TooLiveBrew

He did at least one other national game earlier this season, too

He dragged his foot as he went by & might have even clipped it then. I guess it's karma from last night's game-ending double-play call with Ransom possibly being off the bag... ?

@Jackson 7, Huntsville 4 Huntsville Box A slow but steady offensive attack from Jackson tonight saw them score in 5 different innings en route to the win. Stars starter Evan Anundsen battled his way through 5 IP, allowing 11 H and 4 R (all earned)... along with a WP and a balk. The Generals didn't let up once they'd chased Huntsville's starter; reliever Santo Manzanillo issued a walk and a two-run blast in his inning of work, and R.J. Seidel allowed one run on three hits over the final two innings. DH Scott Krieger led the Stars with three hits (all singles), and he finished 3-4. C Anderson De La Rosa went 2-3 with one 2B, two RBI, and a HBP. 1B Hunter Morris tacked on another double (25) to his Southern League-leading tally, and finished 2-5 with one RBI. 2B Scooter Gennett and CF Josh Prince both went 1-5 with singles. LF Lee Haydel added an RBI via sac fly in the 4th inning. Huntsville PbP De La Rosa's double in the 6th inning was the centerpiece of the Stars' best offensive frame: Huntsville Top of the 6th -Hunter Morris strikes out swinging. -Scott Krieger singles on a line drive to right fielder Chih-Hsien Chiang. -Kentrail Davis walks. Scott Krieger to 2nd. -Pitcher Change: Moises Hernandez replaces Forrest Snow. -Anderson De La Rosa doubles (6) on a line drive to left fielder Chris Pettit. Scott Krieger scores. Kentrail Davis scores. -Lee Haydel grounds out, second baseman Stefen Romero to first baseman Eric Campbell. Anderson De La Rosa to 3rd. -Juan Sanchez pops out to first baseman Eric Campbell in foul territory. Huntsville Gameday

For the same reason Izturis wasn't DFA'd -- he has a Track Record™ as a professional

What a spectacular pitching matchup. Set your DVRs if you can't watch this one live.

If this Hernandez signing is in any way related to Marcum being gone long-ish term, and Melvin went with Grampa Levon over Thornburg... I don't think I'll be able to stomach this.

I only had DirecTV for a couple years, but this sums up my experience perfectly. Cable companies always push the 'what if it rains?' angle on satellite TV. What's funny to me is that, with cable, sometimes your picture will lock up or pixelate for no good reason, whether there's cloud cover or not. The signal issues for me with DirecTV were no worse (& quite possibly better) than with cable.

I like Target Field largely due to its location. If you're there on a beautiful summer evening, to me it's just awesome. The sun sets & reflects off the buildings downtown past the RF gate, and you have more vertically-aligned seating which I think is a cool aesthetic with the park plunked down next to skyscrapers. It just really had a "wow" factor for me. I love Miller Park, but they're very different aesthetics, if that makes sense.

Eh.....if Atlanta would turn it down then say Atlanta would turn it down. Don't say "that deal would be like...." and then enter some ridiculous trade idea that isn't nearly as fair as the other offer. I mean, Thornburg and Lucroy for Mike Napoli? Come on. Fair enough... fwiw, I used Napoli because I was restricting myself to the '13 FA list so service time would be the same as with Marcum. I realize Napoli with Lucroy involved makes the deal worse, which honestly didn't occur to me since I was trying to just come up with a quick comp. I do think that Marcum is being very much overvalued if the return is expected to be something like two young decent players with little to no service time. I just think it's farther-fetched than you do; I think you nailed it with that line. I'd definitely take Scott Podsednik's hitting line at SS for the next 5 or 6 seasons for Marcum right now. And I think I'd take Minor for Marcum too, but I haven't watched much of Minor at all.

Huntsville 4, @Jackson 3 Huntsville Box A Hunter Morris RBI single and two-run blast off the bat of LF Scott Krieger -- both with two outs -- in the first inning gave the Stars a 3-0 lead. Generals starter (and '05 Brewers 10th rounder) Steve Garrison settled in nicely, however, and tacked on six scoreless innings to his rough 1st. Jackson rallied back to tie, with single runs in the 3rd, 5th, & 7th innings. After a scoreless 8th, and one out in the top of the 9th, Kentrail Davis knocked a letters-high pitch over the rightfield wall to give the Stars the lead they wouldn't relinquish. Huntsville starter Josh Stinson was tough in six innings: 5 H, 2 R/ER, 2 BB, 2 K, and a stellar 13:0 GO:AO ratio. Oh yeah, and all five hits allowed were singles. Brandon Kintzler worked in relief of Stinson, and seemed to struggle. He allowed one earned run on three hits in 1.1 IP, but also hit a batter and was charged with a WP. Mitch Stetter finished off the 8th for Kintzler, allowing one walk but no hits or runs. Jesus Sanchez came on and completely shut down the Jackson bats for the save. Davis and Morris both finished 2-4, along with leadoff man CF Josh Prince. Krieger's only hit was the homer, but he also started off a 7-5-6 relay that nailed Jackson baserunner Leury Bonilla at third base to end the 5th inning (Bonilla attempted to go first-to-third on a single to left). Tommy Manzella, C Adam Weisenburger, and 2B Scooter Gennett also all went 1-4. Gennett & Morris both doubled. DH Domnit Bolivar and 3B Juan Sanchez went hitless tonight. Huntsville PbP Here's the kick-start 1st inning: Huntsville Top of the 1st -Josh Prince flies out to right fielder Chih-Hsien Chiang. -Tommy Manzella singles on a line drive to left fielder Kalian Sams. -With Scooter Gennett batting, wild pitch by Steve Garrison, Tommy Manzella to 2nd. -Scooter Gennett strikes out swinging. -Hunter Morris singles on a ground ball to center fielder Denny Almonte. Tommy Manzella scores. -Scott Krieger homers (1) on a fly ball to left field. Hunter Morris scores. -Domnit Bolivar called out on strikes. I mentioned that Jesus Sanchez didn't exactly take it easy on the Generals, & here's what I meant: Jackson Bottom of the 9th -Pitcher Change: Jesus Sanchez replaces Mitch Stetter. -Jesus Sucre pops out to first baseman Hunter Morris in foul territory. -Eric Campbell pops out to first baseman Hunter Morris. -Offensive Substitution: Pinch hitter Ralph Henriquez replaces Gabriel Noriega. -Ralph Henriquez flies out to center fielder Josh Prince. Huntsville Gameday

Fair enough, elite was too strong a description. I do think it is safe to say that Schafer is the 2nd best defensive outfielder in the Brewers organization and a pretty big upgrade over Morgan defensively. Don't get me wrong -- I know what you meant in saying "elite", but I think I'd describe him as having elite defensive instincts, with more average to above-avg. physical skills. Combined, I think saying only Gomez is better than him in the entire org. seems about right... but Aoki might be neck & neck with Schafer. I really think Aoki's defense doesn't get enough love. He's similar to Schafer in that he doesn't have the speed of a Morgan or (obv.) Gomez, but he takes good routes & seems to read the ball off the bat pretty well.

Oh I don't disagree -- but I think it speaks well to his character as a teammate & team-player that he's had no complaints. There are plenty of players who'd be pretty unhappy with being relegated to the playing time Morgan has coming off of the best year in their careers. I don't mean to imply the Brewers should just keep him indefinitely because of this, but more to highlight the team-first attitude of a player who the Brewers got on the cheap because of his supposed attitude problems.

Wasn't Clemens found "not guilty" regarding perjury charges, and his case about steroid use was a mistrial due to an error by the prosecution? I'm not sure if the NG verdict in the perjury case = NG regarding potential steroid use. Not saying I know for sure, but posing the question.

I don't think "elite" should be thrown around regarding Schafer's OF defense just yet. "Very good" or "getting 110% out of his skillset", sure. But Carlos Gomez he is not.

I wouldn't trade Thornburg straight up for Melky Cabrera or Mike Napoli. I wouldn't trade Lucroy straight up for either of them either. And I certainly wouldn't trade them both for Cabrera or Napoli. You are certainly entitled to your opinion of the Marcum for Minor and Pastornicky deal. But your trade is not even remotely similar to the trade proposed by cvollbrecht. The instant-refusal my "proposal" elicited is exactly what I was getting at. I didn't spend much time trying to find really accurate comps for Minor/Pastornicky, because my main point was that cvollbrecht's offer leans heavily in favor of the Brewers. Yeah, Minor's ERA this season isn't good, but that doesn't mean he's not still a good young arm. And while Pastornicky hasn't yet hit at the big-league level, he's only in his age-22 season & is hitting pretty well for a MIF for the second straight (partial) season at AAA... and at 22 is still pretty young for even AAA. Even if someone thinks that both Pastornicky & Minor (BB Amer.'s #37 prospect pre-2011) are overhyped guys who don't have much value (with which I obviously disagree), the Braves could do much better than just burning both of them for half of a season of a good but not great SP. Keep in mind, if the Brewers did receive these two guys in exchange for Marcum, they'd literally have team salary control over them each for the next 5 or 6 seasons. I can't see how anyone would realistically expect the Braves to think that's an even return. If the discussion is one of these two guys for a healthy Marcum, then imo we're in the right ballpark. One other thing to keep in mind, if we're factoring in organizational 'situations' or depth, is that the Braves are really cash-strapped at the moment due to an ugly ownership situation. So the young cheap guys have arguably even more value to the Braves right now than they do the Brewers. I realize this situation is counter-intuitive, in that Atlanta's the much bigger market & has a history of sustaining higher payrolls. But the reality in recent years (& very much kept under wraps, in terms of the national baseball conversation) is that the current Braves ownership is getting ready to sell the team before too much longer (iirc after the end of this season), & has been/is keeping payroll low.

Why would the Braves be interested in half of a season of Marcum for a combined 12 or so seasons of cost control of two young players like Minor & Pastornicky? That's like proposing the Brewers deal Thornburg and Lucroy for a rental of Mike Napoli or Melky Cabrera.

One thing I don't think has really been discussed in this topic (apologies if my eyes missed it) is how accepting Morgan has been of his role this season. Even very early in the season, before it became an issue that Morgan wasn't really hitting, Nyjer didn't have anything to say about his diminished playing time. I think a lot of veteran players, coming off of a season like Morgan's '11, would've been none to happy to be slipping down the depth chart... and especially behind a guy who'd never even played in MLB in Aoki. Morgan has had a team-first attitude about his role, and has adjusted well enough to it that he's done pretty well at the plate for a guy who's getting very part-time playing time -- since the start of May, he's hit to roughly his career norms. The only way the kind of redundant OF depth the Brewers have can work is if guys are accepting of their roles. And to Nyjer's (& Norichika's... & Carlos's...) credit, he's definitely helping make it work.

I'm a little surprised by how few here have been to Target Field. Go! It's really a wonderful park, & not too far away.

Most BF.netters probably already know Kalle's backstory. If not, check here & here (warning: the first link tugs at the heart-strings). I happened to already be going to one of the games on Kalle's schedule -- Aug. 18 v. PHI -- and I figured I might as well ask him if he'd been invited to a tailgate. I was just assuming he'd have already had an offer, but no one had asked him. He also mentioned that he was very excited to experience a real Miller Park tailgate, so I knew this had to happen. None of the details are in place yet, but we welcome any & all BF.netters who wanted to join! Again this is August 18th against the Phillies (gametime of 6:10p). The tailgate starting time will be ultimately up to Kalle & his wife, but I'd guess sometime in the early afternoon would work. I've already been planning to make sure the grill features 'the sausage race', and we'll have plenty of Wisconsin beer on hand. So please RSVP here, and/or share any suggestions!

Ok, cool. I didn't know if the BF mods would want a sticky topic or not -- but I'll start one now & let you work your moderator-sticky-magic.

I realize your post most likely came before this move, but in the Brewers' view, apparently Lance Roenicke to WI was more important than Reed staying at WI. To say that's disappointing doesn't accurately sum up my feelings on the subject. And yes, of course I/we can never know 100% of what goes into these types of decisions, but I see a lot more long-term value in continuing to challenge Reed. He was holding his own at BC so far, there was no reason to drop him all the way down to Helena imo.

I have to agree on Target Field being amazing. The only downside is no roof, but with a roof you lose part of the aesthetic that helps make TF so special.

Vizquel is the interesting case where his glove/defense is one of the best MLB has ever seen, & the question is whether or not he hit enough to get in. I'd say flip a coin on him, but I think I lean "in".

Ditto. The two of them are no great shakes, but they're both clear improvements over Izturis.

I didn't see many at 95 or 96, but that was on the TV broadcast. I'm not suggesting that everyone should agree & label him a RP -- I sure won't. But if this is where the RP comments are coming from in prospect reporting, I just see why now. There's no reason he can't be a big leaguer; like Tedaldtada mentions the changeup was a strong looking pitch. If it matters, I felt the meatballs TT laid over the plate tonight were a result of him being spent more than simply that he missed his spots. I understand you don't pull the guy after 5 solid innings & just 85 pitches or whatever he was at. But he looked spent to me by the 6th. Nothing to be ashamed of in your MLB debut.