Brewers, Chase Anderson on the same page for 2019

In the midst of all the handshakes and hugs in the Milwaukee Brewers’ clubhouse following the team’s National League Championship Series Game 7 loss to the Los Angeles Dodgers on Saturday night, Chase Anderson promised to arrive at spring training as a brand-new pitcher.

Pressed for more details, the right-hander said simply that reporters would have to wait and see.

It was a tough final month for Anderson, who made his last start for the Brewers on Sept. 18 against the Cincinnati Reds, was skipped in the team’s season-turning sweep in St. Louis the next week and then found himself excluded from the roster for both postseason series.

Anderson, who turns 31 on Nov. 30, entered 2018 hoping to build off a career season in 2017 in which he went 12-4 with a 2.74 earned run average and WHIP of 1.09 while allowing only 14 home runs in 141 1/3 innings.

Things didn’t turn out that way, however.

Although he did avoid injury and make a career-high-tying 30 starts, Anderson finished 9-8 with a 3.93 ERA and WHIP of 1.19 in 158 innings. His biggest bugaboo was the long ball, as he allowed a National League-high 30 homers, and his penchant for rough first innings – 6.30 ERA and eight homers – was a head-scratcher.

Anderson wasn’t alone in his postseason exclusion; Zach Davies, another accomplished starter, struggled with injuries and inconsistency and was added to the NLCS roster only after Gio Gonzalez was lost to a high ankle sprain in Game 4.

It was obvious Anderson was disappointed by his fall from favor – especially at a critical time of year – and in the Brewers’ season-ending news conference Tuesday at Miller Park, general manager David Stearns was asked if the sides would need to mend fences before next year.

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“We made sure we talked to Chase and got on the same page before he took off,” Stearns said. “Chase is a competitor. Frankly, he pitched pretty well for the majority of this season.

“I know he was disappointed he didn’t get a chance to pitch on the big stage in the postseason. We understand that completely. We would expect nothing less. Chase is also a good teammate and he’s ready to get back and contribute next year.”

Anderson signed a two-year, $11.75 million contract with the Brewers last Oct. 26 that will pay him $6 million in 2019 and includes team options for 2020 and ’21.

Wait and see: Numbers shouldn’t be an issue with regard to starting pitching when pitchers and catchers report to spring training Feb. 13, especially considering youngsters Freddy Peralta, Brandon Woodruff and Corbin Burnes all appear to be well-positioned to join the rotation.

That should help ease the pressure on right-hander Jimmy Nelson, who will be looking to return to action after having his shoulder reconstructed Sept. 19, 2017 and missing all of the 2018 season.

Nelson was in the midst of a career season in which he went 12-6 with a 3.49 ERA and 199 strikeouts in 175 1/3 innings when he blew out the shoulder sliding head-first back into first base after singling in an at-bat at Wrigley Field.

“First thing with Jimmy is making sure he’s healthy,” said Stearns. “That’s always going to be the first thing with any player coming back from an extended rehab and the complexity of injury that he had.

“He is going to go through a normal off-season. He will begin to ramp up his throwing program at the appropriate time like he has done in seasons past, and we will see where he is when he gets to spring training. If he is still pain-free and feels good, then we will ramp him up accordingly. If we feel like we need to slow it down a little bit and go at a more modest pace, then we’ll do that.

“The goal here is and always has been to get a healthy Jimmy Nelson back on a major-league mound, and we are focused on the health rather than the timeline.”

One reliever who figured to be vying for a spot in the bullpen but instead is out for all of 2019 is left-hander Quintin Torres-Costa, who had Tommy John surgery Sept. 13 after blowing out his elbow in the final series of the season at Class AAA Colorado Springs.

Torres-Costa is a classic left-handed matchup specialist and was very effective in a combined 43 appearances between Biloxi and Colorado Springs this past season with a 3-2 record, 1.31 ERA, 0.95 WHIP and 65 strikeouts in 55 innings.

On the cusp: Keston Hiura, the Brewers’ top draft pick in 2017 and their top prospect in 2018, is unquestionably the team’s second baseman of the future.

The 22-year-old hit a combined .293 with 13 home runs and 43 runs batted in with an OPS of .821 in 123 games between advanced Class A Carolina and Class AA Biloxi in 2018. Now he’s tearing up the Arizona Fall League, hitting .316/2/17/1.001 through the first two weeks and was just named that circuit’s player of the week.

Most important, he has remained healthy after dealing with a right-elbow issue that it was feared might require Tommy John surgery to correct leading up to the draft.

Will all that add up to Hiura potentially making his major-league debut next season?

“Look, I think it’s a possibility,” Stearns said. “I think we also have to recognize Keston hasn’t played a day above Double-A. So there’s a lot of growth left there for him.

“What we’re most pleased with Keston is he got through a full season and that the defensive growth and maturation on that side of the ball was there, and we have confidence he’s a second baseman going forward.”

Another player who could make his major-league debut next season is Mauricio Dubon, the Brewers’ No. 9 prospect.

A shortstop by trade, Dubon also is capable of playing second base. He was off to a terrific start at Class AAA Colorado Springs and in the mist of a 23-game hitting streak before tearing the ACL in his left knee in a base-running mishap.

“We anticipate Mauricio will be ready for spring training,” Stearns said. “He’s gone full force into his rehab. He’s done a great job. He was down in Maryvale for the entirety of the summer, most of the fall. Just went back home for a couple weeks and then will be back in Phoenix for the better part of the remainder of the off-season.“

Where do they fit: Stearns left little doubt that first baseman-outfielder Eric Thames is in the club’s plans for 2019, which is the final year of the three-year, $16 million deal he signed in November 2016. It also includes a 2020 team option.

Thames got off to a good start in 2018, leading the Brewers with seven early homers before injuring his left thumb making a play in the field. He underwent surgery, lost his job at first base to Jesús Aguilar, was miscast in the outfield and then wasn’t included on the postseason rosters.

Thames’s left-handed power is enticing, but he also has been streaky and strikeout-prone. In 234 games in two seasons with the Brewers, he hit .237 with 47 homers, 100 RBI and an OPS of 846. He also struck out 260 times in 829 plate appearances.

“Eric had a season that was a challenging season,” said Stearns. “He started off really well, he had an injury, and the guy behind him played really well and in many ways took his job. But (Thames) is a really talented player. He proved he was a talented player in this league for about a year and a half. That’s exciting for us.

“He’s going to come to spring training with a chance to gain meaningful playing time. We know that when he is in the lineup, he provides a really impressive, powerful force.”

One player the jury remains out on is second baseman Jonathan Schoop, who was a huge disappointment after being acquired just before the July 31 trading deadline. He hit just .202 with four homers, 21 RBI and an OPS of .577 and is arbitration-eligible for one final year, leaving the Brewers with a decision to make.

They could non-tender him, meaning they rented him for Jonathan Villar, a top pitching prospect in Luis Ortiz and another well-regarded minor-league infielder in Jean Carmona, or wind up paying him around $10 million for next year and hoping he returns to the all-star form he flashed in Baltimore in 2017 when he hit .293/32/105 in 160 games.

“That’s a discussion that we’re going to have to continue to have here over the next couple of weeks to a month,” Stearns said of Schoop, who just turned 27. “Obviously, Jonathan has proven that he is a quality major-league player.

“He has had really impressive stretches throughout his career, and unfortunately for both him and us, we didn’t see one of those stretches when he was a Brewer. We’ll sit down to see if we can determine why, and then we’ll go forward.”

Tom Haudricourt of the Journal Sentinel staff contributed to this report