The Brewers farm system was gutted heading into the 2011 season but it looks like some help is on the way. The Brewers are going to be able to take advantage of the final season of the old compensation rules and they’re set to pick up a few draft picks because of their recent decisions. They offered Prince Fielder and Francisco Rodriguez arbitration and it’s expected that both will turn them down to test the market. That means when the two sign elsewhere, the Brewers will get four rock solid draft picks because both are Type A free agents. You wonder how losing these two guys is going to effect Brewers tickets sales.
The odd man out is Yuniesky Betancourt, who wasn’t offered arbitration. Takashi Saito was also a Type A free agent but because of the way his contract was set up, the Brewers weren’t allowed to offer him arbitration.
The Brewers have quite a few big name free agents. The two guys they trade for last year, Zach Greinke and Shaun Marcum, will be free agents. Randy Wolf could be in that group but the team has yet to decided on his $10 million option. If things get crazy, you could see a radically different rotation in 2012.
