mikerollins

How did Lou Pinella do with those craptastic Devil Rays teams 2003-2005?? 63-99, 70-91, 67-95. How did Lou Pinella do with those not so craptastic Mariners teams in 2000-2002? 91-71, 116-46, 93-69 So what happened from 2002 to 2003? Did Pinella forget how to manage? Did he spend too much time talking with the idiot Ned Yost and some of that poor managing rubbed off on him? Or did he just have a team that was far less talented? How about Joe Torre managing the Mets in 1977-1980? 66-96, 63-99, 67-95? Was he that much of a worse manager there than he is now with the Yankees? Or is there just a tad more talent on the Yankees roster? How about Phil Garner from 1996-2001 with Milwaukee and Detroit? 80-82, 78-83, 74-88, 79-83, 66-96? Then he gets to Houston and goes 89-73 and plays in a world series in his first full season? Did he suddently turn into a good manager? Or did talent play into account? How about Bobby Cox? He was 69-93 and 66-94 in his first 2 seasons with the Braves. Then he came back 10 years later and won 14 division titles in a row. Do you think the talent improved during those 10 years? Or do you think Cox went from Idiot to genious? How about Terry Francona? He managed the Philles to records of 68-94, 75-87, 77-84, 65-97. He was fired after 4 years. He took over a talented Red Sox team in 2004 and has since gone 98-64, 95-67, 86-76. The point is, just because he didn't have to get fired and re-hired somewhere else to show it, Ned Yost can manage. He's always been able to. He is just now finally able to manage a team that has the ability to compete.

Intelligence was a typo. I was typing that post pretty fast. Sorry. As for the argument. I disagree that many managers would have done a better job with the 2003 and 2004 teams than Yost. You can make an argument for those 2 teams being the absolute worst teams ever assembled in major league history. I don't understand how you can seriously think any other manager would have done better with that team. As for the Estrada thing, it's really pretty simple. Estrada is a lazy player. He jogged to first on the double play. It pissed Yost off. He got yelled at when he came off the field. He got yelled at in the locker room. He got benched yesterday. Ned chose to keep it in house like a good manager would do, instead of airing dirty laundry to the public, by saying his hamstring has been bugging him. Trust me, if the hamstring was bad, he wouldn't have been in the game in the 12th inning. There is really no reason to blast him to the media so they chose to use a nagging injury as an excuse. What's the big deal here? It is what it is.

He's also managed team with far less than craptacular talent (until this year). Amazing how that works. 2003 Opening Day Lineup CF Alex Sanchez (career OPS .702) 2B Eric Young (.749) 1B Richie Sexson (.864) LF John VanderWal (.792) RF Jeffrey Hammonds (.787, but coming off a .729 season) 3B Wes Helms (.778) C Eddie Perez/Keith Osik (.687/.629) SS Royce Clayton (.681) P Ben Sheets Rotation: Glendon Rusch Career ERA 5.01 Todd Ritchie Career ERA 4.71 (coming off a year with a 6.01) Wayne Franklin Career ERA 5.54 Matt Kinney Career ERA 5.29 Closer: Mike DeJean 2004 Opening Day Lineup CF Scott Podsednik SS Craig Counsell (.694 career OPS 2B Junior Spivey LF Geoff Jenkins 1B Lyle Overbay 3B Wes Helms RF Ben Grieve C Chad Moeller (.641) P Ben Sheets Rotation: Doug Davis, Matt Kinney, Chris Capuano, Wes Obermueller, Victor Santos Closer: Dan Kolb I'm not going to go through the painful OPS's and ERA's of the entire lineup again because just looking at the names shows you how non-talented this team was. With those 2 rosters, it doesn't matter if you are Lou Pinella, Joe Torre, Bobby Cox, Tony LaRussa, Earl Weaver, or God. You aren't finishing .500 no matter what. To even judge Ned Yost on those 2 seasons is an insult to your own intellegence. 2005: With an improving young team takes the step to .500. 2006: Ready for a breakout year in 2006. JJ Hardy: Lost for season with broken ankle. Rickie Weeks out for season with bad wrist. Ben Sheets out for most of season. Tomo Ohka out for season. Derrick Turnbow had a 2nd half collapse. Chris Capuano had a 2nd half collapse. So many things went wrong last year out of Yost's control that is' hard to blame him for the dip back down below .500 2007: Same talent level as 2006, but a little better with Braun, Gallardo, Villanueva all year, Suppan, etc. 12 games over .500. 1st place by 3 games. Playing very solid baseball. I'm sorry this Estrada debate turned into this, but my goodness to even compare Ned Yost to any other manger because he hasn't won anything yet...and in your own words...has been craptastic. Those flippin lineups would have made any manaager in sports history have awfully craptastic results. (fixed accidentally posted emoticon --1992)

I'd be shocked if Gallardo doesn't go back into the bullpen for the first few weeks that Sheets is back just to limit his innings before a playoff run. That being said....Suppan has actually been pretty decent his last 5 starts. I don't know what you expected when we signed him, but I expected him to make a start every 5th day, and keep the team in check where we have a good chance to win. His last 5 starts: 7/20 SF L 5 innings, 3 ER's 7/15 Col W 6 innings, 2 ER's 7/7 @Was L 5 innings, 4 ER's 7/2 @Pit W 5 innings 3 ER's 6/27 Hou W 6 innings 3 ER's So basically he is 3-2 with a 5.00 ERA. Hardly CY Young material, but we didn't sign Cy Young, we signed Jeff Suppan. The god thing about the trend of his last 5 starts being better than the May and June starts is that he is historically a pretty good pitcher in August and September and this year's trends seem to indicate that he will continue to pitch better. If he could have gotten through the 6th inning in those 3 games he only went 5, it would lower the ERA to: 4.50 which is what I expected from him.

I guess we'll just agree to disagree. I never like coaches who blast players publically. I'd much rather have them blast them privately and then just make something up for the media/fans. I think it's the way a team, organization, company should be run. Handle things internally and then make up whatever you or the player wants made up for everyone else.

I guess I've never seen him "lambast a pitcher in public". To me, in public is spoken to the media. I've never seen him do that. He's always taken the high road. The obvious difference here is when you need to make a mound visit, everyone can see. Maybe we need to get Ned and the pitcher cell phones, so that Ned can just send him a quick text message so that he doesn't need to go out to the mound and "lambast the pitcher in public." The only difference between Ned jumping on Balfour and jumping on Estrada was that you saw the conversation on TV with the pitcher. If he waited to "instruct him" when he came to the dugout, it would have been too late.

This might be the wrong place to post this because it is kind of off-topic and deals with a touch of minor league stuff, but I figured I'd start here and it can get moved if needed.... My fantasy baseball team just lost Hunter Pence (my only CF on the roster) for 4-6 weeks. Does anyone know of any sleeper CF's who could be getting called up soon? Any sleepers on someone's bench who could get some more AB's down the stretch as some poor teams prepare for next year? Aside from a trade, my best short-term option is Milton Bradley so I picked him up off waivers yesterday, but I'm trying to catch lightning in a bottle. Any suggestions? I know the people around here follow this type of stuff and I could get a better answer here than any other website out there. Thanks guys!!

He lied to you? No way! Ned Yost lied to Bruce Ciskie. What a terrible way to handle the situation. He should have blasted Estrada to the media and really pissed him off. I just wish we had a manager who would blast players publically to the media like Ozzie Guillen because that would make things so much better. Remember, just like with injuries, Ned Yost owes the fans nothing in terms of what's going on with his team.

Did you want him to go out to the first baseline to chew Estrada out? Meet him halfway to the dugout? Meet him on the top step where all the cameras can see it? I'm sure Estrada got his earful, but the camera didn't catch it. What did you want him to do with Balfour after he had missed on 6 straight pitches? Sit in the dugout and twiddle his thumbs and see "Gee Mike..we should go tell him to throw strikes, but I'd hate to hurt the kids feelings, let's just let him figure things out on his own." The only difference between the 2 situations is the camera was on the mound visit and it wasn't on Estrada when he came back to the dugout.

Fair enough. Sorry. My point is that if Estrada really did have a bad hamstring, I have a hard time believing he would still be in there catching the 12th consecutive inning on Monday night, with a healthy Miller on the bench. I am pretty confident that the injury was a public story, while privately, Hardy and Estrada know damn well why they were sitting. I have no problem with the way Ned handled it, but think it's fairly obvious that there was a correlation between the 2 guys that dogged in extra innings and the 2 guys that were not in the lineup when they normally would be on Tuesday night. I also have no problem with people who do think he was hurt, but I just feel they are bein naive.

He wasn't. You don't have to try to explain it to the people that don't want to listen. Ned took the high road..and said he was hurt. If Suppan wasn't pitching, he'd probably be back in there catching tomorrow.

Face it. He ain't hurt. It's a copout. He's benched tonight because Ned was embarassed by what transpired last night. That's why Hardy is benched too. He dogged out the dropped pop-up, when he should have been standing on 2nd. They got their ass chewed out in the locker room and benched tonight. Ned, being the good manager that he is, doesn't air dirty laundry to the media. So Estrada is "hurt" and Hardy is getting "rest". I'm a huge JJ Hardy fan, and don't have the resentment towards Estrada that some people here do, but what happened last night was inexcusable and Ned will not tolerate it. If you believe that Estrada is hurt, I have some swampland for you to by in Florida.

Looking at the Brewers Bullpen..... Let's play a game.... Something doesn't belong..... http://forum.brewerfan.net/images/smilies/smile.gif

I think it's pretty obvious that when Wise pitches, he doesn't pitch for AT LEAST one day, usually two. So when you pitch Wise, you pretty much waste him for the next 2 games (3 including the one he comes in). When given the chance, I think it makes MOST sense to just let him finish the game that he is brought into. It keeps everyone else fresh, and it's really not wasting anything because he can't pitch for a day or 2 anyways.

Would it be a terrible idea to flip flop JJ and Weeks for awhile to see if it could spark both of them? I think the 8th spot is a bad spot for Weeks right now just because hitting in front of the pitcher they give him nothing to hit, but trying to snap out of his funk..he's swinging anyways. Maybe putting him in front of Braun and Fielder would get him some fastballs to hit. Plus his speed at the top would be nice. It doesn't have to be a permanant change, but maybe for a few games to see what happens.

Ahhh...good point. You're probably right. The Cardinals probably consider the Cubs their biggest rival, hence they would hope the Cubs miss the playoffs. I guess I looked too much into it.

There is a poll up on ESPN.com right now that asks the following: How will the Chicago Cubs finish the season? Miss Playoffs NL Wild Card NL Central Champs NL Champs World Series Champs The poll isn't that interesting...nor are the results as a whole: Miss Playoffs: 46% NL Central Champs: 19% NL Wild Card: 19% World Series Champs: 12% NL Champs: 4% Where it gets interesting is when you break it down by region. In Illinois a disgusting 31% said they would win the world series, which was the leading vote getter, while only 26% said they'd miss the playoffs. In the big-market states, CA and NY..52% (CA) and 46%(NY) said they'd miss the playoffs. However in the rest of the NL Central states: Wisconsin--Miss playoffs 61% Ohio--54% Texas-46% Pennsylvania-60% Missouri-57% They pretty much agree they won't make the playoffs (Texas is a little big scewed with the Rangers market and neutral areas (san antonio, etc). So basically the fans that have seen the Brewers and Cubs the most (Brewers, Reds, Pirates, Cardinals)...say the Brewers will win the division.

Just out of curiosity...how come when a moderator wants to swear it's ok, but when someone else swears it's a strike towards their 3? I could care less. I'm not easily offended and feel the rules around here are far too strict, but it just seems like a double standard.

I think he was just giving JJ and Weeks a mental day off. They have to play 18 games in 17 days and today seemed like a good day to get Graffy in there after his big hit last night. As for Miller instead of Estrada, it really was a no-brainer with a day game after a night game and 18 games in 17 days. So basically it comes down to Gross or Gwynn. I don't really see what the problem was.

People worried about the Cubs right now..don't forget the Brewers are in the driver's seat. 3.5 games is still a week's worth of us struggling and them playing well before they are even in first.... Plus if they do catch the Crew..there's nothing that says we won't catch them back by October. It's still a long season. Plus Soup just tied the game...so the sky isn't falling anymore, right?

Is it "rest"? Or "lack of production"? Weeks since May 1st (27 for 134) good for a .201 average. Hardy since June 1st (25 for 116) good for a .206 average. Against a Righty you are going to have Jenkins in the lineup. You don't want Mench so it comes down to Gross or Gwynn. Day game after a night game with 18 games in 17 days makes it a no-brainer for Miller to play. I don't think its so much about rest as it is..best available options.

So "something is wrong with him" because it was 102 degrees in Washington and Yost left him in too long in the 6th? I thought he pitched very effectively for 5 innings. He was appraoching 90 pitches heading into the the 6th inning. The Brewers have 4 off days coming up and Gallardo, Villanueva (if available, i don't know) plus the Wise, Turnbow, Cordero, etc, etc....he even could have gone to whoever would have been scheduled to pitch tomorrow or Tuesday because they won't pitch for a week. It should have been Capuano for 2-3 innings, Gallardo for 2-3 innings, Bush for 2-3 innings, to get to the 7th inning for Wise/Villy...Turnbow, Cordero. Capuano hit a wall and should have been pulled immediately following Zimmerman's homer. Ueck kept saying it. It was so obvious the 102 degree heat got to him and he was laboring.

Sure they can. Good teams lose series to bad teams all the time, especially on the road. It's baseball. In a short series, where pitching matchups play a key role, you can't expect to win a road series, even against an inferior team.

Welcome back TGJ. Good to see you get a start!!! Lineup: Hart RF Hardy SS Braun 3B Fielder 1B Jenkins LF Miller C Gwynn CF Weeks 2B Suppan P I like Gwynn and Weeks at the bottom getting on for the top.

Well if that's the case.....I think it's a great lineup too and I too am excited. http://forum.brewerfan.net/images/smilies/smile.gif