rickh150

Twice had the opportunity of pinch hitting Turang in extras against lefties.

Miller?

Good win… especially with #5 pitcher and not using back end of bullpen.

Rise and Fall? So unfair. More like he had one of the team’s best OPS/ OPS+ in 2022 and inexcusably gets no opportunity in 2023 while having better numbers than anyone in the organization. Fall? More like suppressed down, kept down, and squashed. Yet let’s pay him $2.2 million to play at AAA. And the DH position? Worst in baseball.

Low bar…great year….and they paid him… and DH in NL… stubborn….mismanagement of DH position….move on… win division…positive vibes.

He shouldn’t have been Game 1 starter in 2021… couldn’t go on 3 days rest…. Which limited Woody to one possible game in a 5 game series. He just had a great outing last week, though. He still is WC Game 1 starter for me. The better question is who doesn’t start in that three game series.

Forget about the change, Devi….give ‘‘em the heater!

Don’t waste your time then…what is it to you? The Hiura debate hasn’t stayed the same…. Just getting more and more absurd not to give him a shot as his numbers surge.

.973 OPS in July .816 OPS in August and this is not this season…. or career minor league… It’s career MLB.

Here, here! And his MLB OPS in 2022 is often forgotten. They give him regular at bats… and they definitely were not regular ( hit in every spot in order, had days off of 5 and 7 in September when others say he had a shot there, rarely had consecutive days batting at same position), he could hit 30+ HRs; OPS was .765, OPS+ 114…. They are nutso with him not getting a shot, and it is now getting to a point where they almost hope he stops hitting, crazy as that sounds.

Mets are in a rebuild.., traded old vets and playing younger players. We are in a pennant race…..apples and dry plums

So you are all in on whatever the Brewers decide to do with him… and hedging if he does well (“bat speed and TALENT”) and I told you so if he does poorly. Got it covered well.

He’s the guy that yells certainly, “There is no truth!” and then never realizes he is making a truth statement.

He is still in AAA. Glad you are adding to it.

Bad AAA numbers often mean no call up… that is true at about every level. And vice versa, when hitting/pitching well, a call up is the norm. No one is guaranteeing great results. It’s just more than time to see what he can do. Love that you keep going to Voit as an example… he actually got an opportunity to play because of results. That would be nice for Hiura.

3-5 HR, 2B…..997 OPS I’m obviously bringing up Hiura…months ago. Just Curious at what point does this get nuts for you if it hasn’t yet. Like would it take a few 2 HR games consecutively for this to get crazy? We have a top 5 hitter in our system on fire at AAA, the DH spot is wide open, and everyone else is seemingly thought of more highly. It is more pride and stubbornness now. If he gets called up NOW and rakes, boy they look bad for sitting on him for months…. .997

I hear ya.. but this isn’t the point…. Winker, Ruf, Jones, and Voit, among others, were thought more of than Hiura, are thought more of than Huira, and presumably will be thought more of than Huira.,… even though they paid Hiura more than almost all of these guys. Crazy stupid and tough to think of a similar example when a guy was paid multiple millions to play MVP #s at AAA when MLB team struggles at his positions.

Just an awful vibe offensively….get Frelick at top of order, move Yelich to 3rd, Adames can shag balls or hit 9th, and bring up Hiura and Black. Two or three hitters can be DFAd yesterday. Play the bat, get a lead, bring in the pen, and sub defense late.

Fellow Rick, This all goes way back to July of 2022 when I started a thread about Huira being treated unfairly and Adames, arguably a worse hitter than Hiura, being treated like an All Star. Last year. 2022. Huira was sent down inexplicably in June 2022 for a month after hitting .800 OPS.. Meanwhile, Adames was struggling and still hitting #2/#3 daily (and this continued all year and really to this day amazingly…deserves less playing time and/or hitting 8th or 9th). It went on and off for a year and 12+ pages. It was locked and another thread was started in its place focusing more on Hiura’s odd journey. Now, the combo of threads is 30 +pages long, 13 months old, and the same mysterious, maddening, troublesome soap opera plays out with Hiura getting the shaft while playing an MVP AAA season (and Adames hits 5th daily at .203) while our DH spot struggles daily with rotating backup outfielders after Winker’s folly. So 13 months ago, in my mind, this was a big enough issue and injustice (Hiura treated like a bum and Adames treated like an All Star) that it drove me to write on brewerfanatic. 13 months ago. The situation NOW is even crazier with Adames hitting 100 OPS points worse and barely hanging on to a starting spot and still hitting 3rd/4th for four months and now STILL 5th. Yet Hiura, who rightfully should have AT LEAST been given a shot to play daily several weeks ago in the rotation of count ‘em 19 DH players this season (Brewers league worst DH by far in OPS), has been tearing up AAA (sparing sveum the stats), not committing errors, and cutting down his K rate. Why this topic isn’t a slam dunk, of course bring up Hiura, among all Brewers fans is a huge question mark to me. Now more than ever.

My expectation is that little power is coming out of the 4 spot when we should have a guy or two on base.

If I am Frelick and am thrown into the fire… first place team hitting cleanup…I would be conflicted. Does CC EXPECT that I hit for some power? If I don’t, am I heading back to Nashville? Why oh why is he hitting in a spot he never has in his life (according to him)? Hit him one or two with an emphasis on just getting on base. Table setter. Sorry Yelich, it’s time to put the big boy pants on and hit 3rd. My RHP lineup….with an emphasis on offense, get a lead, give it to the pen, and make defensive replacements late in RF and 3B. Frelick CF Monasterio 2B Yelich LF Contreras C Santana 1B Canha RF Black 3B Hiura DH Adames SS

Counsell doesn’t dare pinch hit him either….doesn’t matter how awful he looks in at bats on a given night. He’s playing like he is the coach’s kid.

.309/.397/.969 August 1.064 20 HRs…. And he missed a month with injury. Brewers DH #s .212/.304/.632 INCLUDE 152 PAs of Yelich and Contreras at .790 OPS

Stubborn to a fault. Sadly a call up now would probably be like September 2022 for Hiura: spot starts, sitting for five and seven days straight, not really committing a position or place in the lineup to him. I have very little hope of the team trying Hiura/Black down the stretch. Par for the course would adding Winker or Rowdy and batting them high in lineup.

And if we are indeed trading Burnes and more, I’m very ok with getting a couple top prospects (if possible) for Yelich. We have OF prospects and options galore for the next several years.