Proposed Brewers Willy Adames replacement has upside, but shouldn't be only move

The Milwaukee Brewers are preparing for life without Willy Adames and have a ton of different options to replace his production in the coming season (and beyond). While we've touched on the internal and external options the Brewers have at their disposal, MLB.com's Mark Feinsand has offered another potential fit for the club.

Per Feinsand, third baseman Yoan Moncada could be a player the Brewers target to replace Adames' production, or at least some of it. Since they play different positions and have different skillsets on the offensive side of things, there are quite a few differences between the two players, but Moncada has shown upside over the years and proven why he was at one point a top prospect.

Moncada, 29, is on the free-agent market for the first time in his big league career. After joining the Chicago White Sox in the infamous Chris Sale trade with the Boston Red Sox, Moncada played eight years in Chicago, posting a few solid seasons but enduring multiple injury-shortened ones in the process.

Yoan Moncada makes sense for the Brewers, but only to a point

The Brewers would be able to land the nine-year veteran on a cheap "prove it" type of contract, which would certainly attract the club that typically finds themselves in the bottom-half of the league in total payroll. Even if it's a low-cost deal, there's still a bit of risk.

For starters, Moncada has appeared in over 100 games just four times in his career. He had an OPS+ north of 100 (league-average) in just two of them. Otherwise, he's either been on the injured list or severely underperformed when he was healthy enough to take the field.

Since he's still young and he's shown some promise in the past with the White Sox, it's safe to say that Moncada would be worth taking a flier on. He's only a few years removed from hitting .263 with a .787 OPS for the 2021 White Sox and he put together a strong 12-game stint for the White Sox this season before an early injury wiped out the rest of his year.

The Brewers have multiple different avenues to go about upgrading their roster, but Moncada makes sense for this roster - to an extent. Signing him would need to be nothing more than a complementary move and it'd have to go alongside another more significant transaction, perhaps going after a bigger power-hitting fish on the open market.

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