and he set his career high of 30 in 2020. From a production standpoint, he has over 100 runs batted in three of he last four seasons. Speed wise, he has recorded four seasons of 20+ stolen bases.

Kim has MLB superstar upside and is just 25 years old. While he likely is going to listen to offers for an extended period of time, if the Brewers could work some holiday magic and gift this young phenom to Milwaukee, then that would be a very successful shopping trip, even if he was their only purchase during Winter Meetings.

Brewers Need A First Base Solution

Aside from a third basemen, second on my shopping list is a first basemen.

While the Milwaukee Brewers did just tender a contract to Daniel Vogelbach last week, since then, it has become more and more apparent the the universal DH likely is not going to return for the 2021 season, although nothing is official yet. That being said, Vogelbach is not known to be a serviceable defense option for 162 games, so a first basemen is a rather pressing need as well.

The current free agent pool consists of players like Matt Adams, Mitch Moreland, C.J. Cron, and others. If you get creative, you could talk yourself into the Brewers transitioning Kyle Schwarber or Joc Pederson into their everyday first basemen, but these ideas seem like a bit of a stretch. But the Brewers do reportedly have interest in Pederson.

That being said, David Stearns may have to trade to acquire a solid first basemen and to fulfill this position. In 2019, the Brewers traded for Omar Narvaez just before the Winter Meetings.

With a great bargaining chip in Josh Hader to use, I’m sure David Stearns will be listening to all offers presented and waiting for one that absolutely blows him away, and the Crew’s first basemen of the future could be in that mix.

This is typically a very active time for Stearns so hopefully he can deliver this year as well by fulfilling the two items I have on my shopping list.