Milwaukee Brewers Trade for New Starting Shortstop Willy Adames

At the beginning of April, the Milwaukee Brewers traded Orlando Arcia to the Atlanta Braves, giving Luis Urias the proverbial keys to the shortstop position. Urias has had a few big hits and is fourth on the team in OBP but has a below-average OPS+ of 89. Meanwhile defensively, he has been up and down this season and has really struggled as of late, logging four errors in a two-game span, giving him nine on the season.

This created not only enough concern throughout the Brewers’ organization to acquire another option at shortstop, but by trading with the Tampa Bay Rays for Willy Adames, they’ve brought in a full-time starter, relegating Urias to a “super-utility” role as President of Baseball Operations David Stearns called it.

While Urias has taken his lumps this season, this move still came as a huge surprise–I mean, we are only six weeks into his tenure as the Milwaukee Brewers’ full-time starting shortstop. However, the 25-year-old Adames does give the Crew a massive upgrade defensively at the position. Adames was +8 in Defensive Runs Saved (DRS) in 2019, +2 in 2020, and is currently +2 this season. For reference, Urias is -3 in DRS at the moment and is tied for the most errors by a shortstop in baseball this season.

Adames also carries a better bat with a career slash line of .254/.320/.420 and an OPS+ of 103 since entering the big leagues in 2018. In about half as many games, Urias has a .648 OPS and an OPS+ of 76 since 2018. Adames would go on to flash some power in 2019, hitting 20 home runs, and during the shortened 2020 season, he finished the year with an OPS of .813.

This season, however, hasn’t been so kind to Adames at the plate. He is currently batting .197 with a .625 OPS and is striking out nearly 36 percent of the time–and this is something that has been an issue for much of his short career. Adames has a career strikeout rate of almost 30 percent and a walk rate of 8.5 percent.

In order to acquire Adames, the Brewers had to give up two bullpen arms in order to do so. Milwaukee would send Drew Rasmussen and JP Feyereisen to Tampa as part of the trade. Rasmussen has pitched in 17 innings this season, posting a 4.24 ERA and a FIP of 3.86. Feyereisen has appeared in the most games this season out of anyone in the Brewers’ bullpen and has a 3.26 ERA with a 4.13 FIP over 19.1 innings.

In addition to Adames, the Brewers will also be getting back right-hander Trevor Richards, who will be used out of the bullpen here in Milwaukee. Richards has a 4.50 ERA and a 3.40 FIP over 12 innings this season, along with a strikeout rate of 34 percent and a walk rate of just 6.4 percent, according to Fangraphs.

With no immediate options in the minor leagues to help at shortstop, the Milwaukee Brewers once again went to the trade market to try and address what has become a revolving door. In November of 2019, the Brewers would trade with the San Diego Padres to acquire Urias and Eric Lauer. Then about six weeks ago, they’d trade Arcia to Atlanta for two bullpen arms only to trade two different bullpen arms to Tampa Bay for Adames.

This is a Brewers ball club that currently sits two games below .500 with an offense that has been sputtering for quite some time. Let’s hope that the addition of Adames can at least provide some stability at shortstop moving forward.

All stats via Baseball Reference and Fangraphs