brewfanks

You guys have talked about Contreras pitch calling in some situations. Sometimes it comes off as he just doesn't know how to call pitches, but in at least one previous episodes it'd been hinted at that maybe he's overthinking the pitch calling sometimes. While I was never much of a baseball player, it seems like at some point there can be a mind-game and the hitter might have a good idea what pitch sequencing is used, and could reasonably guess what pitch might be coming. I can see a benefit of maybe going off-script a time or two to gain an advantage or to at least keep doubt in the hitter's mind. I also can see the argument in the case of pitchers with great "stuff" that you don't want to throw a worse pitch just to try and fool a major league hitter, but is it possible that Contreras is more guilty of just going too deep in the mindgames, as opposed to not thinking about it enough? I like to think that major league catchers have to be fairly smart back there.

uwshop.com has the "official" postseason t-shirts for $20 now. The defend MKE and the Chasing H18story ones.

I will be there with my family in the second row behind the Brewers bullpen in right field. Looking for a Thames HR or two to come flying over our heads!

I think the perfect marriage of the ideas is using Augmented Reality technology to assist the umpires. I don't think it's quite where it needs to be yet, but it's getting better. It could theoretically project a strike zone, track the ball and offer assistance on whether it was a ball or strike. The umpire still makes the call as technology isn't always correct either, but it could certainly help. I found this article here describing a version of this: https://marlinsminorsmlb.wordpress.com/2017/01/05/augmented-reality-umpiring-the-future-of-balls-and-strikes/

I agree. If we can get any sort of stability in the rotation and bullpen this could be an interesting season. I felt the ceiling was .500 on this team. It still may be, and yes it's still really early, but this team feels very much like a .500 team so maybe the ceiling is a tad higher even?

Call me crazy, but this lineup and staff actually excites me. I think there is a lot of potential here and they could make a nice run at .500 with some guys from the minors making debuts late summer.

I live in KC and have taken a liking to the royals to the point that I own a KC hat, shirts, and wear them on occasion or when I go to a game. I still cheer for the Brewers when they play each other on that rare occasion. It is funny because I'm also in the same boat where I would never do that for the Chiefs, its only Packers for me. Baseball just seems different, even with interleague play.

I'm interested in going back and watching a few of the 2016 best games with my MLB.TV subscription. I got the subscription at the September call-ups when it was dirt cheap (to watch Arcia's first games) so I didn't catch many games this year, especially before then. Which ones are your personal favorites that I should check out?

My Cubs fan brother-in-law is becoming increasingly obnoxious... Please give me hope that the Cubs will not pass the Brewers in the next two years?

Saw this awesome article about pitch framing from the growing-on-me grantland site. http://www.grantland.com/story/_/id/9275754/studying-art-pitch-framing-catchers-such-francisco-cervelli-chris-stewart-jose-molina-others. One thing that stood out is how unlike hitting, a catcher's defensive ability is a reliable and predictable way for a catcher to impact the game. There are no slumps, and the regressions due to age are smaller. On top of that is has an impact. They compare Lucroy as the only one close to Jose Molina, one of the best pitch framers. They say over the past 5 years, Molina's pitch framing alone has been worth 111 runs, or about 11 wins. On top of that it's not like it's close. "...and only Brewers catcher Jonathan Lucroy has approached Molina levels of framing effectiveness... Since his debut in 2010, [Lucroy]'s saved almost twice as many runs due to framing as any other catcher, aside from Molina." Incredible to me that something so small can have that large of an impact in this game...

I think it would be cool to have some sort of bf.net member map. Some sort of a choropleth map so that you can indicate density of members, as well as a way to find fans in your region. Something like this Population Density Map but it also lets you hover over an area and view the members who live there. Not useful for you Milwaukee Folks (unless you are traveling), but would be cool for us out-of-staters... Obviously there may be some privacy concerns and it should probably be an opt-in sort of thing, but could be cool.

I thought the first episode of this season was fantastic and look forward to more Robert California. While I felt that Steve Carrell was brilliant on the show, I never felt like he WAS the show. I thought the ensemble cast carried it well. Andy Bernard will make a tremendous boss and his insecurities will add a bunch of new story-lines. I understand there are a lot of people that think The Office has run it's course, but in my opinion it's just as strong as it was in season 2 and 3. When I rewatch episodes on the DVD from Season 6/7 I still laugh, often harder than I did the first time through. It sort of ages with time (or maybe I'm just watching it when I'm tired and everything is funny...) I think shows have to progress, and characters have to "grow" a little bit. I think the whole Dwight/Jim/Pam/Roy humor of season 2/3 would get old if it was still happening today.

Am I the only one here completely addicted to this TV show? It's like being 9 hours into a 13 hour sometimes corny, often unbelievable, yet extremely entertaining suspense/thriller! If you are curious, you can catch up at the CBS website. This Saturday is episode 10.

I LOVE MLB Network when games are going on. I enjoy watching all of them sit around and talk baseball while the games are going on, getting near instant highlights and doing the live look-ins. Last night's 9th inning was so cool. I don't remember the last time I even had ESPN on to watch Sportscenter or Baseball Tonight. Very cool channel.

Turning this back into a Gagne thread... now that he had LASIK, maybe his goggles won't be so distracting to him when they fog up. That really bugged me last year when he had to keep wiping them off.