Matt Breen

it's great we have the lead, but we've certainly blown a lot of chances.

Bunt??? You're rockin' this guy, got a lefty on righty... why?

segura with two walks and a hit today. looking better every day.

today is international talk like a pirate day. http://www.talklikeapirate.com/ http://www.latimes.com/features/books/jacketcopy/la-jc-shiver-me-timbers-its-talk-like-a-pirate-day-20120919,0,983118.story

I was wondering if people could give me a feel for how Segura has looked. Unfortunately, I moved out of Wisconsin the week we traded for him, so I've not seen him play much. His stats are improving - he's got his BA up to .260 and his OBP up to .318. Nothing great, but much improved. He seems to have settled down a bit and is taking some walks. But he's still not hitting for any kind of power (only 2 xbh). How's he looking? Offensively and defensively. Is he our starter next year, or is destined for AAA for at least part of the season? A strange thing I noticed - he's 2 for 25 vs lefties. Not sure if that means anything. Just noticed it. Thanks. I appreciate any insights.

The Cardinals have a cupcake schedule to with eight games more against Houston and Chicago (the next two games are on the road against Houston, then a series against Chicago and Houston at home follows). They close out against Cincinnati and Washington on the road. I figure the Cardinals have a good shot to win five more from Houston and Chicago - then split the remaining six with Cincy/Nats. That's 8 more wins for a total of 86. That means the Crew needs to finish out 11-4. I'd even say 12-3 to be safe. Also, Gallardo is now scheduled to pitch the final day of the season. Ideally this team will win enough to have the wild card clinched before then, so you can save Gallardo for the one-game playoff (presumably with Atlanta). All this assumes the Phillies and Dodgers falter to some degree. At this point, I'm just hoping we keep winning like this. It's pretty darn fun.

Guy has been great. Walks, hits, SBs.

Awesome! I was wrong.

Suicide squeeze coming!

I'm just excited to have the word 'crucible' used in a thread. It's just an awesome word. Well done, Too Live.

The team is moving Gallardo up to pitch on Tuesday so that he'll be able to pitch the last day of the season - if necessary. From JSonline: http://www.jsonline.com/sports/brewers/painful-test-run-for-brewers-hart-sl6sjon-169976916.html Same article says Marcum won't be coming out of the rotation.

Shields would be a great guy to have - two years of a top notch pitcher would be awesome. But what would it cost? I could see that Tampa might like Maldonado. Who else? Gomez would fit if they dealt Upton - but they only get him for a year. Doesn't make sense. Corey Hart would work, but again, he's only signed for one year and pretty expensive ($10 million). I assume Tampa would want young pitching. Guys like Peralta, Thorburg, Jungmann. I just don't see the Crew dealing the young pitching at this time. Especially when they can probably sign someone in FA. Maybe that person isn't as good - but they don't lose the young guys.

Fernando Rodney with a 0.68 ERA. Sweet. Gotta love how the Rays continue to successfully recycle relievers year after year.

If you go with a rotation of Gallardo, Fiers, say Estrada and a mix of Rogers, Thornburg, Peralta and Burgos, your chances of making the playoffs are greatly diminished because it's unlikely you'll find two rookies who can have great success in the rotation. It's not that these guys couldn't do the job - but it's unlikely. Again, I'm not saying they couldn't succeed - I'm saying that history is against them. There are always exceptions to rules. But to think you will be the exception to the rule is foolish planning. I should also stress that adding a veteran arm would be important if the team is serious about making the playoffs. If management sees 2013 as a 'retooling' year and doesn't think the playoffs are realistic, then all bets are off. The reason you're playing with fire with two rookies in the rotation is that the majority of these guys will likely fail as a starting pitcher. All of these guys we talk about are prospects with question marks. None are elite prospects - the kind of guys in the top 30 or even 50 in prospect rankings. Next year, only Thornburg will probably be in the top 100. That aside, let's just give any pitcher we have the benefit of the doubt and say they are top 100 material. Then go back and look at the pitchers who have been in the Top 100 lists of Baseball America (we could use other lists, but this one is easy and comprehensive). http://www.baseballamerica.com/today/prospects/rankings/top-100-prospects/all-time.html If you go back and look at the names of the top 100 guys over the years, you'll find that roughly 1/3 to 1/4 of the pitchers make it as decent starters in their career. I did not go in and look up every single player for 10 or 15 years, but just picked a few years and went through the list of guys and said 'fail' and 'succeed'. I ignored players I knew were relievers to start with. Again, the determination was whether they succeeded as a starting pitcher. That meant a guy like Jason Grilli - who is now an excellent reliever for Pittsburgh - is listed as a 'failure'. The simple matter is that pitchers fail more than not. Injuries are so common. Other guys just can't make the transition. For every Cole Hamals there are three or four others - guys like Ben Hendrickson, Seth McClung, Mike Jones, Manny Parra, Will Inman, Nick Neugebauer. Breaking in a starting pitcher into the majors is a risk. Many of the 'successes' struggled early. That's why it's helpful if the team can have the other rotation spots filled. There will likely be growing pains with a rookie. If we want to be in the playoffs, we want to minimize that to one spot - not two. I don't think anyone advocates adding Kevin Millwood for three years. But if you can find a decent player - Anibal Sanchez or Edwin Jackson, for example, for a decent rate and no more than three years, you consider it. Those guys aren't without warts, but they bring a predictable commodity to the rotation that is valuable. Perhaps others will look at these lists and come to some other determination. But I think history shows that far more often than not, highly ranked pitchers will fail at becoming starters in the majors. Many will become successful relievers. But the success rate as starters is not promising. Therefore, I think it's a poor plan to load up 2/5 of the rotation with such players. Finally, injuries almost always strike teams. Narveson missed all but two starts. Marcum has missed 1/3 of the season. So, as some have pointed out, it never hurts to have more pitching.

Even if we make the playoffs, Braun won't win it because there will be a segment of voters who won't vote for him because they are convinced he took PEDs. Some writers won't put him first. Some might not even put him on the list because of it. Some writers will cite the 'integrity' line and not give him the vote. Others will find a 'viable alternative' - a guy who comes close to Braun who doesn't have the PEDs stain. A guy like Posey is perfect. You can make a realistic argument for him. Tough position. Excellent stats. Sure they aren't as good as Braun, but Posey plays a tougher position. A lot of writers will let that argument sway them over just so they don't have to pick Braun. If Braun's numbers were outrageously good - like the old Barry Bonds numbers - then he could win. Everyone suspected Bonds was a 'roid monster, but his numbers were so good he kept getting votes. I should stress that it only takes a few guys to have this attitude to spoil Braun's chances. I'm not saying that a 75% of the voters will take this path - but it will be enough to spoil any chance Ryan has of winning.

I agree with this. Here's a list of some guys (I'm not saying all of them are that good - just listing who's available). I've only listed guys who I think would have a chance in our rotation. I included guys who I think the team has a good chance of not picking up their option. And I didn't include anyone who's option was likely to be picked up. Some players are, no doubt, not realistic. But I included everyone. I also would advocate adding a reclamation project - a guy we can get for cheap who is looking for a chance (example: someone like Erik Bedard). Joe Blanton (32) Ryan Dempster (36) Zack Greinke (28) Jeremy Guthrie (34) Dan Haren (32) - $15.5MM club option with a $3.5MM buyout Edwin Jackson (29) Hiroki Kuroda (38) Colby Lewis (33) Francisco Liriano (29) Kyle Lohse (34) Shaun Marcum (31) Daisuke Matsuzaka (32) Brandon McCarthy (29) Roy Oswalt (35) Jake Peavy (31) - $22MM club option with a $4MM buyout Anibal Sanchez (29) Jonathan Sanchez (30) Ervin Santana (30) - $13MM club option with a $1MM buyout Joe Saunders (32) Carlos Villanueva (29) Carlos Zambrano (32) I'd seriously consider adding guys like Thornburg and Peralta and Rogers to the bullpen - if they don't make the rotation.

Veras is just awful.

I give Aoki credit. He's turned into a solid player. Is he great? No. But he's cheap and producing well. If the club could get a good deal for Gomez, I'd be okay with Nori in CF next year. Play Gamel in RF perhaps.

Hows peralta looking?

Another thing about Rickie's 2012 has been his defense. I don't think he's been particularly good. This year. His range has looked limited. I suspect his bad ankle has something to do with it. WAR assessments seem to back this up. As well as fielding percentage and range factor. I hope he looks better in 2013 as the injury continues to heal. Ankle injuries can be tough.

I totally disagree with this. It's not saying Carlos isn't having a good year. But the Mike Cameron comp is off. They are so different - at least as batters. Cameron always took walks at a pretty consistent rate of around 11%. His first year he had a 12.3% rate. Followed by 8.4% and 12.6%. These are for ages 24-26. Carlos' rates for those ages are 5.3, 5.8 and 4.7%. He's actually lower this year than the last few seasons. This year, Carlos is the ranked 228 out of 230 in the number of pitches he takes per at bat (minimum of 300 ABs). His rate, by the way, has gotten worse over the past three years - falling from 3.57 pitchers per AB in 2010, to 3.48 in 2011 and 3.35 this year. Cameron was nothing like this. All these numbers scare me that this year is a fluke. Perhaps he's simply matured a bit - gotten a little stronger, a little quicker with the bat, allowing him to drive the ball a bit better. If that's the case, his ceiling is probably what we are seeing. .250-260, 20 HR, .300 OBP. Excellent defense. Nothing wrong with that. It's quite valuable. But I just don't know if it's real.

I'm not convinced Carlos has turned a corner. He's had a very good year, and I'm happy to have him in 2013. I just don't know if what he's doing is sustainable. His approach at the plate seems like he's guessing. Perhaps I'm wrong. But I worry it's a nice run of a few months - something lots of guys do at some point in their career. To try and project that going forward - after so many years of much worse - is a huge risk. I'm good with him going into 2013 as the starting CF. If he sustains his play, great. If not, we have alternatives, such as Aoki and Schafer. However, I wouldn't be adverse to the team seeing what they could get for him on the trade market. Carlos is a FA after 2013, and with Boros as an agent, i highly doubt he'll be looking to signing a reasonable contract extension. I think the hard thing about Carlos is giving him a price tag. A lot of his value is in his defense. I've seen people float contract ideas - such as 'bill hall contract' and so forth. I cringe at those numbers, because i fear he'll simply regress to the Carlos Gomez of 2009-11 - a .650 OPS guy. Great defense, sure. But that along isn't worth $8 million a year on the open market. So I'd be wary of any long term deal for Carlos. I guess the team could look into an extension if it reasonable - say 3 years and $12-15 million. But I don't think that will work for Carlos. Not with Boros as an agent. In that case, see what his trade value is. Or just keep him for 2013.

I've changed my name to Reilly De Los Santos in hopes of getting signed by the Brewers.

I think the team goes with Corey at 1B, Aoki in RF and Gomez in CF next year. Gomez and Aoki might not start 150 games - maybe 130 or 140 - but you have Schafer to get some starts in CF, and a right hander - like Reed Johnson - in right. That means Mat's job is to back up 1B and 3B, plus play some DH and PH. It's up to him to be ready for that job. If he does well, opportunities will arise. Guys get injured (as he learned). From 2009-11, A-Ram missed 80, 38 and 13 games, respectively. Corey missed 47, 17 and 32 games in that same time span. Also, guys play poorly and get benched. If Mat does well in his role, he should be ready to play more when he's needed.

Dodgers might lose Chad Billingsley for 2013 with a slightly torn ulnar collateral ligament (UCL). http://www.latimes.com/sports/baseball/mlb/dodgers/la-sp-0906-dodgers-notes-20120906,0,4165417.story It will take a few months to see if the injury heals on its own, meaning the Dodgers will have Kershaw (who is awesome), Capuano, Harang and Becket in the rotation. They might want to rely on a rookie, or another signing, but the threat of the big hole might make them make a big move on Greinke. Especially if Zack enjoys his time in the area. Obviously many of us would like Zack to come back to Milwaukee, but if the Dodgers get involved, they might really dump on him a ton of money that we can't get close to.