Fear The Chorizo

He gave up 3 runs over 5 and will probably get at least 1 more inning - that's not a game wrecking start. Brewers haven't gotten a big hit when they've needed it despite having 8 hits tonight, and the trail by 2 with 4 cracks left...lot of game left.

Alexander is starting and Judge has actually been hitting leadoff lately...so his bp session probably starts promptly around 7:11

Why has Hiura not been in the lineup or even gotten an AB since (checks notes) last week Friday? I know this is only the 3rd game of 4 since then in which the Brewers faced a righthanded starter, and he's likely their best hitter against RHP, so there's plenty of good reasons not to get him in the lineup at this stage in the season.

I read the article that was the genesis for this thread, and thinking this is much ado about nothing and trying to read way too hard between the lines. Is an organization supposed to constantly be asking its players and representation who are years away from free agency whether they want to discuss contract extensions? I didn't see anything from Burnes or CAA indicating they've reached out to the Brewers directly to tell them "hey, let's talk about parameters for a contract extension if you're interested". Why not? Why hasn't CAA been calling Stearns every other week to try and get a discussion going for that? To me the article should have been framed like "1 year ago Burnes was part of a Brewers team no-hitter, the first since the Nieves No-No, and since then the outlook of the organization at the MLB level for this current core of players has changed for the worse due to a disappointing playoff exit last fall an uneven 2022 season". Turning its focus to why the Brewers didn't find time to try and negotiate a longterm contract extension for their Cy Young winner during an offseason that included a lengthy lockout (remember the Brewers still had JBJ's salary on their books for 2022 until the day before the lockout began) is just looking for controversy where there really isn't any. Let's see what happens this offseason - it's likely the Brewers are going to have to choose one of their starters approaching free agency in a few seasons that are about to get expensive (Woody/Burnes) to try and extend (if they want to), and either send the other elsewhere via trade or take year to year until they leave as a free agent for more $. We all know that, and I think the discussion should be if the Brewers even should try to retain one of them beyond the ages they currently have them under organizational control.

Quay had some lapses in coverage assignments early, but he jumped off the TV with how explosive he was with that size for a MLB. Once he settles in he's a difference-maker in the middle of the field.

We can do better by the best pitcher in our franchise history than throwing up our arms and saying "we can't afford him anyway, so why bother talking?" Burnes is under team control through his age 29 season, for two more seasons if they want at whatever the salary arbitration process allows. From an organizational management point of view, why in the world should the Brewers offer up any sort of contract extension to a pitcher that will be on the wrong side of 30 when his 1st bite at free agency hits when they're already having to pay Yelich's mega extension forever? Burnes has had a very average 2nd half of the season by his standards, still good but not elite - I sure wouldn't want to be paying an early 30's Burnes with a ~4.25 ERA $25M a season to pitch 150 innings in Milwaukee. My question in all this is, why would McCalvy wait until now, mid September 2022, to randomly ask Burnes this question for an article that's supposed to be based on the 1 yr anniversary of a team no-hitter that Burnes was a part of?

that makes sense...didn't know Runyan was dealing with that

wondering if this move is due to other injured players from week 1 likely being inactive in Week 2, or providing another active backup lineman to take the roster spot of either Bakh or Jenkins potentially missing more time than the PUP activations a few weeks ago initially pointed to. I don't think an active lineman went down injured last week, right?

but it's another to say the coach doesn't have them "ready to play". I didn't say that - I think it is a combination of the organization's approach to the preseason and moreso #12's approach to the offseason/preseason. With the exception of the 2020 season, the Packers have consistently been a poor offensive team over the 1st month of games, and I think that's more on #12 taking a few weeks to get up to speed with what he has to work with on offense in game situations than what the staff does in training camp or frankly in game planning. For better or worse, this is how the Packers ease into a regular season with a veteran QB and evolving offensive roster that has had a significant amount of turnover on the line and at various skill positions - we as fans just need to temper the expectations of getting off to a fast/expected start. defensively, the Packers made a bunch of errors that led to huge plays setting up or directly leading to the Vikings scoring - but there were also flashes of the talent on that side of the ball...those type of errors are going to happen to most teams early in the season. The game wasn't competitive yesterday because the Packers' offense spent 2.5 quarters watching its signal caller yelling at everyone on the sideline like an old man ticked people were on his grass, and couldn't provide enough big plays of their own to make it interesting. I do think the game would've unfolded much differently had Watson just caught that first deep pass - even if he tripped on his own feet and didn't score. That just deflated the whole sideline and set things up for another zombie-like week 1.

in 2020, nobody played any preseason games and there was barely any training camp, so there wasn't any advantage/disadvantage across the league for how different teams ran their camps or prepped for the regular season. Also, no fans in the stands made it incredibly easy for a veteran QB to make play adjustments at the line and dictate offensive tempo - and the start of 2020 probably was the best Packers' Oline in recent years, with both a healthy Bakh and Jenkins. That has very much so been the outlier for week 1 offensive performances by the Packers. That 2018 game against the Bears, the Packers came out awful and were lucky Rodgers didn't get his season ended with a knee injury in the 1st half. The Bears wound up being a pretty good team in 2018, but were exposed as posers in 2019 - GB won that week 1 game at Chicago but it was a defensive struggle and the offense really didn't do anything noteable. I think Amos actually sealed the win with a pick in the endzone towards the end of the game. Packers won a hard-fought 2017 week 1 game at home against Seattle, but didn't score until the 2nd half. Packers barely won 2016 week 1 in Jax, won while playing decently in Chi in 2015 against a bad Bears team, and got smoked on the road at Seattle to open 2014. It's just 1 week - and the Packers have proven to bounce back over the years after rough early season starts....however it's been a trend that the Packers get off to uneven, slow starts in September.

But why do other teams come out looking sharp while we look like we are cutting down the tallest tree in the forest with a herring? I don't get it. Much is made about this being tied to MLF and preseason preparation...I think it has much more to do with #12 and the preseason preparation he goes through each year at this stage in his career - plenty of NFL teams play their starters very little or not at all in the preseason. I think there's something different with how Rodgers goes about his offseason and training camp that just doesn't help the roster gel on the offensive side of the ball. Much is made about the young receivers and Watson's drop on the 1st play was crushing...but last year the Packers' O looked even worse against the Saints with both Adams and Lazard playing along with a healthier O-line. 2020 was really the one season I can remember recently where the Packers hit the ground running and were in sync offensively from jump on Week 1 - that was the COVID year with no fans and basically no training camp/preseason all over the league...plus it was the year Love got drafted and Rodgers suddenly looked like the player he was 5 years prior.

Just a thought, maybe the Packers' D should consider covering Jefferson Just a thought....

There are plays they can make, but their line isn't giving them enough time for them to develop, either - the 3rd down option routes are where the WR inexperience is going to really cause problems with keeping the chains moving.

Remember what they did with Adams last year in Week 1 offensively?

And an opening play TD drop that has set Rodgers firmly in the mode of apparently not even looking at any wide receivers anymore. Viking secondary probably doesn't even need to cover 2-3 route runners at this point until Rodgers actually throws them a pass

This is going to be a very frustrating offense to watch until they get their o-line right... 4th and 1, early in the game....I get the thinking for trying to go for it but also would have much rather just taken the damn points

Early games thus far point to the following: "The Bears still suck"....Fields is not the answer surrounded by a thin roster The Bengals still can't block anyone

Seems to me like Bakhtiari has gotten really good at getting 95% back from a knee injury, then has a setback when he's actually giving it enough effort to test under NFL game conditions, and then has to step back because something just isn't right anymore. Not going to villify him because a career-ending injury sucks in the NFL with non-guaranteed contracts, and he will HOPEFULLY be able to resume playing at a high level at some point (sounds like he's probably out next week against the Bears already as well)...but at this point you've got to wonder how coincidental this type of approach, which has been ongoing for almost 2 calendar years, syncs up with getting all of his guaranteed money paid out - I believe the guaranteed portion of his contract ends after 2022. It just sucks for both #69 and the organization as a whole.

lots of weird results today...A&M is going to be lucky avoiding a L at home, too And Notre Dame...yeesh

gift PI call even though it's the right one...not a great throw

...and then the 13-1 Badgers that played 2 ranked teams and I REALLY doubt any Badgers fan would argue they should have been in there over Alabama(which, just looking at that Alabama team, they had De'Vonta Smith, Henry Ruggs and Jerry Jeudy as their backups. 3 RBs went to the NFL that year, two QBs starting in the NFL. Minkah Fitzpatrick, Trevon Diggs(I know, he's overrated, but 11 picks). A DL that if they were together in the NFL would arguably be the best, OL full of NFL players in their 3 deep...and that was not a great Alabama team. I agree with all of this....but then this is also the reason why college football has become much less entertaining to follow for 90+% of the country. That year's Alabama team wasn't considered a great team by their standards but still had a complete NFL roster. Even a decade or so ago, at least every conference (including the Pac 12 and Big East) had at least one juggernaut program that was a draw for the very best players from all over the country, and there was at least a question as to who the very best few teams would be each year based on previous graduations/jumps to the NFL. Even the juggernaut programs rotated supremacy in their own conference because recruiting and resources were spread much more evenly. Now college football has essentially evolved into arguing which Alabama player will win the Heisman and if any team is capable of beating the Crimson Tide when they have an entire roster of 5-star recruits. They're an NFL futures pro bowl roster every single year. With how the committee is structured to put "the 4 best teams in the playoff" each year, absent key injuries to Alabama they're an auto bid every year without even having to play a game. Programs like Georgia, Clemson, and OSU resemble what the very best programs looked like 15-20 years ago, where they always can reload but will have the occasional 2 or 3 loss season in a down year for them. I think the only reason I'm for expanding the CFP to 12 teams is to at least give more teams a shot at making a run for a title and making Alabama play more top out of conference opponents to get into their annual national title game spot. I'm not saying it will change the outcome at all, but at least there's more 'any given saturday' potential outcomes in the actual playoff format to knock them off.

Mortgage rates haven't plateaued at all - they're just waiting for the next Fed rate hike announcement to continue proceeding higher. They are basically at 6% on average, which hasn't been seen since 2008. https://www.cnn.com/2022/09/08/homes/mortgage-rates-september-8/index.html

That's actually a really big deal with how today's pitching has changed the game. The roster expansion has basically allowed all teams to carry a ton of pitchers and have a deep bullpen, which enables starters to go all-out in effort to get through their 5+ IP and all relievers can go max effort as well - having a pitch clock that doesn't allow for a pitcher to fully recover before delivering another max effort pitch is going to help offense. Some will argue that this change will lead to an increase in pitcher injuries without allowing them to recover - I'd argue the pitchers need to adjust how they pitch in effort to still get alot of outs without having to strike everyone out with max-effort and injury-risking stuff to begin with. You know, "pitch to contact"?? Doing so would inevitably lead to faster games and more entertaining baseball to watch, also.

I really hope he's right - both our vehicles are in that queasy spot in terms of mileage/age that it feels like anytime a significant repair comes up we question whether it's worth it compared to just buying a new vehicle (we consistently purchase used cars traded in after their initial lease is up). Had to replace a differential on my ride this summer, which would've typically led to me changing vehicles if car prices weren't so insane. If they get the chip shortage sorted out that relieves the delays getting new vehicles purchased and on the road faster, that should drive used car prices down even faster. Those prices almost have to crater because people are just not looking to buy anything substantial unless they absolutely need to right now - the mechanic I go to said his business has never been better aside from all sorts of part shortages, because if people have a car that isn't totaled they're holding onto it for dear life. Guessing home prices are going to hit a wall and fall as well, although that might be due more to rising interest rates shocking that market than a lack of demand. People have funds for housing, but the combo of skyrocketing mortgage rates and home prices are a double whammy that forces many 1st time homebuyers to stick with paying their rising rents and keeps current homeowners in their own home.

Also, the CFP poll has more influence on the AP poll than the other way around. Once it starts getting posted in late October or early November, sure - there's no CFP poll out right now though. The AP and Coaches polls set the baseline from which the CFP committee starts their evaluations for whomever fills the last slot or two outside of Alabama until they lose twice, and that pecking order begins with what are pointless preseason polls that definitely do have a bias towards the SEC. I get that the very top of the SEC (Alabama, Georgia) should be considered among the best 5 teams in the country every year until onfield results consistently prove otherwise...but nobody who follows football needs to have to look at a poll in September to know that's the case. On the minus side, many have to cover a game and then churn 3-4 stories on the team they cover, limiting the number of actual games they can watch on Saturdays, so records and scores often seem to weigh heavier for a lot of it than the eye test simply because of time constraints. Which is exactly why polls done before all the teams have a handful of games played and even open up in conference play are pointless, and tend to favor schools from a conference like the SEC where college football rules and sports journalists in that region are going to prop up mid tier schools in the rankings because they are in the same conference as Alabama and Georgia.