TheCrew

Would any of you leave that much money on the table? Easy to say no when you don't have the opportunity and probably never will. You can all say what you want, but when $40 million or more is sitting there................... I seriously doubt it.

Yeah, it sure looked like he took a heck of a beating behind there - even after Yo left he took a few.

Just thought he deserved some love - I haven't had a chance to go back and watch the game, we were sitting 3b side so it's tough to tell how many balls would have gotten away from him but it seemed like he blocked close to a dozen pitches yesterday and took the brunt of a few of them. Unsung hero of yesterdays game imo.

RBI single was huge - but the play he made in the 9th was 1000x more important. He doesn't get there and put his body 100% on the line, they don't win. As for the Yuni bashing - it's a complete joke on this board and based on his play for the Brewers in 2011, mostly undeserved. He was bashed by a group of people on here because WAR/UZR said he was a bad player before he ever donned a Brewer uniform - they aren't going to change their opinion now. The guy that has deserved all the Yuni hate was his partner for most of the season on that side of the infield - and he is rightfully on the bench now. Yuni could homer every at bat for the rest of this post season and play great D and some people wouldn't change their opinion on here because UZR says he doesn't have good range. It is what it is with some and this is exactly what Whitlock is referring to in his article from a few weeks ago. All that said, the Cards series also has another layer involved that many are overlooking - Furcal and the Brewers decision not to pursue him at the trade deadline.

I'm going down without a parking pass, will be getting there about 1pm - normally I wouldn't be worried, but I'm starting to wonder if I should stop off an pickup a parking pass at ticket king or something. Thoughts?

Quoted for Truth - the big problem is that some people present these stats (like WAR and UZR) on the same level as something that is strictly based off the math, like OBP.

Whitlock is garbage and has been for a long time. I stopped reading his drivel after his "theory" that NFL teams with more white players, won more games. All that said, he has a point to an extent - a number of posters around here are guilty of it as well - they point to things like UZR and WAR to try and summarize a players worth and act as if it is the end of the discussion. Yet they ignore things like UZR saying Casey McGehee has good range this season, or Nyjer Morgan had equal value to Bruan a few seasons back to name a few. Sometimes common sense has to come into play - but anyone who visits this board knows there are plenty of stat-heads that like to point to UZR or WAR to summarize an entire players worth. To me, using these flawed stats (at times) is as lazy as Whitlock's writing.

Blake is a huge upgrade. He is a far superior defender and is far more consistent at the plate - furthermore, my post was on August 1st, that was before McGehee had a "ton of key hits" - he's had a good two week stretch, but let's not get carried away. He's been brutal pretty much all season at the plate and his defense is offensive. Casey has had some good luck in high leverage situations, with a BABIP close to .400 - don't get me wrong, I've enjoyed his big moments - but all you need to do is look at his medium/low leverage at bats (and the avg in the .220's that goes along with it) to see how badly he has struggled all year. I'm pulling for McGehee and hope he has turned it around, but I would gladly take Blake in a heartbeat on the roster over a guy like Wilson. Keep McGehee on the bench and he can pinch hit in this high leverage/late close situations since that is the only thing he has done well this year.

With the lead and as well as Estrada is pitching, I'd take my time with Narvy - I'd also maybe use Estrada over the last few weeks in some spot starts to give guys an extra days rest.

I don't think we'll see him start much going forward - take away the injuries and there is a good chance he wouldn't even be at 20 at this point.

Probably mentioned already, but how many starts has Kotsay had this season?

Yeah, Kennedy could be a dark horse - DBacks end up winning the west and he continues to pitch well, he would have a shot but I still say Halladay would have to pitch poorly over the next month. Halladay may have given up 25 hits in his last 3 starts, but he also went 2-1 and struck out 25 and only walked 4. He easily could have been 3-0 during that stretch too, was left in to pitch the 9th the other night after throwing 100 pitches and gave up the lead (although he did K 14 in that game).

Only way Halladay doesn't win is if he implodes over the next month or if one of the top NL pitchers did something crazy/unheard of - i.e. lincecum throwing back-to-back no hitters. If Cueto hadn't missed the first month of the season, it's be a lot closer.

I'd take Kotsay anyday of the week and twice on Sunday over Gamel as a pinch hitter - one big reason is Kotsay strikes out 1 in every 10 plate appearances at the MLB level. Gamel, while it is a small sample size, had struck out over 1 in 3 times. Not what I want from a pinch hitter, not to mention Kotsay has better numbers in every other area. Sure Gamel/Green are younger, but that is all they have going for them in terms of value as PH over Kotsay. At this point in the season - with 6 weeks left to go in the regular season - do you really want to put a rookie who has not done well in short stints at the MLB level in that situation over a veteran who has produced multiple times in that role this year? Green should have been up 2 months ago to platoon (at the least) with McGehee - but that's for another topic.

Excellent post and put it into words much better than I could. Just seems like some have been anti-kotsay and anti-yuniB since the season started - and the primary basis for that was WAR and UZR in most cases - and there is zero flex with that, regardless of what they do on the field for the 2011 Brewers.

Huh? First off, I never said 'he just knows how to be clutch' - Secondly, Corey Patterson hasn't started a game for the Cards in a week and he isn't/wasn't starting because of a hot streak. He was starting because their idiot manager chased Rasmus out of town. Thirdly, Yuni hasn't been as hot over the past 8 games - given that he was just a notch below Tulo for a while, that's not surprising - but he's still been very good, I'd gladly take that production all season. Mark Kotsay isn't a great player, I wouldn't even say he's a good player - that's why he's a bench player - and as the 24/25th guy on the roster, he is fine. Given that he has had multiple game winning hits in the past month, I frankly could care less what his WAR or UZR is and I could care less what it was over the past 2, 3 or 4 seasons. None of that matters at this point. It's also a bit misleading to simply just look at wOBA in the clutch situations - he's got a pretty healthy triple slash lines in medium and high leverage situations this season (for a 5th of'er): Medium lev. .321/.365/.462 High lev. .292/.320.333 It just gets old coming on this site and seeing the same ole "who cares what he did last night, advanced statistics suggest he will not do well over the remainder of the season - he should have never been signed, bla, bla, bla". At some point, you have to look at what a player is doing today - like I said previously, following the kind of thinking your suggesting will never allow you to find the diamond in the rough or breakout player and you'll always end up paying for a player past his prime. At some point, you look at what a guy is doing today. Like it or not, Mark Kotsay and Yuni B are a big part of the reason the Brewes have a 7 game lead in the division and have won 20 of 25 games.

To some, it doesn't matter what a player does for the Brewers this season, it's more important what he did over the past 4 seasons and what advanced statistics suggest he may do in the future. Advanced statistics have their place, but some people put WAY too much value in them and use some pretty crazy logic in trying to defend them. Have to chuckle though as I remember a thread before the start of last season with a number of the advanced stat gurus praising Jack Z for the team he was putting together up in Seattle.......... saying he was the new Beane, etc. - well, Seattle went on to suck. Yuni B has been one of the best SS in all of baseball recently - roughly a 2 month stretch - should he be benched because he's sucked in the past? At some point you have to focus on what a player is doing today, not what he has done in the past - otherwise your never going to find the diamond in the rough and your always going to hold em when you should have folded.

Yeah, it would be pretty cool to see wrigley packed with brewer fans.

Wolf and Lucroy never clicked out there from day one - with the way Wolf is pitching, I could care less if Rock comes down from the booth and catches for him.

Yuni, in his career, is a much better hitter in the 2nd half - I still say he has lost some weight and looks to be in better shape compared to the start of the season. He's been playing some great ball and definitely changed his approach at the plate, his defense still leaves a lot to be desired but who cares when he's been swinging the bat this well. Tired of hearing the UZR argument against Yuni as well - people should be using these advanced stats as compliments to their argument, not the basis. After all, UZR says McGehee is a plus defender this year with good range - and advanced stats once told us that Nyjer Morgan was worth more than Ryan Braun.

Anyone else think Yuni has lost weight since the start of the season? Maybe it's just me, but it looks like he lost a good 15-20 lbs.

I don't know how any Brewers fan that endured the past few seasons of pitching could even begin to call Marcum anything close to average. He's had a bit of a rough stretch lately, but the guy was flat out dominant earlier this season and overall he has probably been the Brewers best pitcher this season.

1-13 this series Albert....... not classy!

Plunk him!

Latroy just redeemed himself for his prior DL stints in my book.