Big Reed

I can agree with Bill james' predictions with the exception that i don't think Hall will have that many doubles. I see Hall hitting 25-35 doubles in 2008. out of curiosity, what does James predict for Crawford and Andrew Jones? to include their runs scored, RBI and Sb totals? Does he predict Jones will bounce back? it would be nice when comparing players if we used the same source for predictions of success /failure rather than our own biases. if you believe what james says about Hall for 2008, then you should also believe what he says about Crawford and Jones. Does bill james have a free web site? or were those predictions taken from one of his books?

ok. i can understand him not liking figgins. I like Willits. as for hall , there is nothing that says he'll bounce back either. he could get even worse. he could approach Andrew jones and Sexson type numbers if he keeps swinging for the fences. Whatever happened to the old philosophy of advancing the runner and putting the ball in play? the brewers are starting to look like the equivalent of a 3 point basketball team - live and die by the home run.

The stats below are Willit's real OBP stats. Ender, where do you get the idea that Willit is nothing more than a .350 OBP player? Surely, you can't base your comments using his minor league or major league stats. he did exactly last year at the major league level as what he accomplished in the minors. his OBP looks pretty consistant to me. This sounds more like your subjective opinion on Willits rather than using his actual stats. At least you were honest in stating that you don't like Willits. from the stats below, how can you arbitrarily say Willits is nothing more than a .350 OBP guy? Since you are always talking about OBP, I would think you'd like Willits. Admittedly, he has zero power. But how much power do you need in a lineup? Looking at his career, Willits skipped low A ball, and he split a season between AAA and MLB. he looks like a fast track type of player to me. Did I mention he's also fast? 2003 Pion .410 OBP 2004 Cal .374 OBp 2005 tex lg .377 OBP 2006 pcl ..448 OBp 2006 MLB .411 OBP 2007 MLB .391 OBp Looking at Hall's stats, if I said he's nothing more than a super utilty guy and .250 hitter, people would be all over my case. but the truth is that hall is not exactly a great fielder, and his average has dipped the last couple of years. Is that a trend? i recall a famous GM saying it is better to trade a guy one year too early than a year too late. Now is the time to unload Hall.

I'm not a big hall fan. it would save the brewers some money. The posters here who drool over OBP stats should love Willits. the other posters like myself who drool over stolen bases should also like Willits. i remember a stretch of games last year when the angels couldn't hit a home run to save their life. but they kept winning games by using their speed, defense and pitching. I like speed a lot more than I like power. I'd trade hall for Willits. I' m not sure the Angels would be that interested in Hall - especially if they acquire Cabrera. Despite his tremendous stats, I'm not sold that Hall is a great shortstop or third baseman. The Angels ' shortstop and third baseman of the future is Aybar and Wood. I'm not sure I'd want hall t o obstruct their path. Maybe he'd be a nice expensive insurance policy if neither prospect blooms as hyped. for what it's worth, Willits played over 60 games in left last year and only 30 games in center. I see Willits as a cheaper version of figgins.

mothership I majored in math. Wit h fingers, we would have won game 2. We would have won in 5 games. it's quite simple, We would have never lost in either game 6 or in game 7 because the series would have been OVER! so what we did in those two games would have been irrelevant.

what I'm saying is yost wanted to win so he put his best lineup in each day. and as part of that best line-up, hall was often watching from the sidelines in September. he was being platooned with gross and gwynn. mench was a n ok player wit h texas, but he to o found himself a platooon player for the brewers. mench had a lot of potential and value in 2005 and 2006. now he has very little trade value. Hall still has some trade value to other teams because he can play the infield. but his value as an outfielder is getting very close to the value mench has. if mench recieved the number of atbats hal l did las t year, i'm quite sure he'd be able to duplicate hsi production. and yes, hall's slump last year dramatically affected his trade value. Nobody remembers how great mench was in 2005 before he was a brewer. as far as hall's value as a shortstop goes , two shortstops have already been traded and neither one's name was hall. the teams looking for shortstops found somebody else. I'm not going to lie about the brewers' September line ups. Why not ask Yost why he benched hall? Great players do not become platoon players when the divison crown is on the line. .

for those that value Hall so much - see that other thread talking about Hall verses Crawford - I think I should point out that hall was not even starting for the brewers for much of last season's stretch run as Yost was already going in a different direction and winning. I have to believe that has probably led melvin to the idea of trading hall, and has also lessened his value in the minds of other GMs. At the end of last season, Hall's value was almost equal to dare I say it ? Mench!

Hall for Garland? Sheets for mc Cann? talks with cordero? continued talks with the braves? at least it looks like melvin doesn't want to stand pat over the Winter. he's at least making inquiries. or you might say other teams are phoning the brewers and want our players. which is also a good thing.

I look at closers and losing teams from a different viewpoint. I think a good closer can turn a losing team into a winner. having a great closer allows the starters to pitch differently and allows the coach to coach differently. A starter can go all out for those first 6-7 innings knowing he doesn't have to hold back and also pitch the 9th to ensure he gets a win. So many baseball games are decided by 1-2 runs, and the teams that make the play-offs are the ones that win those close games. Rather than looking at why the brewers failed down the stretch last year, we should look at why the dbacks, rockies, and cubs all succeeded in September. Dempster had 28 saves and only blew 3 chances. valverde had 47 saves. and Colorado had Corpus and Fuentes who were both red hot. Fuentes did not allow an inherited runner to score the entire year. rather than becoming a winner and then adding a closer to the mix, I think guys like Valverde and Corpus were the real reason their teams became winners. When I look at the Brewers of several years ago, the difference between being a winning team and a loser was because of the blown saves. if the brewers had invested in a proven closer several years ago, they would have become a winner sooner. I realize I have no stats to back me up - just proven examples. Tom Seaver didn't win 50 games in 1969. But he did make the people around him better. Rollie Fingers didn't get 7 saves in one world series. But he is the reason Oakland won and the Brewers lost. if fingers was pitching for the brewers in the 1982 world series, the series would have gone 5 games maximum. And Fingers was one of the prime reasons the brewers made it to the series. Pitching is what beat the Angels in the play-offs, not hitting. something that doesn't show up in stats. We all know Rivera is a great closer. However, Chamberlain would not be half as good if he didn't know Rivera was in the bullpen ready to bail him out if he got into a jam. knowing he had Rivera, Torre could use Chamberlain to maximize his output. if Torre didn't have a closer he had confidence in, he might have used his starters and middle relievers a lot differently. the same applies to the brewers. without Cordero, perhaps Bush and Suppan and the other starters would have been asked to pitch 7-9 innings instead of 6-7 innings. the effect could have been they all burned out by September. a quality closer is worth more than a quality left fielder. Cordero is worth his $10 million.

just curious- is bagwell's salary finally off the books for the Astros? I had thought even though he had retired, the Astros were still carrying part of his salary last year. With both bagwell and biggio off the books, the Astros would have enough money to do a lot of things such as re-signing Pettite. With a new GM in St Louis, and the Cubs and Astros also flexing their dollars, I hope the brewers do more this Winter than just standing pat and hoping our youth will improve and pitchers get healthy.

I'd like to acquire Baldelli, but not at the expense of giving up Hardy. As far as shortstops go, I thought the Drays liked that young shortstop they acquired from Houston. I thought they also liked Reid Brignac as their shortstop of the future. So why would the DRays be rumored to want another shortstop?

I used to propose trades that made logical sense, and I would give up talent ot get talent. But in looking at the real trades made in the last 5 years, i found very few trades that were even or logical. perhaps all these strange lopsided trade proposals were closer to reality than the ones I could think of. i would think a Webb for Willis trade would be fair. but I seriously doubt the marlins will get anything close to Webb when they trade Willis. So maybe a Capuano for Willis trade would be a good one to propose.

You don't want to build your entire team around first and second year players. You need some young veterans to add into the mix. they provide leadership, stability and a gate attraction. look at the Seattle Pilots. they had both an aging Don Mincher and Tommy Harper close to his prime along with their young players.. thus my choice is Utley.

Can the brrewers petition the league to eliminate the 7th inning? My guess is the brewers would have won 120 games this year if the 7th inning was not part of any of their games. can we petition MLB as fans to eliminate the 7th inning? or at least call it something else? Could we start the game with the 7th inning and then replace it with the 4th inning? Can the brewers waive all of thier relief pitchers who have pitched in the 7th inning this year? is our problem in the 7th inning in any way related to our sausage races? or the opposing team's inspirational singing of take me out to the ball game? Does that song bring tears to our relief pitchers' eyes? I've noticed a trend of ineffective pitching by brewers pitchers in the 7th inning. The eternal optimist, I even started capuano on my fantasy team today - only to done in by the 7th inning curse once more. .

Braun - I think he was brought up at the right time. it was obvious in Spring training he needed more time to improve on his fielding. On the down side, I would not have started the season with both Council and graffy. I would have traded one of them off. YO's innings. I realize a lot of people are concerned about a pitcher and hsi innings. And everybody points to Wood and prior as being overused and flaming out. neither Wood or prior pitched much las t year and they still became injured this year. the same applies to Sheets. pitching a lot of innings did not result in their injuries this year. perhaps, some pitchers are more prone to injuries than others. perhaps pitching a lot of innings is not really as big of a factor as some people here think it is. Did pitching a lot of innings cause the minor league arm injuries to Gold, Jones, Parra and nuege? or were they injury prone? I think throwing 95 mph pitches causes more injuries than pitching a lot of innings. our relief corpse - never before have i seen so many relief pitchers implode and give up 3-4 runs in an ininng. The best guage of how well or bad our relief pitching was this year would be to look at how many runners in scoring position were allowed to score. I have to believe that stat is probably a record breaker this year. ned's managing. you get what you pay for. he's not the lowest paid manager around. but he's also not close to making joe torre type money. before i get on Yost's case, i'd like to see the names of 4 other managers who are paid less than ned and doing a better job than he has done. sheets: is it time to cut our losses? if the guy was healthy, we'd have a 6 game lead. but when is the gu y ever healthy? hall: a mistake to move him to the OF. a mistake to give him a long contract. should have traded him over the Winter. However, Weeks would not have nmade a better CF. if hall stayed in the infield, he would have played third, and braun would have remained at AAA. The Cubs were smart enough to realize Soriano was a terrible center fielder and moved him to left field. the brewers were not as smart with hall. Unfortunately, it's kind of obvious now hal l is not the brewers' centerfielder of the future. So what do you do with him? his trade value is not what it used to be. trading inman: many people have pointed out Inman really had no future with the brewers despite his ability. very few people have pointed out the brewers will receive two first round picks for losing Linebrink at the end of this year. if you invest one of those first round picks in a college senior pitcher, you'll have somebody who will be pitching at AA in 2008 and will arrive to the majors about the same time Inman will. defense verses catching verses pitching - not sure who to blame. good defense makes pitchers look good. Good game calling by a catcher makes pitchers look good. I have to believe a part of the blame that the pitchers and relievers are getting should be shared by our poor pitch calling and mediocre defense. our defense may not be making a lot of errors, but they are also not making a lot of diving plays either. Their lack of range is also a factor. bottom line- we need to catch more of those line drives rather than letting them bounce first. and we need to call for the right pitch when we have two outs. when we lose, there is a lot of blame to spread around. we wi n as a team. we lose as one as well. changes ? get a true CF. find a starter who can pitch past the 6th inning. cut Yost some slack.

a lot of people on this board were cutting down a guy named Wells as having nothing left and would not be a contributer for this team. What has Wells done since being acquired by the Dodgers off waivers? he's won two games and given up a combined total of 4 runs for those two games. not bad for a worthless fat, washed up pitcher. if Wickman was so bad, why did the dbacks claim him? After today's game, whicjh move would I have prefered melvin to make? Claiming Wickman off waivers? or his tremendous trade for king?

Wickman had a couple of bad games. he also had several good games in tha \t stretch.

actually it was melvin's plan to re-acquire branyon. But the cardinals with their worse record were able to claim him before us. in a related move, Rolen was placed on the Dl today which would explain why the cardinals made this move.

too live- I was listening to the radio broadcast. I would never intentionally actually watch a cubs game on TV. I'm not sure if the radio and TV guy are the same, but I will agree the announcer sounded as if he was the manager and this is what's going to happen for a fact. when in reality, he has no clue what's going to happen. Although I would have to believe traschel would probably start in the double header against the cards. That sounded realistic as that would enable the rest of their starters to keep on their normal 4 days off rotation. it was inevitable that Rocky cherry would be traded as the Cubs did not want a box score that included cherry pie.

The announcers said during the Cubs broadcast today that the Cubs may go to a 6 man rotation They also said that Traschel would pitch in the double header against the Cards. Traschel will be used as a starter rather than long relief. TRWI7, could you be more specific in providing the actual names of the prospects the cubs gave up? who is their 7th best prospect and what is the best name ever ? As for the cubs giving up their 7th best prosect to acquire him, I have to wonder how great their 7th best prospect actually is. looking at the annual BA prospect handbook for 2007, it shows the Cubs' 7 prospect at the begining of the year was 3b Scott Moore. it said his future with the cubs would be as a reserve or trade bait. if this is the guy they gave away, then it's no real loss for the Cubs. as far as baseball names go, the Cubs have a lot of prospects with great names. there's Rocky Cherry; Pie; (but no Cherry Pie) Jesus; Mark Reed ( I always liked that name) ; Norwood; Jake Fox; Pie; papelbon; jae-kuk Ryu to name a few cool names.

Rydogg - I hate to be super critical of your work. But, you're making it hard for me to maintain my image as the hardest to read poster. Although, I, myself in my bizzarro world, had no problem reading your posts. it also made perfect sense to me. like the poisiden adventure, the ship has sunk. I do have a question. I noticed in one of your posts of this thread that 2008 was backwords but not upside down. Was that intentional? Was there a hidden meaning there? or does your font not do numbers?

As i've said in the rumors thread, there have been plenty of players available. clearly, Wickman has been available for some time. it's just melvin has no interest in him. I have to believe there are a lot of other players available that melvin also has no interest in. Managers all hate guys who complain a lot. but for the sake of winning, they trade for them, and play them - ala gary Sheffield. it comes down to do we want a happy club house? or do we want to do everything possible to win? it looks to me like having a happy clubhouse takes priority over winning. I can't believe melvin doesn't like Wickman just because of his crybaby attitude. I'd rather see Wickman pitching with his bad whinning, attitude than seeing the happy go lucky Capuano pitch on the mound. And yes, I recall when Wickman signed with the braves, he turned down the chance to pitch for several other teams offering more money because he said he only wanted to pitch for a team that planned to use him strickly as a closer. is Wickman still going to make those type of demands and watch from his couch? or wil he be willing to bend? and yost says we have a plan? and he wants to stick with that plan? I guess that plan doesn't inlcude winning this year? I hate to say it, but sometimes you have to throw out the long term plan and use a short term plan. that time is now. and besides, Wickman leaving after the season to free agency will give the brewers two more first round compensation picks in next year's draft to use towards that long term plan of ned's. I would think the brewers would love to pick up a potential free agent just for the draft picks alone.

I would have to ask the unpopular question. Did the brewers blow out Nuege's arm because of over use? Did the brewers ruin Gold's career because of over use? Did the brewers overuse Peterson, Jones and Rogers? Did the Brewers overuse Sheets? or did their arms breakdown because of other mechanical reasons? and while I named a bunch of brewers, I could have said the exact same thing for many other teams. The brewers don't have any more pitchers with arm problems than any other team. they are just highlighted more because the brewers are more dependent on their home grown talent than other teams are. I'm more of the oppinion that more pitchers burn their arms out trying to throw 95+ mph fastballs than from being overused. When I look at pitchers today that have had long careers verses those whose careers were shortened, I see pitchers like Maddux, Glavine, Clemins and Moyer who have stopped trying to throw the ball and started learning how to pitch. On the other hand, I've seen a lot of high fastball pitchers like Prior and Wood flame out. Nobody will ever accuse Maddux of throwing high heat. Steve Carlton was known for his curveball as were Ryan, Johnson and Blyleven. it's interesting that all 4 pitched successfully over the age of 40. On the other hand, the careers of Gibson and Palmer were both cut short. Was it a coincidence? how fast does Clemins throw today? 92? 89? maybe what the brewers need is not to limit a pitcher's amount of innings, but rather the velocity on his pitches. I realize fans love to see a pitcher register 99+ on the pitching gun. But perhaps that's what is ultimately ruining a pitcher's career. perhaps a lot of these pitchers throwing 95+ mph pitches do not have a body that was built to do so. I haven't done any research on this subject. I do know guys like Kaat, Ryan, Carlton, Randy Johnson, Seaver, and Blyleven did not continue to throw heat as they got older. it was part of their arsenal, but not their main weapon. I don't know enough about Pedro Martinez to speculate if his arm breaks down because he tries to throw high heat, or if it's mechanics or if it was from overuse earlier in his career. but he always seems to break down. Sowers was supposed to be a great college pitcher not really known for the velocity on his fastball. To contradict my thoughts. he's had plenty of injuries after he left college. Those problems cannot be attributed to either over use by the Indians or from throwing high velocity pitches. so for every theory, there will always be exceptions. However, I am led to believe the primary reason so many young pitchers fail has more to do with how they pitch rather than how much they pitch.

I have to believe that monroe , wells and wickman are all players better than what are on our current roster. Capuano and Vargus are both making Wells look good. Couldn't the brewers have put in a claim on Monroe just to stop the Cubs from picking him up? is gross better than monroe? Please don't try to tell me there is nobody out there that is not better than what we currently have. When a team gives up 11 runs to the lowly Giants, there has got to be better players than what we are putting out on the field. When a team loses a series to the pirates and reds, there has got to be better players available than who we are playing. I don't mind losing. but it 's the way we lose lately that is frustrating. rather than waiting until the August 31st deadline to acquire a fix, the brewers should have made a move over a month ago.

my point and question was to ask if the brewers were planning on making a move or just standing pat. My belief is that standing pat will not get us to where we want to be. I did include the names of about 15 pitchers I'd like to see the Brewers try to acquire. rather than having a discussion of the merits of flaws of a certain player, i wanted to discuss the merits of standing pat verses making a move. Sometimes making a move even invloving an insignificant player can provide an incentive for the other players to play better. how about comparing the records of the contending teams that have made a move verses those that decided to stand pat? The Dodgers, Red Sox, Mets and Cubs have all acquired a player off waivers. has their record improved since? I guess you could say the brewers acquired Weeks, Gross, and Mc Clure. My contention that making a move just to make a move is actually a good thing. and should not be poo pooed