jjfanec

They just got a catcher for Lowell. Not sure how good he is. Buchholz if traded, will be the center piece for Adrian Gonzalez not Gamel. We would need a lot more that in my mind.

Aumont might have been a reliever last year but I read where other teams thought he would be a starter again. If he ends up starting he is a very, very good prospect. Many questioned moving him to relief to begin with and I will be interested to see where he ends up. The CF with no power was good enough to play in the Futures game last year. He still posted an OPS of .916 last year with 14 triples and and OBP about 100 points higher than his average

Getting one of the best pitchers in the game at a bargain price?I do not think 3 of your best prospects for a one year rental is a bargain price. Aumont is a better prospect than the rankings suggest because other teams see him as a starter not a reliever.

I think our board would have been livid if 3 of our top 7 prospects for a one year rental of Cliff Lee. Especially when the Mariners might are not really one pitcher away from a deep post-season run. Also I am not too sure our board would have loved giving a big contract to a speed player like Figgins who is over 30. Not a bad signing, but definitely not outside the box. If they sign Cliff Lee long-term it is a better trade but if they dont, it is like the CC trade with one more top prospect, a half year more, but Milwaukee was right in the think of the playoffs (and a Ben Sheets injury away from being very dangerous). I am not saying Jack Z is doing poorly by any means. I just think the grass is always greener. I mean the reason Melvin has to go and sign guys like Wolf is because Jack only drafted one major league starting pitcher so far and I guess Parra but whether he deserves a spot remains to be seen.

This a great example. Now Wisconsin is not Northwestern, but they are closer to them than most Big Ten schools. People who think grades do not matter for college athletes at all big time schools are flat out wrong.

Ding Ding. By all means, UW should be proud of how selective they are in admissions. But that doesn't have anything to do with athletics. There is, and will always be different standards for athletes, and those are no more difficult than almost all BCS conference schools. So the constant harping on some sort of academic superiority with their athletes is a farce. Like I said, they admitted guys like Boo Wade, Ron Dayne, and Booker Stanley. Marcus Landry was no genius out of Vincent either. They routinely hide guys in "majors" like agricultural journalism. So having some guy on a messageboard imply a MU player is either learning disabled or used illegal help to qualify really pisses me off. This is just not true. Sure athletes have different standards but certain colleges still have higher standards for their athletes than others. Look at Notre Dame and Stanford. It is constantly talked about how those two schools cannot get the same players others schools can. The Badgers quit recruiting Maymon when the saw what his grades and test scores were. They knew he could not get in. That is pretty well known. Also look at the amount of junior college players each team has brought in. Bo Ryan has brought in one that I know of, but Marquette has had many more. Juco players are much harder to get into colleges and that is why Wisconsin does get many of them. This is not Wisconsin Badger fan elitism. It is the truth of how recruiting works. Some schools can get players in that others cannot. It is not saying Marquette is Memphis, they are a good school but their restrictions on athletes are just different. Now schools can get athletes in who are not at the same academic level as the average student but there are different lowered standards for each institution. I love the Badgers and will root for Marquette more often than not. But to say the admissions level on each team is the same is wrong. Just like it is to act like Wisconsin is like Harvard and Marquette is like a community college. They are close but their standards are different.

How could any of the Marquette fans be complaining about the officiating? Hayward walked 3 or 4 times before finally getting called for it. Not to mention his complete hack job on Leuer that got called a block. I thought it was a pretty evenly called game. Bad calls both ways. Also, Maymon has a long way to go to be Blair. His shot is not pretty. Teams should just foul him at the end of games if he is in there

Has there been any link to the Brewers being interested in Correia? Or is it just a thought people on this board have had?

This is certainly true, but over the past two seasons, Harden's avg. fastball velocity has dropped. From 2004-'07, his FB averaged right around 94 mph. In '08 & '09, it sat at 92 mph. He could certainly regain some of that velocity, but I'm not sure that's likely. Regaining velocity is another reason why I'd like to see him pursued as a RP in 2011... but that's me rambling now.Exactly my thought. I think that Harden would be a great closer, which is one reason that I would have offered him three years. His stats the first time through the lineup are very good, plus he would only need two pitches to close. My thought was sign him as a starter this year, keeping in mind he could succeed Hoffman in 2011 if he wasn't able to log enough innings in the rotation.I am not saying that it would definitely not work, but a guy with arm injuries and arm fatigue problems like Harden may struggle being able to pitch two or three days in a row. He would be great as a reliever if he could stay healthy and strong over a full season

I'm fond of the career 3.39 ERA and 1.24 WHIP. Spectacular pitcher. The difference between a special player (Harden) at a team-friendly contract (1 year, $7.5 per) and a pedestrian player (Wolf) at 3 years, $9 per is such a monumental difference. It's like the deals happened in two totally different environments, yet they happened on the same day. I can't fathom it. Paying a premium for 200 innings of merely average/good pitching instead of much, much less money for 140 innings of very good pitching makes no sense to me. We'd be far better off right now if we had Harden at 2 years, $14 million than we are with Wolf at 3 years, $30 million. It's heartbreaking. Harden is not spectacular. That is the biggest overstatement I have seen on this board in awhile. He was great with the Cubs two years ago, but last year with his 4 ERA and Whip of 1.34 is most definitely not spectacular. The two years before that he barely pitched. I know he strikes guys out a lot but he does so at the cost of walking guys and pitching very few innings. Wolf is going to you 7 or 8 more starts and unless Harden can duplicate his stats from two years ago even though over the last four he has done that once. Heartbreaking? Harden did not get 2 years at 14 million. They got him for 7.5 this year and an option for 11.5 million next year. Throwing out ideas like it was 2 for 14 million is just wrong. Harden is not the pitcher you have decided he is. His career numbers are mostly irrelevant because over the past 4 years he has had two injury shortened years, a great year (albeit injury shortened) and an good (albeit injury shortened) year.

What is with the love for Rich Harden? The guy has been special one of that last 4 years and even in that year he did not have more that 25 or 26 starts. He kills your bullpen. He will be on the DL at least once, probably, more during the season. Even if he does well he cannot finish a season strong because his arm wears down. His velocity was down at least part of last year. Cubs fans i know were happy to see him go. With the state of our rotation, ie lack of depth, we cannot afford a guy who more than likely with miss a good chunk of time with injuries. He has great stuff, no doubting but how can a guy who averages 6 innings or less per start, who wears down easily, and who will be on the DL at least once be considered special or the guy this rotation needed. I just do not see it. Plus stuff is great when you can stay healthy but he is lucky to be the later years version of Ben Sheets and could easily miss a lot of time.

I like this philosophy as well. Wolf is a safe bet to put money into. He may not have the upside of some of the others but we need a guy who can be a solid reliable pitcher who is not a huge injury risk. With Wolf in fold I think we have the opportunity to take a risk if we have the money.

I so tire of the "They shoulda made this debunked trade rumor." It was a rumor. That's it. And if you think Wolf's three year contract is a risk, what about trading a decent, veteran everyday player for a guy who may never take the mound again. How many World Series titles have the Twins won with this approach? I'm not sure why the Twins are held up as this great model when they manage to get bounced from the first round every year. They do some things right, but they, nor the Brewers, will ever win a championship without taking some risks. The Wolf contract is a pretty good one. Last year's staff was so bad, they had to sign somebody besides a high-risk, high reward guy. It would be great if they could bring in Duchscherer, Sheets and Mulder and have one or two of them work out. But their track records suggest none of them will. Wolf's suggests that he will be at least in average starting pitcher for the Crew this year and next. Melvin had to make a move for a guy like Wolf and then take some shots on guys like Mulder and Duchscherer. Indications are that he will do exactly that. It's unfortunate that the Brewers had to go this route and don't have home grown pitching help on the horizon. But comparing this signing to that of Suppan is just silly based on both past performance and pure stuff. I agree 100% here sarge. People love to fall in love with proposed trades that may have no validity or they like to think we have pulled off trades like the Granderson trade for pitching but I just do not see how we had the pieces for some of those trades. We are a terrible match in trading for a guy like Jackson because the Tigers wanted young pitching, and Scherzer would have been great but look at the pieces and see how we could match that. We have some good minor league talent but teams are not lining up to trade young pitching unless it is a guy who is coming off a bad year. That can work great, or it can back fire and to trade for someone you need to trade your talent as well. Wolf is much more projectable for a rotation that has too many question marks to try to fill through bounce back guys.

Melvin has brought Salome up a lot more when talking about his catchers the past two weeks from what I have seen. A lot of the Lucroy love fest lately has been from scouts or writers down covering the AFL. At least three have been tweets from different guys. Melvin has talked about Lucroy more but he has brought Salome up as an option more lately.

Why would Braun not be able to be in top 6 when he was 3rd last year and put up better numbers this year? I think it goes Pujols, Prince, Ramirez, one of the Phillies guys and then Braun.

I disagree, I think that the addition of Lackey would make them into a serious playoff contender. I would put Lackey and Gallardo up w/ the top of any rotation in the league.I agree with Yoshi here. While Lackey may cost more than is prudent to spend he would have been the second best pitcher in last years class behind CC. He and Yo could make a nice top of the rotation and with a healthy Dave Bush, Parra and someone in the 5 spot I would feel pretty good. We will still score runs so if we can get pitching we will be in very good shape.

Yeah the Bucks are going to have to win consistently deeper into the season for most casual fans to get really excited. With Jennings and Bogut here for a while, if the Bucks can get another guard (or a healthy Michael Redd, if that exists anymore), they will be a very fun team watch and I think people will come. Michael Redd and Gadzuric both come off the books after the 2011 season, so the Bucks will be in great shape financially and could maybe even move those contracts during next season to get some quality players. This year hopefully they can make the playoffs and put themselves in a position next year to trade or wait our 25 million dollars in the expiring contracts of Redd and Gadzuric.

Brandon Jennings is making me pay attention to the Bucks again. I lost track of them when I was in college, but they are pretty exciting right now.

Even though it is a small sample size it is nice to see Wooten continue to miss the bats of some of the best minor league hitters. If Braddock stays in the bullpen he and Wooten could help us from having to over pay for relievers in the future. Both are having very nice AFL seasons, even if Wooten has not pitched much.

How is that true? Lucroy had an OPS .50 points higher than Salome. The only stat Salome had much better was his average, but Lucroy's OBP was over .100 points higher than his average. For their minor league careers their overall numbers are quite similar. Salome had the amazing year in AA but an OPS around or below .800, 3 of the past 4 years. Lucroy and Salome both looked to profile as solid hitting catchers. Salome has more offensive upside but over the past 4 years he has been closer to Lucroy's overall numbers than to his year 2 years ago.

Outside of a poor 2006 Heether has had an OPS over .800 since 2005. This year he had an OPS over .900. Yeah he was old for his league but those are impressive numbers. He was only a year older than Mark Derosa at most stops and put up much better numbers. I am hoping he can turn into that type of player. He played 17 games in LF and at 2b this year, 22 at SS, 63 at 3B. I am interested to see what he brings to the table. Hopefully he gets some chances like Casey did this year ro show what he can do.

Can Heether play RF? I would love to have someone to slide in when Corey Hart goes into one of his prolonged slumps. I would love to see Heether become a Mark DeRosa type guy

The Brewers already have a lot of utility players and infield positional players on the roster. DeRosa would be redundant since McGehee is very comparable to DeRosa.I would be okay with DeRosa becoming our everyday RF if we can move Hart for pitching. I like DeRosa's approach and he could fit well in the lineup. Just not sure how much he would cost. I think there will be a lot of interest in him.

I agree but the poster I responded to said it would have been jackson for Hardy. I think we would have needed to add one of our best pitching prospects with Hardy to get the deal done.

I am pretty sure Melvin knew Hardy was not going to be enough for Edwin Jackson. A 26 year old pitcher coming of a very good year, who is cheap, nets a lot more than a SS who is starting to get expensive coming off a really poor year. Hardy at best was bringing back a pitcher like Aaron Harang who is expensive next year and declining at this stage in his career. I do not know where you get the idea we very well could have gotten Jackson for Hardy. That seems to be a stretch. If Michael Bowden was the pitcher the Red Sox were offering do you really think Jackson would be the guy the Tigers offered? We would have to have given up other players as well to get Jackson.