brewtank34

Oh yes he will. Much Much worse things are going to be said to him now. Things that unfortunately will be said around children in the stands as well. It's going to get nasty.

The only thing that worries me is the abuse he's going to get from the fans. Fans can be ruthless and he's going to hear some pretty nasty stuff. No doubt that's going to stick in your head. It's going to affect him and he'll go in droughts more than usual this year. He'll end up with above average numbers IMO, but it's not going to be near his MVP capabilities.

Sure wouldn't mind seeing him get a hit this spring. Just sayin'

To me, I think it's just a matter of time (w/in the next 2 weeks) before we get the press release info with Greinke being extended. I think Greinke has appreciated the chances the organization has given him to assist with scouting other pitchers. I think he see's what the organization did for Counsel and he's going to want the same treatment. I think the organization is interesting in using Greinke's talents/brains long term as well. Greinke knows Mark A is a winner and wants to continue that trend. The fan base has been excellent towards him. Like I said....it's just a matter of time.

What's up with MLB Network not airing the game so far?

I'd be ok with a 3/14 deal for Ax.

I'm so glad we can finally stop pondering line-ups w/out Braun in there. What a great day for the Brewer Nation! Morgan/Gomez/Aoki Hart Braun Weeks Ramirez Gamel Lucroy Gonzo Pitcher

Never wavered on you Braunny!!! I'm not happy with MLB "vehemently disagreeing" with this... this will only lead to further skeptics on the matter, saying "Braun's still guilty". WAY TO GO #8!!!!! YAHOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

You're not alone. Makes sense how this thread has received over 100K views. C'mon Braunny!!!

I boycotted ESPN for 2 weeks after the Packers loss to NYG. I wasn't about to spend the lead-up to the Super Bowl watching that horrible excuse for a sports reporting network poison my ears with their nonsense and East coast love affair for NYG and NE. I didn't even watch the Super Bowl. 1st time I never watched the SB. Crazy! I digress... The boycott was actually quite refreashing. I was proud of myself for doing so.

Probably reset once the site got updated.

I remember when the news of this first came out and I thought to myself, "geez, having to wait till the end of January is going to seem like an eternity!" Hopefully, this ends soon, but it's looking like eternity is longer than I imagined.

Mods, please feel free to move this thread somewhere else, but I didn't want to place this idea in the "Predictions", "Braun" or "Line-up" thread as it deals with multple variables that would kind-of derail those other threads. In the prediction thread, Warning Track ignited a spark/question that maybe you all have some insight on. This got me thinking, basically what you're saying here is Braun is only worth 4 W's. Before reading this comment, I was under the assumption that the Crew will be just fine for the 50 games that Braun isn't going to be playing. I feel/felt that our Pitching rotation will keep us in the majority of the games and that our offense still has the likes of Weeks, Hart, Ramirez, Lucroy, Gamel.... I was under the assumption that the Crew will hover around .500 and once Braun comes back, we'll show our true colors. But now, after reading this, my eyes fixated on the "no suspension" vs. "suspension" records, and I'm more scared/nervous about this upcoming year if Braun is to be suspended. How can the loss of Prince AND Braun result in anything close to 90 wins? Our two best offensive weapons gone and I'm assuming that we'll be just fine. I fear I may have been drinking some bad kool-aide. I fear that Hart and Weeks may revert back to their swinging at foolish outside sliders with their eyes closed because the opposition doesn't have to worry about Braun and Prince. Ramirez will add some nice offense and protection for Weeks/Hart, but will it be enough? At this point, I'm assuming a 79-83 Win season. Please someone help me before I completely go off the "worry ledge". I want to get back to the "The Brewers will be just fine ledge" What are our legitimate (non kool-aide) expectations for a season without our two top offensive weaopons?

Player of the Year: The reigning MVP of the NL. Easy. 2nd choice is: Weeks, 2nd All-Star appearance. Pitcher of the Year: Yo Rookie of the Year: Aoki. I'm pretty excited to see what this kid can do. Most Improved Player: Gonzalez. Improved from his own stats, but improved in relation to the production of our SS position in general. Questions Answered: 1) Will Gamel be a liability or prove to be a reliable producer in the wake of Prince: He better! I feel he'll end up with a .265 avg, .310 OBP, 18 HR's and 75 RBI's. For a 1st year in the bigs, I'll take that. He'll show signs of improvement throughout the year. 2) Will Braun's production decline due to Prince leaving? Minimally. 2) What position in the NL Central will the Brewers finish? 2nd, Wild Card ( I want to say 1st due to having LaRussa out of the NL Central, but for now, I'll stick with the Wild Card) Record: 88 - 74

Maybe, maybe not. Braun's always been a stand-up guy. Bonds, Clemens etc....not the case. If Braun is able to convey that he is either completely innocent or somehow not a cheater (failed to notify MLB of a certain medication that is warranted), then I feel that the public is going to see Braun differently. At least, that's what I'm hoping for, so maybe I have some kool-aid eye glasses on.

Nope, I am holding out for a 25 game suspension as I've heard 50 games for a PED, 25 games for something other than a PED or possible failing to notify MLB of the medication. I could be wrong though and will have to re-read some of the posts in the other Braun forum.

JB, The loss of Fielder will definitely impact our offense. I agree with you that Prince definitely impacted how the opposing pitchers game-planned against the Brewers. However, we now have a pretty solid replacement (Aramis Ramirez) who is still pretty opposing to the opposing team's pitchers. We still have solid offense with Weeks, Hart, Lucroy, Morgan, Ramirez and even Gonzalez. I think you're being a bit over-dramatic with our pitchers. 6th in the NL in ERA? C'mon man. Greinke, Yo, Marcum have been stable top end of rotation pitchers for their whole career. Wolf was agruably our best pitcher the first half of the year and remained consistent throughout. Yes, they all have their bad games, but you can't say anything that will change the fact that our pitchers kept us in almost every game last year.....and that's with Greinke missing the 5 weeks of the season.

The only uncertainty is Gamel. Other than that, we know exactly what we have in every single one of the players on our roster. We know that Weeks, Hart, Ramirez will be our power guys when Braun comes back. We know that Braun will be an absolute stud when he comes back. We know what we have in Gomez/Morgan, Gonzalez and Lucroy. We know that our Starting Rotation is stacked. We know that our BP is stacked. I'm not sure what you mean by "this many uncertainty's" Our pitching rotation will keep us in the hunt until Braun comes back. Our offense is still stacked as well. If Aoki doesn't pan out, I'm sure DM will sign a veteran OF that can hold the ground until Braun comes back. We have good young pitching coming up. We have some decent position players that we can rely on in the future such as Gindl, Green, Schaffer, amongst many others that will be servicable MLB players. Do we have a Prince Fielder in our minors? Not at this time, but with the amount of offensive power that we currently have for the next 3-5 years, I'm not worried about power. We need pitching to stay relivent. DM is finally understanding this and is running this organization as such. I would not be surprised to see us extend Greinke. I would be surprised to see us extend Marcum (but hey, he was awesome until the late season breakdown...maybe another year of working out and getting his arm back to normal will help him become a dominant pitcher again). Seeing that our pitching and our offense is still Playoff built, I doubt that the Crew will be out of the race come July 31st which means that in most likelyhood, either Marcum and/or Greinke will walk at the end of the year and we'll get draft picks for them. If that's what it takes for the Brewers to get into the playoffs again, I'll take it. We have a great squad and it can make some noise come October.

The system isn't destroyed. The Brewers have 3 players in the top 100 prospect rankings, and a bunch of players who had big years last season. Also with the additional wild card team it will be easier than ever to make the playoffs. I believe that any team once in the playoffs can win the WS. So yes I would gladly trade prospects and sign Fielder to have a great chance to make the playoffs and possibly win the WS for the next 3-4 seasons. With the additions of Ramirez and Fielder, Green and Gamel would be blocked. Schafer is already blocked in CF with Morgan and Gomez there. Greinke and Marcum would net us some good draft picks if we let them walk to re-stock the system. Look, I don't think Greinke and Marcum are worth the money they will likely get, and I wouldn't give it to them. The Brewers finally have a good amount of quality pitching prospects in their system that will eventually go along with their offense, or that could be traded for a proven MLB top pitcher by next off-season. Many people were saying that the Brewers didn't have the prospects to trade for Greinke, but they did it anyways. We still have Greinke and Marcum for all of 2012. Also if the Brewers decide that they want to re-sign Greinke/ or Marcum and fail in extending them, then in 2013 they will be without Greinke, Marcum, and Fielder and will be forced to re-build in 1 year from now anyways. I'd go after Fielder, and let Greinke and Marcum walk. So, I'm in the majority that believe there is a 0.000000000% chance Fielder is in a Brewer uniform this year, but I'll play along with this scenario. If Fielder were to sign w/the Crew, we wouldn't be able to afford extensions to either Greinke or Marcum. We wouldn't just let them walk and not get anything for them, so we'd have to trade them at the trade deadline (I'd rather trade them and get more prospects than just a couple of draft picks for them both walking). But here's the thing, we wouldn't trade them at the trade deadline because we would need them for the Playoffs because with a line-up of Weeks, Braun, Fielder, Ramirez...etc etc combined with out pitching rotation, there would be no way we miss the playoffs. So...we'd up up having Greinke and Marcum walk. This would be an Epic Fail in my mind. Let's see how Gamel does.

BillShaikin Bill Shaikin I'm told #[/s]Brewers invited Fielder to return for 1 year so as to get mega-deal from new #[/s]Dodgers owner next winter. Boras showed no interest. Well, you can't say Mark A didn't try. This is all on Fielder and Boras. Wish you the best Prince. "you know"

I agree with it relying on the writers. The "system" is the writers.

Exclusive? Not sure about that. Larkin saw a 20% jump in his votes from last year. 20%. If he wasn't a HOFer last year, then what changed this year? Just because no one better than him was eligible this year doesn't make it right for the baseball writers to "all of a sudden" see how great Larkin was (and yes, I'm glad he's in, well deserved). The system is wrong, and it frustrates me. There should be a two year window to get in. If you were good enough to make it, then the voters should vote you in accordingly w/in that first two years of eligibility. That's what I call exclusive.

Lucroy is not even close to one of your 5 best hitters, why hit him 2nd? He has a .307 OBP over 2 seasons. He's had one month (April, 2011) where he had 50 AB's and OBP'd over .326. He's not a table setter. Last year, he might've been a good choice to move up in the order when McGehee, Gomez, and Betancourt were all hitting in front of him. He has a .307 OBP hitting in front of the pitcher. He's a contact hitter that will excell in front of Braun. That's why.

1st 25 games: Vs. Righties Morgan Aoki Weeks Ramirez Hart Gamel Lucroy Gonzo Vs. Lefties Aoki Lucroy Weeks Ramirez Hart Gamel Gonzo Gomez Post 25 game suspension Vs. Righties Morgan Lucroy Braun Ramirez Weeks Hart Gamel Gonzo Vs. Lefties Aoki (RF) Lucroy Braun Ramirez Weeks Hart (1B) Gonzo Gomez

But if the team keeps losing players like Sabathia and Prince Fielder to free agency, how much longer can the success last? It can be frustrating as a fan, but who really honestly expected Milwaukee to keep either of those two long term anyway? Sabathia was just a rental (despite the offer that had no chance of being accepted) and we've been saying "Fielder will be leaving at free agency" since about 2006. I'm more than happy that Braun, Weeks, Gallardo, and Hart have all been extended. Who could have envisioned such a scenario just five years ago?Well said. I agree 100%