Milwaukee Brewers: Recent deadline trades for pitching
By Kenny Jilek
2018: Joakim Soria
Acquiring a reliever from the White Sox worked out so well in 2017 that the Brewers decided to do it again in 2018 with Joakim Soria. Soria was having one of the best years of his long career before the trade deadline and with the White Sox well out of contention, they decided to give him up for two young pitching prospects in Kodi Medeiros and Wilber Perez.
Soria did not continue that same success in Milwaukee. He wasn’t bad by any measure, just not the electric arm that the Brewers had hoped to add to an already dominant trio of Josh Hader, Corey Knebel, and Jeremy Jeffress.
He did not let many runners on base, with a low WHIP of only 1.09, but those runners would come around to score more often than almost any other time in his career. Of the six teams he had played for up to that point, his 4.09 ERA with the Brewers was the worst total for any team. If it wasn’t for the down season he is having with the Oakland Athletics, with an ERA of 4.75, it would be the worst mark he’s had for any team. He is now 35 years old and possibly showing signs of slowing down.
In the playoffs, he dominated in the NLDS against the Colorado Rockies. He appeared in all three games, only allowing one hit and no runs while striking out five batters. He even picked up the win in the Brewers’ game one walk-off win.
The NLCS was a different story. He made four appearances, but only got six outs in those four appearances. He gave up four earned runs in the series, giving him an inflated ERA of 18.00 for the NLCS. His struggles were part of the reason the Milwaukee Brewers couldn’t quite get back to the World Series.
Overall, it wasn’t a horrible trade. He did some good things and got some big outs, including a strikeout of Javy Baez in game 163. Unfortunately, he couldn’t do enough against the Los Angeles Dodgers to finish the job and the Brewers went home.