ST LOUIS, MISSOURI – JUNE 28: Frankie Montas #47 of the Cincinnati Reds reacts in the sixth inning … [+] against the St. Louis Cardinals at Busch Stadium on June 28, 2024 in St Louis, Missouri. (Photo by Brandon Sloter/Image Of Sport/Getty Images)
The Milwaukee Brewers weren’t among the teams involved in a flurry of deals leading up to Major League Baseball’s annual trade deadline.
Instead, general manager Matt Arnold and his staff did their wheeling and dealing early, adding a trio of pitchers to a staff that has battled through an onslaught of injures that has left the Brewers’ rotation in shambles and forced the bullpen into working overtime in order to keep Milwaukee atop the NL Central Division.
Notably absent among those acquisitions was a front-line starter. The Brewers were among the teams rumored to have interest in Detroit’s Jack Flaherty, who ultimately went to the Dodgers.
The Brewers also were thought to be on the hunt for some left-handed offense with Christian Yelich on the IL with a back injury but no such deal came to fruition.
Still, Arnold is confident that the deals Milwaukee did make — along with the plethora of players expected back from the injured list over the next few weeks — will be enough to help support a deep playoff run.
“I think we certainly believe in the group we have, first and foremost,” he said Tuesday after the deadline had passed. “And then also the ability to add multiple starters, starting with Civale and then Frankie, and then also a reliever that we like a lot in Mears.
“Yeah, I think we accomplished what we hoped to this deadline.”
Whether or not the moves play out as intended remains to be seen. In the meantime, here’s a look at the players Milwaukee received and the reasoning behind the three players Arnold and his staff did add to the roster:
RHP Aaron Civale
Not counting veteran left-hander Dallas Keuchel, whom the Brewers acquired from the Mariners’ minor-league system and made three starts before being designated for assignment, Civale became the Brewers’ first major acquisition of the season when Milwaukee sent two prospects to Tampa for the right-hander.
Civale was in the midst of the best season of his career (5-2, 2.34 ERA) when Cleveland dealt him to Tampa at the deadline in 2023 but he finished out the year with a 5.36 ERA in 10 appearances for the Rays and was 2-6 with a 5.06 mark in 17 starts for Tampa this season.
The Brewers, though, saw enough in Civale’s perephials to make a move and while he’s yet to return to that 2023 form (4.29 ERA, 1.429 WHIP, 4 starts), he’s provided some stability — and innings — to a rotation that had been lacking both.
LHP Nick Mears
Mears, 27, wasn’t having the best season in Colorado where he’d posted a 5.56 ERA in 41 appearances but came to the Brewers with a 1.80 ERA over his last 12 outings thanks to the discovery that he had been tipping his pitches, a revelation that came to light when an opposing player told one of Mears’ Rockies teammates.
“I would say I’ve definitely had a few implosion innings, but it also doesn’t help that I was tipping pitches for a month and a half and I was never told,” he said. “Hitting is hard, no matter how you put it, but I think it’s a little easier when you have an idea of if it’s a fastball or an offspeed pitch.”
Mears provided the Brewers a badly-needed boost for a bullpen that has been ravaged by injuries, a need that became even greater just hours before the trade when left-hander Bryan Hudson became the 13th Milwaukee pitcher to land on the IL this season.
“It came together really quickly,” Arnold said. “The ability to access that type of arm, we felt like it made a lot of sense. We’ve obviously had success with our bullpen here to this point, and [we] felt like adding another good arm like Nick Mears was something that would continue to help our staff as well.”
Adding to Mears’ appeal: he’s under team control through 2027.
He made his debut Monday night in Milwaukee’s 8-3 victory over the Braves, striking out two batters in a scoreless ninth inning. His second time out wasn’t quite as sharp; Mears allowed back-to-back home runs Wednesday in a 5-2 loss to Atlanta.
RHP Frankie Montas
Montas’ numbers are far from impressive (5.01 ERA, 1.44 WHIP) and the ancillary numbers aren’t much better. Still, with five pitches — including three different fastballs — in his arsenal, combined with the Brewers’ penchant for finding ways to help pitchers improve not to mention the emotional boost that comes when a players makes a 10-game jump in the standings and finds himself pitching for a team with plans for a deep October run, Arnold is confident that Montas will be able to flip his script.
“We spent a lot of time on it,” Arnold said. “He’s in front of a different defense here, in a different ballpark, a different environment, and we really like the stuff. And Frankie, I talked to him yesterday, and he’s really excited to be a Brewer.”
Montas also has something few members of the Brewers pitching staff can claim: postseason experience. He’s made three playoff appearances in his career, twice with Oakland in a 2020 Wild Card series and another with the Yankees in the 2022 ALCS.
“We want to have that kind of pedigree and experience in a postseason type of environment.
“We think he checks a lot of boxes.”
Montas is expected to make his Brewers debut this weekend when the team travels to Washington D.C. to face the Nationals.
