RockCoCougars

I'll have to remember these next time that I want to go as a poster for Halloween.

I agree with most of what you said here, expect for possibly your explanation for why the Brewers have had a mediocre season so far. The starters have been average in terms of ERA, the offense in terms of runs scored have been a little better than average. The bullpen is near the bottom of the pack in terms of ERA. You called the offense, "inconsistent", which is a claim made against the Brewers pretty much every year. I don't really know the answer but has the offense really had a higher spread in runs scored per game than expected? The Brewers pythagorean record is in line with their actual record, so i think their problem is that they are just getting outscored in general. I've been wondering about this. It seems to me that the offense is very inconsistent... more specifically they have problems scoring more than 3 runs (nearly half the time). Obviously it's a somewhat correlated stat, but they are 6-28 when they fail to score 4 runs. Outside of doing the calculations manually, is there anywhere that you can find a team's standard deviation for runs scored per game? I'm guessing that the Brewers are relatively high when compared to other teams. They just seem very feast or famine to me. Looking at BR, they've actually had more games with 8 or 9 runs scored than 4 or 5. That seems way out of whack.

I hope that's true. I tend to think of Michaels as a clown, but I'd have to think that he has some connections within the organization. The Brewers need to get Greinke to the table now. If he doesn't accept that or something close to it, then you think about trading him if they look to be out of contention in a month or so (I'd say that 5 games back at that point would be the cutoff).

ever since the 0-10 loss to the cubs, the brewers havent lost a game by more than 3 runs, with 6 of 8 by 1 run. Yeah. Without bullpen meltdowns we could be talking first place with a sweep. That said, the Reds have been having bullpen issues of late also. I'm not ready to concede the division just yet. Obviously getting swept would be a disaster, but I really feel that if they can get even 4 runs a game, they should be able to win the series. I'm good with 2 of 3 and a 5.5 deficit. While the July schedule doesn't look to be quite the cakewalk on paper that June did, there are lots of home games and/or beatable teams. Time for the offense/bullpen to step it up now that the rotation has.

With Gallardo and Greinke both going, and Arroyo pitching on the other day, I don't think that 2/3 would be a miracle- I actually expect it. The Reds are playing poorly and the Brewers have been in every game for the past two weeks right until the end.

Huge series to say the least. Before it started, my goal was a 3-3 road trip, taking 2 of 3 in Cincy (though I have to say that I'm disappointed that the Brewers couldn't get one of the weekend games. The Reds are really floundering right now, so winning the series isn't a stretch.

Fifty hits a year is a major stretch at this point if he is a part time player. Even if he was able to accomplish that, we'd be looking at Spring 2015 as a target date. In my view, the only way that Vizquel is going to get to 3,000 is if someone is desperate enough to give him a regular job next season and if he can stay healthy enough to hold it. Two huge ifs.

7. Zack Greinke, RHP, Brewers - When teams ask about his availability, they are getting “not yet’’ from Milwaukee, but the fact is, he will be available as soon as they hear the right offer. Greinke is due to be a free agent, and there doesn’t seem to be any chance of the Brewers signing him long-term. As one NL general manager said, “If you take him on, you have to know what he is. He’s not an ace, but a middle-of-the-rotation guy who can pitch quality innings and games for you. That’s why it’s tough to give up a lot for him.’’ I guess that Greinke is an 'innings eater' then.... To me, this sounds more like something that a Boston writer (who considers Milwaukee flyover country) pulled out of his rear than something that an employed GM would say.... either that or they confused Greinke with Randy Wolf.

In my view, Vizquel has no shot at 3,000 hits. His glove has kept him around for the past several years, but he barely plays shortstop anymore in the sparing playing time that he gets. I think that he's at the end of the line, and I've actually been surprised that he's found work the past few years.

That's an interesting opinion and I would say it's the complete opposite of conventional thinking on this issue. Most would say that cruising through quick innings is easy on the arm and that it is the long innings with high pitch counts that are difficult. Actually I would agree with Roenicke on this one, and this is coming from a guy who thinks that pitch counts are pretty much bunk. Cruising through innings is easy on the arm, but sitting for ten or fifteen minutes and restarting is not. Regarding pitch counts, I don't understand why 100 is a magic number. In the later innings, the difference between 100 and 120 is two or three pitches an inning.

I see it this way... Hernandez can't be worse than Perez. He's likely going to be used as a Suppan-esque 'innings eater', a 'mop up guy'. He will probably be the fifth or sixth guy in the pecking order, and is likely to pitch in games where the Brewers are behind. Right now, the Brewers have no relievers who seem to be able to go more than one inning, hopefully Hernandez can pitch 2-3 innings if necessary. Now I reserve the right to change my mind on this, if RR starts running him out there in the 7th inning in tie games, but I don't think that's going to be his role.

Then it was basically like the Nowitski/Traylor deal. From what I remember, that was the second year that high schoolers entered the draft. KG went the year before and went 4 or 5, I believe. Then Kobe and O'Neal went mid first round in '96. I believe that McGrady went in the 8 range the year after Kobe. I remember there being a bit of hype about Kobe, but that was such a stacked draft that there were a lot of hyped guys. Teams didn't start taking the H.S. players at the top for a few more years. Back then, mock drafts weren't everywhere (usually the only one that I saw was in the paper the morning of the draft), so I'm not sure where Kobe was projected to go, but it wasn't extremely high.

He might get the average over the Mendoza line by the break.

This move smacks of the Luis Cruz situation to me. Watch another team snap up Maysonet and then Izturis will get hurt again. I think that Maysonet is superior offensively and defensively to Izturis (I know not saying much) anyway.

Oh wow, the double whammy. He's from Seattle and Selig 'stole' his team. Being somewhat up on the history of the Pilots, the fact of the matter is that they would have moved to somewhere else if it hadn't been Milwaukee (probably Dallas). The ownership group was drowning in debt, and had no money whatsoever. No one local wanted the team either. Back in those days, with tightwad owners squeezing every cent out of their teams, there was no way MLB would have taken over ownership of that mess to wait for a new stadium/new local group in Seattle. So we have that and the fact that little Jimmy finally got his dream beat writer job covering the Twins for the Pioneer Press. Evil Bud swept in again, and tried to extinguish that dream with his dastardly contraction plan.... never consider that Carl Pohlad, a billionaire, was a skinflint and actually went to Selig (his good friend) suggesting the contraction of the Twins (most likely in an effort to blackmail the taxpayers into building a new stadium for him, but I digress). In the end, Caple covering anything Brewer related is akin to me writing a piece on the relative merits of Billy Beane and Theo Epstein. Never mind that Selig hasn't owned the team for a decade or so. I don't blame Caple for being bitter over losing his childhood team, but he needs to remember that he's a writer, not a fan. That said, ESPN isn't exactly known for their objectivity. If this little stunt creates a blip of controversy in the LeBron/Sandusky/Casey Martin/Tiger Woods/Lance Armstrong ocean, all the better. It draws traffic to the website.

What is the point of Izturis anymore? Ransom looks like Cal Ripken at the plate compared to him.... and that's scary, because he's hitting like a buck-sixty himself. I'm sure that Green will go down with Ishikawa coming back. As I said above, there is really no need for Perez whatsoever. Isn't there already one open spot that hasn't been filled as of yet (Thornburg's spot)?

I see the Corey Hart situation as fairly similar to the Geoff Jenkins one a few years back. A pretty productive guy who came up through the system, seems to enjoy playing in Milwaukee and belied that by signing an extension before hitting free agency. Hart will also be roughly the same age Jenkins was when his deal ended. Jenkins was the odd man out in Milwaukee because of Braun and ironically Hart. As we stand this time, I don't really see any young studs ready to take over right (or first for that matter) for the foreseeable future. Jenkins also had a worse history of serious injuries than Hart and seemed to age worse because of it (not to mention he is reportedly one of the guys on the 'unconfirmed list'). I'd certainly be open to offering Hart an extension, but I'd probably wait until the off season to start pursuing anything, to see how things play out for the rest of this season and in free agency.

I say that because it would have taken more money than a straight $28.25 for 3 years to get Wolf. How do we know that? It's not like Wolf was a hot item. As far as I can remember, the only other team that showed any interest in him at the time was the Mets. I'd have been fine with a mutual option with no buyout, but I can't believe that the option year and the buyout would have been a deal breaker. Same with Suppan. Did they really need to add that 5th year buyout for him? Now I'm not panning the Wolf signing by any means, because it actually worked out much better than I expected. I thought that it may turn out to be a disaster and I was wrong. That said, the Brewers need to be cautious about giving long term deals to guys who are not in huge demand (especially with their previous teams). They need to start signing guys who other teams are interested in as well (cough... Greinke).

Hopefully if true, Livian will fill the 'Dave Burba' role. This way, there is a guy who might be able to step in for an emergency start or two and can actually pitch more than two innings out of the pen. Personally, I'm tired of hearing the 'taxed bullpen' excuse, and there is absolutely no reason for Perez to be on the team.

http://t3.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcRFDLBX8bBqWZyuLfVd4XOElAtGB19sZJmS36ORnOvQGghkyYIJXA

The Cousin's pork sub commercial has been incredibly irritating to me while watching games recently.... all Cousin's commercials actually. BTW: I'd be stunned if Sandusky walked on this, but if he did, he'd probably wish that he was in prison (no way would he ever be part of the general population).

What am I missing on this Pastornicky guy? I see his name tossed around all the time here, but he did not impress earlier this season, and he really hasn't hit in the minors. Is he just someone seen as a warm body at shortstop who's fairly young or what?

With all due respect to his recent turnaround, Wolf is not worth $8 million per. I might consider bringing him back on a much reduced incentive laden contract under the right circumstances, but that depends. On a related note, I hope that Melvin doesn't give out buyouts to any more older pitchers. Between Suppan, Riske and Wolf (if bought out), that has to total $4-$5 million just to make guys go away.

Saw an interesting 'factoid' type thing this morning. The Detroit Tigers have not had one player suit up for them as an active player that would go on to the HOF since Al Kaline played his last game back in 1974. What are the odds of that?

OK. He's went as far as he can.