Thurston Fluff

If Ned has the choice between rebuilding Atlanta of finishing what he started here I doubt he'd go back. Why put yourself through another rebuild when you almost have this one were you want it and are about to reap the rewards of six years of work? He'd have to be some sort of masochist to jump ship to ATL now.

Backup, you own your own business? How could you tell?

What I got out of Billy Beane was he found what was undervalued and likes to reduce risk. OBP wasn't set in stone as the best way to build any team at any point in the future. There may be a time when everybody likes OBP so much they ignore BA and guys who hit for average but don't take many walks will be cheaper for their production than high OBP guys. That is a great way, IMo, to handle small market teams since they have to be frugal. That does not mean a team that can outspend everyone would do as well following that philosophy. OBP will always be more valuable than BA but if everyone is willing to pay top $ for it then it may not be as cost effective. As far as Boston goes they got guys for their bench who were cast off by their former team because they could afford to give them more than other teams would for a bench player. So it's hard to give them credit for having enough to spend more than other teams on part time players. Though they have done far more with their resources than teams like Seattle does. Part of the Beane philosophy is to draft older players. He doesn't like drafting high school kids because they are higher risks. Which was why he didn't like Prince. That philosophy has worked for him but it did mean he missed out on Hart, Hardy and Prince for no reason other than age. He also liked Keith Ginter so his approach isn't infallible when it comes to evaluation. IRRC he also didn't really value defense all that much but to me that may be the next undervalued asset. I wouldn't be surprised if Beane starts to find great defenders in the near future.

Yost's in-game decisions started immediately, but the losing mindset had to be changed over the course of years. So true. It's always obvious when someone makes mistakes in the game but not so with gradual change over time. While it may have taken years for that to take hold he did start the process immediately upon arrival. When asked if he would have sat Hernandez to avoid an embarrassing k record he said players play and he didn't really want someone who would want to sit regrdless of circumstances. What he did do from the word go was to change the way things were done though. I still remember his first spring training when pitchers and catchers reported and some of the position players came early. He told them if they came they had to be ready to work out and not just hang around in street clothes. He got rid of music in the clubhouse so some players didn't force others to listen to their music. They could use headphones but couldn't last their boombox. He generally is credited from outsiders with creating a professional atmosphere here in Milwaukee. Probably because outsiders only see or think about the Brewers a few times a year so they may actually notice those gradual changes as opposed to those of us who watch them daily.

Bmuch if you do go there I'd be interested to know what you think. It's your basic greasy spoon sort of place but I always liked their food. I'm kind of curious if it's just memories of times past that makes me like it or if it's actually good. I do know it was, and still is, a favorite of locals. Maybe you can be my guinea pig. I haven't been to downtown Sturgeon Bay in a few years now but there was a place called the Nautical Inn that really had good food. More of a supper club than a diner. They always had great food and good atmosphere for casual dinning. That area changed a lot since my days in the hood so maybe not even there anymore. Andropolis is gone so is the Hillside diner which had the best patty melt I've ever had.

My hours suck. I start at 8 am weekdays and work every weekend. The last time I had a day off was When I went to Hawaii in January. The first vacation I've had in four years. I work the store and do all the deliveries then have to do more deliveries at night. I don't get paid vacation and no sick days. I pay for my own health insurance and pension. I get no paid holidays and work most of them for no extra pay. I get no overtime even though I work 60-70 hours a week. I also wouldn't change jobs for the world.

Odd how people who hate this site spend so much time looking through it with a fine tooth comb. Maybe it's just me but when I come across a site that I don't like I usually just don't go there again. I must admit I don't know much about baseball. I was the guy who thought Mench should never be allowed to face nighties. In my defense I meant to say knighties. He has such a pumpkin head any knight he would have faced would have had way to big a target to hit with that lance. I may not know baseball but as a card carrying nerd I sure do know the finer points of jousting.

Careful don't give Ned the same credit as we gave Melvin last year with Arizona. He was a genius, deftly handling the bullpen to perfection, thus the reason for winning with such a poor run differential. Ned is just lucky.

I've heard/read a lot of whining about our terribly unbalanced H/A schedule to date yet we had played only 1 less road game than the Brewers. No but you can't deny the Cubs have had a lot easier road schedule so far this year. What is the road record against winning teams? How few have there been so far? We may be in denial about the number but you seem to be in denial about how tough that road was so far. I think the point was that to this point, some/much of the Cubs current lead can be attributed to playing an easier schedule. He was talking about the up coming stretch from the 24th of July to August 11th. I'm not as worried about that stretch as he was since I think the brewers can have a winning road record in that period and the Cubs have to face the Brewers at home 4 games. Not an easy task for them. If we gain any ground on them then that sets up September really well.

brewtank all the teams play the same schedule with the exception of a few interleague games. We had Boston and got swept and the cubs had Tampa and got swept. That pretty much means the two teams will have the same amount of home games and the same strength of schedule at years end. If the Cubs do win it won't be because they had an easier schedule. Remember the Cubs have to play 4 on the road against the Brewers in that stretch. If you look at the Brewers at home that is not an easy task for any club. Let alone a team that can't beat the Brewers at their place. I think sometimes we overlook the Brewers as part of other teams tough road games and overlook games against us in determining how tough a stretch of games will be for others. We have to get used to the fact that the Brewers are really good and they now are the tough part of other team's schedule.

TLB probably all true. His career is that of a loogy. Again, though, Ned said as much. But from what I've seen since he got here is he can face a RH or two without getting killed by them and get through an inning instead of having to get pulled and use two relievers for one inning. It may be a small difference and maybe I'm reading too much into small samples but I'm not overly worried if he faces a couple RH in a close game. They just don't hit him hard. Especially when a good LH is sandwiched between them or third up sort of situation. I think maybe what I call a loogy is a little different than what you do. To me it's a guy who just can't be expected to survive an inning when he has to face two or more RH hitters. Maybe this isn't the right place for this discussion but when it comes to relievers, especially lefties, I'm less interested in on base as I am slugging %. I think that is the one place where you can live with a few base runners as long as they don't hit for much power. So they allow a few too many base runners to the off handed hitters. As long as they keep the ball in the park or off the walls they usually get three outs before they allow a run to cross. Perhaps someone will show me how wrong I am but if I have to chose between the two I'll take more runners vs higher slugging out of my relievers. Ok Russ or endaround go ahead and show the chart of how wrong I am.http://forum.brewerfan.net/images/smilies/smile.gif

Whether he can sustain it throughout the rest of his career is doubtful but he may be able to hold it together long enough to have the proverbial career year.

Only one more road game. I think that's his point I'm sure that was his point. He did fail to mention the road games so far have been against pretty weak teams. They have only faced a 3 teams with a winning record on the road a total of 9 times all season and went 2-7 in those games. The Brewers by comparison have faced a winning team on the road 18 times and have a 7-11 record. The Cubs still have a tougher road schedule ahead to go along with that one extra road game.

Draw a faulty and stupid conclusion from a small sample, and then find out the hard way that it doesn't work (that parts yet to come if Shouse actually starts facing decent RH with regularity). Classic Ned. You're right. We can draw a lot better conclusions from Endaround's examples of how bad he is over the last three years with a whopping 17.1 IP in 06 vs RH, 24 IP in 07 and 10.2 this year. Maybe if we looked at his career of 129.1 ining vs RH and see he has done pretty much the same overall as he is this season. Way too high a BAA a WHIP of 1.79 with only 12 hr given up to RH in his career. Seems to me he has always let a lot of RH get on base and very few of them hit him hard. So why would you be overly worried if Shouse had to face a couple RH in the inning along with a LH or two? He may let too many of them get on base but he rarely makes it easy for them to score.

As of this morning: Pirates record 36-40 Pirates record less games vs Cubs 33-32 I say again Perception isn't always the same as reality. Are you suggesting the Pirates are an above average team if it wasn't for the Cubs? They'd have an even better record if you subtract the Brewers wins as well. probably a lot better record if you only count the games of sub .500 teams. I suspect most teams would look a lot better if you only counted games against sub .500 teams. Fact is the Cubs have had less games against winning teams than the Brewers have so far. Many of which came on the road. I don't know how many good teams the Cubs faced on the road yet but considering they've faced less winning teams overall that number would also be smaller than the Brewers. If the Cubs are for real, and they very well might be, that will be the next test they need to face before we just hand them the central. While the Cubs do have the advantage now I'm certainly not giving up hope.

I think if we trust that Shouse is going to keep his SLGA v. RH that low, we're going to be disappointed. Probably somewhere in-between the 2006 & '07/'08 stats is where the 'true talent' level lies. Besides, end's point on Shouse was that he's not good (& hasn't been good) at getting RH batters out -- I think a .350+ OBPA does tell you a bit about that. The point wasn't that Shouse gets crushed by righties. Just my opinon, though. I'm not saying he's great against RH as much as I'm saying he isn't horrible. If I'm going to take Ned's statement at his word then this comment "When we first got him (Shouse) everybody told me he was a situational lefty and he might have been. He has proven to be more than a situational lefty." Doesn't seem to say anything about him being dominant it just says over the time he's been here he has shown himself to be more than a true Loogy. He may not be good at getting them out but he is pretty decent at not letting them score. Maybe I view loogy differently than you do. I think true loogys get crushed by RH. Shouse has shown he can survive an inning unscored upon facing a couple RH along the way. He may let a few of them get on base but he doesn't allow them to score without stringing together an unusually high number of hits. That would be more than a true loogy IMO. I'm not saying put him in to face a RH with one out and a man on third. I don't think Ned was either. Just because he isn't the best option for that situation doesn't make him strictly a loogy. If you look at his OPS from the last three years it was 937 in 06. That would have been the time when he was a true loogy like Ned said "...and he might have been..." In his last two years he has an OPS of 698 in 07 and so far this year is at 744. The middle range would be 790ish. If you weigh recent performance more heavily than that of three years ago (a time when he didn't face all that many righties so the numbers may be small sample distorted) it might be fairer to think he could end up closer to 780ish so you are right TLB he very well could be somewhere in that middle range. Still not all that bad considering his effectiveness vs LH mixed in with that.

It really depends on what you want to do. If you want to shop or gold it's different than if you want to sail or fish. Bmuch if you went to Sturgeon Bay and didn't go to the Pudgy Seagull you missed the locals dive diner. I grew up in door county and lived in Sturgeon Bay in my early 20's. Pretty much lived off the Seagull's all you can eat specials. Anytime I get back there we still have to go there just for the memories.

Last year Yost started using Shouse against right handed hitters and predictably he got lit up. He can't get right handed hitters out, a OBP above .350 pretty much tells you that. No it doesn't. It tells you he allows them to get to first more often than we'd like but that's about it. His OPS isn't that bad and he doesn't allow many extra base hits. If he faced nothing but right handers what are the odds he will allow three runners to reach base before they get three outs? In the worst case scenario he'd have to face nothing but right handed hitters while giving up those three hits before he gets three outs. How many teams would he face that could put up enough righties in a row to get three hits without first recording three outs? The Brewers are one of the few that could do that and he obviously doesn't ahve to worry about that. The very numbers you posted show he can be trusted to get three outs before he gives up a run more often than not regardless of what side the hit from.

1) Do nothing and have little or no chance at making the playoffs. I don't see how doing nothing automatically means no playoffs. They seem to be doing pretty well so far and have the worst part of their schedule behind them.

Did you mean the AL east? If so I'd agree. I know the Brewers played well this week, but they didn't win a single game against the Red Sox. I don't know how much you can read into that. Houston also swept us in Houston. That doesn't really mean anything. For the record I do think a full strength Red Sox team is better than the Brewers full strength but I don't think they are so far above the Brewers that we wouldn't stand a chance against them.

As long as they slug under .400 I don't see the problem. If all they do against him in one inning of work is get a walk or base hit they'd have to string three of them together to get a run across. The odds of that is pretty slim considering how well he does with the lefties he'll face in between those righties. If he was giving up a lot of extra base hits along with those runners then maybe there would be more cause for concern. I don't really want him coming in with a runner at second to face a righty but to start an inning I don't really see it as a problem. I don't mind if he faces a righty between two lefties or something like that, but I don't he should be considered some kind of all-around great reliever. I think this is about how I feel about it. Even if he faced two righties and one lefty I'd be ok with it as long as it isn't middle of the order type righties. At this point in time with the struggles of Mota and Riske just getting going after the injury I don't mind if he picks up some of the slack. He's not an all around great reliever but he is on a decent streak at the moment. Why not use him while he's hot with all the other problems in the pen at the moment?

If this team collapses and fails, than Yost should be shown the door. You will not find me disagreeing with this at all. I've said all along I expected this team to be better than last years. If Ned couldn't win more with this team than last year (bad luck with injuries aside) he should be fired. I bet even Ned would agree with that. However since the team is doing better why criticize?

Brando I'd imagine that some of that has to do with their expectations of what they can do is as low as yours. I don't think it out of the realm of possibility to think Melvin knows he needs some warm bodies but none are really ready so he tells Yost such. Yost in turn uses them sparingly because Melvin warned him this guy wasn't really ready and should only be used to save some of the other arms for more important work. I don't know if that is the case at all but it would seem to make sense since these guys are only here because of injury. Especially considering none of them are really all that high of prospects to begin with.

I meant Knighties. He should never hit against anyone with body armor riding a horse. Despite the spelling error I thought that was pretty obvious.

fair enough. Obviously my postings are not to your liking so I'll just avoid responding to yours and we'll all be happy.