nate82

It could also be a bad battery or a bad connection with the battery just a guess with the headlights going out part. Might want to get the battery checked to see if it is still good. Just my guess anyways I know when I had my older car I thought it was a problem with the engine when something similar to this would happen it turned out to be a faulty connection to the battery the power connector wasn't getting a full connection with the battery and had to replace the cable for that.

Yeah for Yankees Red Sox opening night on ESPN!

Just to a cabin in the summer every once in awhile and I like to have a phone near me and since my phone doesn't really work all that well up there it is kind of useless until I get close to Green Bay. My uncle has AT&T and his phone works somewhat up there some dropped calls but I would rather have the dropped calls than having no service at all. I think I am going to go with AT&T though just simply because it works somewhat up in the northeastern part of the state and that most of my time I am in major cities like Chicago and Houston. I just don't know anyone that has Verizon that lives up in the northeastern part of the state.

I currently have Sprint and they have been doing the opposite for me. I just can't stand the dropped calls anymore from Sprint and the bad lines I get. Once I get past Green Bay I don't get a connection at all with Sprint so I can't use it up around there at all.

Heyman says that Sheets is going to get $10m plus incentives. Wow that is more than what Harden got and he actually pitched last year. So I guess Sheets and his agent weren't really all that crazy in asking for $10-12m per year. Heyman tweet.

According to Danny Knobler Ben Sheets has signed with the A's there has also been a press conference scheduled for 1pm PST also. Link to the story of Sheets signing with the A's.

Apparently Sheets has signed with the A's.

AT&T has a price plan that is more along the budget that I am looking at about $100 with their data plan, minutes, and 900 text messages. While Verizon is about $30 more than that I will pay more if one or the other has better coverage in the Milwaukee area. Does anyone have AT&T or Verizon currently? How is the service in the Milwaukee area and also in the north eastern part of the state for both of the carriers? Was thinking about changing from Sprint I keep on getting dropped calls and sometimes the line is fuzzy and I can't hear anything and then it is clear the next day. Replaced the phone a couple of times with Sprint and the problem still persists with them.

Washburn equals the left handed version of Suppan. That 3.78 is misleading since Washburn pitched most of his time in a pitchers friendly ball park in Seattle. Don't forget that Washburn had a bad year in 2008 in a pitchers ballpark and when you look at Washburn's stats even more closely you will start to see why Washburn would be a bad idea. Look at Washburn's fly ball and line drive rate from last year it is a telling stat. Washburn is a soft tosser and he is not an upgrade over Bush if anything they are about equal and Bush will cost a lot less than Washburn so no the Brewers are not better off releasing Bush and trying to find another pitcher at $4m. Washburn won't sign for $4m you are going to have to add another $1-4m onto that contract. You will be paying about $5 or $6m for the same pitcher that you had at $4m so why dump bush when Washburn isn't even an upgrade over Bush. Just for a comparison Washburn was pitching in a pitchers ballpark in 2008 and had an ERA of 4.69 while Bush had an ERA of 4.18 you can even look at the advanced stats for pitching and see that Bush and Washburn are nearly identical in value so paying $4m for Bush is money better spent than paying $5m+ for Washburn.

It is not like you are moving a player from 1B or 3B to catcher here or for a football analogy an offensive lineman to the QB position. It is still the OF there is not that much of a difference and it is not like Gamel hasn't played OF before when he has played baseball. There is not much he can screw up it is not like there are designated plays that he has to run that will hurt his ability to play a different position we are talking about the OF here. I do not see a problem with moving a player from the IF to the OF. There shouldn't be much of a problem it is not like the player can't learn everything about the OF in a couple of weeks. Overly simplifying things here but all you have to do is run catch ball and then throw ball. I don't really see the problem here or the big deal of moving a player from the IF to the OF as everyone else makes it out to be. I believe some are overly exaggerating how hard it would be for someone to go from the IF to the OF with very little time in the OF. I am probably underestimating how hard it could be but I don't think it is as much of a problem as some people think it is.

I thought the same thing. This sounds more like if any team that will be moving to Orlando it would be the Rays.

You could always throw Gamel out in RF not the best option but he should be athletic enough to make the transition if Hart is not cutting it.

I think the speed will help the bottom of the order a little bit. This is where the Brewers can take full advantage of stealing bases. With the Brewers the 7th and 8th hitters in the lineup is probably going to be Gomez and Escobar. With the pitcher batting 9th you could have either Gomez or Escobar steal a base and then get the speedier player to 3b with a sacrifice or just let the pitcher strike out. Either way Gomez and Escobar will be in scoring position at 1B or 2B so that shouldn't really matter. I don't really want to see Weeks stealing bases with him batting in front of Braun and Fielder. Having Gomez and Escobar at the bottom of the lineup will create the best times to steal bases. I believe near the bottom of the order is where you want your players stealing bases since the reward out weighs the risk by a lot. You have some of your worst hitters at the bottom of the lineup and that is not even including the pitcher. Increasing the likelihood of scoring at the bottom of the lineup is where you would want to be stealing bases. Since you have the pitcher in the 9th spot a caught stealing in front of the pitcher is not all that bad unless it is the 3rd out of the inning.

No you are comparing a closer who is getting paid a premium for a stat that is paid at a premium price (saves). Cameron's offense and defense are close to Fielder but at his age he definitely is not worth the same as Fielder. So no I don't think there is any under or over valuing. Only over valuing would be on Hoffman.

Two players that the Brewers haven't had to pay a premium to get. One being the only other team interested wasn't going to give him the closing job and the Brewers were and the Brewers did pay a premium for Hoffman.

Because that is the best option for the Brewers. For one you already have a player that is playing in the city of Milwaukee and has been playing here for awhile now. To bring a free agent to Milwaukee you are going to be paying a premium either it being for an average player or an above average player. Prince by far is the best option for the Brewers of any future free agent where the Brewers will not have to overpay because of the city the Brewers play in. Also paying for free agents that are past 30 years old is not a wise decision for the Brewers injuries and decline are going to be way to risky for the Brewers to sign players after 30 years old. Of course there are players who are out of the norm but there isn't an abundance of them on the market every year. As for Prince's FA year there are going to be a lot of options available at DH and 1B for teams to choose from it is just in the best interest of the Brewers to sign Prince over any of those other players. Prince brings in more value to the Brewers than most of the players on the FA list that year.

If they are on the market and willing to come to Milwaukee. There are more than enough players in the farm system that project to be either average or just below average. Lawrie and others will be under control and at a very low cost. It would make sense to have Prince and Braun with those low cost players than having Braun and a bunch of average players. Filling holes is all fine and dandy but you are not really making the team better other than filling holes. When one hole gets filled another one shows up. You will be constantly filling holes and the FA players you are picking could be the next Suppan or Hammonds. I would rather give Prince a big contract than giving those big contracts to the Suppans and Hammonds. Players that will be filling holes for the Brewers in 2012: Cain, Schafer, Gindl, Lawrie (possibly), and others. There is even some good players in the system that could be good or great role players in Farris and Wheeler. There is also Salome and Lucroy who will be on the team in 2012. I wouldn't be surprised to see the Brewers rotation consist mainly of the younger players in the farm system right now. That maybe good or that maybe bad but I would rather take that risk with the farm system than going out and overpaying for FA pitchers. Other than trading for a pitcher I don't see any other way for the Brewers to get the pitching help. The offense is what is going to carry this team lets see how far Braun and Prince can carry this team over the next 4-6 years. I just don't see any reason why the Brewers should be spending money on older FA when they can sign a youngish player they already have.

I would rather pay Prince than pay 2-3 average guys $3-5m a year to be league average when there are players in the farm system that can do just about as good for league minimum.

Why? Who else are the Brewers going to be spending that money on? If the Brewers don't spend that money on Prince they are going to be spending it somewhere else. More than likely it will be on free agents who are older than Prince and are more than likely in their decline. Prince being paid up to $20m a year wouldn't be a bad investment for the Brewers. A strategy of relying on your farm system while on spending money on certain players sounds more like a great strategy than a terrible one. The Brewers really should stay away from free agency but that doesn't mean they should stay away from paying their players that they already have and need at free agent prices. I'm not even sure Prince is going to get the big bucks that some are thinking he will be getting especially if you look at the possibility of who maybe available after the 2011 season.

The biggest problem I see with giving Fielder that kind of deal is that you are going to have pitching concerns. Pitching is a premium and it costs a lot in free agency to get the pitching you need. The Brewers would be heavily relying on the farm system to generate some really good pitching prospects and we all know no matter how good we think our pitching prospects are not all of them are going to work out and be successful.

Do the Brewers trade Fielder next year or in the middle of this year? or should the Brewers try and resign Fielder and go with Braun and Fielder as the future of the team and hope that the young pitching prospects the Brewers have develop into #2's and #3's. Signing Fielder to a semi long-term deal might be a good idea though there are a lot of good free agents out there in the next off season but I doubt the Brewers would be able to land any of those free agents so should the Brewers just swallow the pill and try and sign Fielder after this season? Would a 5 year deal be enough to keep Prince in Milwaukee that would be near the $100m mark? I don't think Prince really is a $20m a year player but when you look at the options for the Brewers will the Brewers be able to replace the value they lose from loosing Fielder. Of course signing Fielder would make the Brewers rely more so on their farm system to produce average to above average at other positions where the Brewers could fill those spots with free agents. I know having two players taking up the majority of your payroll is a bad idea but is it really that bad of an idea for small and mid market teams? The Twins are a mid market team and it would be wise for the Twins to lock up Mauer long-term no matter the price tag well at least within reason. Wouldn't the same be true for the Brewers to be able to lock up Prince for at least 5-years would be a good idea. The Brewers really are not going to be attracting a lot of super star free agents the same with the Twins. I believe the Brewers, Twins, Rays, etc. should be locking up certain players and not going after high dollar free agent players that are either beyond their prime or just reaching the summit (just about 30-years old) and those type of teams should stay away from overly priced super star pitchers. If the Brewers are going to spend money I would rather see the Brewers give out a big contract to Prince over Lee or any other high priced free agent that will be available next year. I believe giving Prince $15-20m a year is a lot better than giving Lee that same amount of money over about the same time length. If the Brewers sign Fielder to a huge contract there are options in the farm system that the Brewers can use to replace other players the Brewers would be losing (Weeks, Hart, and Bush). The Brewers can replace those three almost rather easily Lawrie can replace Weeks at 2B both are about the same defensively and offensively I will give the edge to Weeks when fully healthy. With Hart there are a lot of players that he can be replaced with Schafer, Cain, Gindl, and some more that are in the system. Replacing Bush will be a little bit more difficult but there are options to replace even him in Butler, Rogers, Scarpetta, and Arnett all of which are either close being on the team in 2011 or a year or two after. I believe the money that the Brewers do have to spend should be spent on players like Fielder and Gallardo in the next few years. I believe the Brewers have enough young talent in the system now as far as pitching goes that the Brewers really could rely on Prince and Braun to be the ones to carry the team forward.

There is no asterisk behind the 1919 World Series and there should be no asterisks behind Bonds, McGwire, or Sosa's numbers or any other player who used PED's. There is also no asterisk behind Pete Rose's numbers. People will remember that the era was tainted no need to put an asterisk behind some numbers that can or could be passed by someone else. The record books are the record books and history will show us what really happened there is no need for any asterisk behind those numbers.

The Cubs are serious about Sheets but just not at the price that Sheets and his agent are asking for. I believe Sheets won't sign until just before spring training starts which will deflate his value even more so. I believe Sheets can get a deal similar to Myers but he is asking way to much right now 10-12m a year for 2 years is just way to much. I could see maybe a 1-year deal for Sheets with a mutual option for a second year at $10-12m maybe. I haven't seen or heard any rumors lately involving the Brewers so that may mean nothing is up or something is being worked on and they are just waiting on certain dominoes to fall first.

Depends will Redd's insurance on his contract be covered if he is on IR or does he have to be on the active roster but just rehabbing for the insurance to cover it? I agree though with your other point about Ridnour he maybe someone the Bucks can trade during the deadline and pickup a nice player or a draft pick. Would be a late round draft pick though. There are quite a few teams out there that will need a veteran PG to come off the bench for them. I'm just not sure who the Bucks could get for Ridnour though.

Does a buyout count towards the Bucks salary next year in terms of the salary cap? I haven't found anything that says it does or it doesn't count towards the cap or if only a portion counts. I would really consider buying out Redd's last year if I were the Bucks. Redd is just useless to the Bucks right now and he is taking up a roster spot that someone else could be filling for next year. I believe the Bucks will have a good team next year with Bogut, Jennings, and a lottery pick player. I wish Redd would have stayed healthy this year and the Bucks would have been able to dump Redd in a trade for something of value or anything but it looks now that Redd is done and he is not worth the contract that he has right now. I really believe the Bucks have to look at buying out Redd's final year next season or the Bucks are going to be strapped for salary cap space and probably won't be able to sign their draft pick.