MNBrew

I still like LouisEly's initial post. They're hotter than heck and still find ways to be crybabies. They play quite good baseball as it is, but for those who notice, their whining & petty gamesmanship tendencies sure undermine any front of classiness they attempt to put up. It doesn't make me feel better about the Brewers' losing, but I feel at least vindicated that the Brewers play & conduct themselves in a way that's far more respectful of their opponents and of the game.

Roenicke has plenty of gumption. Getting ejected would do exactly what in that scenario? It can't make our hitters hit or Adam Wainwright any less of a master out there on the mound! I hate this losing, too, but it gets old how some posters here have such a negative disposition against any & every Brewers manager that we could win the World Series and and people would still say our manager sucks and should be fired . . . and the GM should be fired, too, for making moves that enabled the Brewers to win rather than build for the future . . . Tonight I wondered why they didn't try to go more aggressively small-ball-wise with Gomez twice getting on base. If Wainwright's having "one of those nights," which clearly he was again, I totally understand not wanting to squander the few chances we had. But Wainwright's who he is, and sometimes you have to gamble, which the Brewers clearly didn't tonight. Instead, the Cards got 2 runs and Wainwright pitched mistake-free thereafter (albeit with a few absurdly generous WRONG calls from the HP ump). I truly hate the Cardinals winning, and thus especially I hate losing to them, but Wainwright's having a Cy Young-caliber season, too, by most any standard -- unfortunately for him, it's just not to the same extent Kershaw is this year. Our offense is so anemic right now. That's become by far the biggest problem, as it's been the majority of the 2nd half. The ugly losing skid will have cost us the playoffs. Even though our pitching has come around and we've won 5 out of 7, it's now PITT & StL who control their own fates, and they're doing so most handily right now. It's sure not over yet, but tonight's outcome sure hurt.

Wooten would have to pitch like he did in 2013 to have any chance of making the 2015 bullpen. To my thinking, the positive peripherals cited about Wooten here are like whip cream on poop: You can't disguise the fact that he's not been good at all. I still want to think Wooten could be okay, but the proof is in the pudding and absolutely nothing about his performance gives me cause for optimism. Short of a major turnaround in what are sure to be limited chances in these last 11 games, my feeling about Wooten is approaching the way I already feel about Figaro.

16 w/ 11 left is sure better than 18 w/ 12 left. Nice win tonight! Let's get 'em again tomorrow! [attachment=0]aramis.jpg[/attachment]

Is it possible to beat a team by boring them to the point of falling asleep? Just hoping....

It's starting to seem silly to keep doing this, but I refuse to give up even if it proves for naught....[attachment=0]BrunanskyBrewers.JPG[/attachment]

Really, no one else jumped on this tonight? . . . Gotta keep all hope alive![attachment=0]Robin Yount.jpg[/attachment]

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

Whew! Disaster averted for the time being. K-Rod's kinda the curveball-loving version of Turnbow -- every pitch is an adventure and every pitch has as much a chance of missing by a lot as it does anything else. I wish he'd rediscover some of that form that encourages fans' confidence rather than fear.

K-Rod's version of pounding the bottom of the strike zone is throwing the ball anywhere between a guy's knees and the ground. Sheesh!

If K-Rod could at least miss CLOSER to the zone, they might swing-and-miss at more pitches. It's not too hard to lay off a pitch that's 2 feet off the plate ... unless you're a Brewer hitter foolishly chasing a slider... again and again and again...).

Gameday lags so behind sometimes and doesn't update some information quickly at all, so you can spend nearly a full half-inning w/o it giving you all the information. It's never been this bad before this year, but since sometime mid/late summer, it's been consistently bad. (Point: This time it showed Heisey up with a runner on 1st without ever showing where pitch #4 went to Phillips and that he'd earned a walk to 1st. Sometimes it lags behind by a whole AB or two.) On topic, I wish K-Rod would come in & find the plate right away instead of what he was up to -- again, pitches everywhere, taking a knuckleballer's approach to the strike zone -- this time to Phillips to lead off the 9th.

Can't help it. Another Brewers win and a Cardinals loss. Continued posting might prove to be in vain but I'm not giving up hope and enjoying every bit of progress, however long the odds.[attachment=0]Seitzer 1.jpg[/attachment]

Well said, MJLiverock, and thanks for saying it so well that I won't spend 45 minutes wordsmithing an attempt to make the same points in about the same way.

Regardless of Broxton's salary & contract term, giving up those two guys for him is steps up from the rubbish given to the Mets for K-Rod in 2011, but it's nowhere close to being harmful to the prospect quotient in our farm system. Time will ultimately tell on Shackleford & Astin, but if Broxton keeps pitching even remotely close to what he's done this year, I can't help but see the net of this as a major "plus" deal for the Brewers.

Okay, we know the reality as of today -- 16 games left -- but since the Cards lost last night & tonight, and the Brewers actually managed a win, I couldn't resist.[attachment=1]Matheny 2.jpg[/attachment][attachment=0]Matheny 1.jpg[/attachment]

No, RRR. Your starting pitching has taken a dump in the last 20 games. I truly don't understand this - the numbers are there for anybody with access to a computer. I don't know if there was a follow up, but that should have been the question. And we've put our best starting pitching prospect in the bullpen so Matt Garza can go 4 innings. Jimmy Nelson flat-out stinks right now. He has a 2-7 record, has an ERA that keeps rising, hasn't won any of his last 6 starts and only once in his past 10, has made it through 6 innings once in his last 4 starts . . . and you think it's a problem he's in the bullpen? Really? He may well be part of the rotation picture next year and for quite some time after that, but I don't want to see him start another game this year. Sure, he pitches longer than 4 innings - by 1 or 2 if he lasts that long. But lately he also gives up as many or more runs than Garza did tonight, which helps nothing. Garza was far from good tonight. But tonight's loss had nothing to do with the starting pitching. This one's entirely on horrible clutch hitting and K-Rod.

My buddy in Phoenix & I were commiserating yesterday and brought up the exact same idea: Estrada taking Gallardo's place in the rotation. Doubt it'll happen, but at this point nothing should be sacred!

I hope Figaro never pitches in MIL again (well, he could pitch against us). He wasn't stellar last year and he's really been shaky this year, each outing seemingly making that point more and more. Duke, if not overused, might not be bad to have back. But there needs to be more quality depth than it turned out we had this year. There's no great logic behind this, but it would be kind of cool if somehow Kyle Heckathorn gets an NRI to spring training and -- the keyword -- earns a place in the BP. I say this because it would be nice to have someone the organization's invested a lot of time into defy the odds and provide some solid payoff for the team's investment.

In the interest of full disclosure, I emailed Haudricourt last night to ask why Mark Reynolds was starting against a RH SP. He answered fairly promptly and said it's b/c Reynolds' career numbers against Penny were very good. It's just too bad Reynolds brought his 2014 approach instead of his Brad Penny approach last night.

Thanks, 'stache. Your response to this point is exactly what went through my head when Jim Bowden made the same assertion on MLB Network Radio the other day when I was driving between my two school buildings. If Bowden made a legit attempt to understand Braun's situation, he never would've uttered the utterly foolish remarks of an ignoramus that came out of his mouth the other day.... which were basically this: "I know he's had some injuries, but Braun just hasn't been the same since the PED thing happened." . . . Hello 2012, most-tested guy in MLB with better-than-his-MVP-year numbers!

I don't think he's lost the team at all. Heck, into mid/late August, there was legit discussion for him as a manager of the year candidate. To suggest that this 3-15 skid resulted in the players quitting is absurd given where the team's been at all year. As McCalvy tweeted the other day, this isn't a matter of the team not caring, but caring so much that they're trying too hard and consequently making matters worse -- an unfortunate combination of human nature & "that's baseball." As McCalvy also noted 3 days ago, "I try to stick to facts, but here's an opinion: Unless there's a clubhouse issue, firing the manager is a dumb idea." The implication is clearly that Roenicke hasn't lost the clubhouse at all. A 20-7 start could prove to be a mirage. A 71-55 record likely isn't, esp. when the offense was still near the top of the league in runs scored and the starting pitching was holding up pretty well. Going 3-15 since then is a horribly timed full-team slump . . . . although lately now it's proving to be more of a rotation, clutch hitting, power hitting, and batters not named Lucroy/Gennett slump. Roenicke makes the occasional dumb move, and no manager's ever perfect, but I still believe wholeheartedly that he should continue to be the manager & Melvin should be the GM. Wish I were in WI so I could see the Brewers' broadcasts & get the pre- & post-game interviews, insights, etc. I really appreciate the coach/manager presser coverage that "local" Fox Sports broadcasts include -- good stuff here in MN, anyway, so I'm assuming similar stuff for WI. Two more McCalvy tweets after tonight's debacle -- quoting Mark Reynolds -- prove the Brewers aren't mailing it in and are sure trying their best, ugly results notwithstanding: Adam McCalvy @AdamMcCalvy · 1m Reynolds on recent frustration: "We're all feeling it. We're human. We know the fans are booing us for a reason. We're not getting it done." Adam McCalvy @AdamMcCalvy · 1m More Reynolds: "I mean, we can't seem to do anything right right now, but at the end of the day, we're not out of this."

I don't care about Gallardo's nationality or residency. He's a pitcher of increasing inconsistency & decreasing reliability. He's either totally hot (enough to last 6-7 IP, anyway) or totally lousy. For all his potential, he really hasn't given the team much of a chance to win in way, way too many of his games. And there's zero "clutch" factor with him, either. I hate to say it because there are lots of games where he's gotten quite good results -- his 3.61 ERA in spite of his recent debacles means there's been lots of decent pitching along the way -- but I think I'd just rather risk taking a step backwards by trading him for a reasonably decent return vs. dealing with another year of way too many games like this one tonight.

We've had Jimmy Nelson in the wings (in the upper minors) for 1.5 years and he's won 1 of his last 10 starts, going 1-7 in that stretch. Maybe Nelson will have a Peralta-like 2nd year and these struggles will serve him well in the long run. I'm hopeful. But to put so much faith in Jungmann seems a little premature -- hopefully still justified in the long run, but premature right now -- since he hasn't had nearly the MiLB success Nelson did. I don't think we can totally stand pat. But I'm not sure a total housecleaning's in order, either. (That said, Alfredo Figaro should never pitch for the Brewers ever again, and why he's still around while Blazek, Pena, and even Wooten haven't been brought up completely astounds me.)