brewerfan82

I swear, if Kent ever became a fulltime broadcaster, I'd never listen to the Brewers again. It's so painful listening to him.

I just remembered the game was on and my ears started bleeding to the sound of Kent's upward inflecting voice. He just said BA will be doing the play-by-play for the rest of the game... shwoooo!

Just wanted to clarify that they are showing MLB spring training games today and throughout the preseason. I have not seen any minor league games listed in their schedule as of yet. It would be great if they do show minor league games though. Additionally, I would love to see some more college baseball game coverage if possible!

Over the past 3 years: <font size="3"><span style="font-family: monospace; font-weight: bold;">Po Player vs. Right vs. Left</span><br style="font-family: monospace;"><span style="font-family: monospace;">RF Endy Chavez .289/.333/.394/.727 .287/.315/.350/.665</span><br style="font-family: monospace;"><span style="font-family: monospace;">LF Luke Scott .281/.365/.537/.902 .236/.340/.421/.761</span></font> I'd pass on Chavez, and while I love Luke Scott, he'd be competing with Nixon and Nelson for backup corner duty and would still leave Gwynn/Duffy as the most likely candidates for the other spot.

For what it's worth, here are the splits among our outfielders and our potential backups over the past 3 years: <font size="3"><span style="font-family: monospace; font-weight: bold;">Po Player vs. Right vs. Left</span><br style="font-family: monospace;"><span style="font-family: monospace;">LF Ryan Braun .283/.327/.546/.873 .351/.412/.702/1.114</span><br style="font-family: monospace;"><span style="font-family: monospace;">CF Mike Cameron .243/.321/.449/.770 .277/.389/.503/.892</span><br style="font-family: monospace;"><span style="font-family: monospace;">RF Corey Hart .270/.306/.476/.782 .305/.368/.525/.893</span><br style="font-family: monospace;"><br style="font-family: monospace;"><span style="font-family: monospace;">OF Jim Edmonds .270/.367/.493/.860 .169/.233/.293/.526</span><br style="font-family: monospace;"><span style="font-family: monospace;">OF Trot Nixon .267/.365/.379/.744 .210/.322/.301/.623</span></font> Edmonds would compliment that group very nicely, offensively and defensively.

I would love to see us pick up Edmonds for the 4th outfielder spot. Being a lefthanded bat in an all-righthanded starting outfield, I think he could easily find his way into the starting lineup a couple times per week. I don't have much faith in either Gwynn or Duffy, so having Edmonds would allow Nixon and Nelson to duke it out for the final spot, but without Edmonds, it's hard to not have one of Gwynn/Duffy on the roster unless Nixon can adequately play centerfield.

I love the signing! There should be a lot of good competition for the bullpen and some quality depth if needed. Now go snag Edmonds and let the Spring Training battles begin!

I'd love to add Edmonds if we've got the dough left to do it. We could end up with a very impressive and experienced bench with a lot of lefthanded options to balance out the lineup if the cards fall right: Rivera ©, Lamb/Hall (IF), Counsell (IF), Edmonds (OF), Nixon (OF). Not to mention, Brad Nelson just may bust out a little this year. While I'm content with us going into the season as is, adding Edmonds and possibly one more reliever (Cruz, Cordero or Izzy) would really get me pumped for the season. We can use all the quality depth we can get.

Is there any concern about how many innings Gallardo can pitch this year considering he pitched fewer than 40 innings combined between AAA and MLB last year because of his injury? Or is that not likely to effect his innings per game and more-so a worry about wearing down as the year progresses?

I think we can still afford to give up that pick. We're still going to have three picks before the second round and possibly four, depending on where Sheets ends up. Not to mention, two or three picks in the second round. It's not what we were ideally looking at when the offseason began, but that's still a ton of picks. I'm not sure what the drop off in pick success is from our 27th first round pick to our 41st supplemental pick, but I can't imagine we're in a worse situation losing our first round pick than we would have been keeping it and not having any compensation picks. It's not like we're losing a top ten or even a top twenty draft pick. That said, Perez's inconsistency is troublesome, but he still has the tools to be the top-notch pitcher he looked assuredly to be when he first came up with the Pirates. If Doug can get a decent deal for him, I'd love to have him thrown into our rotation: Gallardo, Perez, Bush, Parra, Suppan would give us a very balanced attack and help shore up our depth in the bullpen as well. I'm also not a big fan of the idea of keeping the money now for flexibility later in the season. If we can get an obvious upgrade now, for the full year, I think it's best to take it, rather than giving up money and talent later on for a half year of service. It worked out well last year, but last year we didn't have any obvious holes to spend that money on going into the season (outside of maybe the bullpen, but we had already thrown a bunch of cash at Gagne and Riske). This year, our starting rotation is an obvious weak point if we don't get another established starter in it. I'm still crossing my fingers that Sheets falls back into our laps, but I wouldn't be upset at all to land Perez (at least assuming he's not getting the money he thought he was getting going into the offseason).

Now that I've eliminated the first 132 unique guesses, I should have a 0.37% chance of getting this right! (assuming we're only dealing with integers here...) I'll go with: 245 (the number of double plays turned in his Brewer career)

Please not Kent Summerfeld. He's done some fill-in work during Spring Training and he is just torture to listen to.

Looks like the Cubs are just saying they're okay that the Yankees are spending that much because they're doing it within the rules and I don't think that really differs from Mark A's opinion. Mark doesn't have a problem with the Yankees, he has a problem with how MLB is being run to allow teams with different resources to outspend teams without those resources. That's why the "sour grapes" comment from the Yankees was ridiculous. Kind of like saying "sour grapes" to Susan B. Anthony (On a much lower scale, obviously).

was the music being played from a boombox or other electrical device? was she in the bathtub? did the boombox/music device fall into the tub electrocuting her?

is the stick a pole vault? is the path a track?

Holy moley razzzor!!!!!! I just went cross-eyed and had a minor convulsion from that!

Did he drive off an incomplete road? Was an earthquake involved? If the man wasn't set up to die by the fortune teller, would something bad have happened to the fortune teller? ...or a loved one of the fortune teller? Is it important that the fortune teller had to draw the map? Would a regular map have shown more accurate information that would have prevented the man's death?

Was the tarot card actually meant for the man that died? Or was the tarot card meant for the fortune teller? And did the fortune teller think the man would cause him to die? So he killed the man instead?

I don't think the point is that players don't want to come to Milwaukee specifically, it's that the general region that Milwaukee is in isn't as appealing as those on either coast or in the South and that is definitely a disadvantage. That means to get those players Milwaukee HAS to outbid teams in favorable locations, where as teams in those locations most likely only have to match an offer from Milwaukee to have an advantage. You hear about players wanting to play on the West coast or the East coast all the time, you rarely hear about a player whose preference is to play in the Midwest. While money wins out most of the time, when a player makes it known that they want to play in a certain region, many times teams outside that region will dedicate their resources elsewhere rather than trying to pursue that player. It's not often that a coastal team considers itself out of the running before bidding begins because a player wants to play in the Midwest. And that doesn't even consider the fact that it's easier for those teams to generate the money necessary to make substantial offers to big time free agents.

True. However, if pitcher X warrants a comp pick or two after next season (as Johnson probably would, assuming we'd offer a pitcher of his age arbitration, which is debatable), you could still argue that cheaper pitcher X plus two comp picks now plus one or two comp picks next year > than Sheets plus two comp picks next year. You still are likely to get more comp picks by signing someone other than Sheets in the end.

My brother has a katana that he would like to display on his wall. I've found places online to order wall mounts for them, but is there anyplace locally in Madison that I could buy something like that from? I'm looking for something like this: http://www.1strateknives.com/3pcswallstand.html Thanks!

Agreed. I'd like a Cameron + Hall for Cabrera + Kennedy swap if it lays the groundwork to add some payroll elsewhere. Sign Dunn and Fuentes and trade for Beltre (would a couple decent, but not top, prospects get it done?) and we're looking pretty good for around $90mil. Lineup: Weeks, Hardy, Fielder, Braun, Dunn, Beltre, Hart, Kendall Bench: Rivera, Lamb, Iribarren, Cabrera, Nelson Rotation: Gallardo, Parra, Kennedy, Suppan, Bush Bullpen: Fuentes, Riske, McClung, Coffey, Villanueva, Stetter, Swindle

Outfielders currently on the Yankees roster: Johnny Damon (L) - 09: $13m Hideki Matsui (L) - 09: $13m Nick Swisher (S) - 09: $5.3M, 10:$6.75M, 11:$9M, 12:$10.25M club option ($1M buyout) Xavier Nady ® - 09: arbitration Melky Cabrera (S) - 09: pre-arbitration, 10: arbitration, 11: arbitration, 12: arbitration That's a lot of left handed options. If they want Cameron to man centerfield, is there any way we could swing a deal to include either Damon, Matsui or Swisher instead of Cabrera? Would you trust any of those guys in centerfield for the Brewers? Or would this force Hart out of the outfield in favor of a better defensive option (Which we may need him as starting pitcher trade bait anyways...)?

I'd love it if we could snag one of Sheets, Lowe or Johnson and make a trade for a younger starter with potential (i.e. a Hughes type) to fill out a rotation of Sheets/Lowe/Johnson, Gallardo, Hughes-type, Parra, Bush/Suppan. Sheets has the best potential, but is a bit of an injury risk and costs 2 compensation draft picks Lowe is probably the most reliable and actually surprisingly comparable to Sheets, but would also cost a pick Johnson is still pretty good while he's out there, but is a huge injury risk. But he also doesn't cost a pick and would be a nice addition to the rotation at the right price.

With CC gone to the Yanks, the Brewers will have to look elsewhere to bolster their rotation. I really hope we can acquire two dependable arms via trade or free agency. Here are the free agent arms available according to mlbtraderumors.com (with their stats over the past two seasons for type A and B free agents): Type A (offered arbitration) A.J. Burnett (32) - 3.93 ERA, 1.28 WHIP, 9.5 K/9, 3.5 BB/9, 387.0 IP (to Yankees) Derek Lowe (36) - 3.55 ERA, 1.20 WHIP, 6.5 K/9, 2.3 BB/9, 410.1 IP Oliver Perez (27) - 3.91 ERA, 1.36 WHIP, 8.6 K/9, 4.5 BB/9, 371.0 IP C.C. Sabathia (28) - 2.95 ERA, 1.13 WHIP, 8.4 K/9, 1.8 BB/9, 494.0 IP (to Yankees) Ben Sheets (30) - 3.39 ERA, 1.19 WHIP, 7.0 K/9, 2.2 BB/9, 339.2 IP Type A (not offered arbitration) Jamie Moyer (46) - 4.37 ERA, 1.39 WHIP, 5.8 K/9, 2.9 BB/9, 395.2 IP (to Phillies) Andy Pettitte (37) - 4.29 ERA, 1.42 WHIP, 6.4 K/9, 2.7 BB/9, 419.1 IP Type B Paul Byrd (38) - 4.59 ERA, 1.36 WHIP, 4.1 K/9, 1.5 BB/9, 372.1 IP Jon Garland (29) - 4.56 ERA, 1.41 WHIP, 4.2 K/9, 2.6 BB/9, 405.0 IP Randy Johnson (45) - 3.89 ERA, 1.22 WHIP, 9.2 K/9, 2.1 BB/9, 240.2 IP Braden Looper (34) - 4.52 ERA, 1.32 WHIP, 4.7 K/9, 2.3 BB/9, 374.0 IP Brad Penny (31) - 4.04 ERA, 1.41 WHIP, 5.5 K/9, 3.4 BB/9, 302.2 IP John Smoltz (42) - 3.04 ERA, 1.18 WHIP, 9.0 K/9, 2.1 BB/9, 233.2 IP Randy Wolf (32) - 4.45 ERA, 1.40 WHIP, 7.9 K/9, 3.4 BB/9, 293.0 IP The Rest Kris Benson (33) Roger Clemens (46) Matt Clement (33) Bartolo Colon (36) Shawn Estes (36) Josh Fogg (32) Freddy Garcia (33) Tom Glavine (43) Mark Hendrickson (35) Livan Hernandez (34) Orlando Hernandez (43) Jason Jennings (30) Kenshin Kawakami (34) Jon Lieber (39) Rodrigo Lopez (33) Pedro Martinez (37) Mark Mulder (31) John Parrish (31) Carl Pavano (33) Odalis Perez (32) Sidney Ponson (32) Mark Prior (27) Kenny Rogers (44) Glendon Rusch (34) Curt Schilling (42) Koji Uehara (34) Kip Wells (32)