BillScottCanRake

I think there is a difference between "no longer being a prospect" and "no longer being able to be an everyday player". Even though they are often linked together, I think a former-prospect can still be an everyday player, even though it's less common. I think typically a player will lose their status as a prospect around 26-27, but they those players can still become ML regulars. Because of their late start they will probably have a shorter career than someone who reached the majors at 24, but I don't think there is a specific age at which a player can't become a regular. I think that regardless of their status as a prospect, both Jones and Parra still have plenty of time to have productive major league careers, even if they start later than they would have liked.

A couple of comments: The fact that Jackson is rated the number six prospect in the Brewers organization doesn't mean he's going to be a top of the rotation guy. I think most people projected him to be a middle-to-back of the rotation starter or reliever based on his stuff. That doesn't make him over-ranked, as teams need 3, 4, and 5 starters, too. I think it's too easy to see "No. 6" and think of him as a disappointment. Many excused last years struggles citing he was 'working on his mechanics' or some variation thereof. But can you really buy that rationale for more than a handfull of lackluster starts? I don't recall Jackson or anyone mentioning a mechanical change, but if he made one, yeah, I can understand that. It only takes three or four breakdowns per start, three or four pitches out of 100, to turn a decent start into a terrible one. Depending on the change, it could take a full season or more for the change to take hold and help him. I can't even imagine how hard it would be to not only unlearn something that you have done so often that is has become almost a habit, but then learn a new way of doing things. It would almost be like being taught a different way to type after doing it a certain way for years. But the most difficult part of a mechanical change isn't getting it down so you do it most of the time, it's getting the change down so you do it all the time. You've got to be able to use and trust your new mechanics all the time, even when the bases are loaded and there is only one out. The temptation or instinct to revert to how you did things before has got to be tremendous. Again, I don't recall any changes being made. But if he's making them, I wouldn't be at all surprised to know that some of his struggles resulted from the changes he's making. To answer the general comment, I don't think that Jackson had the kind of year he hoped for last year. But I think it's premature to write him off, especially if one kept realistic expectations.

well we can't do much until our player development contract runs out. Didn't we just sign a 4 year deal??? If a new stadium deal isn't in place, I think the Brewers can opt out after two years. EDIT: This is from one of the articles above: The current contract runs through the 2010 season, but the Brewers could break the agreement if a new ballpark isn't constructed or massive improvements aren't made to Greer Stadium, the current home of the Sounds.

I'm not sure if you are aware of this, but here is a Jack Z interview from December 2004. www.brewerfan.net/ViewArt...icleId=126

Milwaukee is on pace to score 1458 runs this year, which probably would lead the league.

Fermaint and Dillard

I agree that Hardy, Weeks, Fielder and Hart are all guys that Jack drafted and are now at the major league level and those things kind of impact the numbers I have quoted in earlier posts, but the fact that they are at the bottom of both of these lists says something, I think, about Jack's performance as SD. I'd like you to come up with the numbers since 2000, instead of over the last 12 years. Let's compare apples to apples here, instead of using 5 years of Bando's numbers. Otherwise it just looks like you are looking for numbers to show us how you are right about Jack Z.

The two disappointing things I noticed (directed at Jack Z) are that the teams farm system is in decline. It went from #1, to #3, to #5 and now this year is ranked #7. I know how hard it is to maintain high levels like this, but it is still in decline. When you are at number 1, you can only go down, so a decline is to be expected. The other thing I would say is that while it's cool to be number one, I'd never, ever judge a scouting director on being number one. It's not important. What is important is the ability to continually add talent to the system. I don't think anyone can really argue that Jack hasn't continued to add talent that is major league caliber. So, beyond that, how come Milwaukee dropped? If you take a Fielder, Weeks, Hart and Hardy from your top prospect list, you'll more than likely drop from number 1. I don't know of any minor league organization that could take those hits and not decline. I wouldn't be terribly surprised if they take another hit next year when Braun is no longer a prospect, and maybe someone like Gallardo. And, if prospects are traded for ML talent, it will take a further hit. But I doubt that BA will give the Brewers credit for turning a minor leaguer into an instant major leaguer via this route. And this is the big one.....The Brewers have the lowest, in all of MLB, in "Total Player Seasons Produced". (in the last 12 years). Since Jack Z hasn't been scouting director 12 years, I don't believe that is a fair barometer of his tenure in Milwaukee. This year's team will have the following Jack Z players starting: Fielder Weeks Hardy Hart The Bench will have either Rottino or Gwynn. By June 1, you'll be able to add Braun to the list. Maybe you'll be able to add Gallardo soon. While the list doesn't include any pitchers (you can add Sarfate if he gets called up at any point this year), that's a pretty good haul when you consider he didn't take over until 2000. It's hard to get service time for players when the main guys are all 23, 24 and 25 years old. I understand being critical, and I know that as fans we sometimes are less critical than we should be. But I strongly believe harping on a couple of things and ignoring the overall results is just as harmful as letting things slide one shouldn't.

Little Ben is Ben Hendrickson (while Big Ben is Ben Sheets).

1. Rolando Pascual - Only 18, hopefully he can have some success in rookie ball and move to WV in 2008. 2. Charlie Fermaint - I am interested to see how Fermaint handles Huntsville. 3. Zach Jackson - Hopefully we'll see hitters missing the ball a bit more often than they did in 2006. 4. Mike Jones - My only hope for Mike is he makes it thru the 2007 season healthy. If he does, I think he'll be in Milwaukee no later than next year. 5. Roque Mercedes - I can't wait to see how Roque does in his first full season in WV this year.

A couple of comments from someone who is far from a draft expert, so take these for what they are worth. My impression of Jack Z is that he is a bit of a risk-taker (a calculated risk-taker might be a better description) at times, especially in the first round, because he is confident that he's going to acquire a lot of talent from round 1 thru round 50. He feels like he can try to hit a home run with guys like Rogers, Jones, and Jeffress (guys with tools that need some refining) because he can find guys like Corey Hart in the 11th round of the draft. I'd be much more upset with those selections had Jack Z and the rest of the scouting department not found talent outside the first couple of rounds. From my point of view, it's difficult to be too upset with a few first round misses (even if they seem pretty obvious) when he's had so many hits over all.

You have Jenkins as your team offensive MVP but he is not your leader in any of your offensive categories. Good catch- I copied-and-pasted from last year's thread, and I thought I had updated everything, but I must have forgotten offensive MVP. Thanks for the catch.

While I don't have the credentials Blazer has, I was a huge Maybin fan pre-draft, too- to the degree I had a dream the Brewers selected him (yes, I realize that I should talk to someone about that http://forum.brewerfan.net/images/smilies/smile.gif ). I was very disappointed by the pick. That said, it's pretty hard to argue with the Braun pick, given that he is closer to the majors, and he, too, looks like a future star.

Each year around the start of Spring Training someone starts a thread to get everyone's pre-season predictions. I know another thread was started, but since the "official" prediction thread tends to get more detailed, I started this one based on last year. Let's limit the posts in this thread to predictions, rather than comments about other's predictions. At the end of the year, we can revisit this thread and see how right or wrong we were. Have fun! 2007 Milwaukee Brewer Pre-season predictions Team Record 2007 Record: 84-78 2007 Record as of Sept 1-ish (135 games): 70-65 2007 Predicted Finish within the NL Central: Second 2007 Playoff Predictions: Fourth in NL Wild Card Offense- Individual Team Leaders with 502 PA Batting Average: Weeks .310 OBP: Weeks .375 SLG: Fielder .580 OPS: Fielder 915 BB: Fielder 90 2b: Hardy/Hart 38 3b: Hart 5 HR: Fielder 38 RBI: Hall 105 K: Hall 155 SB: Weeks 28 Pitching- Individual Team Leaders Wins: Sheets 17 Losses: Vargas 10 Saves: Cordero 32 WHIP: Sheets 0.90 IP: Sheets 223.2 K: Sheets 270 BB: Capuano 92 K/9: Sheets10.86 BB/9: Sheets 0.80 OppOPS: Sheets 600 ERA (among starters): Sheets 2.21 ERA (among relievers): Sarfate 2.50 Appearances: Capellan 70 Team Awards Offensive MVP: Fielder Team Cy Young: Sheets Most Valuable New Addition: Estrada Minor Leagues Awards Minor League Offensive MVP: Charlie Ferment Minor League Cy Young: Yo Gallardo Misc First player not on opening day roster recalled from Minors: Carlos Villanueva First player on 25 man roster removed (via waivers, trade or optioned): Turnbow First Player on the DL: Gross (pulled hammy) League Awards AL MVP: Johan Santana, Twins NL MVP: Albert Pujols, Cards AL Cy Young: Johan Santana, Twins NL Cy Young: Ben Sheets, Brewers AL ROY: Daisuke Matsuzaka, Red Sox NL ROY: Homer Bailey, Reds Post Season AL Champs: Minnesota Twins NL Champs: Florida Marlins WS Champs: Minnesota Twins Comments Have fun!

That was a good interview. I like how you tried to get Chapman and Counsell to go at it. http://forum.brewerfan.net/images/smilies/smile.gif Nice job.

There is a draft order thread, but it scrolled onto the second page. p092.ezboard.com/fbrewers...=919.topic Feel free to post your thoughts on the suckiness of the system there. http://forum.brewerfan.net/images/smilies/smile.gif

Hopefully these examples illustrate why you can just subtract SLG and BA to get ISP. If a player goes 4-for-12 with four singles. This gives that player: - BA: .250 - SLG: .250 - ISP: .000 To get the players ISP we can use two methods. First, take the totals bases minus singles and divide that by the players ABs: (tb - 1b) / ab = ISP (4 - 4) / 12 = ISP 0/12= 0 The second method (and the most common) is to subtract SLG and BA: slg - ba = ISP .250 - .250 = 0 We can see the ISP is zero in both cases. The reason for this is BA treats all hits the same, while SLG takes into account the number of bases for each hit. When you subtract BA from SLG, you are in effect subtracting one base from each hit, leaving only the number of "extra bases" collected. You have, in effect, removed all of the singles and are only looking at extra base hits (or, more correctly, only the extra bases). Just to make sure this works, you can look at a second example where a player also is 4-for-12, but they have 2 doubles and 2 singles for 6 total bases. - BA: .250 - SLG: .500 - ISP: .250 Again, we can calculate ISP two ways. This time, lets use the easier method first and just subtract slugging and BA: slg - ba = ISP .500 - .250 = .250 The second, (total bases - singles) / ab: (tb - 1b) / ab = ISP (6 - 2) / 12 = ISP 4 / 12 = .250 Once again, we get the same result. Hopefully that helps.

I liked Tom Wilhelmsen's potential.

I agree... trades are much easier to propose a trade than actually pull one off.

Would Hall work in center of course but would he be better at SS, so with that if we could upgrade SS with Hall and upgrade CF with a better player (TBD) That TBD part is the catch. Who knows what it would cost in terms of talent or money it would cost to acquire a CFer? Maybe getting someone to play CF and leaving Hall at SS might have made those positions better, but the cost might have been not acquiring Estrada and Suppan, plus some other guys if TBD had to be acquired in a trade. Depdending on who TBD turned out to be, it could be argued the team is better with the addition of Suppan and Estrada than it would be with that other guy. Unless a CFer fell into Melvinâ??s lap, I think he decided the team would be better of with Hall and Hardy in the lineup together instead of something like Hall and Clark, or Hall and Clark/Gross. Hall is the better choice to move, not because of how he plays SS, but rather his overall athleticism makes him a better choice to move to CF.

Ryan Braun was rated the #2 prospect in the Arizona Fall League according to Baseball America. The story is subscriber-based, so I'm not including a link. Patrick, is that rating based upon their play in the AFL, or their entire body of work, including the AFL?

Maybe we can trade him to San Diego for Peavey? http://forum.brewerfan.net/images/smilies/smile.gif Seriously, tho, I wonder what his value is right now. While his last name might add something to his value, are other GMs gonna wonder why Milwaukee wants to move him? If the team needs a CFer (which appears to be the case since they seem to be rumored to have talked to every FA CFer out there), why not just play Gwynn? I am inclined to think Gwynn has more value to Milwaukee in 2007 as a 4th/5th OFer/defensive replacement/pinch hitter than he has trade value. With this team finally (hopefully) on the cusp of winning something important, that type of player has more value than ever before. I think he might help the team more than anyone they could get in a trade. Of course, it only takes one team to want him badly enough for my opinion to change.

I can't think of too many at the moment, but I've got a couple. There has been quite a bit of talk about his defense at third. I'd be curious to hear how he feels he is doing defensively. Is there anything about professional baseball that has surprised him? Either on the field or off? Good luck with your interview!

Nice signature! But I thought we weren't allowed to do those. Anybody help out here? Otherwise, I'll make one for myself. They aren't allowed. Per the BF.net FAQ, found at p092.ezboard.com/fbrewers...=576.topic What am I allowed to have in my signature? Ideally, signatures should not be longer than your posts, nor should they distract from the content of your post. A good rule of thumb is that if your signature is longer than 3 lines (including paragraph breaks), it may be distracting. It also is easier on the eyes if your signature is written in italics, separated by a dashed line or a hard return) so it is easy to distinguish where your post ends and your signature starts. Images should not be used in signatures. Language used to condescend or talk down to other users should not be used either. If you have a personal site or blog, feel free to advertise it in your signature, but try and keep it tasteful.

Isn't Gallardo currently considered one of the top pitching prospects in the game? Yes- and while it's entriely probably he'll have a better major league career than Nick's two year run, he doesn't have the same upside as Neugebauer. The problem is we KNOW Neugebauer never reached his potential because of injuries, so that tends to skew our view as to just how high his ceiling was. If both players reached their maximum potential, Neugy would have turned out to be the better pitcher.