Brewer Fever

Darn right he pulled Suppan too early. He was in no major jam. He had thrown 83 pitches and we had a 5 run lead. And Shouse can go more than 1/3 of an inning. At most we should have used 3 pitchers. Suppan for 7, Shouse for 1 and possibly two. And if needed 1 pitcher for the ninth. Ideally Linebrink to get him back in the groove after his week off. Like I said if you force yourself to go through 5-6 pitchers you're going to come across guys who aren't effective that day.

You simply can't continue to use 5+ pitchers in 5 run ballgames. Remember I'm talking about 5 pitchers before the Phillies 5-run 9th. This is not a today only trend or rant. This is a continuing pattern with Yost this season. He simply misses far too many opportunities to get through a 9 inning game using a solely a starter and a single reliever or two. Using today as a perfect example, you'll see that Suppan left the game after 83 pitches with 2 outs in the 6th and a 5 run lead. You're telling me he couldn't finish off the 6th and then go one more inning and pitch 7? To further exasperate his mistake Yost uses Shouse for the mere 1/3 of an inning he pitched finishing off Suppan's 6th. Yost then proceeds to burn through two more relievers over the course of the next 2 innings despite the fact that they pitch clean innings each and we maintain the 5 run lead. Now you can't tell me that Shouse is a 1 out only pitcher or that Villanueva and Linebrink are both incapable of going beyond 1 inning. The problem with this bullpen mismanagement is two-fold. The short-term effect is a matter of mere probabilities. If you go through 6 pitchers, the chances increase that you're bound to call upon one who won't be on his game that day. You have the first three relievers pitch successfully yet you dispatch of all three of them to find out if you can find one who doesn't have it. The obvious long-term effect of this bullpen mismanagement is an overworked and ineffective bullpen. Some of these guys just are not used to getting up and throwing every or every other day. As I type this, the result of finding those 1-2 relievers who didn't have it today after dispatching 3 who did has led to the Brewers using their 7th pitcher today. Now, many of you have asked for examples of Yost's incompetence with the bullpen and here you have it. Maybe this could be a thread to track this continued mismanagement. If I have time I'll dig up other games in which far too many pitchers were used in games that were well in or well out of hand.

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My tip is get out of the stock market and buy commodities. The stock market just finished a period of hyper inflation and will be in an overall bear mode for the next 15-20 years while commodity prices soar during the same timeframe.

All that money appears to be pretty well spent. The Cubs look like they just bought themselves a division title. Even those pitchers they signed appear to be good purchases, better than Suppan the both of them. Here we are an organization that builds for years from rock bottom via the draft and player development, and then whoosh a last place Cubs team turns NY Yankees on us and spends 300 million to fly up to 1st in one year. I foretold this scenario before the season started and took TONS of heat for it. One unnamed poster felt fit to mock me for it many times since then. I laid this scenario out because what the Cubs did this past winter was potentially the worst thing that could possibly happen to the Brewers. No one wanted to hear it, but guess what...it just happened. When their sale goes through, the wallet will only get fatter. MLB may never have a salary cap, but no team should ever be able to spend in one offseason what the Cubs did this past winter. Taking a last past team and zooming past a young and devloping team with nothing more that a gigantic wad of cash and reckless abandon is demoralizing and in no way good for the game.

The Yankees, Mets, Red Sox, and many other teams have been hot after Linebrink for years now. He has a few bad outings and suddenly we think we can or should get him on the cheap?

Well, then, work harder to get over it -- people can be into whatever they want. Also, I hate when people make reasoned, intelligent criticisms of a trade and somebody has to come back and berate them as if they're criticizing the very concept of making a trade Well, I hate when people aren't capable of hearing the other side, so I guess we're even.

First off, Inman isn't a B level prospect, he's more like an A-. Thatcher is probably more around a B+ while I'd put Garrison at a B. That's what I'm saying. We had to give up something better than a bunch of B and C prospects in order to improve the major league club. If we do nothing everyone would complain. We have all these people barking for moves to get better but they seem to think we can get good players for marginal prospects. Overall the prevailing sense is that AA players are more important than doing what it takes to stabilize the big club that has a realistic chance of making the playoffs.

I can't get over how in love with minor league baseball some of you are. This team desperately needed a stabilizing bullpen arm, one that knocks everyone save for Cordero, down one rung. We haven't been to the playoffs in 25 years and we're gonna sit on our hands? Either that or live this fantasy where we trade nothing but B and C level prospects for talent that will actually help us. Nice job Dougie, now go get some more if you can.

Hate to be too much of a downer but the Reds have been playing winning baseball (10-7) since they fired Jerry Narron. Just something to consider.

Oh thanks, I actually went to grade school with the sister of nail in the skull Patrick Lawler.

Patrick Lawler? Is that the guy who survived a really long nail shot into his skull?

And somehow when Capuano comes back both Spurling and Capellan will still be on the team.

Do we have a walkoff win this year? I see them occur on Sportscenter virtually every night and I'm constantly thinking about how we need one.

I knew I might have egg on my face after saying that and it was worth it.

I couldn't care less if Capellan exits the club after today's game.

Capellan instead of Villa? Does Yost have a wager on the Royals?

Let's see, I've got Fielder, Hardy, Jenkins, Estrada, and I know there's one more... Oh yeah, I've got Gabe Gross on my bench, that's my man. It sure would have been nice if someone had been on base when Hart hit that one.

This team will achieve the things we know its capable of when Yost either picks a same starting 8 that play 95% of the time or when Yost is shown the door. Whichever comes first.

I fired up the PC to see if even ONE person could defend both Gross and Counsell batting there. Inexcusable.

Not only do I have a bad feeling about this game, I have a bad feeling about this entire series.

Tonight we see how big of a big game pitcher Jeff Suppan is. Does he have what it takes to propel the Brewers into 1st place? Huge game tonight. The season hangs in the balance. I'm only being half-sarcastic on this one, so I went with the teal font.

All that tough talk by Yost and it appears all he did was cave and make both Jenkins and Mench starters.

Let's make this real simple. If Clemens pitches at all in 2007 it will be for either, NY, Boston, Houston, or Texas. That's it. By now it shouldn't even have to be explained why only those 4 teams are possibilities. And really only NY and Hosuton seem likely. Anyone who even suggests the possibility of convincing him to come to Milwaukee should get a timeout.

Hmmm, now where did we hear talk of this before?