lithium75

I am not a fan of the Sheets/Gallardo comparisons. They are very different pitchers. Sheets is more of a Nolan Ryan type fireballer, and Gallardo seems more like a young Kevin Brown. Thankfully, he checked the "IAM the center of the universe" attitude at the door.

Don't mean to be picky, but calling Sheets a tremendous athlete is a bit of a stretch. Anyone who has watched Sheets run, field his position or bat can see that he has trouble walking and chewing gum at the same time. He is a good pitcher. He can throw a baseball fast and accurately. That, however is the extent of his athletic prowess. Gallardo would have been drafted in the first 5 rounds as a position player had he not been able to pitch. If Sheets couldn't pitch, he'd be teaching people how to paint their bathrooms as a sales consultant at Home Depot. Disclaimer: I'm not trying to discredit anything Toby has said, just wanted to take the time to pick on Sheets a little.

Braun is 1-3 with a 2 run HR and a BB. Good start. www.minorleaguebaseball.c...n_surwin_1 edit: Make that 2-4 with a single and a two run HR.

I wouldn't do Yo for Crawford straight up. I don't think I would do Capuano for Crawford straight up. I would hwever do the Davis, Rodgers, and an assortment of Jackson, Hendrickson, or Eveland, but I don't think the DRays would do this unless it were a last resort. Take a long look at the Tiger's stats and roster this year. They won with pitching, starters and bull pen arms. Their offense isn't much better than ours was. For us to win, pitchers who could be aces (think Capuano = a younger Kenny Rodgers, and Gallardo = a Bonderman in the making) are more important than a few more runs next year.

Not meaning to toot my own horn here, but this list seems eerily familiar to the list I posted almost a year ago entitled "Top Ten Prospects One Year From Today" except for the fact that I had Inman #2 and vastly overestimated Escobar. Hey, who didn't overestimate Escobar after the AFL year he had?

Carl Crawford for Bill Hall? I am not overly keen on quoting stats, and don't think that OPS is the best judge of offensive talent, but I do agree that there is some mathematical validity to OPS. That being said, A 26 year old short stop with a .900 OPS is more valuable than a 25 year old left fielder with a .830 OPS. Granted the 56 stolen bases with a high success rate helps, especially when Hall had 8 staels and 9 caught stealing this year. VORP or some other stat like that could prove that Crawford is a better offensive player, and I don't like the 160 strikeouts that Hall had, but it is tough to value someone who can play Left field, and possibly center field higher than someone who has proven that he can play SS, and 2b well, 3b adequately, and who looked natural in limited playing time in center field. Hall must be valued higher due to power numbers and position bonuses. Crawford for Doug davis isn't enogh on our end. Chris Capuano for him would be fair, but I think we need to keep Capuano and Davis until Gallardo is ready, hopefully at the deadline. Also, I think that the D-Rays are looking for a prospect that will cost them nothing for 3 years, then not too much in the arby years. They are full on in the save money at all costs, and they wouldn't be able to Keep Capuano long enough for him to be worth giving up Crawford for. I think the only way we get Crawford is a package starting with Gallardo, and I don't want to get rid of him. Someone like Boston will pony up a Lester, or the Yanks will give up Humber. Someone will be willing to part with a nearly ready young blue chip arm for him, I just hope it is not Gallardo.

Yo is a possible true ace caliber pitcher. It is a whole lot harder to find a true ace pitcher than a .830 OPS LF. Gallardo could get injured, true but if Gallardo lives up to his potential, he will be way more valuable than if Crawford lives up to his. Crawford is already a proven good player, so there are benefits to the deal. The problem is that a team who has a true #1 starter, true #2, #3, #4, and #5 usually don't make the playoffs. Small budget teams that make the playoffs usually have a #1 3 #2's and another guy, all who are young guys in arbitration. Gallardo and Inman are our guys who will fill these roles in the next 4 years. Seeing that we never draft College arms, and Rodgers and Jeffress seem to have questions about their control, we need them more than we need Crawford. If all you care about is contending for the playoffs the next two seasons, and then starting over, fine, trade for Crawford. Deal away Gallardo, possibly Inman, and another guy. If you want to compete fot the playoffs the next two years, make the play offs in 3, and compete for the World Series after that we need to keep Gallardo and Inman. Make this trade, and in two years, we could lose Sheets, Capuano could be gone in 3, and Bush soon after. Right now I don't see us competing with Parra, Eveland, Jackson, Rodgers, or Jeffress as our #1, #2, ect. #4 or #5? possible, but for us to make a World Series in the next 10 years, we need Gallardo AND Inman to succeed. Crawford can't get us there. If we can get the deal done without Gallardo, I'd think about it. I would prefer to get it done without Inman. The bottom line is that it sounds like it will take at least Gallardo, possibly Inman, too. Prediction? Lester and a couple of other prospects for Crawford. Boston wants to replace Coco Crisp, and they could care less that Crawford is not a center fielder. They'll stick him out there anyway. They probably don't WANT to lose Lester, especially with Shilling probably done, and Clement done for Next year, but they would probably just go sign Zito anyway.

The "Fielder, Weeks, Braun, Oh my!' line needs to go away, though

I have read through the posts, well, I pretty much got the points of the posts on this thread. Here's my opinion. I have been trying to make the point since a month left in the season that Lee could use to lose some weight, and finally one other poster took note. Way back when on this thread, bat04 also mentioned it, but like me, no one even took it into consideration. Heres my stance on Lee. I feel that taking his stats as a whole for the season is a problematic way to judge his season. He started off cool, heated up, then went cold, eventually turning into a slap hitter. This can be explained by the fact that players often have trouble when switching leagues. It is tougherr to face a pitcher for the foirst time than facing a pitcher which you have 10-20 at bats against. Even in Lee's cool start, he struggled against career National Leaguers, and had success against pitchers he had faced in the American league. Once he got adjusted to the National league he got hot. After the all star break, he started to fade. Remember how tired he looked at the end of the Home Run Derby? After that, he started to slow down. By the last month, he was jogging to first base on grounders and pop ups. He was unable to drive the ball. For the last three weeks of the year, all he could to is hit soft liners to right. He just looked flat tired. What can we do about this? He is on the payroll for next year. Tell him that if he doesn't cut weight, he will be dealt. If he shows up in camp at 240 lbs, we trade him at the all star break. If he cuts the weight, we look to sign him to an extension. What are the benefits of doing this? Presumably, he has made the adjustment to the National League. He should come in next year and hit right away. Hopefully he will start out hot. If he is still at 240, we can expect him to get tired after the break. With his hot start (I hope) he will increase his trade value. When we trade him at the break, we can expect to get more value. By then, we should know more if Cruz or Hart are ready. If he is still as heavy as he is, we won't be losing much in the second half anyway, so we will maximize Lee's time with us. If he does cut down to 215-220 lbs next year, we sign him to a 3 year $24-$27 million contract. Hopefully by dropping some weight and getting in better shape, he will keep hitting into the second half. Also having Cruz and Hart to give him a day or two off will help keep him fresh throughout the next year. If, as I expect, he comes out slugging right away next year, it is good either way, whether we keep him or trade him. If we can get him into good enough shape to make it through a whole year without burning out, he will be worth extending. I would leave it totally up to Carlos to lose the weight and stay if he wants to. If he doesn't, he will be shipped out.

Here's the scoop: www.jsonline.com/sports/b...364138.asp His wife is pregnant and the "family health issue" has to do with her pregnancy. I hope everything is OK for Prince and his wife.

Yes, Duke is a good pitcher, so we should rip him. On the other hand he is also a rookie, so he should shut us out. Good pitcher vs. Rookie, it will be interesting to see which of the Brewer's offensive trends is stronger and wins out.

I think we need to plan a way out to get back to .500 on the 81st game. We seem to get to .500, then slide a few games. If we get back to .500 too soon, we may not have enough time to get back to .500 after the subsequent slide, and may finish another year sub .500. It has become obvious that we can not breach the apparent invisible force field that separates us from a record above .500.

No, I was saying that bunting is one of those basic skills of baseball that we are terrible at. We are not just terrible, we are the worst bunting team I have ever seen. If we rarely attempted to bunt, this would be of little consequence. We attempt the sacrifice bunt frequently, and fail horribly at an alarming rate. I only mentioned Atlanta because they are a fundimentally sound team. Not just at bunting. And I never suggested that any team is 100% successful at anything. The whole point was not to dispute the validity of stats, even though I phrased it in a way than it seemed as though I was. The point was that if we were even an average bunting team, we would have won 3 to 5 of the games that we have lost. .500 is nice, but 6-10 games over would have been better, and we would not be dreaming about the Wild Card, we would be right in there for it.

10-8 to +.500, can we do it?

I have to say that I am somewhat disapointed that a month or so ago, nearly a thousand posts were made when we got to .500, and this late in the year, only a handful of people showed up for this time to .500

The rooter, now his official position designation is "Backup Back" to Jenkins

They are there, just don't date anyone but the type of guy that everyone who writes here hates

It is suffice to say that she is hot

Good, I didn't jinx us

Common sense would have said to bat Fielder there, hope it doesn't come back to haunt us

or not

Capuano should be done, here's to the bullpen holding for #17

I wish my Milwaukee Brewers played in the NL West

Yeah, I'd definately kick her out of bed for eating crackers...Professional athletes have very rough lives

Oh yeah, and 2 quick runs are nice.