In an extremely underwhelming move, the Brewers acquired right-hander Claudio Vargas for minor-league utility fielder/catcher Vinny Rottino.  Vargas will join the Brewers tomorrow in San Diego.

Claudio has only thrown eleven innings with the Dodgers this season, all as a reliever, but has posted a nice 1.64 ERA with ten strikeouts.  Prior to that, he compiled a 3.46 ERA in thirteen innings for Triple-A Albuquerque, so his arm is extremely fresh.  I would not obviously not expect anything under a 4.00 ERA in a starter role, but Claudio could provide a better stopgap than Mike Burns in the rotation.

It is unclear whether the Brewers will send Burns back to Nashville after this acquisition.  The Brewers promoted him late this morning because nothing else appeared to be in the works, but Doug Melvin throws a curveball and acquires the former-Brewer Vargas.  More importantly, the Brewers acquired a stopgap starter that did not cost anything important -- no offense to Vinny Rottino, who is a nice utility player.

I must admit that I am pleasantly surprised with the Vargas acquisition.  He is unlikely to be fantastic in the starting rotation, but his velocity has been up around the 94 MPH mark in his recent relief outings -- which suggests it will settle in the 90 MPH range as a starter.  Vargas at least has a higher upside than Kevin Correia in my mind and costs far less.