The stache

Just stop saying it's on Grisham. Please, for the love of God. You're sounding like a broken record. If he fields that ball cleanly, it's at best a tie game, and there are two guys on with, what, one out? Grisham allowed the winning run to score with his misplay of the ball. Yes, it was a bad error. But you are way, way overstating how big an impact that had. He's a 22 year old kid. Brewers veterans-the guys being paid millions of dollars-could have done something...anything with RISP. They didn't. Again. And they went up there hacking in the top of the ninth, per usual with this team. On the list of people to blame for this loss, Grisham is pretty far down the list. Hader blew it because he couldn't find the damned strike zone. When it became obvious to everybody in the park, and everybody watching the game, Hader was allowed to continue floundering instead of stalling for time, and getting another pitcher in there. Now, maybe another pitcher still loses it. But a change of pace from "96 fast ball. 97 fast ball. 97 fast ball", and, you know, a couple pitches that actually came within a mile of the strike zone, might have led to a different outcome. Counsell made his mind up before the 8th that Hader was going two, win or lose. That was foolish. And then sending the worst hitter in baseball up to the plate with a runner (Cain) on helped kill a potential rally.

Can somebody please explain to me why, with a guy on in the top of he ninth, down 4-3, with our season on the line, Craig Counsell sends Orlando Arcia, the worst hitter in baseball the past two seasons (based on 450 PA per season min) to the plate? I'm not even going to get into the whole "leaving Hader in when it's clear he has absolutely no control" discussion. Arcia is a known entity. If you don't at least tie the game with those last three outs, Arcia's defense doesn't matter, because the game's over. Anybody else would have given us a better chance at either moving the base runner up, or driving him in.

It's Jeremy Jeffress all over again. Just choking in high leverage situations when it matters most. I don't care how fast he can throw, or how many strikeouts he throws. He's an implosion waiting to happen, and he blew it again. Counsel should have pulled him. It was clear he had no control tonight. A few he almost threw were wild pitches.

Just shoot me. He has no control tonight. None. He's just raring back and throwing it as hard as he can.

Josh Hader is cutting years off the end of my life. And these announcers are ticking me off. "that bat died a hero!" So much for impartiality by announcers. The Nat nut snuggling is getting way beyond annoying.

Please hit into a double play.

God dang it he can't find the strike zone. He's a wild pitch waiting to happen.

Hader is all over the place. The one night we need him to be on top of his game. And that was a foul ball.

On August 1st, Cody Bellinger was hitting .331 with a slash line of .432/.677/1.109. Since then? He's hitting .243, slashing .342/.526/.868. If the MVP is the, "hey, look at what you did in the first four months of the season" award, Bellinger deserves to be in the discussion. If the last two months of the season count for anything-and that's when most guys not playing on an absolutely loaded team need to produce to help their team get into the playoffs-Bellinger hasn't been anywhere near MVP caliber. Hell, in a year when an MLB team has hit 300 home runs, and at least six teams (iirc) will break the single season record, slashing .868 isn't even All Star Caliber. Ryan Braun is slashing .846 for the year. Would you put him on the All Star team if it were picked right now? Even with his crappy first month, his year, offensively, is just 22 points lower than the god Cody Bellinger's last two months. I'm sorry. An MVP doesn't hit .243 the last third of the season. And just for _____ and giggles, let's see where his fWAR is with a couple games left. All that time that Yelich has missed, and where are the two guys for the year? Cody Bellinger 7.5 WAR Christian Yelich 7.8 WAR Bellinger has played in 23 more games, to date. And he still hasn't been more valuable than Yelich. And he won't be. Total contribution considered, Yelich is more valuable. That Cody Bellinger has put on a white Dodgers uni, and had his name called by the public address announcer at Chavez Ravine means diddly squat. He's been there in name, but he sure as heck hasn't played like an MVP. Meanwhile, Christian Yelich was destroying the ball when he got hurt. In nine September games, he was hitting .345, slashing .513/.724/1.237. And Rendon? Don't make me laugh. He's disappeared so fast I want to start calling him Jimmy Hoffa. The last 16 games-one-tenth of a season: .173 AVG .366/.327/.693 His last ten games? Embarrassing. .152 AVG .348/.242/.590. Christian Yelich is going to win the batting title. Again. Yelich .329 Rendon .321 He's going to lead the NL in OBP. Yelich .429 Rendon .411 He's going to lead the Majors in SLG, and by a comfortable margin. Yelich .671 Trout .645 He's going to lead the Majors in OPS, and by a comfortable margin. Yelich 1.100 Trout 1.083 He's going to lead the NL in OPS+, and by a huge margin. Yelich 179 Bellinger 166 He's going to lead the NL in at bats per home run Yelich 11.1 Alonso 11.5 He's going to lead the NL in win probability added, by a laughable margin. Yelich 7.1 Bellinger 4.8 What's the problem? Christian Yelich is the NL MVP. Anybody that votes for Cody Belinger is a moron that should have their vote taken away. And anybody that votes for Jimmy Ho....I mean, Anthony Rendon, should have his card taken away, and then have some common sense slapped into them. These two guys have crawled on their hands and knees during the home stretch. NL pitchers couldn't stop Yelich, so fate had to intervene on behalf of the other teams in baseball.

I'm just here for the chest bumps and champagne. I'm so happy right now-if you turned off the lights to my bedroom, you'd see an ear to ear grin in the dark, like the Cheshire Cat. What a comeback by the Crew! 19-4 in September, and 17 of our last 19. 13-2 since Yelich went down. Wow.

Braun's 30th double of the season tonight is #400 for his career. The double is career extra base hit #790. He's got some games left to play this year, and if he's healthy next year, and puts up similar numbers at age 36, it's not unreasonable to see him breaking well into the top 100 all-time in extra base hits. Then some big names start falling. Carlton Fisk 844 career extra base hits Roberto Clemente 846 Duke Snider 850 His 3,449 total bases are also moving up the list.

That was a big milestone for Ryan Braun. He just got his 30th double of the season, and the 400th of his career.

For me, how a team plays the game is just as important as winning. And it's a real pleasure to watch this team play. I don't get to see every game, but I watch whatever I can see, and replay every highlight known to man until I can't click anymore. The 2019 Brewers have become a bin of misfit toys. A reclamation project here, a discarded piece there. A veteran or two that have found the fountain of youth. And yet somehow, a little voice in my head is telling me that, while this season might not end with the World Championship we've so long hoped for, the trial this team has gone through together is going to pay big dividends down the road. These are the kinds of times that can galvanize a franchise. Adversity has certainly brought this group together. Having their backs pressed to the wall has shown them they can do things they didn't know possible. Christian Yelich has carried this team for so long. Now, with him out injured, other guys are stepping up. It's really an empowering time in Milwaukee.

The Brewers are playing .800 ball in September after beating the Friars tonight, 5-1. 2-1 against the Cards 4-1 against the Cubs 4-0 against the Fish 1-1 against the Astros 1-0 against the Padres 12-3 in September, and 13-3 in our last 16. To restate for the record: No Christian Yelich since the 10th. Keston Hiura has been out since August 30th, just now coming back for pinch hitting opportunities in the Cardinals series. Mike Moustakas missed ten games in the past month. All Star starter Brandon Woodruff last pitched on July 21st. Two other former All Stars, closer Corey Knebel (in 2017) and reliever Jeremy Jeffress (last year), have missed the entire season after Tommy John surgery (Knebel), or were ineffective trying to fight through injury, and released (Jeffress). Jimmy Nelson, our staff ace, 9th in the National League Cy Young in 2017, whose return we have been anxiously anticipating for over a year, has come back, clearly unable to regain his former dominance. Sadly, the big guy may never return to being the same pitcher. Lorenzo Cain has been battling injury all year, and is not his usual self. Brent Suter just returned a year after Tommy John surgery. I'm sure I'm forgetting others. In other words, this team is a walking MASH unit. In their places? Guys like Corey Spangenberg, Tyler Austin, Drew Pomeranz have played extensively. There's no way this team should be alive in the playoff race. But they are. And we're getting contributions from the unlikeliest sources. How about the solo shot from Travis Shaw to give us an extra run of breathing room at 4-1? How big a boon would it be for this team if Shaw took some confidence from tonight, and started to turn his season around right before the playoffs? How about Corey Spangenberg-4 for 6 with a triple, a home run, and 5 RBIs the last two nights. Ryan Braun had been cold before last night's trip to the plate in the top of the ninth. Then he smashed a 433 foot grand slam to win the game. The Cubs look to be winners again tonight, so we're still a game behind them. There's no guarantee we'll make the playoffs, and if we do, with so much firepower missing, what could we reasonably expect from our guys? That's for down the road. Right now, though, the future sight unseen, I've got to tip my cap to the guys wearing the Brewer uniform. Everybody counted them out. Even after we won 96 games last year, and came within a game of returning to the World Series for the first time since 1982, the experts saw us being a few games over .500 in 2019. Well, they're wrong. This team has character. They're a small-to-mid market team that faces adversity just based on the amount of money they can spend on their roster, and more adversity was piled on as the season wore on. And they've never given up. The Brewers make us all nuts at times. But I don't know if I've ever been more proud of my team. The 2019 Milwaukee Brewers don't know the word "quit". And this patchwork team is showing, once again, how unpredictable the National Pastime is. You never know what's going to happen. That's why they play the games. How can you not be romantic about baseball? While I'd love to shock the world by getting into the playoffs, and then making an improbable run to a World Series, no matter what happens, I've enjoyed the ride. This is why we watch the games.

He's been long compared to Mickey Mantle. Sadly, his career might be shortened by injuries, as Mantle's was.

I'm confused, that wasn't this board? touche

Good! If I were in the seats, I wouldn't be a real fan of the netting, either. But I'm even less a fan of some little kid fighting for their life in the ER because they got hit in the forehead with a line drive foul ball. All parks need to extend the netting. In fact, I feel this should be league mandated. Just too many people have been seriously injured at games, and MLB putting "you enter the ballpark at your own risk", or whatever the verbiage is now, just isn't cutting it.

Wait, just wait. Even better. Reactions courtesy of The Gateway Redbirds forum CardsofSTL said: "Had to be [expletive] Braun" Magneto2.0 said: "We're not making the playoffs." This is so much fun. Ryan Braun just lifted his leg, and tinkled all over Cardinal fans' weekend.

/starts counting all the hands on heads. I love this. Absolutely love it!!! If you watch the video on MLB.tv it's hilarious how many go up at the exact same time. Yup, I've watched it 7 or 8 times, now. Each time is better than the last. At 50 seconds comes to payoff, for me. Almost dead centered in the frame, in a shot of Brauny's home run from a camera looking towards the first base side, there's a guy in a white Cardinals tee shirt, with dark glasses and it looks like a backwards hat on. His arms are crossed prior to the pitch. When Brauny jacks it, he raises his left arm up, and lowers it in disgust, no doubt voicing some expletive. That just made my day!!!

/starts counting all the hands on heads. I love this. Absolutely love it!!!

After saying that this morning, I feel like I should be going to Vegas, or, at least, playing the lottery.

Crawling on a fractured kneecap is probably not a good idea. Rolling would be the way to go. You'd better get Yeli good an' liquored up before you ask him to roll with a busted patella. I've had one, and when I landed on it (split the sucker in half), I let the expletives fly like Cosmo Kramer at the dentist. http://giphygifs.s3.amazonaws.com/media/2vHlxetCd5B9m/giphy.gif

I agree with everything you just said. I also feel that they should take the awards seriously. Or, more seriously. Again, as baseball so often demands, context is everything. Back in Ruth's day, guys usually only won an MVP once. I forget at what point that changed. So, that didn't have much of an impact on Hall of Fame voting. But when I see guys coming up for Cooperstown consideration now, those bullet points-MVPs, Gold Gloves and Silver Sluggers, batting titles, All Star selections-they still carry weight. Then again, I'm still trying to figure out how Jeter won all those Gold Gloves. So, what do I know? But there are MVP votes that just baffle me. 1941 is a great example, in the American League. DiMaggio's 56 game hitting streak was a fantastic feat, but he shouldn't have won the MVP. Ted Williams hit .406, and his OPS was 204 points higher (1.083 for the Yankee Clipper, 1.287 for the Splinter). But DiMaggio was becoming the darling of New York, after first being viewed as somewhat aloof by the Bronx media, and Ted Williams had a contentious relationship with the media. They took the opportunity, and stuck it to him. I would hope today's voters looked upon the vote they cast as being important.

Would you agree that what a player does in the last month can (or, at least, should) hinder his chances as much as it can help? Because, in 9 September games, Cody Bellinger is hitting .219, slashing .359/.406/.765. The NL mean OPS for 2019 is .756. In what should be the most important month of the season (typically-it's not for the Dodgers, as they're a shoe in for the playoffs, now), Bellinger is a league average offensive player, thus far in September. The Dodgers are 5-4 in those games. And again, Yelich won't get the rest of the month, sadly. But in September, he's OPSing 1.237, and the Brewers were 7-2 in the games he played. Bellinger could still turn it around, but we're almost halfway through the month. If he doesn't pick it up, big time, why can't a bad last month hurt him? It doesn't matter who leads the majority of the race. Crossing the finish line first counts. And even when Bellinger was at his best, Yelich was just a little better. Since the break, there's no comparison. Bellinger simply hasn't played like an MVP. A .902 OPS, in this season with explosive numbers, wouldn't get a player a sniff of the MVP. Well, that's what he's done since the break. As an aside, I looked at Yeli's splits for 2019. And, I saw this: Just to put into context how great he's been over the last year of baseball, I checked to see the most total bases in any single season, and compared Yelich's rate per game played. Over a 162 game sample, Yelich would have 425 total bases. That would be tied for the seventh best season in the history of Major League Baseball. Sammy Sosa is the only player in my lifetime to match it-he had 425 total bases in 2001 when had 64 home runs, and 103 extra base hits. The other guys on the list? 1. Babe Ruth, 457 (1921) 2. Rogers Hornsby, 450 (1922) 3. Lou Gehrig, 447 (1927) 4. Chuck Klein, 445 (1930) 5. Jimmie Foxx, 438 (1932) 6. Stan Musial, 429 (1948) We know Sosa used PEDs, and Chuck Klein's 445 needs to come with an asterisk, as well. That's when the Philadelphia Phillies played their home games at the Baker Bowl. Look at his home/away splits for 1930: Klein was a left handed batter, and the Baker Bowl (per Wikipedia) was 280 ft down the right field line, and 300 ft to right-center. If we discount Klein's stats as the product of an extreme home field advantage as a hitter's park, and Sosa's performance due to steroids, essentially, what Christian Yelich has done the last calendar year, his offensive performance, in the aggregate, ranks with the best individual offensive seasons in baseball history. When you're on a short list with Ruth, Gehrig, Hornsby, Foxx and Musial....you're doing something right. I was surprised that Ted Williams wasn't on this list, but I remembered how much he got walked. His best was 368 bases in 1949. He also walked a career high 162 times.