bani1717

How long are you saying you have to wait? I've only been to the lot post-game around 4 or 5 times since the 2008 season started, but a couple times I've waited till 1.5-2 hours after and haven't gotten him (can't specifically remember if I saw him come out those times or not).

The 10 saltines in a minute are almost impossible. A few years ago when I was at State Fair I went to his stage area in the big expo building and gave it a shot (although it was actually 12 saltines at the time). Not even close. You were allowed to drink as much as you wanted before eating provided you swallowed everything. The closest anyone got was eating like 8 and having another 4 in his mouth, but he couldn't get them down. At the time Homer's award for everything was $500, but he was talking about upping the ante to $1000 IIRC. Thank you for starting this thread. I've always told my friends that I don't like to do speed-eating type contests because I'd rather enjoy what I'm eating and just eat a lot. Here is my chance to put my money where my mouth is.

Call me overly optimistic, but that 6-10 record tells me that we are currently playing worse than we actually are. We will heat up yet and play better than we actually are for a while. We just aren't that bad. Things will change. I'm not saying we will make the playoffs, but I don't think it's too far out there to believe that we may have a chance to compete for a berth in September.

I thought the point about Brewers fans talking trash about the Cubs all the time is pretty spot on. I attended 3 Brewers-Cubs games at Wrigley a couple weeks ago and encountered a total of one ****** Cubs fan trying to start something about the Brewers. Granted, the Cubs fans who come to Miller Park are (generally, but certainly not always) complete ******* in themselves, but there are many Brewers fans who act the same way back toward them. It's almost like some Brewers fans feel "alienated for life" by Cubs fans and want to just give everything back and then some. Other than that, while it was obviously exaggerated, I thought it reflected some other accurate things that I have witnessed on numerous occasions. I actually enjoyed reading it.

I think the economy has less to do with things than the fact that the team performed well last year. Even for the season ticket holders who put their money down for '08 postseason tickets, I believe you could have gotten that money refunded if you wanted (though I don't know for sure since my tickets are actually in my buddy's name....). Plus, factor in the fact that we have had something like 24 sellouts or so this year so far. Season ticket-holders alone won't sell out a game, except for maybe Opening Day. Even then, tickets weren't sold out until season ticket holders bought extras, etc. So, attendance is up more due to more smaller purchases (single games, 9-packs, etc.) than because enough people put money down last year. (not saying that isn't a factor, just saying that on-field performance has prompted people to buy tickets in spite of the economy) If you want to talk about the resale market, then yes, ticket sales are way down (they are probably up in number of sales but down in amount sold). There were TONS of Cubs tickets available on stubhub this year, many even below marquee prices at the ticket windows - buyers were willing to spend less for tickets (decreased demand) and more people were putting tickets for sale to make some of their money back (increased supply). That's the area of ticket sales that's been hurt. But even there, I think enough tickets have been sold on the secondary market that even if some people stop buying from the Brewers, the people who used to buy on stubhub or ebay may turn to buying from the Brewers. If the Brewers continue putting a winning or at least competitive product on the field, I think people will still come to see them play. Just my two cents.

1) Yes. 2) Yes, assuming you do it early enough. 3) My girlfriend had a terrace reserve FC 20-pack this year and her Opening Day tickets were in 422, directly behind home plate, in like the 17th row or something. (If your question is about extra tickets in addition to your 20-games, you don't even have the option to buy extra OD tickets if you have the FC 20-pack.) 20-pack ticketholders pay the regular season ticket price, so you do get a decent discount.... it will be less than twice as much as a nine-pack costs for sure.... plus if you pick the right games, you can easily sell some of your tickets here/on stubhub for profit/whatever and make some money back...

It's probably a "handling" charge. Apparently they charge $5 for shipping and $5 for handling.

Downtown Chicago a coupel weeks ago on Saturday evening the 4th I saw Jason Kendall and Ken Macha walking with their families at different times. Macha with his wife, and I didn't realize it was him in time to say anything. Kendall was with his whole family, and my girlfriend just said "Hi Jason," and he just said hello back. Granted, we were fairly close to the team hotel, but even still it was cool to just see those guys out on the street.

If the Brewers give away another bobblehead that contains a player with a removable bat, the Brewers will give you a replacement bat if you ask for one. I had one break on a Prince Fielder bobble back in 2007 and my brother just went to guest relations (without showing our broken bat or anything) and asked for another bat and they gave one to him just like that.

The only reason I can say that umpires get vacation is because they are ALWAYS on the road. Players at least are home for half the time. Umpires are definitely not at "home" for half the games they call. I think that putting up with that as well as putting up with simply being the generally unappreciated person in the stadium would wear on anyone. And do you guys really think that the umpires don't have calls reviewed by the league and aren't evaluated? Just because it doesn't happen publicly doesn't mean it's not happening at all.... my guess is that Causey won't be umpiring too much more in the MLB in the near future. Besides this, does it accomplish a whole lot to suspend umpires? If you do that, theoretically all you do is replace them with more "replacement" umpires who are most likely not full-time MLB umpires for a reason.

Well, they could just err on the side of calling it in play. It's not any different than the current possibility of a non home run being called a home run, only to be reversed. Does anyone know how exactly the Questec system works? I'm just curious how it adjusts for height differences and batting stance differences when looking at the strike zone and calling balls/strikes.

This movie gets me every time. For anyone who has ever seen an iron man competition, you know how dead tired everyone looks at the very end. Try to imagine what this guy is putting himself through just so his son can experience it with him.

One thing I hate about buying autographs in general is that I like the satisfaction of knowing that I obtained the autograph in person, either at a free Brewers signing or out by the players lot/during BP/whatever. I have signed 8x10s of pretty much all the starters on the Brewers team and I obtained every one of them through these methods. It started out as just a thing to save money for me by not springing for autographs but now it's turned into much more of a hobby and "pride" kind of thing I guess. That said, it would be hard to say no to the Hart 8x10 for .99 when I paid $5 to obtain the unsigned 8x10 that I had him sign.

The Packers are a team with state-wide tradition and lots of history. They also play what is probably the biggest overall sport in America as a whole. People talk about sitting down and watching football games, even people who are only casual sports fans. For baseball, a lot of casual fans don't do too much other than go to an occasional game or two per year. Any one football game is just so much more of a big-time event since there are only 10% as many games as there in a baseball season. For the Brewers to outdraw the Packers on TV regularly (or probably even at all) would require the Brewers to have sustained success for 10-20 years and for the Packers to be sub-.500 over that same span.

I would feel upset if I was one of those people too.... I guess my point is that he isn't some big jerk who just hates to sign for people and doesn't want to give anything back to his fans. However, it does state on brewers.com/blockparty that player appearances may be subject to change - so I guess it's one thing to be disappointed, but it's hard for me to blame the Brewers for that one. I, like everyone else, doesn't know why Fielder didn't show, so maybe he is to blame for not notifying the Brewers soon enough that it wouldn't work. I don't know. For the auto Friday that he missed, that is another crappy situation for anyone who waited for him for a long time. The story I heard was that he was getting some kind of "treatment" or something during that time. I'm not saying that I wouldn't be pissed too if I had waited that long in line, it's just that I've never seen him as a guy who is some big arrogant prick or something like that.

I got not only autographs but also a picture with Prince (as did my girlfriend) when he was on his way into Wrigley when the Brewers were in Chicago. I have gotten his autograph before without \too much hassle, but this instance struck me as one where he was impressively nice and fan-friendly.

Actually, I believe Sunday games sometimes outdraw Friday night games, at least over the past couple of years. In any case, weekday afternoon games certainly do draw big crowds and do sell out a fair share too. However, most of these are school/YMCA type groups that receive discounted tickets. They also offer half price tickets to kids and seniors for most day games. Weekday afternoon games aren't going anywhere.

I certainly believe that Melvin is doing everything in his power to find a deal to make this team better. That said, I honestly believe that Melvin's comments will have a far more negative effect than Braun's comments. Braun simply sounded like a frustrated player who was voicing his honest feelings. He never said anything about the pitcher's not being any good period - he said that we got outperformed this series. From the original blog about Braun: Braun said the Cubs' starting pitchers are "a lot better than ours." "They threw the ball a lot better than our starters did," said Braun. "They certainly swung the bats better than we did as well. Clearly, they were the better team. "It was nice to at least get one win but they clearly outplayed us and outperformed us during the series." (end quote from blog) If you notice, Braun never said that the Cubs' starting pitchers ARE a lot better than ours. Those are Haudricourt's words in the blog (hence they are not in quotes). Braun said, "Their starting pitching was clearly a lot better than ours in this series." He's talking about this series. Haudricourt makes it sound as though Braun thinks our whole rotation is crap all the time, when that's not at all what Braun said if you take his words in context. Also, Braun clearly stated that he knew Melvin was trying to make our ballclub better. And that the asking price was pretty high. He concludes by saying he would like a move made sooner, which is not unreasonable at all. Additionally, I don't see Braun's comments as throwing players under the bus. He said we got outperformed this series. Guess what, it happens to everyone, even the best players, so that isn't calling people out. And he's not calling Burns or McClung out because those guys know they are replacement players and not the number one candidates for the job. While they both want to make the most of their opportunity and would love to be starting for us all season long, they just aren't that level of pitcher. It's not a knock on them as people or as professionals. They just aren't the most talented pitchers, and Braun was simply stating that he would like to have more talent on the pitching staff. I'm guessing that if you asked Seth McClung, he would be more than happy to go back to the bullpen immediately if it meant giving our team a better chance to go deep in the postseason. Did anyone see how thrilled he was last year after Braun's homer against the Cubs in game 162? A big 6'4 guy or however tall he is jumping around like a little kid. I'm sure that he would settle for that feeling again even if it meant going back to the bullpen. He has to know he will never be a regular in the rotation for a contender anyways. Maybe (just maybe, I obviously can't say for sure) this team is so close that they all were on the same page with what Braun said and Melvin just wasn't. As for Melvin's comments, he seems to assume a lot from Braun's statements. By talking about Braun throwing guys under the bus, he tells us all exactly how he interpreted Braun's statements - with the idea that some guys are underperforming. Melvin's statements worry me more than Braun's. Then again, it's all just likely a result of Melvin being frustrated with losing and with not being able to currently find a good deal to make. So, he wasn't in the greatest of moods when he read/heard Braun's comments and took them in a very negative way.

Took the Skokie Swift and transferred onto the Red Line for the last 3 games plus on Thursday night just to go downtown. It worked great, except that Thursday night there was some small backup in the Red Line (only about 10 minutes or so).

This is unrelated, and I think I may have mentioned this a while ago at some point, but I am planning on going to Wrigley for autographs this weekend. I am hopefully going for BP all 3 days I go (Friday, Saturday, and Sunday) and also probably early before the game for when the players enter the stadium on Friday. I was wondering if anyone has any autograph experience at Wrigley and could offer any advice. For getting autographs early before the game on Friday, one of my specific concerns is exactly where to go (I heard from someone Addison Avenue, but I just wanted to verify this and check whether it's like behind the home plate area or what). Also, do players arrive for away games as early as they do for home games? I was planning on just getting there at 8am for a 1:20 game to be safe. As far as getting autographs inside the stadium, if there's any Wrigley-specific thing I should be aware of or anything that's different from Miller Park please let me know. From the website it looks like you can only wait at the club box wall on the outfield side of the dugouts, but if anyone could offer any more details I'd appreciate it. Thanks!

Monopoly is definitely Parker Brothers. That said, I still liked the original post a lot.

One other time I saw a ball hit up into the terrace box behind home plate. I want to say it was Ken Griffey Jr. but I'm not totally sure.

The reason some of those "smaller" sports are still around is because they have national championships in the past and, therefore, lots of private donors. I am pretty sure the rowing teams function primarily from donations. Personally, rather than having to worry about adding a women's sport, I'd like to see them take away men's soccer and add a baseball team. As I just looked at the roster there are currently 29 guys listed. Some of those will get cut and Idk what the scholarship numbers are, but as far as number of athletes it would essentially be an even trade that would satisfy Title IX, I would think.

Haha, I guess I shoulda put a smiley after my first statement, I was just joking around with that. As for my second statement, I completely agree with you that it isn't necessarily a smart way to build fandom. However, I doubt that the Steinbrenners put building fandom at the top of their priority list. They are all about revenue and trying to buy a championship. So when it doesn't work and they have a potentially smaller fanbase, I will feel less sympathy for them than I do now. And, while the decrease in capacity, increase in ticket prices, and plumeting of the economy make things harder for families who want to see games, it's not like a family trip to the ballpark in New York was cheap before the Yankees built a smaller stadium.

Same here. Thanks for giving me at least a ray of hope that I won't be sitting through 3 miserable games. Where will you be sitting? I will be in 220, 236, and 506 for the 3 games, respectively.