Fear The Chorizo

To me it boils down to this - either it's Yost or it's Melvin and Yost... if the talent on the field is good enough to win x number of games, then it's the manager's job to get that talent to produce. If the talent on the field isn't as good as what it was made out to be, then the blame starts shifting toward the GM - 99% of the time when the GM goes, the manager may as well pack his bags, too. Regarding the Brewers, they definitely have more talent on their roster then when Melvin & Yost started working for the Brewers, but I'm not 100% sold on their current roster being good enough to contend. What I think has handcuffed them is how heavily they've relied on homegrown players and depending on none of them to be overrated. Small market teams need to do this in order to contend, but they also need to be able to identify early on whether a big-time prospect is worth keeping around for all of his pre-arby years, or if he's more valuable to trade for prospects/areas of need when his value is still sky-high. Also, small market teams have to be able to develop a majority of their own bullpen in their minor leagues, so they can afford to pay their everyday players. I don't have the exact numbers, but I would think a vast majority of Milwaukee's payroll goes to their pitching staff, including their bullpen. Veteran relievers are nice to have, but they're also very expensive. Right now the Brewers have close to 20 million of their bullpen payroll either pitching ineffectively in the minors or sitting on the DL - not something that a small market team can afford if it expects to contend.

Dillon cannot play second base, unless it's in a beer league softball game.

"But the Brewers fought back and went on a 9-1 run: http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a345/rluzinski/NLCStandings0606.jpg .... and lost 1/2 to the Cubs. " At least they didn't lose 3.5 ( Cards and Reds), 4.5 (Pirates), or 7 (Astros). The half game of ground they lost came as a result of the Cubs playing an extra game. I'm more concerned about getting in front of the next team ahead of the Brewers (Cardinals). Unless the Brewers can get themselves into second place in their own division, thinking about what the Cubs are doing or the wild card doesn't matter much.

to see that the entire NL Central is currently ahead of the 2nd place NL west team definitely makes me think that the Central is no longer a weak division. In fact, there's probably going to be a good argument for putting the NL Central behind only the AL/NL Easts, if not better right now.

102 games left, 6 games back, 10 games left against the Cubs. That's about all the statistical analysis needed for me to realize that it's way too early to be forgetting about the Brewers winning the division. Trades, injuries, slumps, and hot streaks for a number of teams can either enhance or eliminate the Brewers' chances between now and seasons' end for both the division and the wild card, but none of those events can be accurately predicted until they actually happen - which they will. Currently the only scoreboard watching I've been doing is with the Cardinals - the next team in front of the Brewers in the division standings, and the would-be wild card leader. Milwaukee's 3 games behind them right now. If the Cubs truly are a team capable of winning 100-plus games, then so be it. The Cubs are 18-15 against teams within the division, and 20-7 against everyone else. The Brewers are 16-13 against the Central and 16-15 against everyone else. The difference between the Cubs' and Brewers' everyone else? Brewers played 20 of those 31 games against teams with records currently above .500, and the Cubs played only 8 of their 27 out-of-division games against current winning teams. Not saying the early schedule is the only reason Milwaukee trails Chicago by 6 games, but it's definitely a factor as to why the Brewers aren't 2-3 games closer.

The Brewers have done what the Cubs did last season when they went on a hot streak but couldn't initially make up ground on Milwaukee - they gained ground on or passed everyone else. Aside from the Cardinals and Marlins, there's nobody else eligible for the wild card with a better record right now than the Brewers. 1/2 the teams that made the playoffs last season overcame larger than 7 game deficits at later points in the season than June 4. If the rest of the season were played in a simulator, I may think differently, but there's just too many different things (injuries, trades, hot/cold streaks) that could happen that will affect the standings to give up on the division now.

If we start trying to project a team's season win total at arbitrary points in the season, it quickly becomes pointless to use the preseason win projection as a starting point or reference, no matter how it was originally determined. The Cubs have played 35 games against teams who are currently under .500, and 23 against teams at or above .500...their current record is 37-21 - not exactly a large disparity between their record and the number of games they've played against winning/losing teams to this point. For comparison, the Brewers have played 19 games against teams currently under .500, and 39 against teams at or above .500...that is a huge disparity when considering that the Brewers are currently 2 games over .500. Oh, the Cardinals? 35 games played against sub-500 teams as well. The Astros? Only 21 games against sub-500 teams, most of which occurred during their hot streak a few weeks back.

I see a lot of similarities with this year's Cub team and last year's Brewer team - shaky middle relief, an early season overuse of key relievers (i.e., playing/managing with the season is over in July mentality), historically average starters outperforming their career numbers, and a home-heavy schedule full of cupcakes and favorable pitching matchups. I'm not saying the Cubs are suddenly going to lose the next 15 games, but there is way too much baseball left to be played before conceding the division. I think the Brewers' current 7 game deficit has more to do with the schedule difference and their immediate lapse following the Gallardo injury than anything the Cubs have done. As the rosters look right now, I don't think the Brewers have enough quality starting pitching to stay red hot for months at a time and pull a Rocky/Philly-like comeback to overtake the Cubs. However, I think the Cubs have more than enough warts on their team, especially on their pitching staff, to keep them from winning 8 out of every 10 games they play, too. An injury, or a trade for either team could really change the outlook

The other issue I have with schedule strength is that different pitching matchups totally change the difficulty of any series of games. Trying to go back and look at how many times a team misses the opponents' ace compared to a different schedule is extremely hard to do. In that regard schedule strength isn't really about who you play, it's when you play them. I will agree that the biggest variance in schedule is interleague opponents, since teams don't play the same interleague schedules. The saving grace is that if you are truly better than the rest of your division, the # of inter-division games gives more than enough opportunity to overcome any scheduling advantages...IF the team that appears to be slighted by their schedule is actually a playoff-caliber team.

I think limiting walks is the key to a successful reliever and a successful bullpen - force a team to put together more than 2 hits in an inning to generate a crooked number on the scoreboard. I think the Brewers' current bullpen walks to many hitters, and puts themselves in terrible situations where 2-3 runs can be scored in an inning with 1 hit.

I understand the SOS argument, but part of me doesn't buy it. Teams that have the worst records in baseball tend to end up with the toughest schedule strengths, because their opponents won more games against them compared to other teams. Of the top 10 strength of schedule teams in 2007, only 4 had records above .500, with two of them being right around .500. Only Boston and Seattle were significantly over .500. Teams like the Devil Rays, Royals, and Nationals were in the top 5, probably because they were so bad that most of their opponents got fat off them. However, if we get into the SOS argument and combine it with misjudging talent/potential, we do find an interesting correlation - the team with the weakest SOS in 2007? The Milwaukee Brewers, who managed to win only 83 games with that weak schedule. Another glaring item is that the six weakest schedule strengths last year were the 6 NL Central teams. So, if the NL Central is improved at all, which it does seem to be, it would make sense that wins won't come as easy for the Brewers as they did last season.

Boston also had an unfair pitching, defensive, and baserunning advantage

While the Cubs do have some players that seem to be overachieving, compared to the Brewers they also have a much larger number of players that have a significant track record as to what kind of production can be expected of them. Everyone talks about many of the Brewer hitters underproducing, but what kind of track record is there on them to feel comfortable with that statement? J.J. Hardy - other than the opening two months of 07, he's been a similar hitter to what he's done so far this season. Rickie Weeks - other than the last 35 games in 07 he's been a disappointment, injuries or not. Bill Hall - other than the year prior to signing his contract, he's been the same all or nothing type hitter as he is currently. Fielder - great 07 and solid 06, but there's no reason to expect him to drop close to 50 bombs a year until he does so more than once in his career. The Cubs are a good team - we knew that before the season started. They are playing at a pace that the teams on their schedule to this point would have dictated. The big question is whether the Brewers are as good as what people thought they were, once these pitching injuries have decimated their depth and the strain their roster puts on young players and pitchers, with few key veteran contributors. It's too early to worry about what the Cubs - or the other 4 teams in front of the Brewers in the standings - are doing. Lots of games left, but it's about time that this "talented" Brewers team starts to win at a consistent clip...if they don't, my guess is it has more to do with misjudged talent on this roster than explaining it away with schedule strength, injuries, and a team slump.

Weeks isn't injured right now, having an awesome month and a half to end 2007 is great, but he's had an awful first month and a half of 2008..kind of cancels itself out if you ask me - while I like the fact that is OBP is over 100 points higher than his BA, he needs to get his average up. Yost talks about how he's hitting into terrible luck, but I think he's using selective memory. Weeks has hit quite a few balls on the screws right at people, but he's also had plenty of lazy popups to short right field and routine grounders. It's one thing to say a guy's hitting into bad luck when he's hitting everything hard, but not when he's getting robbed once a game and basically getting himself out the other 3 ABs. Even if all his bad luck outs turned into hits, his BA would be around .225, which isn't exactly lighting the world on fire.

Villenueva's starts make it that much more obvious that his best role is as a long/middle reliever. He doesn't have dynamic stuff, and he tends to start getting rocked the 3rd time through the order. He's great to get you 2-4 innings, and can be effective getting lefty hitters out with his changeup, but he has to be perfect with his pitches to get guys out and keep his pitch count low enough to get him further than 5 innings. As he's pitching right now, he's a bullpen killer.

It's funny, around this time last year there were plenty of threads talking about how if the Brewers would only play .500 ball the rest of the season, there'd be next to no chance that they'd lose the division - now the same line of thinking is being used to show what pace the Cubs would need to remain at to sew the division up. Fact is, it's WAY too early to be writing anyone off. The Brewers took a big hit when their 2nd-best starter went down, but there's still well over 100 games left to play. Projections are interesting things to look at, but there are plenty of instances where reality doesn't match up well with them. The Cubs are the favorite, but I still don't think they're 10 games better than the rest of the division - we're looking at a snapshot of the season right now when the Cubs are going well and the Brewers are scuffling.

back to .500 and starting to swing the bats a bit...if they're still at .500 by the end of this week with the teams they're playing I'll be very encouraged. Anything better than that is gravy.

It always comes down to pitching, and their pitching staff doesn't have enough - especially in their rotation. They have all kinds of offense with that lineup though, they're probably good enough to finish within 5 games of .500, over if their pitching is ok, under if it isn't. You have to think the Cubs are the team to beat, but it's not like they don't have their warts, either. I think we may be looking back at this last road trip as the stretch that kept the Brewers from winning the division - the combination of Gallardo going down and dropping the next six gave the Cubs more than a working margin of a lead on the Brewers. Still a long way to go, and so much can happen between now and September to drastically change things.

Yost doesn't make moves until his own players talk about what they should and shouldn't be doing to the media...the Braun/Fielder flip-flop in the lineup, Gagne removing himself from the closer role. He acts like he's the most knowledgeable baseball man ever when questioned by the media, yet the only changes/tinkering he does with his roster is stuff reporters tell him that his players said.

It's tough to say they're babying these starters when by the 5th inning they're at or above 100 pitches, and the opposition starts crushing them the 3rd and 4th times through the order.

If I were Ned, I'd be getting my resume updated for future interviews for a pit crew job in NASCAR...the writing's starting to appear on the wall, IMO.

I think whatever marginal effect a catcher has on a pitching staff can be more than outweighed by pitchers lacking command and throwing pitches in bad locations. A catcher can call a slider low and away or a fastball in, but if those pitches aren't located properly and are hit 500 feet after catching too much of the plate, the intent of what the catcher wanted with the pitch doesn't really matter. I really don't see Kendall getting shaken off much, so at least he seems to have a good grasp of what pitchers want to do in certain situations.

I think part of the problem is that contracts exploded - if a team signs a highschool pitching phenom to a bonus baby contract on draft day, they're going to take every precaution in the world to keep him healthy, since they've invested significant value in him. Keeping a young pitcher on such strict pitch counts early in his career basically eliminates his ability to build up his arm strength/endurace to a point where he could handle becoming an innings-eating horse once he gets to the majors. In the old days, if a phenom blew his arm out in the minors, they'd go pick up another phenom without worrying about wasting millions of dollars. This is even more apparent in the major leagues once pitchers reach free agency - many injuries that guys pitched through 30 years ago lead to significant DL stretches for today's arms. With guaranteed money in contracts, both pitchers and teams want to limit as many injury risks as possible. Back in "the day", if a pitcher continually didn't take the ball due to arm soreness or pain, he'd get his walking papers and be released from the team. What Sandy Koufax did the last few years of his career never would have happened in today's game...his elbow/arm was basically shot and overused, but he continued to pitch. Careers last longer now on average than they did back then for pitching - when a player is worth so much more now than they were then in a dollars sense to organizations, it should be no surprise that there's an increased emphasis on playing it safe with pitcher's health....why do you think they went to 5 man rotations?

As currently built, the Brewers are supposed to be a team that can win alot of 8-6 ballgames - get decent starting pitching, above-average relief, and hope to bludgeon teams to death with the bats...since the bats have slumped basically the entire season so far, the pitching staff has been under increased strain and it's really starting to show. Before the season started, I don't think anyone had the Brewers pegged as a top 5 MLB pitching staff. If this team doesn't score a ton of runs, there's really no chance they can win consistently...especially after Gallardo went down. This team does nothing well right now - nobody really brings it up anymore, but I think the looming contract/arbitration status of basically the entire core of young position players has been a significant distraction to this young team. Guys like Hardy, Hart, Fielder, Braun, and Weeks have at least had discussions about pre-arby contract extensions, or are entering the arbitration process after this year. I don't care how talented and even-keeled a young player is, when dollar signs start flashing around and the pressure to play for pay finds its way into their heads for the first time, it's tough to block it out and just go perform. I'm sick of listening to Yost continue to argue that it's early, and "we're going to hit, and get on a nice roll"...EVERY team goes through a 2-3 week stretch where they tear the cover off the ball and play great - it's almost impossible not to have a hot streak over the course of 162 games. It's how the team performs when they're not playing great that determines how good their record will be - Yost seems to refuse to accept blame/criticism and insists on 'riding it out' and waiting for the players to perform. He has a knack for doing the same thing and expecting different results. Just because he was a good 3rd base coach under a great manager in Bobby Cox doesn't mean he automatically becomes a know-it-all manager who doesn't have to answer his critics. I for one am sick of his demeanor and approach to managing this team, and think it's time for some new direction for this roster. Count me in on hoping that Melvin forgets to give Yost his plane ticket back from Miami and gives it to Simba for his carryon

The way this entire team is hitting, the lineup thread can probably take a few weeks off - it doesn't matter who's hitting in front of and behind whom, nobody's doing much of anything right now.