titanrick

I'm a sucker for the retro-70s look...

Hard to believe Chourio (3/11/04) is a full year and a half younger than Wetherholt (9/10/02), who is the odds-on favorite for ROY in the NL. And this is Chourio's third season! I think the RISP numbers this year could be that he's pressing more in those situations. When he's chasing pitches outside the zone, the only chance he has is if the pitcher makes a mistake. When he's patient and laying off the junk, he is a real force. I think that will improve as he matures.

I just hope they ruled it a hit so I can keep hearing Vinny tell me that Hamilton has been good defensively!

Are you basing that on defensive metrics or the eye test? I have a healthy respect for analytics, but I gotta say - I watch almost every game and cringe when the ball is hit toward him. Way too many terrible throws, botches some easy plays, just seems like a wreck sometimes.

Agreed, I thought Adames was the quintessential "clubhouse leader" which is why I was somewhat worried when he left. All we've done since is have the best record in baseball. When one leader leaves, someone else steps up to fill the void. Teams have "lead by example" guys like Yeli and "rah-rah leaders" like Adames was, and Contreras seems to be now. All the top teams spout cliches constantly... we're playing for each other... we never quit... we're a family. All that is true, but it's true for almost every team that has a winning record. And as Jopal pointed out, it's not even a necessity for title-winning teams. Mostly just something for the media to write about.

There goes my theory that Sanchez wanted to pitch so he could waste our final challenge.

I'm all for giving him the QO if he finishes the season as it has gone so far. But if that's the case, he'll never accept it because someone will offer him a lucrative multi-year deal. If he slumps badly down the stretch, I think the Brewers play it safe and let him walk away feeling like we already got the peak performance year in his career.

Agreed. And with Uribe, the goal has to be that he's fully healthy for October, not for two series against the Cubs.

Cubs managed one hit today, an oppo bloop single. No offense on that team at all. They're doomed if they even make it to the playoffs.

Yeah, dropping that easy double play last night will never show in the scorebook or defensive metrics, but that cost us 5 runs and who knows what happens if we get out of that inning clean? Inexcusable.

I think you might be remembering 1982 Yount rather than 1974-76 Yount.

It can be tough to read through the IGTs. In my mind, there's a huge difference between "Yeli looks lost right now; I think he needs to move down in the order" or "That's a really steep price for two rentals!" as opposed to "I've said this before - Murphy is a horrible game manager!!!" or "Arnold gets ripped off again in this trade, like he always does!!!" It just comes across as though you've never watched a full season of baseball in your life with these blanket judgments based on one game or one trade in late July. And I get it - emotions run high in the middle of a game and people have to earn the benefit of the doubt. But if Murph - back-to-back manager of the year and best record in baseball again this year - hasn't earned the benefit of the doubt with you, then no one ever will. We're incredibly lucky as a fanbase right now to have the organizational talent we have.

ESPN game? So no BrewersTV again?

Agreed, I keep hearing the TV guys (either tandem) say that Hamilton is good defensively. And he does make some good plays on occasion. But he also seems very shaky at times and short-hops a couple throws each game, which could easily become errors. I tense up every time a grounder goes his way.

I'm not the expert on this, so please correct me if I'm wrong. But I've read that players on the 40-man next spring, when a presumably long lockout will occur, are unable to train or play at team facilities. Players not yet on the 40-man can continue with a minor league season. If that's true, the risk is a long interruption for our top prospects' progression. I think it's easier to ignore that risk if the player is Jett or Hardin or someone very close to getting promoted already. But if it's somebody in AA who is not as "seasoned" yet, it's a bigger risk.

Yeah, I always try to find the silver lining and that could be it. If the Dodgers cruise to a third straight title after buying Ohtani, Yamamoto, Tucker, Diaz, Skubal (and many more), then maybe that's enough of a wake-up call to get the system changed. I know some players are saying they will never accept a salary cap, but that's a relatively easy problem to fix if the owners really want to. From the owners' standpoint, you show what percentage of revenue is currently being spent on player salaries, then propose a system with true revenue sharing that raises that percentage, with a cap and floor in place. So instead of 1 player getting $700M, you wind up with seven players getting $100M. Once you propose a system that gives more overall money to players, but spread out more evenly, then a majority of the players are going to get behind that. The key is, do the owners really want to solve this? Because the current system allows them to just complain about the Dodgers' advantage, but not have to worry about a salary floor each year. I'm skeptical you will get enough owners to agree to that.

Yeah, that is a big clue to me. If you're the Tigers, you have zero incentive to agree to a trade Saturday night because waiting until Monday afternoon could only drive up the price further as teams get more desperate. But if you insisted on Pena and Henderson (as an example) from Milwaukee and they flat out said "We're not giving you both of them" or "Henderson is off the table", then you would feel comfortable taking the Dodgers' best offer, You could assume that you were not going to get more value by waiting until Monday afternoon. The media "scolding" us for not matching or exceeding the Dodgers' offer is completely ignoring the fact that we NEED our top prospects to compete in the future. Giving them away for a two-month rental is an enormous cost for us. The Dodgers don't need them. When a hole opens up in the OF or in their starting rotation, they simply go out and sign the two best available FAs for $300M each. It's just not a level playing field, even when you're talking trades. No one seems to understand that aspect of it.

I think the disconnect is that this forum seems convinced Yeli is washed and will never hit well consistently again. Murph seems convinced Yeli is in a funk and needs to work his way out of it. I have to admit, our chances of winning a WS are significantly improved if Yeli is an .800 OPS hitter rather than what we've seen lately from him. I have to hope that Murph realizes the jig is up in October if Yeli is still struggling this badly. You can't win playoff series with your leadoff DH being a non-factor. Or, Yeli turns it around and we all look foolish for doubting that he could still perform like we need him to.

Everyone (including me) likes to grumble about the fact the Brewers don't spend "enough" money to push us over the top, but this is the second year where we've taken on "dead" salary (McCullers and Jordan Montgomery) in order to improve our team in other ways (Gordon and Shelby Miller). That's at least a small indication that they value winning over saving money. There are obvious limits to that, as anyone who has ever balanced a checkbook knows, but it's encouraging to see them "wasting" money on bad contracts in order to get improvements with desired players.

My take on that is MLB outlawed the colored index card being displayed in the dugout for the hitter at the plate, which was giving them real-time feedback. I don't see how or why MLB would tell teams they can't discuss strategy with a player in the dugout before he goes up to hit. It just feels like we don't have a plan, and that's frustrating because thankfully, it's unusual for this team. I hope you're right and it's just a learning curve and we'll improve before the playoffs.

That quote is from Ketel Marte, not Chourio, if that matters. This issue of our hitters' use of ABS is frustrating for me. The Brewers pride themselves on getting an edge in every imaginable way since we will never be able to outspend teams like the Dodgers and Yankees. So why can't we be better at this aspect of it, given we're 100 games into the new system now? To be clear, the split-second judgment of "Was it an incorrect call?" is very difficult. If players don't trust their own judgment, most of the time they should just accept the call and not challenge. I'm reminded of a Bunty at-bat early in the season where he looks at a called third strike that wasn't particularly close to being a ball, then compounds his problem by wasting a challenge on it. It was early in the game, too. But there is no excuse at all for Chourio's miss on the last strike of regulation. Even if he's wrong, we still have one left in extra innings. It is no longer a question of "Are you certain?" and more a question of "What have you got to lose by being wrong?" In this case, he wasn't losing much and would have gotten the challenge correct. But these are things that should be taught to our hitters - that the timing of the challenge matters greatly! And the rules are strict that you can't coach from the dugout in those situations, you can absolutely remind someone in the on-deck circle that we have two challenges left in the bottom of the 9th and if it's close at all, don't be afraid to try it! And yet, our boys seem lost on when to challenge and when not to. Chourio clearly discussed it with someone after that game, because he incorrectly challenged in his first at-bat the next game! Coaches... Murph... tighten up the ship here!

17. But I can't see Stearns doing that. He would look so unbelievably foolish, especially if Freddy turned it around after getting here. And Peralta's value is much lower now than the Jett/Sproat package, so the articles combining the two trades would practically write themselves. What I can see happening is the Cubs trade for him. Familiarity with Counsell, coupled with their ongoing desperation for starting pitching that can stay healthy. That would make sense.

How in the world can someone accidentally tweet out a text they intended to send someone privately? Although thinking that tweedledee and tweedledum were actually named "twinkle dee and twinkle dum" might be a clue. Just like you eventually have to take the car keys away from Grandpa, I think the same should be done for a phone.

I hope that means Greg Jones is the one driving Luis Lara from Nashville to St. Louis.