Brewers: 3 players the team lost faith in too quickly

2. Trent Grisham

To make one thing clear right off the bat, I don’t think the Trent Grisham trade was made because of the error in the Wild Card game or even necessarily that they “lost faith” in him. But he was a budding prospect that had finally arrived and before he could establish himself, the Brewers sent him to San Diego in that infamous trade.

Grisham and Zach Davies went to the Padres in exchange for Luis Urias and Eric Lauer. Urias was the shortstop for a little while, but has since been demoted to the utility infielder while Lauer has been a sometimes good sixth starter.

Meanwhile, Grisham has continued to blossom with the Padres and has turned himself into a star out in centerfield for San Diego. Grisham won a Gold Glove in 2020 and in 2021, he’s hitting .301 with six homers and a 156 OPS+

Despite having two highly-paid centerfielders on the current roster, the Brewers have been lacking offensive production out there this year. Lorenzo Cain has battled injuries and hasn’t been hitting like his 2018 self and Jackie Bradley Jr. has been stumbling out of the gates with just a .154 average and a 38 OPS+.

This trade wasn’t necessarily about the Brewers giving up on Grisham, but rather trying to address the shortstop position with the addition of Urias and dealing from a position of strength in the outfield. With Cain under contract for a few more years beyond 2019, Christian Yelich returning from a knee injury and Ryan Braun still under contract at the time, there wasn’t a spot for Grisham.

In hindsight, perhaps they should’ve kept Grisham as the fourth outfielder and platooned him with Ryan Braun to get Braun his off days and then they could insert him as the everyday starter once Braun’s contract was up, giving him the full job here in 2021. Instead, they opted to address shortstop, which wasn’t a bad idea, but had to give Grisham up to do it.

The way the outfield is performing right now, it sure would be nice to have Grisham still on the roster.

3. J.P. Feyereisen

One of the most recent players the Brewers moved on from, is it possible the Brewers lost a little faith in J.P. Feyereisen when they made the trade with Tampa Bay?

The Brewers sent Feyereisen and Drew Rasmussen to the Rays in exchange for Willy Adames and Trevor Richards. They were having issues with Urias at shortstop and wanted to make a change, which one could argue was giving up on Luis Urias too quickly, and dealt two key arms from their bullpen to do it.

Since then, Adames has sparked the offense, but the bullpen has been lacking depth in key innings.

In his two outings prior to the trade, Feyereisen gave up six earned runs in just 1.1 IP with three walks allowed and just one strikeout. This was after he went his first 17 outings without giving up an earned run. Did the Brewers feel perhaps Feyereisen wasn’t as good as his start to the season would indicate and that he would soon come crashing down to Earth and they should trade him while his value was still high?

We may never find out if that actually was the case, but getting traded after coming off his two worst appearances of the year at least makes things look that way on the surface.

What has Feyereisen done since the trade? Well, he’s only become the closer for the Rays and put up a 1.08 ERA in 8.1 IP with nine strikeouts and three saves.

If the Brewers did believe those two poor outings prior to the trade were a sign of things to come, that hasn’t been the case.

No matter what it was, it would be very nice to have Feyereisen in the Brewers bullpen going forward. Having Adames is great, but there’s a big hole in the bullpen now.

More often than not, David Stearns and the Brewers don’t lose faith on players too quickly, and give them enough opportunities to fully know what they have in them. They want to avoid a Jesus Aguilar or Trent Grisham or J.P. Feyereisen situation as much as possible.