JJHardy7

He got it because he made a great play in one of the games with the highest exposure. That's enough to put you on the radar. Once you're on the radar, that's all you need. I guess I don't buy that one bit, but that's my opinion. Again, I'm not saying he deserved the GG. Most here complain how the national media gives no coverage/respect to a small market...then they do and it's because the guy has a 'bat'. I don't get it. Do you have any quotes from voters stating that's why they voted for him? He does have a pretty good arm, but that arm was around all year and not just on one play. The play most likely helped him, but I don't think it made him. Braun didn't have that great of a bat last year. Not to say it was bad or anything like that, but he didn't hit the ball nearly as well as it seems. He also didn't make any flashy plays that get you noticed by the voters. If it was truly about a bat, Braun beats Nate IMO. Especially the way the season ended last year. The absolute most important thing is to make one great play in a clutch situation and then a couple more great plays. You don't have to actually be good to win a GG, you just need to get noticed and then hit well. I guess I don't agree with that. I think it's important to get a reputation. I'll admit the award isn't handed out to the player(s) that always deserve it. I think it's similar to all-star games. Once you get in and fans like you...you'll almost always be voted in whether or not you're having a great year. Even if Nate did get the vote for one play my point is that he's not terrible. I'm not saying 'hey we could've got a GG OF with a bat'. I'm saying I wouldn't have minded going after him since our OF right now isn't set past this year besides Braun IMO and Nate has a pretty decent contract. I'd have been all for extending Cam, getting Nate, and trading Hart, but obviously the Pirates weren't looking for a Hart type player.

He got a gold glove because of the throw he made in the allstar game and because of his bat. The guy is not a good CF. There's no way this is true. If it was about the bat, Braun would've received a GG. A guy that's playing in a small market that has a plus bat (ie not a Braun bat) just doesn't scream 'poster boy' to me. There are a lot of other players that didn't get it that would've been a 'poster boy'. I'm not saying he is or isn't GG caliber...I am saying it's not right to flat out call him a bad CF and assume that the Pirates are so big with the national media that it's a slam dunk that he got it because of his bat. That doesn't make sense IMO. CF might not be his ideal position, but I would take him anyday in the OF. I'm going to guess he won the aware because of his fielding percentage and some voters really liked his arm. I don't think he's a 'true' GG player, but when it comes to defense in the OF I think it's fair to try and judge that by actually watching him play. I'm going to guess that most here (including me) haven't watched a ton of Pirates games when they're not playing the Brewers. I think Nate and Braun are somewhat similar defensive players. Depending on how the OF is next year, I'd still take him on my team. Ideally though, CF is probably not his best position.

Endaround, when you make comments like that could you please provide the statistics backing up your opinion. To make just the simple one line posts (I´ve seen a couple of them this morning) seems really snarky ("it´s true because I say so") when you provide nothing to back that opinion up. Agreed. It's almost it's as if endaround says something and it's true because he said it and there is no need for other opinions.

No he's the poster boy for why Gold Gloves are given to bats and not gloves. Everything measures him to be a win below average in CF. I'm not saying he's a stud in CF, but how in the world does a Pirate get a GG if he's that bad? Is it because he's so well-known or the Pirates are so popular? He's obviously doing something right in the eyes of the voters. Again, he's not perfect, but either is the Brewers 2010 OF situation until decisions are made with Cam and/or Hart.

Good for Nate. I guess I don't get the move for the Pirates since they had him signed to a decent contract. He's a pretty good player and I know the Brewers weren't 'in the mix', but I sure as heck would've loved to get him some how. He's signed to a pretty fair contract and could've taken over for Cam next year if Cam isn't back. I'll admit we would've had to shuffle some things to get him and figure out playing time this year. This may have been a trade to give up on Jeffress if the organization feels he may struggle for a bit.

Like I said earlier, that game by itself wouldn't bother me if he didn't have the rest of the season full of bad starts already. You bring up a lot of good stats ennder. I think the most important stat that may 'trump' everything else right now IMO is that the Brewers are 3-8 when Parra starts and 27-14 with the other starters.

I think Manny needs to head to Nashville. I know people say 'he has electric stuff' and such like that, but I guess I don't know if that's 100% the case with Manny. I think he has good stuff...not electric. He's more of a command pitcher with good stuff when he's on. I guess my opinion on pure 'stuff' from what I've seen from him in the minors is that he's like Yo when he's on. I don't know if Yo's stuff is 'electric', but he has some plus pitches and pretty much can put them where he wants to. I'm not knocking on Manny or Yo. I don't want to compare, but I don't think a guy like Maddux had 'electric' stuff. He had plus pitches and had great location. Yo is more like that IMO and seems to really, really hide the ball from a hitter. I think Manny is a LH of Yo when he's on. The problem is his stuff isn't good enough to be wild since it's not 'electric'. The same would probably go for Yo, but Yo has control well beyond his years. Manny just doesn't have the pure power stuff that MLB pitchers will swing at when out of the zone and seems to throw meatballs when his control is gone. I've been a Manny fan for a long time. I think he needs to take a trip to Nashville and get some confidence back. Dillard deserves a shot. Swap the two and see what happens. If they both pitch well, it's not the end of the world and the Brewers will have a 'good' problem to have. Manny is at a critical spot. I'm a really big fan of his when I got to see him Nashville, but I've always been cautious to label him as a #2 or #3 type guy. He very well could be, but he has room to grow and there will no doubt be some bumps. As much as we like to say the Brewers were fine last year with Sheets and CC came when Sheets was 'bad' so we'll be ok because Yo is here, etc, etc I think that just assumes Manny would/will figure it out. The Brewers can't afford to have a guy pitching like Manny is right now and continue to compete unless the other guys pick him up. I'd prefer to make a move ASAP and get Manny back in Milwaukee by the end of June.

That contract never really gave me a warm fuzzy feeling. $4+ mil a year for 70 innings of a good but nothing special reliever? And we get him at 31, 32 and 33 years old? I'm not saying it was necessarily a bad signing but just unnecessary. That could be worth something though. They paid $900k this year for Julio to pitch two bad months. Pitchers do get paid in this league who put up numbers -- that doesn't mean it's not luck and such though. I guess I really wonder how his injuries were handled in his time in Milwaukee. IMO he looked like a better pitcher before and the first few months in Milwaukee than he has since. I think he's been hurt awhile. I do agree with you that it didn't have to be a multi-year deal. For a guy like Riske or most relievers I'm fine with a 2 year deal. I think if it's a deal longer than that the pitcher should be special

Deosn't matter. That is already figured into the value. The player you are referring to is a replacement player. It is assumed that a replacement player is worth 0 and whatever innings a pitcher pitches is in place of that replacement player. That is why it is value over replacement player. Sheets pitched 198.1 innings at a 3.09 ERA in place of that replacement player. I understand that, but shouldn't there be some 'negative' value? And this question isn't just a Sheets question. He pitched nearly 200 innings last year so it probably wouldn't have made a lot of difference. For example, if Sheets pitched 100 innings last year of 3.09 ERA and then was out for the year. The Brewers lacking depth and prospects call up a terrible, terrible pitcher that starts every spot in Sheets place and finished with 50 IP of 9.00 ERA and the bullpen picks up 50 extra IP and their ERA (and other indicators) go up also compared to how they would've been otherwise. I don't think simply putting in a 0 for a replacement player makes sense at each situation. Again, this isn't a Sheets thing from last year and it's not a 'real' example.

Is there any way to calculate the value lost by Sheets (or any other player) when out? I mean if you're going from a #1 to a #6 for x innings and the bullpen maybe gets over worked for x innings and their production is hurt because of that it seems to me there's a lot of moving parts instead of saying player X is worth X period. IMO it has to be pretty difficult to figure that out for a starting pitcher. If a position player gets hurt, it might be a little bit easier to figure that out?

He hadn't given up a run in his last 4 appearances which covered 5.2 innings - It was time to put him out there and see if he was going to be able to perform in close games, At some point it had to happen. If you want to bring him in the game, that's fine. I just think IMO he was struggling pretty bad last night. 'You play to win the game'. Julio has been up and down this year and when he's letting guys on base and not getting outs I think you need to make adjustments quicker than you would with a more consistent pitcher. It was pretty clear to me that he was putting the Brewers in a spot that they were going to be down a few runs and that proved to be too big of a gap for the team to close. If you want him to pitch, that's fine. He's the kind of guy though that can struggle and when he does it's not pretty. In other words, get on the bullpen phone a little quicker if he's on the mound (ironically enough it looked like the phone was 'broken' last night when they made the call for Coffey).

I don't think Macha was really punting the game, though. Julio did have effective outings recently and he was probably hoping to (1) spare a few arms for later in the series while (2) hoping Julio could continue his string of good outings. The factor that makes Julio's last three outings different from last night is the fact they were not high pressure situations. The Brewers were at least four runs ahead in his last three appearances. I guess my point is that it was somewhat clear (at least IMO) that he wasn't pitching well. I just don't like guys 'working through things' when the game is on the line and more and more of the opponent baserunners get on base. Herm Edwards once said, 'You play to win the game'. I just don't know if the Brewers did that with Julio pitching last night.

I guess my point is though if Julio can't be counted on he shouldn't be on the team. Sure the bullpen has been used a bit, but if a guy comes in and pitches that poorly he shouldn't be on the team. It pretty much was 'punting' IMO. I wouldn't mind them calling Dillard up at all. If the bullpen is going to be worked a bit, it might make sense to have another long relief type guy in there.

Since when did TJ surgury come with a 16 month recovery time? Brewers prospects Mike Jones and Amaury Rivas had TJ surgery in late July of 2007, and both made it back for opening day 2008, and Rivas had a breakout season. Riske's likely return would be next June, and earlier is a possibility. I agree X. I also think though he might be 'back' next year around June, but that doesn't mean he'll be effective. Your example of Jones kind of indicates he might be healthy (like Jones was last year), but still struggle for awhile. Any word on Cappy? Wasn't his surgery around a year ago?

Leaving Julio in that long last night reminded me of Yost. I wasn't a Yost 'hater' as much as some around here, but to me one of his biggest flaws was how he left pitchers in too long.

I'd rather he said nothing and did what he did which is being upset and going inside to be with his team than rant on TV or make up a bunch of fake humility or cliched praise of the other team. I'd rather have a guy upset about the loss than hear the boring cliches anyway. I think this is being made into way more than it really should be. As someone said they don't shake hands after a baseball series and football is pretty non chalant about post game handshakes, the coaches shake hands but everyone else goes their own way. This is a good point. I guess I like that LeBron was actually upset enough that he didn't want to talk. I don't see anything wrong with that. I know Cowherd on ESPN radio is always whining that fans care a ton more than athletes. That is true sometimes, but it appears that LeBron was just as upset as some Cavs fans. It's good to see athletes 'caring' about wins and losses -- especially in the NBA.

Sheets was found to be worth $20.6 mil because his performance was deemed 43 runs better than an average AAAA starting pitcher . They are saying that every 9.4 runs saved is equal to 1 win, so Sheets was 4.6 wins better. Whether that win occured on opening day or during game 162 is largely irrelevant in terms of making or not making the playoffs. Oh I understand and I agree with that. I've looked it and it does have some nice value. I guess for me it's hard to take Sheets (or any other player) and try to figure out the value when the player is hurt. I guess IMO there are just too many moving parts to extract an exact value if that makes sense. Sheets was a great pitcher when healthy and my guess is he made the bullpen look pretty good too since those guys got more rest when he's healthy. It's a two way street I guess. I'm not the biggest Sheets fan, but IMO there's no doubt in my mind that we miss the playoffs without Sheets or Sabathia. He did have extreme value to the team when he was healthy.

I've seen Katin play quite a bit and I really like the guy. I just don't know if he'll be a starter in the bigs. I think he could be a bench type player, but I kind of wonder if MLB pitching would be too tough on him at this point because he seems to lack some strike zone awareness.

The best available player. Redd is going to be out the first month or so I believe of the season so the Bucks are going to have to plug someone into that hole. I would take Holiday or Lawson with the 10th pick if either of the two are available. That's kind of to my point. Do you re-sign Sessions or CV if all is equal in terms of money (I know this might not be the case)? This draft seems pretty weak with the exception of PG. I still would love Lawson and I think we might be able to slide down a few spots for him. Not sure if there will be enough interest though for teams to trade up.

I'm not sure what to make of this statement jjhardy7. I guess you're right in that injuries are a concern right now, as he had to have elbow surgery, but I'm guessing it has more to do with the fact that the team that signs him has to give up a 2nd or 1st round pick if he signs before the draft. And since the earliest he would come back is August, why would any team give up a draft pick to sign him. I'm guessing he will receive a couple offers after the draft, and Texas is most likely going to be the highest bidder. I guess I should clarify a bit. Let's say Sheets would be willing to sign for $3 million this year. I'd imagine there would be/would've been teams signing him to that type of deal and giving up 2nd round+ picks. Either Sheets wants more money or teams are scared of his injury history. I know it's hard to know to what level and what specific injury history they're worried about. When was it 'known' that Sheets was going to be out for the year? IIRC he didn't have much interested, but if I also remember the specifics of his injury weren't known for awhile. Did he not have any interest BEFORE the significance of the surgery? Just for the record, FanGraphs seems to be really, really good at estimating contract value. They pretty clearly have player prices figured out almost to a 't' I agree with this, but I also agree with mkm13 to a degree. I just don't think you can calculate a value of a #1 going down, having a #6+ pitcher replace him, and then have the bullpen take on extra issues if you're #6 is bad or pitches like a #10. I'm not saying Sheets contract wasn't fair or anything like that. I just think sticking by how underpaid he was wouldn't be right at least from the Brewers point of view. I think fangraphs is an excellent tool for players who don't miss a lot of time with injuries. You can swap #1 for a #6, but I just don't know how you'd put a specific value on potentially having most of your bullpen pitching more, which in turn could lead to your relief pitchers having worse numbers. I still can't believe that people think Sheets winning games for us early in the season don't matter. I wish he had been hurt early and come back later in the season. That way people would call him "clutch." I know winning games early in the season is important. I just have a hard time exactly saying that Sheets value was x or y compared to his contract. The drop off goes beyond swapping him out for a #6 type SP.

Right, Blake is an expiring contract on steroids right now. If we trade for him and then waive him, he's happy because he could probably go back to Portland or wherever he wants and we get instant savings since his contract is unguaranteed. I didn't know that some contracts are guaranteed. Why is that? I would like that too, but Kohl won't and never has gone above the luxury tax. I would look to trade Alexander for a 2nd round pick, maybe explore trading Jefferson to San Antonio for a couple of their partially non guaranteed contracts and then explore Ridnour trades. I want at least Sessions and the 10th pick on the team next year. I'd like to see Villanueva and Ilyasova brought back, but that seems unlikely at this point since I don't think we'll be able to clear enough salary. I personally don't think Joe is that bad that we have to trade him for a 2nd round pick, but I guess we'll see. Who do you take with the 10th pick though if you have Sessions?

I don't have a problem with it at all. I'd rather have that then what happened after Mavs/Nuggets games in the playoffs. I just imagine he's upset because they had such a good regular season and got it handed to them at the end. I don't think it's a big deal and he's not the first or last guy to do it. I think saying he has to 'grow up' is not true at all. My bet is he's one of the most mature 24-year olds out there. I'd suspect there'd be more guys going off the deep end instead of simply not wanting to shake hands or discuss it. I think the media is blowing up the loss is what is a big deal to me. They're comparing the Mavs team that won 67 games (I believe 67) and lost in the first round a few years back to this team and how it's one of the biggest upsets ever. I don't think ESPN radio is right about that. Losing in the Eastern Conference Finals to one of the better teams isn't a huge upset...the Cavs just didn't match up well at all with the Magic. It's as simple as that.

He's not going to retire. He'll be looking for a job until he's 40. After all Ausmus is still out there. But no reason it should be in Milwaukee. Well he may not have a choice. If he finished the season hitting under .200, I don't know that a lot of teams will be lining up to sign him as a starter. Sure the staff may like him, but at the same time to me it comes down to price. Would Kendall come back for $1 million and share more time? I don't know. If that's the case I could see him calling it quits. The guy gets upset when you give him a handful of days off during the year. I don't see a paycut and less playing time making him want to continue playing. Now if someone gives him $5 million and starting everyday...sure he'll be back. I hope they save their money for Cameron, not Jason. Cheap, cheap, cheap or nothing. Agreed. I'd also like to see not a huge promise of playing time. Macha seems to be a 'promise' type manager who will stick to his word rather than what's best for the team.

You mean the same razor-sharp manager that waited until halfway into Gallardo's outing to have the umpire force him to lose the bandage on his elbow? A lot of managers would have recognized that & acted on it right away. But Dusty knows it's like striped bass fishing. You have to cloak your actions. Gallardo never saw it coming! Did he have the bandage on the beginning of the game? To be honest, I didn't notice it (probably missed it) until Dusty said something. If he did have it on the beginning of the game, that's pretty bad.

We're past the getting the feet wet stage. That was the runup to his DH games. We are now at the point where Macha is utilizing his players on a game by game basis, trying to win each game while using players often enough to get the best out of them. Again, just because you don't agree with the reasoning doesn't mean there isn't reason behind each move. Then why is Hall starting over him at times? Hardy missed almost the entire previous season. It would be nothing like bringing up Escobar right now. Hardy probably should have spent time in the minors getting his swing back before playing in the minors. It would be like Escobar getting hurt in early May and missing the rest of this season and then being the opening day SS in 2010. No it wouldn't. If Escobar came up now, I feel he'd put up similar offensive numbers for awhile as Hardy did. I think he'd struggle a bit. I'm not saying calling Hardy up was the right move or wrong move. I am saying this team has had issues with defense with Braun, Weeks, and Fielder and it would be in the best interest of the team to get Gamel at 3B everyday. Hardy is really the only guy that came up as a plus defender. As somebody else suggested...I'm sure Gamel is working on things before games with Major League coaching. That in itself may be more valuable than game experience at AAA. When he plays, sure. I just don't see how taking ground balls during BP is going to help him as much as live action. It's not like Don Money was a scrub in AAA. My point is he's a better hitter than any other option at 3B (Gamel actually hits lefties better than he hits righties)...so why isn't he starting everyday? If the Brewers want to continue to develop bats, that's fine. They just haven't shown at all that they can develop IF in the minors. I still think Gamel can do it, but he's not going to do that by having a manager start a veteran over him...just because. Macha is trying to win now. Finding time for a guy not hitting and below par on defense when your defense has carried you thus far is difficult to do. And as for Hardy, what makes it really bad is despite all Yost's talk of being patient by June Hardy was a part time player and remained so for the rest of the season. Then why have him the bigs? He has similar numbers to Braun (give or take) at this point offensively. Did they bench Braun? I just fail to see how this is a good move for Gamel now and long-term. Give him the job and let's see what he can do. Positional players don't like being a DH. Let Gamel play 3B a week or so and we'll check back in on those offensive numbers. He's the third best hitter on the team. As far as Hardy, he had the defense. The team also wasn't projected to do much so it moved him up. I'm not saying it was the right idea or the wrong idea, but when they did give him a chance to start everyday. Why not let Gamel? He clearly has much more potential at the plate than Hall does. If Hall didn't have a big contract, he'd be on the bench more.