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Thurston Fluff

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Everything posted by Thurston Fluff

  1. Thurston Fluff
    I'd ALSO like to add it's IMPOSSIBLE to know how Hellweg would have fared as of late had he gotten just good defense. Not great defense. Heck, even average. What should be a couple double plays turns into a couple runs scored. Instead of escaping the inning with limited or no damage bobbled balls, throws to the wrong base(he's been guilty) where he went for the lead out instead of the double play on what should have been routine. I agree he belongs in AAA and I also think he had a future as a legit top end of the rotation guy if he can gain some amount of control. But I think you are reaching on this point. This is the same defense as the rest of the pitchers have and they don't have ERA's, earned being the operative term here, over 10. Not a single 3-0 count he had was due to poor defense. The lack of control is his problem and that does not come from poor defense.
  2. Thurston Fluff
    I'm sure the arbitrator Fredric Horowitz knows that if the ruling doesn't fall mlb's way he may be fired. Just ask Shyam Das and the late Peter Seitz. The way it is set up the players select one member, MLB another and the third has to be mutually agreed upon by both sides. The players union can fire that third guy as easily as management can.
  3. Thurston Fluff
    Thank you for that painful, but funny, reminder. I guess if anyone wants to know how far we've come we went from calling a 106 loss season bad to considering a season we barely broke .500 bad.
  4. Thurston Fluff
    I'm not defending Braun or any of the guys, but there's a system to test for PEDs and drugs in place. Can you really suspend a player for PEDs when he hasn't actually failed a test? Is there a precedent for this? For instance, did baseball suspend players named in the Mitchell Report? No, they did not. I believe they can if they can show proof they did use them. The Mitchell report was about PED use before it the bans were outlined and implemented so it didn't cover them. I was for MLB going beyond testing and opening up an investigate arm to vet out cheaters. I looked at testing kind of like I look at DNA in crime investigations. It makes your case virtually fool proof if you follow protocol, but it is hardly the only thing you should rely on to find criminals. That said I can't say I am a fan of their tactics. Threatening someone with the choice of long legal battles they have no way of paying for or telling them what they want to hear seems little more than beating a confession out of someone. I want Braun to pay if he really did do it. Though at this point I think they botched it so badly we can never be sure if he did.
  5. Thurston Fluff
    That's not how it works. Teams outplay or underplay their talent level all the time. 96 is overestimating the talent level of the 2011 team. Overestimating your talent is what leads to years like the 2012 and 2013 Brewers. It may not work that way but it appears to me you are using actual records to say the 2012 and 13 team's talent level was overestimated. You can't have it both ways.
  6. Thurston Fluff
    I don't want to even debate the playoff hunt stuff again but you're on pretty thin ice if that's your main justification for playing an injured player in April and May. I can see at the end of the season or through the playoffs, because there is no more time, but it's a long season. What ever you personally thought their chances were to begin with they thought it was worth trying to play for a playoff spot. I thought if everything went well it was possible as well. Considering we have to win enough games early to make late games count I don't think taking the chance he could playing on his knee was wrong. I think we had a better chance to win if they kept Ramirez in. It didn't turn out that way. But all you can do is try to figure the odds, play accordingly and see what happens. Unless you are saying we would be in the playoff hunt without him what makes it wrong to field your best team possible early in the season? Don't they count?
  7. Thurston Fluff
    If the problem is one of the lesser knee ligaments then why not sit him for a month to 6 weeks and let him get completely healthy? What's the point of trying to play through something this season? I'm glad they took a shot at turning this around before they sat him. Once the season started they did what they felt they could do to keep in the playoff hunt. It expect them to do that every season. That said, it was tried and not in the cards. Time to move on. Sit Am-Ram until totally healthy, even if that isn't until next season and play Fransisco and Halton more.
  8. Thurston Fluff
    Who knew the cure to our hitting problems are one sniff away? http://flip-programs.com/ACHEMS/2012_ABSTRACTS_WO/files/assets/basic-html/page68.html
  9. Thurston Fluff
    I think part of the problem is he doesn't need surgery as much as extended rest. If he really needed surgery and was just putting it off until winter they'd probably do it. But if he needs extended rest to get back to 100% I don't think you can just sit him for the rest of the season. But the point in well made. There is no reason to keep pushing a hobbled Ramirez to play as many games as he can possibly handle at this point. Let him rest or even DL him for 15 days. Then play him 4 times a week instead of 5 or something along that line.
  10. Thurston Fluff
    I'm just not seeing that happen. I know it's possible, but there are too many 'ifs'. And then there's a lack of depth at most spots. Especially starting pitching. An injury or two can just kill a team like ours. That is always going to be the case. In 2011 we had even less minor league depth. If injuries would have hit that team like it is now we would have been royally screwed as well. We got a little lucky with health and made a good run. I'm not sure how realistic it is to expect good all around minor league depth and a playoff caliber roster on a $100 million max budget. So I assume now he has no position. Now THAT is great organizational asset management. How exactly is playing him at multiple positions an organizational asset management failure? WE are playing for the future so doesn't it make sense to see what players who might be part of the future can do? How does one learn if he is capable of moving around unless they move him around? What does losing a game by finding that out now hurt in the grand scheme of things? Would it be better organizational management to leave him at first or not play him at all and learn nothing about his future potential as a utility infielder?
  11. Thurston Fluff
    I am certain that first time banning would reduce the amount of guys using it. If someone wants to take a calculated risk, which really is what the game has always been about, they will do it. If a borderline big leaguer believes that a substance will be the difference in making it to or not, he will certainly take the risk, even with the risk of a ban out there. Wiping out their stats would be pretty meaningless for this type of player. First time banning also does not stop an established guy who wants to extend his career either. Worst case scenario for him is that he has to retire and focus on the family a couple years early. IF you look at the guys who got caught last season this seems to be true. Cabrera was an underachiever close to being out of baseball and Colon was old, broken down aging vet looking for a year or two more before he was done.
  12. Thurston Fluff
    Except for the fact that Francisco is NOT A FIRST BASEMAN! Where has he been playing for us? All caps doesn't make your assertion a fact.
  13. Thurston Fluff
    Have they decided he's a SP or RP? I don't know, but it's been out there that he profiles more as a RP long term than a dependable SP. Would those be the same profilers who thought Segura was destined to be a second baseman? Let them get some time in and see what they can turn into. No need to pigeon hole him into one role quite yet.
  14. Thurston Fluff
    I have a superstition about posting in game logs. I did once and the team lost the lead and game after I hit submit years ago and never did again. What better time than now to try and break the curse?
  15. Thurston Fluff
    Frank Thomas was one of the first players to publicly campaign for steroid testing way back in the 90's, I believe... to the MLBPA's chagrin. Nothing would surprise me in all of this, but I would be pretty surprised if he was a juicer. This. He was always very vocal about it. People can be naturally big and can get bigger gradually just by working out. What they rarely can do is be that big and remain injury free as they age without chemical aid. He broke down like normal big guys do.
  16. Thurston Fluff
    If there was ever an example of why bringing guys up when they aren't ready is a bad idea this is it. It does not dampen my belief he can be a good player someday. It does show that bringing a guy up to see what you have in them only shows where he is not what he can be.
  17. Thurston Fluff
    And there were no more first basemen left in baseball and/or the Brewers system? OK, I understand. No there were more. In fact they had Lalli, Morris and Halton in the system. Two of which they tried. As far as outside the system they did find one. Jaun Francisco. He currently has a .879 OPS for the season. Granted he only has a career .752 OPS but he is young. Still that is better than what we would have got if we went with someone like Lyle Overbay at the start of the season. This whole idea that we didn't have enough options at first base is way off base. To say we had zero is pure hyperbole. We had six, not including Lalli, by my count. It just took some time to find one who could both stay healthy and produce. Just took a look at my numbers. I was was wrong, Francisco doesn't have a .879 OPS for the season. Just for us.
  18. Thurston Fluff
    WAR is a pretty solid indicator of demonstrated value, no? No. It is a flawed attempt to show a players value in a single number. It uses some metrics that are known to be flawed in the sample size they are using them in and rates the value of offense to defense as equal without actually knowing if they are of equal value. Something I highly suspect is not true.
  19. Thurston Fluff
    We had three first baseman not even counting Halton and Morris. They are all on the DL for the season.
  20. Thurston Fluff
    The Cardinals also won it all two years ago with a rotation which struggled to last just five innings in nearly every start vs the Brewers in the NLCS. They won that ring with great bullpen pitching and good hitting. Bingo. There is a difference between trying to build the ideal team for a deep playoff run and only trying to build the ideal team for a playoff run. If we tear everything apart every time we feel we can't build the perfect team with what we have I think we will miss out on a couple chances at the playoffs. I think the more rolls of the dice the better. Again I do understand the other approach. The Marlins did it with success a couple times. I just don't think it is the best way to maximize our chances at getting there.
  21. Thurston Fluff
    Wouldn't it be ironic if next season we had Halton, Gamel, Green and Morris all playing so well RRR had a hard time finding enough playing time of all of them?
  22. Thurston Fluff
    Even if the rotation does improve, how will we match up in the post season pitching wise? I guess going 1 and done in the playoffs will put butts in the seats but competitively that doesn't interest me at all. I want to get on top of the pitching situation once and for all, then we'll be truly competitive, even in the post season. Pretty much every team that played against the Braves in the 90's had to matchup with the best staff in baseball and somehow managed. The Cards won a World Series trotting Suppan out there. Pitching is important but you don't need great starters as long as you have a good pen and a pitcher or two to get hot. Granted it's not ideal. Then again ideally we would like to have a 3 aces, a stud closer and four solid setup men, (two lefty two righty,) to go with five tool players at every position. Realistically we can build a solid offensive team with at least average pitchers and a deep pen and take our chances when we get there. To tear everything down just because we can't manage to fill our ideal team right now seems like a sure way to shorten the actual chances at getting to the playoffs anytime soon. Personally I think the more times you go the better shot you have. I can see the argument of building for one or two big years where you have the perfect storm of great hitting and pitching. I just don't think that approach gives you the best odds of actually winning the whole thing.
  23. Thurston Fluff
    We can do as much damage to the franchise by over selling as under. It is stupid to go into a 2002, half decade, rebuild mode if we don't have to. I'm not convinced we need to for pretty much the same reasons JB just said. Yes we do have to fix the pitching. But I think we are closer to that than some others. Hell we could keep the very same pitchers and probably be better next season simply by them pitching to their norm or improving the way most young players do. TO be clear I am not advocating that just saying it isn't as bleak as it seems now.
  24. Thurston Fluff
    Good points. The fourth one though is somewhat debatable. I point to the following quote from that article you posted in another thread. I think the greater point is what is the right deal in terms of both prospects and timing? For example I think Lohse has more value to us if we trade YoGa than if we don't. He would be the one veteran in an otherwise young, inexperienced group. If all he can get us is an low ceiling prospect in that scenario I don't think it is worth trading him. YoGa is probably not going to get us as much now as we'd like. He might bring us more in the winter. So do we trade Lohse now only to find out he had more value to us than the guy we got for him? If we trade Lohse now then YoGa in the winter then we have to figure out how to help the young staff along which might lead to another Suppan or Wolf signing. Does that help at all?
  25. Thurston Fluff
    The Brewers have a good enough core that turning things around isn't that far fetched. Nice to see someone else who can see the silver lining. I sometime wonder if our good finish last season makes our outlook more bleak now. It gave us hope the team could compete this season. Something most of us here didn't think would be possible when they traded for Greinke and Marcum. This was supposed to be the beginning of the tough times and it is turning out that way. Even though I thought they could compete if things fell our way I still don't think this season is a sign that all is lost for the foreseeable future. We are seeing some good performances out of some key guys for our future and our young pitching is getting it's feet wet. If normal progression applies this season should be the worst of it for them. And I'll be absolutely shocked if the Brewers trade Lohse, Gallardo, or Ramirez, all players who should be moved for the right offer. I think we all agree if the right offer comes along they should be traded. Problem is what kind of offer do you think a semi-injured, expensive, old third baseman can get you? Gallardo is having one of his worst seasons. Is this the time to expect the right offer to come along? Lohse wasn't signed in part because nobody but us wanted to give up a first round draft pick for him. If teams aren't willing to give up a completely raw player of unknown professional ability why would they be willing to give up a more advanced one?
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