danzig6767

I agree with you Ennder, but the odd thing to me is that for as much speed as Gomez has, for as often as he tries bunting, and for what a weapon it can be for him, it sure seems like he not only struggles a lot to get down great bunts in spots which makes it near impossible to throw him out, he also struggles to just consistently get his bunts down in fair territory for whatever reason.

Well, Braun had walked 57/56 times in the last two years and i said that i could see him upping that to around 70-75 times, but i couldn't envision him being the type to walk 100 plus times as the elite patient hitters do. I could be a bit low in those projections. We'll see. I do agree with you that his approach this year does seem more real and not just an early in the season deal which will fade away significantly as the season goes along. Maybe playing with Prince who is elite at taking walks has finally rubbed off on Braun? Maybe his good, but not great season last year made Ryan decide that he had to force pitchers to throw him more strikes by getting ahead in the count more often? Maybe it's simply a guy maturing as a hitter? Or maybe it's a combination of the three? Braun had such incredible production from the minute he stepped on to major league diamonds, he could put up big numbers without doing stuff like working the count and getting himself in favorable ball/strike situations more often than not. Like Vlad somewhat, Ryan with his great plate coverage was often able to swing at stuff off the plate and still get big hits. Last year though, Ryan struggled a bit, at least for the kind of standards he sets for himself. So i wonder if that made him do some reevaluation of his approach at the plate and deciding that with more patience, he can get back to the .900 plus OPS/30 plus homers guy he expects of himself.

Given how bad our lineup has been at the bottom of the order when it was filled with the likes of Kotsay, Betancourt, Neives, and then the pitcher, i could live with the bunts because the odds were so slim of any extra base hits or stringing together multiple hits. I even didn't mind bunting Gomez if Weeks was on base because Gomez is so poor at getting on base and if he actually gets the bunt down, it's likely a better shot at Carlos getting on than if he swings away.

I was very troubled by Melvin acquiring Betancourt, but by no means do i want him to perform poorly and i can't see anyone else wanting that either. People come to this site because they are Brewers fans first and want to see the team do well. As for his hitting, while most here i'm sure despise his hack at every pitch approach at the plate and thus the terrible OBP, i think most would acknowledge that Yuni has some pop in his bat for the position and that he's far from alone in being a poor overall hitter at the SS position. One only needs to look at the stats of all shortstops last year to see that numerous guys had a sub-.700 OPS. Hell, if Betancourt could play SS at or near the same level that Gomez plays CF, i'd be thrilled with Melvin bringing Betancourt on to the team regardless of his brutal OBP totals he posts every year.

That has really been my only strong beef with the manager so far. It truly was baffling.

That's why i doubt if few or any GM's use just defensive metrics when evaluating players they are going to consider acquiring, this includes teams that rely more heavily on sabermetirics. I think it's safe to assume they view defensive metrics as just a tool to go along with what their scouts say about a players defense. If then the scouts and metrics both pretty much agree on a player, then a GM has more reason to trust that evaluation of a player's defensive abilities. If though the metrics and scouts differ greatly, then the GM should try his best to get to the bottom of why this is. The troubling thing with Betancourt before Doug chose to acquire him is that the defensive metrics put Yuni in a very negative light and most scouts or people who have watching him play defense over an extended number of games also said he was a very poor defensive player at arguably the most premium defensive position on the diamond. It's hard to find anything or anyone who has watched him play for awhile that has a positive thing to say about Betancourt beyond the fact that he can provide some extra base pop for the position. Speaking of Melvin, i've long wondered how exactly he feels about more advanced stats in general? I've heard him interviewed many times and here and there he'll say things that involve not just basic stats like say batting average/ERA, but then he'll rave about how Betancourt had 78 RBI's last year or more than once bemoan strikeouts in the lineup even though team strikeout totals really show no clear story in why teams score more runs than others.

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Nobody is saying you aren't free to your opinions about Betancourt. What i and others have an issue with is your ridiculous holier than thou attitude as if people disagreeing with you on Yuni are only coming to those conclusions through mindless hate for him even though you've stated that in your eye test so far he hasn't been bad and you're also using statistical data that most would find extremely flawed given the small sample. Plus, nobody has said that Betancourt has by himself killed the team with his defense. All that has been stated is that many here read all the consensus of negative opinions towards Betancourt by scouts/fans of his previous teams and read how defensive statistical data comprised over his last few years said he was a shortstop with terrible range. So we as Brewer fans have got to see him play 16 games and many of us see how poor his lateral agility is, thus it makes us not have any reason to doubt the very negative opinions of scouts/fans of his previous teams and the negative statistical data. This combined with his bad hitting really concerns us going forward since we could end up being in a close race for the playoffs. Then you come riding in on your high horse acting like the many of us who think the lack of lateral agility he's shown confirms Betancourt's negative views by nearly everyone in baseball are being irrational fans, all the while the data you keep posting to try and prove this point not only wouldn't be thought of as worth much of anything in such a small sample by those deeply involved with statistical analysis, they'd side with us in saying the Brewers should very concerned about Yuni going forward. Oh well, i know this site strongly discourages pissing matches back and forth between posters, so i'll pass on responding any further to your posts given we obviously disagree on what we've seen of Betancourt so far and like others here, i don't find anything compelling at all in 15 games worth of defensive statistics.

So by your logic Straw, unless anyone making a post that doesn't include a statistic next to it, that means it's not "adding something to the discussion"? What we see happening on the field with Betancourt or any player for that matter should be off limits and included as just the rantings of irrational fans, even if we also have years statistical data to back up what we are seeing? All at the same time you keep popping into this thread telling us what you see isn't as bad, and you have 15 games of data to back you up. Don't you see how ridiculous this makes your position sound Straw. If anyone is acting like the JSonline posters you're complaining about, it is you. You're posts are no different than anyone else in this thread. You telling us what you think you see, just as others have, the only difference being that others are more confident in using data accumulated over years on Betancourt instead of the 15 games of data you continually keep trying to make us believe has more or any value. But you're the lone rational guy trying to save others here from reading uninformed rants. Please.

Wow, what could possibly possess a guy making 425,000 dollars to steal some 10 dollar shirts? I wonder if Leake has been shoplifting for a long time and even though he's now making more money than the vast majority of the population, he still can't help himself from thieving?

This is amusing. You complain about people posting uninformed and irrational stuff, at the same time you repeatedly keeping posting defensive statistics over a sample this small which makes them basically worthless. I and others simply aren't buying what you have to say on this topic, so in turn you pull out the i'm being so rational card while everyone else is just an idiot ranting for no reason. Get over yourself Straw.

Yea, there is a difference between having batting practice or doing simulated games vs facing live pitching in a real game. I understand that nobody wants to watch Kotsay or Almonte go out there and look so overmatched any longer than we have to, but all teams send players down for assignments in the minors if they miss an extended amount of time. Thus, i have a hard time envisioning that the whole league is foolishly following the same practice with previously injured players. It's just a bummer that Morgan has been hurt of late.

Straw, everyone here that really wants Betancourt gone and never wanted him on the team fully accepts that odds are very high that a different SS would also be a crappy hitter just as Yuni is. That's not where the loathing of Betancourt comes from. It's that he sucks at the plate and in the field at arguably the most important defensive position on the diamond. All of us that are so frustrated with him being acquired would be ok with a bad hitting SS so long as that guy was good defensively, we weren't asking Doug to acquire a guy who could put up a .750-.800 OPS. Just have skill at least at one the two areas of offense/defense, not suck at both as Betancourt does. As far as your response about complaining. I get venting about something you don't like every now and then. I get that. But rehashing the same complaint over...and over...and over...and over...ad nauseum is what I and others find so ridiculous. If you want to just rehash something you've already posted, open a Word doc, type out your vent, and then delete it and spare the rest of us the same old tired complaint. If you have something new to add to the discussion, by all means, add it. Part of having an intelligent discussion is getting past the...me angry...must type anger...type post.Well Straw, the title of this thread is pretty clear. It's also very clear that for most here, they don't like Betancourt. So you won't find many positive things said about Yuni in this thread. If you find the complaining about him so annoying, there is a simply solution. Either don't come into the thread at all, scroll right past the posts by people that you know don't want Betancourt on the team, or tell us why we are wrong. You're acting as if someone is pointing a gun to your head and forcing you to read every post in this thread. That isn't the case. There have been countless different topics on this forum over the years which i chose not to read for a variety of reasons, but i didn't go in them to tell posters what they should or shouldn't say.

And my question is, what are you hoping to accomplish with the complaining? All your complaining does is drive many of us who realize that there isn't much that can be done at this point batty. If that is your aim, I suppose your complaining is accomplishing its goal. If that's not it, what purpose could it possibly serve? Wouldn't it be better just to accept, for now, that what we have is the best our team was able to put together going into the season? Accept that, and hold out hope for the future that Melvin makes a deal to bring an average to above average SS to Milwaukee at the trade deadline? I would think that being hopeful for the future is a whole lot better for one's health/sanity than constantly be lashing out and raging over something that is out of our control and isn't likely to change in the near future. I have tried to take this approach and have said as much in a couple different threads. But some feel the need to complain and bash him, over and over, when we have so many others that have the same defensive issues he does. Cruz and Punto are not upgrades and this is what we have. I think most would love to have a premium SS but that is not going to happen anytime soon. We can hope he hits something like he did last year and the errors don't come in bunches. Maybe we get lucky later in the year and someone becomes available. But I would not be surprised if nobody does. No question this team has all kinds of defensive problems besides Betancourt, that makes acquiring him even more troublesome. It just makes the team defensive issues worse, especially on the infield. I can't fathom another team in baseball being less athletic and having less range on the left side of the infield than the Brewers with Yuni and Casey. Plus, it's a bigger deal because Betancourt plays shortstop, a premium defensive position. It's more important to have a quality defensive SS than it is a thirdbaseman, just as it is more important to have a quality CF more so than a guy in LF who plays good defense. Before the season when some scouts questioned the Brewers ability to win a playoff berth, one of the main reasons why is they felt we have very poor overall team defense, which was exasperated further in their eyes by acquiring Betancourt to play shortstop for us. We already had subpar infield defense with Prince, Weeks, and McGehee, then Doug throws more gas on the fire by adding Yuni who both the stats guys and scouts agreed was a terrible defensive shortstop. Not just barely average defensively, they all agreed he really bad. So why shouldn't fans be bothered by this as we watch him hack at every garbage pitch a pitcher throws and then on defense we see him play like he's moving in mud?

And my question is, what are you hoping to accomplish with the complaining? All your complaining does is drive many of us who realize that there isn't much that can be done at this point batty. If that is your aim, I suppose your complaining is accomplishing its goal. If that's not it, what purpose could it possibly serve?This is a sports forum, what do you think happens a lot on nearly every sports forum out there unless a team is flat out dominant with little to no flaws? Forums besides being a place to simply discuss things about a team they cheer for, they also are a place for fans to vent over things that they disagree with team management over. By your logic of saying fans shouldn't bother complaining about things they disagree with, sports forums would lose about half of their traffic if fans were just supposed to accept everything management did given fans can't do anything about it. For example, if Gomez stays in the two hole all year even after Harts get back and Carlos stays the same crappy hitter, should fans here just not bother commenting on that decision since we don't get to fill out the lineup card?

Straw, everyone here that really wants Betancourt gone and never wanted him on the team fully accepts that odds are very high that a different SS would also be a crappy hitter just as Yuni is. That's not where the loathing of Betancourt comes from. It's that he sucks at the plate and in the field at arguably the most important defensive position on the diamond. All of us that are so frustrated with him being acquired would be ok with a bad hitting SS so long as that guy was good defensively, we weren't asking Doug to acquire a guy who could put up a .750-.800 OPS. Just have skill at least at one the two areas of offense/defense, not suck at both as Betancourt does.

I absolutely know baseball very well having played in both HS and College. I will love the day that he is gone as the Brewers play in the National League...not the American League. You cannot continue to put all of that extra strain on your team with that shoddy of defense. It elevates the pitch counts, kills the morale and oh yeah, costs runs/wins. Sure, he can hit when he is going well...but when he is not he doesn't contribute one thing to this team.Nobody will argue that Prince is terrible defensively It's you saying that he's not an asset to the offense which is pretty ridiculous

Yep, 100% serious. I'm not sure if you can search my posts or not but I have been calling for the team to trade him for 2-3 years already. He plays zero defense, quite possibly ruined Manny Parra's career (look at the pre-dugout fight stats and the post-dugout fight stats) and is so amazingly streaky that he is not an asset to the offense. Sure, when he is hot he is scorching. When he is in a funk he is good for 2-3 pitches per at bat with either a K, a pop-up or a lazy 4-3 grounder. This team will not miss him. Edit: ...and it's not just the "occasional error". He is possibly the worst 1b in the league right now. He doesn't even make the routine plays anymore... Anyone who thinks Prince Fielder isn't an elite hitter and not an asset to our offense can't know the game of baseball very well. Yea, he's terrible defensively, but he's a fabulous hitter.

Our whole infield defense is crap Wow, we needed that break big time

Can't fault Green there. He got an out and then two grounders to thirdbase that resulted in a 1st and 3rd situation.

Our fabulous defense at work again

The problem with you're argument is that Betancourt isn't a rookie or a guy in just his second or third season. He's in his 7th season, it's very rare for any player in his 7th season to magically revert from being the bad player he's been in the past. How often does say a defensive player who had terrible range as a 26, 27, and 28 year old, out of nowhere show better range as a 29 year old? How often does a guy with 3100 big league at bats and a pathetic 106 walks during that time suddenly start showing some patience at the plate? Just because something is technically possible doesn't mean we should have any hope for it to happen when the odds are about one in a million. Hell, when Yuni was asked in camp if there was any chance that he'd start being more selective at the plate. His response was something to the effect of, i'd like to, but i'm Latin and we Latin players like to hack. Not exactly inspiring words of a guy with any intent at all on changing his by far biggest flaw as a hitter.

These games all matter before Hart gets back. Once he gets back, guys like Almonte, Kotsay, or Boggs if he was up will be asked fairly often to pinch hit late in close games. Even when Hart gets back, he could be forced to miss 3-5 game stretches because of any number of ailments. Boggs is a switch hitter and our bench is mostly lefthanded batters. Point being is that yea the 24th and 25th guys on the roster will generally have limited impact on team, but they can factor into a few games. The Brewers could end up winning or losing a playoff berth by a single game or two. So the Brewers or any team that could potentially be in a very close race for a playoff berth would obviously be best served by having the best bench possible, regardless of the fact that the everyday players are vastly more important. If Doug could say what exactly that Almonte brings to the table compared to Boggs, i'd love to hear it. Almonte is worse defensively. Nothing in his minor league stats suggest that he's a better hitter than Boggs. He can't switch hit. So why is he on the team instead of Boggs? Meaningless exhibition games stats? I'd be curious to know because there has to be a reason given Doug didn't just pull Almonte's name out of a hat because he feels the last few roster spots are as utterly meaningless as you do?

I'm pretty much a complete novice when it comes to computers. I can turn mine on and surf the net, that's about it. Well, i've been using Firefox for ages and currently am using the 3.6 version. My mom's husband is running the new 4.0 and for now at least, i'd prefer tokeep the version i have. For whatever reason though, over a week ago, i haven't been able to open new tabs. Regardless if i try clicking on the + thing or go under file and ask to open a new tab, neither works. Anyone have a clue what could be causing this? I tried seeing if i could do something under tools in the option area which tabs is in, but that accomplished nothing.

Good for them It's nice to see a quality band get some popularity vs a lot of the crap music that makes up so much of what's popular today. The small intimate type of settings you mentioned are good for fans fortunate enough to see a band before they hit big, but the band has to struggle to get by. The Black Keys are such a great band and deserve some financial windfall that comes with more popularity.