GAME05

for a team that has probably already gone over its budget this year, it seems like an extreme reaction to spend the money on cutting a player and signing a new one before we've even seen how he fares on the team.

not sure exactly where to find them, but you can also do a search for houses to rent if you don't want the resort or a motel. my folks rent out their house down there for about $80/day and i believe have some baseball player renting it every March.

Greinke doesn't know the city or the fans yet, either, so i could definitely see Melvin giving him some time to (hopefully) come to love it. right now we're just another team. it seems to me that the selling point about Milwaukee definitely isn't what it looks like on paper, but that for family-inclined players, it turns out to break the stereotypes and be a great place to live.

there must be a few players who are starting to realize that although agents like Boras are out to get them the most money possible, that Boras is also trying to get the most money for himself. and that means taking a pretty big risk on not getting injured to get the big FA payday. fielder turned down $100M from the Brewers to make $150M in free agency, but if he gets seriously hurt this year (sure hope not) he ends up finishing his career having made $20M. that's a pretty serious difference, especially considering the risk of a career injury is definitely present.

when you're dealing with mid- to low-budget teams, the quality of the farm system is indirectly proportional to the quality of the major league club. at least we have Marcum and Greinke through 2012. with a lot of first-round draft picks coming up, maybe that will only mean one or two years of futility before we see a few blue-chippers in AAA, ready to make the jump.

from the clips i've seen he has such a heavy fastball that batters just can't lift up very well. i'll take a correction from people who've seen more of him, but that's the impression i've gotten. he has the command issues that pretty much every young pitcher has, but it seems like if he's one of the rare guys who can figure that out and fix the problem, that the sky's the limit with him. as far as pitchers i'd like to see when i go to the ballpark, Rodgers would be my second-favourite after Marcum.

i'll only care when SI says that we had the #1 postseason. rankings like this remind me of every NFL draft, when the team that is awarded "best draft" is merely the team that trades up to grab an extra first-rounder.

after two surgeries, most players would leave the game, but it was really inspiring to watch the way you stayed with it and battled back not for a paycheck, but simply because you love the game of baseball. it's impossible not to root for someone like that. when you finally do return to Milwaukee, even if it's in another uniform, you'll be getting a standing ovation from me. class act.

i can't tell the difference if i get a bad haircut vs. a good one. and they always show me the job they did on the back of my head. i always figure the etiquette in that situation is to accept the mirror and smile as if i think it looks good, but i don't really even care.

i'm really crossing my fingers that we can get by with Betancourt and Counsel. at this point, i have no interest in depleting the rest of the farm system to trade for a SS.

not down on Saito at all, and we certainly have the pieces to give him a rest every other day. but i really thought the last rotation spot would have gone to a backup SS (since Counsel can't really play every day if needs be), or a backup CF. am i forgetting a name? Who's our backup CF?

eh, i can't think of a time where i could blame the quality of another team for the Brewers being bad. plus if it wasn't the Phillies being so good next year, then it'd just be another team that was.

"That's one magic loogie" is up there with the best.

the draft pick compensation expires in June, i believe. so SD could just wait until then so sign him to that one-day contract. plus that would give Hoffman a little extra time to find work if a closer somewhere happens to get injured. i'm really hoping SD signs him, even for a short period. he really deserves to have one last save in a San Diego uniform before he walks away from a HOF career. it didn't even look natural to see him in a Milwaukee uniform, though cool that "..played in Milwaukee.." will be on yet another plaque in Cooperstown in a few years.

Hawing has inadvertently made us relish-tray snobs.

Merry Christmas to my friends at Brewerfan! I truly look forward to visiting this site every day and always appreciate the advice. another year in which i've been able to give nothing or next-to-nothing, but never have my friends/relatives cared in the slightest, and that makes me feel great.

i think that making first-offense DUIs into severely-punished crimes goes too far and like it that they only involve heavy fines, a criminal record and alcohol counseling. as it is, to have a DUI on your permanent record has a way of severely harming a career as employers will hesitate at hiring someone with any kind of record. not a justification, but .08 is pretty easy to get to, and a level which you barely notice if you have a decent tolerance. i think that for 90% of the population, getting a DUI is a pretty big wakeup call and they won't get in that position again. repeat offenses are frightening, however, as they show a trend of doing it again and again until the eventuality of causing an accident. maybe there could be different DUI penalties based on the BAC you blow. like, blowing a .09 gets you fines and mandatory classes for a first offense, but blowing .25 is much much harsher. i think there's a difference of being moderately impaired and unable to drive versus being so drunk you can barely get your keys in the lock yet choosing to drive, regardless. the guy deserves the sentence he got, but i can find some sympathy for him. guy's obviously an alcoholic and doesn't have the decision-making abilities most of us do when it comes to alcohol, not like he's getting in his car saying "I don't care what happens." i don't picture him laughing in the courtroom about it. i knew a kid who drank and drove and ended up killing his best friend while he walked away unharmed. part of his sentence was to do community service for us, and the kid's eyes looked like his heart had been ripped out of his body. kid is going to have nightmares about that for the rest of his life. and from the solitude of his cell, this guy is probably going to, as well. so as i imagine this guy is already being tortured in his head, it's hard for me to stand and point a finger yelling 'monster monster monster.'

downer. this is like finding out it was all a dream. you're gonna at least wrap the olives in bacon, right?http://forum.brewerfan.net/images/smilies/smile.gif

is it wrong to quit a job specifically because it scheduled you to work Jan 1 (2-7 pm) and you really really want to watch the Rose Bowl. it also doesn't hurt that i live in TCU country and i'll get to be THAT GUY at the bar when i go to watch.

God be with her.

there would have been a lot less pressure for CC in New York than Milwaukee, ironically. in NY he's one of a handful of incredible players, but after the half-season he had here, we would have expected him to be 25-2 every season and pitch every third day.

i remember reading that Greinke had pretty much given up his slider at some point last year because he didn't want to tax his arm for a terrible team when he was also about to be traded. maybe if Milwaukee became a 90-loss team he might do that again, but that won't be next year. his relatively high numbers from last year don't bother me one bit. Greinke strikes me as a pitcher, who if he decided he was going to strike out the side, he'd strike out the side.

that's a good point. i'd imagine as the Brewers organization handles things with Greinke going forward, we won't want to thrust him into situations that could be overly uncomfortable, but at the same time, not want to treat him like he's an eggshell. i hope he really ends up liking Milwaukee and finds that it's the best place for him. certainly not a ton of cities to play in where you can work for an owner who truly wants to win, yet find yourself in quiet suburbia within 30 minutes from the ballpark.

did extremely well on an interview for a part-time recreation (my field) job near Austin, which i'm somewhat unlikely to take. also did very very well on an interview for a full-time Park Ranger job (my ideal job) in Southern Texas. summers there are 105 degrees + 90 percent humidity, so that'll be extremely rough to handle at an outdoor job, but the experience would be too good to pass up. i'd be leaving after two years with experience and a Master's degree into a better economy, so i'd be highly marketable. if i'm not offered the job, i think i'll head back to North Carolina. i think i made a mistake thinking i could handle summers in Texas, but i think they're actually going to eat me alive. North Carolina has a terrible economy for the recreation field, but i know someone who can speak for me for openings in Charlotte, and a favourite professor of mine there knows pretty much every hiring manager in the state, and would be able to speak on my behalf. at the worst, i have a job at a summer camp just about lined up. i'd be the at the same level as a bunch of 20-year-olds, but it'd still be good resume fodder for me. i know i can't make decisions based on friends (though i want to move back to NC in part because of them), but it stinks that my friend here was really excited to have me move down. now i'm working at night so we don't hang out, and then i'd end up moving out on him right after i get here. he's moving away in two years, which at least makes me feel a tiny bit better about it.

i saw this on mlbtr yesterday, so fortunately i didn't have the aneurysm that others had.