batman

STARTING LINEUPS: Da Crew Brady Clark CF Rickie Weeks 2B Bill Hall 3B Carlos Lee LF Wes Helms 1B Chris Magruder RF J.J. Hardy SS Chad Moeller C Ben Sheets P Da Fish Juan Pierre CF Luis Castillo 2B Miguel Cabrera LF Carlos Delgado 1B Juan Encarnacion RF Paul Lo Duca C Mike Lowell 3B Alex Gonzalez SS Scott Olsen P Prettied up: Milwaukee Florida --------- ------- Pos Player HR RBI AVG. Pos Player HR RBI AVG. --- ------ -- --- ---- --- ------ -- --- ---- CF Clark, Brady 7 28 .316 CF Pierre, Juan 1 19 .262 2B Weeks, Rickie 4 13 .276 2B Castillo, Luis 2 17 .338 3B Hall, Bill 13 36 .280 LF Cabrera, Miguel 16 59 .340 LF Lee, Carlos 22 72 .271 1B Delgado, Carlos 15 57 .300 1B Helms, Wes 2 12 .287 RF Encarnacion, Juan 11 46 .283 RF Magruder, Chris 2 10 .225 C Lo Duca, Paul 2 33 .304 SS Hardy, JJ 1 16 .188 3B Lowell, Mike 3 32 .219 C Moeller, Chad 4 10 .194 SS Gonzalez, Alex 4 29 .278 P Sheets, Ben (3-6, 3.63) P Olsen, Scott (1-0, 3.86) SERIES PREVIEW: I made some formatting changes so check it out: www.brewerfan.net/ViewDai...portId=407 SCOTT OLSEN: He's only 21 and he does indeed have great stuff, but Olsen's ERA is a little deceiving. He's only made two appearances (one start) and he's given up two home runs and a 772 opponent OPS. On the other hand, he has fanned eight in seven innings. He's bound to have some trouble adjusting to the big leagues, I think, although he's certainly a grade-A prospect. Baseball America rated him the Marlins' second best prospect before the season and also indicated that he has the best slider in their system. He was drafted in the sixth round out of an Illinois high school in 2002 and has advanced very quickly. He spent 2002 in the Gulf Coast League, 2003 in the Sally League, and 2004 in the Florida State League. This year he opened the season with the Carolina Mudcats in the Southern League and went 6-4 with a 3.92 ERA and 94-27 strikeout-to-walk ratio in 80.1 innings before being recalled. He's never pitched in Triple-A. Let's go Brew-ers! ~Bill

How many knee-jerk reaction threads will there be after today's game? I'll go with seven, but five will be locked. Although it is a holiday weekend so there aren't as many people online as there would be on a weeknight. So scratch that. Five, with three locked. ~Bill

I'm sure glad Jorge didn't come in to start the seventh. Good job, kid. ~Bill

JORGE! Rejoice. ~Bill

Worst. Game. Ever. Heh, at least Jorge might get to pitch! ~Bill

Wise is EASILY our best reliever, he's the guy I want with tha ball in that situation. Good point. ~Bill

Argh. This must be what it feels like to be incarcerated at Guantanamo Bay. ~Bill

I think Lloyd Mclendon is an idiot, but you have to like how he's using his closer in the eighth inning here. Take notes, Ned. ~Bill

I love how Ned says to everyone who will listen that young players don't practice bunting in the minors anymore and it's a lost art and blah blah blah. And then he's surprised when he calls a bunt with one of said young players and he doesn't get it down. Yeah, it's J.J.'s fault... but if he's not comfortable sacrificing, stop calling for a sacrifice. Save us, Prince. ~Bill

This shotgun barrel tastes kinda oily, and it sure is a long way down from this ledge. Good thing I have a plastic bag tied over my head. *kills self* ~Bill

Did I mention Chad's amazing skillz at blocking balls in the dirt? 'Cause he's awesome at that, too. I'm not in a good place right now. Someone call a counselor. ~Bill

Moeller is awesome at throwing out runners trying to steal. I know the stats don't show it, but that's why you don't play the game with stats... you play it with people. Argh x 2,000,000. ~Bill

Why are we double switching to put Helms in at 3rd?? So what if the pitcher's spot is due up 4th, Santana isn't going to pitch the 9th, why not just pinch hit when the time comes? Logic? How dare you bring logic into this discussion, dog with a mouthful of bees?!? What the heck is going on? Did Ned and Maddux read about Dock Ellis' no-hitter and decide that it would be cool to try to manage a game on LSD? Yikes. ~Bill

Santana is sweet at stranding inherited runners, so Ned wanted to make sure he felt comfortable when he came in. Therefore, he let Phelps open the inning so the Pirates could get a few baserunners. Not only that, but then he double-switched so that Helms can come in and play defense at third. Because, you know, he's really great with the leather. **projective vomit** ~Bill

Goody, more walks. **vomit** ~Bill

I'm glad they didn't use JDLR today. With Sheeter starting tomorrow, there's a high probability that he'll be needed in long relief. How many innings does Sheets average per start... like three and a third or something? Good job, Ned. ~Bill

Nice, brettac! ~Bill

Victor is sporting the beginnings of a beard... I'm a fan of the new look. Now if he can only convince Double-D to bring back the full version of his Sharpie goatee, all will be right with the world. Good job getting out of the jam, Vic! ~Bill

Wonderful defense, guys. Really. **vomit** ~Bill

No prettiness today, but here are the lineups. Pirates: Matt Lawton RF Freddy Sanchez 3B Rob Mackowiak CF Jason Bay LF Daryle Ward 1B Jose Castillo 2B Humberto Cota C Jack Wilson SS Zach Duke P Brewers: Brady Clark CF Rickie Weeks 2B Bill Hall 3B Carlos Lee LF Damian Miller C Wes Helms 1B Geoff Jenkins RF J.J. Hardy SS Victor Santos P Wouldn't it be nice to see "Corey Hart RF"? http://forum.brewerfan.net/images/smilies/wink.gif ~Bill

I'm pretty stoked to see Duke pitch... he's only 22 and he's been pretty darned good at Indy this year. The weird thing is that he stopped striking out people when he got to Double-A last year and that's continued this season... he fanned just 66 in 108 innings with the Indians. In any case, I'm glad we're going to get a chance to see him in his debut. If the Pirates have their way, he'll be a staple of the Bucs rotation for a long time. ~Bill

Rickie = awesome. It's also awesome to watch Julio pitch when he's had some rest... 97-98mph fastball and that uber-wicked slider. He's good. ~Bill

That throw by J.J. was bad, but Helms didn't even try to catch it. It was a pretty routine shorthop... I wouldn't complain if he wasn't able to catch it, but he didn't even attempt to get his glove on it. Or if he did "attempt," said attempt was terrible. Thankfully, it didn't matter. ~Bill

Carlos ran into the padded wall down the left field line in the top of the first. He banged his left knee a little bit and the trainer came out and looked at him... Carlos stayed in the game and then he hit in the bottom of the first. He walked and then scored from first on Miller's double. He wasn't running real great, and Magruder replaced him for the top of the second. I don't think he's hurt badly... just a painful bruise, probably. But let's all cross our fingers. ~Bill

I did that myself... I'm going to try to write a perl script to format the USA Today lineups prettily... this will take too long to do manually every day. ~Bill