adambr2

Aguilar just not a good fit for a timed homerun derby. Too rigorous for a big guy. Way too slow and methodical.

Why? I personally think he's probably going to end up in Philly but it's far from confirmed. Definitely appears that we're still involved.

I'll help out. Here you go: - Brewers love Machado and have made a very good offer. The names tossed around include Phillips, Ortiz, Burnes, Lutz, Woodruff, Arcia, Bando, T. Williams, Houser, Peralta, Ray, Erceg, Dubon, Gatewood, Brown, Nottingham, Stokes, Carmona, Medeiros, Ponce and a few others. That's just a preliminary list - I'm guessing some other guys have been talked about. 50% chance we get something done. - Brewers won't include top prospects such as Hiura - but you never know if that will change. - Brewers don't want to increase their offer any more except for if they have to. It's coin flip that we increase the offer. - Phillies have made a good proposal. Brewers might have to increase their offer to beat, but maybe not. It's toss up that we don't have to increase the offer. - Yankees made an offer but not good enough - 50% chance that could change. - Dodgers had a proposal but it was rejected. 50/50 they may come back and try again. - Between 2 and 29 other teams have inquired on Machado. - O's will wait until after the all-star break to announce trade. But that may change if they feel they can get more by waiting. Odds are about even that things get wrapped up this week. - Orioles have been scouting Brewer players. 50% chance the Orioles scout Brewer players and eat peanuts at the same time. - Mark A wants to go 'all in' but Stearns does not. If a deal is done, that means Mark A won the battle. If not, then Stearns did. Even money that Stearns wins this one, but you never know. - Come back later tonight and I will scramble all these things up, re-word slightly, and add some random percentage points. Of course, I'm leaving and never coming back if anyone questions me. Never means about 50%. Somewhere out there, a Brewerfan.net lurker is relaying this information to one of his friends from his 'insider.'

If hypothetically Knebel was moved back instead to pitching in the 7th or 8th inning in close games and blows a lead in those innings vs blowing the lead in the 9th inning, what is the big difference unless people want Knebel pushed back into a garbage man role in the pen? Sure it stings more for fans when a lead is blown in the 9th inning instead of the 7th or 8th inning, but either way, the lead is still lost. Move either of Jeffress or Hader into the main closer role, and it takes away their ability to snuff out rallies in say the 6th or 7th innings as they've done so many times. Our starters rarely go beyond six innings. Many leave in the 6th inning. So once one of them leaves a game with a small lead, those 6th, 7th, and 8th innings which need to be covered are just as important as the 9th inning to keeping that lead. Because if he were entering in the 6th or 7th inning with a fresh pen he would not be throwing 34 pitches if he didn't have it, he would have been replaced by then. Yet another consequence as I mentioned of a conventional closer, for whatever reason the manager feels obligated to give him the entire inning no matter what and live with the result. And for me the inning is totally irrelevant, it's about situation. String of free swinging righties coming up? Sure, go with Knebel or William's. In a jam and looking for a groundball or K? Jeffress or Hader is good. Top of the order up with a couple lefties due? Hader. To me the idea of going with a certain guy because of what number happens to be in front of "inning" is antiquated and insane, yet precisely what they do with Knebel.

I'd be pretty wary of Escobar. He's a pretty mediocre player career-wise having the best half of baseball in his career. Maybe you get lucky and he continues it for another half, but I think it's as least as likely that you just end up with another option on your Villar/Miller/Perez pile.

I'm guessing among many others that he is headed to the Phillies on Wednesday.

We said this pretty much the entire 2nd half last year and all of this year so far. So literally almost 200 games.

Something small for Ramos. Maybe another Swarzak type rental for a pen arm. Bench bat. That's about it.

I have no idea why they continue to force a conventional closers' role, particularly with a reliever who is prone to control problems and blowup outings when he is off. They were so successful as a unit in Knebel's absence with a situational approach. It's not a coincidence that they've regressed since they went back to a conventional approach, even with Knebel. And part of the consequence of having a defined closer is that the manager typically seems to feel obligated to ride them out for the inning to the bitter end regardless of whether or not they have it working on a particular day. Williams, by contrast, was pulled quickly for a matchup. Knebel was never going to be pulled in the 9th regardless of how he looked or what his pitch count was. It was "his" inning.

One thing that got kind of overlooked on the last play because we were all pretty much defeated by then anyway: Kratz had a gift Eddie Sedar windmill out at home and he just kicked the crap out of it. Yes, the rain obviously didnt help but the relay was on line and that's a play a pro catcher needs to make which unfortunately reinforces the notion that Kratz brings absolutely nothing to the table. Wouldn't have won us the game but would have bought us one more chance with the top of the order coming up or at least kept us out of the loss column on a suspended game.

Not really, just an objective evaluation of talent. I think most outside evaluators would probably agree on the Cubs having a pretty decided talent edge both in the lineup and rotation at least. Sure, we have some improvement candidates and I certainly never said all our struggling players are going to continue to be disappointing. But objectively I would say Aguilar is probably as big of a regression candidate as they come, and pitching wise DJ has most of these guys outperforming expectations. Jeffress isn't going to carry a 1 ERA in the 2nd half and even our latest pen struggles are probably more just of a regression to the mean from what they did in April and May. I'm okay with putting a big emphasis on winning the Wild Card in our moves but I can understand why some would not. I also would point out that there's nothing we can do to "make sure" we win the Wild Card although I think Machado increases our odds significantly.

We're pretty clearly not as good as the Cubs, who are about to pull 2.5 in front despite basically no Darvish and some really underperforming guys like Rizzo. I think any shot of beating them for the division is wishful thinking at best. Their lineup is where we want ours to be, they are at least on par with us bullpen wise, and their rotation, while underperforming, is better than ours. Sure, anything can happen and all that, but if I'm placing a bet with a gun to my head it's the Cubs and probably fairly easily. You can take any combination of moves we can realistically make, Machado and all that, and it likely isn't swinging the balance. Wild Card is probably realistic, I think the Dodgers and DBacks will both make it so it would come down to us versus likely the Phillies, so yeah, very likely Machado swings the balance for the other WC. I guess it comes down to how important it really is to us to go for that knowing that if we lose the Wild Card game it really was for nothing anyway. Not crazy about our odds in any 1 game playoff knowing we have no ace to line up for it.

Not sure if it was you, but I know some had a topic about William's having "Roogy" type stats. I would've kept Williams in there too, but I don't see this as a black and white situation. At the time I posted that, he did. But he's actually been quite dominant against lefties since then. The problem with the move wasn't the next guy, it was the fact that if you didn't retire him, you couldn't get Williams back in and were stuck with Jennings against Bell, which is a horrible matchup, Bell has much more success as a righty and Jennings gets destroyed by righties. It would actually have been as good of a time as any to stick Taylor out in a corner OF spot for a batter, but Counsell doesn't venture that far outside of the box.

It's not that they rely on them too much, this was Hader's 3rd appearance in July. It's just that Knebel isn't very reliable anymore and they still try to pound that square peg in that round hole and make him their conventional closer. Knebel has days when he is dominant when the hook is landing and other days when he's lacking control it's ugly to watch and he's prone to blowup innings with that. It doesn't help that any fast runner who reaches is immediately in scoring position because he lacks any ability at all to hold runners on. In many ways he reminds me of a mid 2000s Derrick Turnbow. Some days you get dominance, other days it's scary to watch, and it becomes pretty obvious early in which one you get on a particular day.

Well, this was prophetic.

I don't know if we'll make the playoffs, but I know going for anything significant in short term pursuit of a 1 game wild card is a bad idea, and I do know this team ain't winning the central. It's complete deja vu from last year. 5.5 up at the break, vanished in days. 2.5 up in the division just days ago, now a 2.5 game deficit. We're not outlasting the Cubs. Why is that true now but not 10 days ago when they were taking 3/4 for the Braves? I didnt think we were winning the division 10 days ago either.

I don't know if we'll make the playoffs, but I know going for anything significant in short term pursuit of a 1 game wild card is a bad idea, and I do know this team ain't winning the central. It's complete deja vu from last year. 5.5 up at the break, vanished in days. 2.5 up in the division just days ago, now a 2.5 game deficit. We're not outlasting the Cubs.

You guys excusing Counsell realize that Jennings is NOT a LOOGY, right? He is an even split guy for his career. If he had pulled Williams for Josh Hader, I don't think anyone would be blaming Counsell. Dan Jennings isn't a good reliever. Taylor Williams is. There was one out left to get. In the absence of any certainty, which there wasn't, ride the better arm. That was an atrocious joke of a meatball that Jennings left right over the heart of the plate.

Face it folks. This is the same old Brewers, and they'll destroy your hearts. Just starting their second half swoon a couple weeks earlier than last year.

Hahahaha, go screw yourself Counsell

Great move, Craig. Just genius.

Counsell couldn't get Williams out of the game quick enough, but had no issue riding his "closer" when he had no semblance of "having it."

Um. Hope this works, but not a fan.

Hopefully this team has had it with Knebel being our conventional "closer".

Hahahaha, dear God. WTG Knebel!