Do The Brewers Have Financial Flexibility This Off-season?
October 21, 2025
8 comments
I understand that we are a small market with a super rich owner but not a mega ultra rich owner.
I just wish Mark A would make an announcement and say “alright we’re going all in this season”, and then just blow a bunch of money in free agency on insane one year deals.
It would be so cool and is a fantasy.
It’s not how the world works, and knowing our luck the budget gets smaller because of the lack of TV deals. All these teams are losing tens of millions of dollars.
They probably do, but, I mean… I’m going to effort post here, hold on.
TLDR: How markets work
In general in MLB whenit comes to the discussion of financing it really comes down to a few things:
– What is the market power you have to sign top talent free agents
– What is the msrket power you have to trade+extend promising talent
– What is the market power you have to to extend promising home grown talent
– How many “shots” can you take
– What is your room for error/misjudgement
Those first 3 on various weights are what most people think of, that last one is sneakily the most important. Any asshole can identify a top player and pay them, but the stronger your finances are the more shots you can take and the more you can miss without sinking the team/organization.
The challenge of small markets that goes unstated is in those last two. Everyone focuses on those first three because theyre obvious, you can put a $ to it. You cant put as easily or communicate as freely the risk. This is where small markets lose.
So then, let’s talk about payroll. At the end of the day you have to start with a few assumptions:
– Owner net worth is NOT owner free cash
– A club is a business
– The business has a market
– Each market has an addressable market (easily gotten fan $s – local area or metro) and a max opportunity (various definitions, but if youre a VC youre saying all people globally, and if youre not an idiot you’re saying “people with Milwaukee or Wisconsin ties)
The ball club does not need to be profitable, but no one should expect that it wont be for a continued period of time. An owner COULD BE a good samaritan who will gladly lose money every year for a shot at something which to them is pure pride and status. But the long arc of history should tell you that this just isnt how humanity works – so let’s aside an assumption that an owner could spend more, for an assumption that an owner will spend more if there is a reasonable opportunity to do so, and will spend less if there is significant risk.
In general, a clubs revenues are determined by its addressable market + media deals, advertising, profit sharing (league growth), etc
Far and away the biggest component is ticket, merchandise, concessions, etc – basically you, a fan, buying in.
For Milwaukee, in game attendance is going to be some formula where the variables are
– Population
– Population density
– Cost of Living
– Logistics (how easy)
– Ticket prices (related to cost of living)
– Substitute options
– etc
The greater your metro population and the better you can convert that population to fans who will spend scarce $ on the Brewers vs alternates (Packers, Bucks, Badgers, theater tickets, concerts, etc… its just entertainment/social ventures) the more opportunity you have. The greater the economic conditions of the area, the greater the willingness to spend $ the higher you can charge on tickets. More opportunity
We can walk this out in a lot of ways, but the biggest variable here is simply population and population density. Fans in Madison are likely to attend fewer games than fans in Milwaukee. More over, the more fans in a geo area, the more likely you are to fill seats and maximize opportunity.
This is where the STRUCTURAL disadvantage of small markets and the MLB lies, which are often at the cross roads of:
– Lower population/density
– Lower cost of living (lower prices)
All of it impacts the top line number: revenue.
So when we talk about can the Brewers spend more? Probably. But it completely misses the point that we are spending more to lease an Audi. The Dodgers/Mets/Yankees/Phillies/Astros are spending more to to buy a yacht.
And if the team collapses and fan support shrivels, our revenues plunge and we hit a death spiral where our floor is *so much lower*.
Enough for another bite of the apple.
From 2018 – 2025 (excluding covid season) Brewers payroll has ranged from 109mil – 136mil.
Last 3 seasons it has been 129mil, 124mil, 121mil.
Brewers current projected 2026 payroll with all mutual options is 155mil.
If you decline all the mutual options it brings it down to around 107mil. (Woodruff, Quintana, Hoskins, Jensen)
Brewers should have 15 – 25 million to use this offseason, depending on the owner’s commitment.
Considering we only really need one bat, Hoskins coming off the books alone should give us the flexibility we need.
The free agents suck this year. I’d rather extend Contreras, Miz, and maybe Turang as Vets for the Made+Pena+Chourio window.
As long as we get a summer of family entertainment, doesn’t really matter? 🤷
Isn’t Rhys Hoskins 18mil or whatever it is, coming off the payroll?
8 comments
I understand that we are a small market with a super rich owner but not a mega ultra rich owner.
I just wish Mark A would make an announcement and say “alright we’re going all in this season”, and then just blow a bunch of money in free agency on insane one year deals.
It would be so cool and is a fantasy.
It’s not how the world works, and knowing our luck the budget gets smaller because of the lack of TV deals. All these teams are losing tens of millions of dollars.
They probably do, but, I mean… I’m going to effort post here, hold on.
TLDR: How markets work
In general in MLB whenit comes to the discussion of financing it really comes down to a few things:
– What is the market power you have to sign top talent free agents
– What is the msrket power you have to trade+extend promising talent
– What is the market power you have to to extend promising home grown talent
– How many “shots” can you take
– What is your room for error/misjudgement
Those first 3 on various weights are what most people think of, that last one is sneakily the most important. Any asshole can identify a top player and pay them, but the stronger your finances are the more shots you can take and the more you can miss without sinking the team/organization.
The challenge of small markets that goes unstated is in those last two. Everyone focuses on those first three because theyre obvious, you can put a $ to it. You cant put as easily or communicate as freely the risk. This is where small markets lose.
So then, let’s talk about payroll. At the end of the day you have to start with a few assumptions:
– Owner net worth is NOT owner free cash
– A club is a business
– The business has a market
– Each market has an addressable market (easily gotten fan $s – local area or metro) and a max opportunity (various definitions, but if youre a VC youre saying all people globally, and if youre not an idiot you’re saying “people with Milwaukee or Wisconsin ties)
The ball club does not need to be profitable, but no one should expect that it wont be for a continued period of time. An owner COULD BE a good samaritan who will gladly lose money every year for a shot at something which to them is pure pride and status. But the long arc of history should tell you that this just isnt how humanity works – so let’s aside an assumption that an owner could spend more, for an assumption that an owner will spend more if there is a reasonable opportunity to do so, and will spend less if there is significant risk.
Risk = low(er) revenues
Opportunity = high(er) revenues
In general, a clubs revenues are determined by its addressable market + media deals, advertising, profit sharing (league growth), etc
Far and away the biggest component is ticket, merchandise, concessions, etc – basically you, a fan, buying in.
For Milwaukee, in game attendance is going to be some formula where the variables are
– Population
– Population density
– Cost of Living
– Logistics (how easy)
– Ticket prices (related to cost of living)
– Substitute options
– etc
The greater your metro population and the better you can convert that population to fans who will spend scarce $ on the Brewers vs alternates (Packers, Bucks, Badgers, theater tickets, concerts, etc… its just entertainment/social ventures) the more opportunity you have. The greater the economic conditions of the area, the greater the willingness to spend $ the higher you can charge on tickets. More opportunity
We can walk this out in a lot of ways, but the biggest variable here is simply population and population density. Fans in Madison are likely to attend fewer games than fans in Milwaukee. More over, the more fans in a geo area, the more likely you are to fill seats and maximize opportunity.
This is where the STRUCTURAL disadvantage of small markets and the MLB lies, which are often at the cross roads of:
– Lower population/density
– Lower cost of living (lower prices)
All of it impacts the top line number: revenue.
So when we talk about can the Brewers spend more? Probably. But it completely misses the point that we are spending more to lease an Audi. The Dodgers/Mets/Yankees/Phillies/Astros are spending more to to buy a yacht.
And if the team collapses and fan support shrivels, our revenues plunge and we hit a death spiral where our floor is *so much lower*.
Enough for another bite of the apple.
From 2018 – 2025 (excluding covid season) Brewers payroll has ranged from 109mil – 136mil.
Last 3 seasons it has been 129mil, 124mil, 121mil.
Brewers current projected 2026 payroll with all mutual options is 155mil.
If you decline all the mutual options it brings it down to around 107mil. (Woodruff, Quintana, Hoskins, Jensen)
Brewers should have 15 – 25 million to use this offseason, depending on the owner’s commitment.
Considering we only really need one bat, Hoskins coming off the books alone should give us the flexibility we need.
The free agents suck this year. I’d rather extend Contreras, Miz, and maybe Turang as Vets for the Made+Pena+Chourio window.
As long as we get a summer of family entertainment, doesn’t really matter? 🤷
Isn’t Rhys Hoskins 18mil or whatever it is, coming off the payroll?