TooLiveBrew

I know this is specifically about the NFL, but does/could it have any impact on MLB? Obviously the article mentions that MLB has an antitrust exemption. Supreme Court denies NFL increased antitrust protection

This would be hilarious, and I'd bet the crowd would eat it up

In addition to the A-ball guys, Amaury Rivas is one that could be up as soon as this season, but probably more likely in '11. Mark Rogers isn't all that far away (though whether he can start or not is another story), and Willy Peralta -- admittedly an A-ball guy as well for now -- could be in the rotation by '12. Then the other A-ball guys, like you note, would probably follow. As for the Rays, I'd venture to guess that if LaMar had gotten them a postseason berth & bigger fan following, he'd probably have been able to retain his job. Here's a quote from (then new team president) Stuart Sternberg, who fired LaMar: "It's not good enough any more -- and maybe it was 20, 30, 40 years ago -- to say: 'Hey we're a baseball team, come out and see us play.' ... You've got to give people a reason to come,' Sternberg said. "And most importantly, you've got to give them a reason to come back." I think Melvin has absolutely been a huge part of giving Brewers fans a reason to come to the park, & a reason to come back over his time here. Without that, I'm sure he would have already been fired. It's not exactly a gold standard of comparison, but I think you have to consider when you comment that the Rays axed LaMar, that they reached 70 wins once in his tenure (averaged just under 65 wins). Melvin has done a far better job (10 wins/season more on avg. over the same number of seasons), which is part of why I think most calls for his termination have either too short a memory, not enough patience, or both. I definitely get the beef people have with Melvin, most specifically in your nicely-phrased comment about the floor v. the ceiling. I also want to see him focus more on ceiling than floor. But I guess the reason I want to see him get more time is that I think the organization has already shifted in that direction via the draft. And, aside from trading for power arms (which as has been noted by others, is hard to do), an org. like the Brewers is going to have to draft & develop them, but that takes time.

6 years ago Melvin was already two season into his rebuild so I think of it as generous to not count them. This team is on pace to lose a 100 this year, 90 is assuming they improve. What would it take for Melvin supporters to switch? 10 years of these results, 15 years? Never? One organization that's been talked about a lot lately in comparison is Tampa. Tampa basically was built up from nothing, and took 10 seasons of averaging right around 95 losses to get to where they are today. So for me, yeah, I think 6 or 8 years isn't really enough in this instance, especially because the promising pitching in the organization is still a year or two away from MLB. Once you hit that 10 year mark, I would say it's pretty safe to say whether Melvin's work has paid off or not. Keep in mind that, in the meantime, he took the Brewers to the postseason for the first time in a long time, which has gone a long way towards rejuvenating interest & revenues. Tampa didn't get a playoff appearance until *after* 10 seasons (& still don't really have great fan support).

Even tossing out his first 2 years at the helm since the Selig's purposely drove the payroll and franchise into the ground Mevin's team will have averaged an 80-82 record over his last 6 years (assuming they lose 90 this year) and will have had 1 playoff appearance, 2 seasons with an above .500 record and an average division finish of between 3rd and 4th. That, to me, is actually a mark in favor of Melvin, given how woeful the entire organization was (esp. MiLB) when he took over. If you're examining him as a guy that's rebuilt or rebuilding a franchise, I think it's pretty safe to say that he's done very good work. Much of it is still coming to fruition, and I think the pitching that can/will arrive in the next couple of seasons will bear that out. I just don't think it's anywhere close to fair to assess him as though we've seen everything he can do. He started from almost literally nothing; it takes a lot longer to build up from there.

I'm curious to get others' takes on what Melvin's success with so-called scrap-heap guys is worth. He essentially picks these players up for free. This is just a list of guys off the top of my head: Axford McGehee Kottaras Estrada (Marco) Coffey Narveson Davis (first go-round) Podsednik (only on here bc he helped get Carlos Lee) Turnbow Clark Kolb Wise EDIT: added Coffey & Narveson

You have to take a look at Capuano by May 29th, though, due to the out clause in his contract (unless he agrees to delay it further)

I have no problem with people disagreeing with Melvin on fundamental strategy issues, or faulting him for not spending money efficiently on certain FAs & re-signings. But the revisionist history of, 'He should have known player X would fall off & sell high on him before that'**, & esp. the Sheets nonsense has to stop imo. If we're going to be critical, let's at least be objective. BREWCREW5 nailed it. Sheets did not want to re-sign here since the Brewers weren't willing to offer a multi-year deal (just like the rest of MLB). Melvin didn't miss the boat there, he made a wise decision on an oft-injured pitcher, and Sheets decided (because of that) that he wouldn't come back. Like PeavyFury said, if Melvin signs Sheets to, say, a 5-year extension, he gets slammed on here non-stop in 2009 (& if/whenever Ben goes down again with injury). ** Criticism of not selling high on players doesn't inherently bother me, but it's gotten to be a bit much lately it seems. Melvin doesn't have a crystal ball & cannot reasonably predict every player that will stay in top form & every one that will fall off, nor can any GM.

Well, he's been lit up by some, & handled some fine (like yesterday). I just want the #600 stuff to go away.

We were both wrong, at least according to MLB Gameday. It had that pitch as a slider in the upper right quadrant of the strike zone. Ah, human memory http://forum.brewerfan.net/images/smilies/smile.gif http://mlb.mlb.com/mlb/ga...lb_chnmlb_1&mode=gameday (at-bat was in the 5th inning) Man, Gameday is so sweet.

He hasn't ripped a inside corner/just off the plate fastball down the LF line once this year. I believe he did that earlier this season against the Cubs... I had his reaction to ripping (iirc) a fastball down the LF line at Wrigley as my avatar for a while.

I wish I could believe that Macha would use Trevor in save situations where he'd be facing the bottoms of batting orders, but I really doubt I can expect that. I'd love to see Hoffman used that way just to get him to #600 or #601 so we can stop worrying about him as someone with magical 'Closing Ability' & just figure out who our best RPs are & then use them as such.

That's not his line v. LHP, joepepsi, it's his line "vs LH Starter". I have no idea why Baseball-Reference made that part of the splits page so akward, but here's the explanation of "vs LH/RH Starter": Hart's splits as of today are v. RH: .220/.297/.451/.748 v. LH: .349/.420/.744/1.164

Everything I read & hear about Lawrie is that there's basically no way he sticks at 2B. He's probably going to be the RF of the future.

I doubt it was popular for Colorado to trade Holliday in 2008 either. That's not a good comparison at all. The Rockies dealt Holliday due to his impending free agency (traded after the '08 season so as to get more value from him than as a rental player), not just because they were selling high.

Cutter Dykstra – "Party In The USA" by Miley Cyrus This has to be explained. I'm too curious about it.

Yes but Winn is horrible. And so is Hart against righties, which is the role Winn was signed to fill. The Yankees are set in the OF now that Swisher is back.

You're absolutely right, my mistake. I was (incorrectly) remembering him only having 3 or so strikeouts in the 8 inning start, and then just assumed his K numbers were low. They're not great, but certainly not real cause for concern. I still have some reservations about how effective Cappy can be against big leaguers, though.

The concern I have with Cappy is that he isn't striking guys out. It's going to be hard to be as efficient in the bigs without strikeouts.

Maybe even the Yankees could be a fit Nick Swisher is their RF long(ish)-term, and he's back in the lineup tonight. And like you mention, they have guys to face RH & LH pitching in Winn & Thames. The Yankees would not be a fit. The mention of Tampa is intriguing though, given that they seem to make some sense as a possible destination for Fielder.

Hah, and she took him to the police station for clicking off his seatbelt as a kid? That's a bit strange.

Thanks brewjihad, I'm off to check that out

His curveball seemed slow too, almost like an eephus pitch. His curveball velocity has been roughly 70 mph for as long as he's pitched in MLB

Once again I am astounded by Brewer management. Last night Schroeder said Kottaras would be doing nearly all the catching because the Brewers "don't think Lucroy is ready"??? I'm reminded of TheCrew07's signature...

And that's yet another reason why swapping out Stetter for Braddock makes little sense. Just DFA Suppan already & be done with it.