TheCrew07

I haven't followed Maybin since he was prospect but I see he's been awful so far in MLB, much like another super prospect at the same time Delmon Young. Young was pretty good last season, having a break out season of sorts, so maybe there's still hope for Maybin as he's only 24.

He seems to dive at the base and then slide over it. While it's certainly not textbook, and it is dangerous if he slides all the way over, it is actually the fastest way to get to the base. More conventional slides are a split second slower since the runner decelerates the last 5 feet or so before making contact with the base. Carlos dives at the base and decelerates after touching the bag. As long as he is able to keep his back foot on the bag every time it seems like a good technique. On that triple there he went feet first though and slid late. He usually doesn't go feet first so it was pretty awkward. Ohh I understand, it just seems unecessarily aggresive and it has to hurt more plus be a greater injury risk wouldn't you think? I always slid head first and trying to come down that close to the bag would honestly make me nervous, but I also have weak shoulders. Prince with the best play he's made all season on that line drive.

Watching Latos pitch is like listening to Evan Frederickson start in years past, up in the count only to walk a hitter and WPs, so many unnecessary extra pitches and extra bases, which of course leads to extra runs thankfully for us Brewer fans. It's too bad for San Deigo, this Latos has very nice velocity, he should be better than this, then again we always thought that about Parra as well.

This is an interesting question. Clearly Greinke has the better stuff, but outside of one phenomenal season, he hasn't been all that great stastically. On the hand Marcum has already had TJ surgery and has anemic velocity. As long as Marcum can maintain his control and velocity differential between pitches, he'll be successful, but that decline is exceedingly difficult to project. I think the lack of velocity separation between his pitches was Suppan's biggest problem, It's just something that's easier to see over a 3 year span than comparing 1 season to the next. I've always liked Marcum, I still think that he should have been the single target of the Overbay trade, but he's not someone I would resign given his history. I think that Marcum will perform more consistently than Grienke as long as his arm holds out and he retains his velocity differential between pitches, once I again I'm just not comfortable predicting how long that will last. I think Greinke is getting quite a bit of mileage out of his one great season. He's obviously an extremely talented pitcher, a fantastic all around athlete, and a good hitter, but outside of that one season he's just never been as consistently dominant as he should be. He's not in the same class as a Halladay or Sabathia even with similar stuff, but I think we paid that kind of price for him. I think on average he's a very good #2 with the potential to be dominant, and someone will overpay for his services when he hits FA. He hasn't been hurt yet, so at some point you'd think he'll need surgery like every pitcher does. Finally, given his mental disorder, I'm not certain you can pencil him in to remain in the game long term or be certain which Greinke you're going to get? Are you going to get 2009 Greinke or the 2010 version that admittedly checked out when his team continued to struggle? I'm just not sure how to project Greinke at all, not just from a mental standpoint, but he's unique in that his FB velocity really isn't dropping as he gets older either, at some point you'd think it would have to start dropping off wouldn't you? I'm not sure there's a right answer here, there's plenty of risk both ways long-term. I guess I'll say Marcum, but it's more of a coin flip than it should be given the talent difference between the 2 pitchers.

Gomez seems to have problems sliding... though the hustle was awesome as no one was helping Ludwick find the ball, the slide into 3rd wasn't a thing a beauty. I've noticed he always slides all the way over 2B on his steals as well. Lets go Prince.

The pregame show is doing everything it can to Jinx the crew talking about how offensive the Padres offense is and how Latos isn't able to win a game... the Padres will probably go off for 8 runs tonight and Latos will pitch a 4 hitter.

I don't necessarily disagree, the counterpoint would be that teams have seen him enough in person now to have a good scouting report on what he does. College pitchers should hit the ground running A ball, so the test is to see if a player can maintain success as hitters make adjustments to him. He's been flat out dominant, but is it a hot streak or his he really just that much better than the competition? I haven't seen him pitch in person, I doubt I will this season as he'll be promoted by the time I get to a game, but I don't think you can really answer that question without seeing him pitch in person. For example I saw Scarpetta pitch quite a bit in WI, that's just the way the schedule happened to break for me (I bought my tickets months ahead of time), and that's why I've never been as high on him as others on this site, he just wasn't consistently impressive in person. His curveball was impressive at times, but his overall performances just weren't. I saw pitchers that were impressive that season, 2009, but none of them were Brewer prospects.

Everyone knows that Bowman is one of my boys, but when he has the best ERA of the starting pitchers I'm not going to be overly excited about what's happening at AA either.

As my dad always says, "It's time for this team to make some hay!" The next 2 series present a great opportunity to start climbing back into the race.

I just looked at the Nashville boxscore and didn't get past the score, my goodness. Thornburg was pretty awesome.

Wow that was some AB by CC... I wasn't sure he still had it in him.

That wasn't my intention, he's clearly the least best performing hitter of our top 5 thus far this season(Weeks, Braun, Fielder, McGehee, Lucroy.... Hart is just back so I didn't include him though I have my concerns about him as well). My point was to highlight that if a 1 month sample proves Gamel doesn't deserve to be in the 1B conversation for Milwaukee, then what does it say about McGehee? If you graph McGehee's career to this point, what does it look like? Why should we be optimistic about his future when he made a name for himself by over acheiving in the first place? Gamel isn't going to back to 3B for the Brewers, I never made that claim, so lets not get overly sensitive about nothing. I've grown weary of continually defending the reality of Gamel's statistical production around here, it seems that articles written in the JS have clouded many people's opinions of him. Mat's only offensive flaw is his strike out rate, which by the way improved significantly last year. He hits for AVE, hits for SLG, has a very good walk rate so his OBP good, and is very good athlete/strong armed so should be a solid defender at 1B. It's impossible for a fan like me to speak to his attitude, I don't know him personally, but I honestly don't care what Hardicourt or anyone in the local media has to say about a player, generally speaking they either toe the company line or drop unwarranted criticism (which I think also has it's roots in the organization, see Rickie Weeks). Instead of building a case for or against a player using the total picture of his entire career, people cherry pick the individual stats and sample size that best supports their particular arguments. Not just here like in the case of JB12, but all over the site lately.

Because he hasn't even pitched 40 IP? I don't recall any first time A baller promoted by the Brewers before June? I'm not saying he's been getting lucky, because he's clearly dominated A ball, but his velocity is ordinary for a RHP, it's just average. I'd be much more excited if he had the raw power to blow hitters away like a Rogers. Right now from where I'm sitting he's a slightly more talented Mike Fiers, but it wouldn't surprise me if he ended up in AA by the end of the season. If he dominates for 2 months in WI and continues that level of dominance for 2 months in BC, he could get that end of the season bump up to AA. Toby's idea of bumping him straight to AA is intriguing, but I would rather see Heckathorn bumped up first.

And McGehee's current line screams major league starting 3B? 2011 28 MIL NL 32 133 121 11 32 9 0 2 14 0 1 11 21 .264 .323 .388 .712 You have a funny way of picking the players you support and those you don't, not to mention the data you choose to support your claims.

I don't agree with Melvin leaving but that's another topic. You have the underlying issue right on though. The hitters are who they are (I really hate that cliche, I wish I thought of a different one). They are not going to magically change with a new hitting coach or manager. In the end I think the offense will be fine. It amazes me how many think that you can just "coach em up" and get different results. The problem is that the way the organization operates will not change unless the GM changes. Melvin had an immediate positive impact on the MLB roster when he got here, he's very good at assembling competitive teams. However his methods do not produce sustained success for a team like Milwaukee which doesn't have the resources to compete for marquee free agents, not that I think free agency is the way to go about building an organization regardless of market size, because I obviously don't. I've posted literally 100s of times why I don't think you can can cycle talent the way Melvin has done and maintain success either. We graduated a ton of talent to MLB and traded away the rest, now we're left with essentially no depth at the positions that matter the most, starting pitching and position players. We'll have good bullpen depth for a long time, but the bullpen is the least important part of the triad. I like Marcum and Grienke as players, but I wouldn't have traded for either one, not this off season, the trades came way too late. The organization has never placed a premium on defensive development, this is why mangement pieces like Nichols need to go. It's criminal that a player like Micheal Brantley played DH more than he played the field all those years. How tough would have been to rotate the 4 outfielders through the 3 OF positions and DH? Even if the players only end up being bench players, they at least have experience playing different positions so would have increased versatility for the MLB team. The Brewers have always just thrown the players out on the field and let them play, that's how we develop defense as an organization. Gamel's defense wasn't addressed at all until he hit AA, Braun was allowed to play 3B based solely on his athleticism while his bat carried him, or own good defenders are those that were naturals... Weeks has worked damn hard to get to average, and he's had a below average start to the season. The end result of this philosophy is that we have limited options defensively, which limits the offenive flexibility of the team as well. Gamel could have made a huge difference adding another power LH bat to the line up 2 years ago, but his defensive issues limited his availability to the big league club. Unfortunately all these issues are tied together, it's not just as simple as replacing hitter X with hitter Y. I want players that are as close to complete players defensively as possible by the time they the hit the majors, waiting 4 years to players to reach an "average" level competence significantly reduces their overall value through their cheapest years when the Brewers should be getting the best possible value out of those players. That way they can concentrate on their bats, their hitting, and focus on 1 learning curve when they get there, the defensive (fundamental) side of the game should be instinct by the time they reach MLB. Fielder does nothing fundamentally sound at 1B which is why he struggles so bad, and I can't believe the organization allows him to continually try to tag runners and try to win the foot race to the bag given what happened with Gallardo? Why won't he just toss the ball to the pitcher covering the bag? It's such an easy play... Is he that bad excuting an underhand toss that he'd rather make the much tougher play than risk a bad toss? Why won't he ever get under a bad throw he needs to scoop instead of flailing at it? Regardless, it's extremely obvious that the Brewers as an organization don't emphasize plate discipline or defense through the minors the way other organizations have done, and as such those shortcomings become transparent at the MLB level. In my opinion the little things the Brewers don't do well offensively are tied to the problems they have defensively, it appears the organization focuses almost exclusively on SLG, at the expense of everything else. In the end Melvin backed himself into this corner because he never acquried enough pitching when he knew the organization didn't have any coming through the system with this current group of position players. His moves over the years had severely limited his options to the point where he made both trades this off season out of desperation, which of course further limited what he could do position player wise on the MLB roster. How do fix a roster that's compromised entirely of position players who mostly have the same profile offensively and defensively? It's no secret around here that I believe every team in the post season can hit but pitching and defense will make the difference in the playoffs and win championships, 1 misplay can change a series because the sample size is so small. Look at how the Cameron and Weeks misplays in a single playoff game changed the series against the Phillies in 2008, there isn't any margin for error when it's "win or go home". That's why I've never been in the "must win now" camp on this site, the roster makeup has been fundamentally flawed from the start. The question now is how do you change the hitting, fielding, or pitching when you don't have any other options talent wise (prospects) and can't afford to buy anyone because the payroll is maxed out? A change in organizational philosophy is needed much more than a immediate change to the position players on the team. However in the short term it would help significantly if our 5 best hitters were actually batting 1-5, which isn't a Melvin issue, but a Roenicke issue. I'm willing to give RR time as he's transitioning leagues, but there's really no excuse for batting someone like Gomez 2nd... not ever.

The start of this season has been abysmal at every level, although it's hardly a revelation on the minor league side, it was to be expected.

UZR has plenty of holes in it, the metric certianly isn't perfect, and zone system won't be.

I've been saying it for a long time, and I know it's not a popular opinion, but I honestly feel that nothing with this organization is going to change until Melvin and his chronie Nichols are gone.

Not much has changed... other than the pitching has stunk this time around.

Just got home and see that Weeks was charged with another error? He's had a rough start defensively.

Interesting thread idea, I like it, but it's too easy doing 1 per level though. I'll do mine with 1 pitcher and 1 hitter a bit later tonight when I catch up on everything. Pitcher Austin Ross (Heckathorn was a very close 2nd, his K/BB of 4.83 is pretty impressive) Hitter Kris Davis. Mike Walker was a close 2nd but Davis is putting up awesome numbers as a righty in the FSL and he also sports a good BB rate.

Not to take this thread any further off topic, but Gamel isn't in a position where he can be choosy at all. If his heart isn't in it then he need a change of heart or as much as it pains me to say it, a change in organization. He's ultimately responsible for making the most of his tools, and he hasn't come close defensively. Part of that blame lies with the organization, but he needs to be realistic about where he stands and make the best of the situation.

What bats? Where's a Brett Lawrie to trade for another impact MLB player? Yep that whole Sheets, Sabathia, Linebrink, Lopez draft pick thing has worked out wonderfully for the farm system. I have a major problem discussing draft picks like they are certainty, or that their value can be adequately qualified, when in truth they are incredibly risky propositions and incredibly difficult to quantify. The whole "it's okay to trade prospects because we'll get them back" argument has proven to be one of the biggest phalacies tossed around on this site. We can certainly trade excess/redundant talent, but we still need to be able to cycle impact talent back into the system. We went from one of the best farm systems in baseball to one of the worst, part of that is natural cycle as players graduate, but that's not the case here. We've had plenty of time to recover from Weeks, Fielder, Braun, and Hardy moving from prospect to MLB players, 6 years now, but we've only slid farther down each year. Comp picks for FA signings are not typically going to hit MLB within 2 years, even best case, so where's the help going to come from post 2012? To get impact talent later in the draft we are typically looking at drafting HS players like Odorizzi and Lawrie, the top 15 picks are protected and that's where the Weeks and Braun type college players get drafted. Players like Odorizzi and Lawrie will take time to develop at their own pace, and the upredictability of the learning curve is reason to possess more legit prospects, not fewer. For example, of the first 6 picks in the 2008 draft (3 1st round and 3 2nd round), only Seth Lintz is left in the system, and he hasn't pitched above rookie ball yet, with poor results. The 3rd round pick Logan Schafer looks to have an MLB future, we gave away 4th rounder Josh Romanski for nothing, 5th rounder Maverick Lasker looks to be a back of the rotation type if he makes it. Remember this was the draft that was going to help rebuild the organization's depth after the Sabathia trade... Lawrie became Marcum who should be a 2 year rental, and Odorizzi (who was our best pitching prospect in my opinion) was included in the Greinke deal, and what kind of realistic opportunity do we have to resign him? He looks to be a 2 year rental as well, he'll be long gone while Jeffress, Odorizzi, and Cain are tearing it up for KC. Not to mention there's still realistic hope for Escobar as well. Gennett isn't an impact prospect today, he's a defensively challenged 20 year old with an intriguing bat for his limited stature. What exactly does claiming prospects who aren't ready for MLB aren't better than replacement players prove? Circular doubletalk anyone? Every MLB player was once a prospect, every prospect has their own time table, and the Brewers need a steady stream of impact prospects to keep the MLB team competitive year in and year out. I fully understand that prospects will fail, but that's exactly why we need as many options as possible, for every Yo there is a Parra. I certainly agree that we need to build with the draft, but there are very few instant fixes that come through the MLB draft, players are years away from contributing in most circumstances. Futhermore, good GMs don't make quantity for quality deals, or at least the GMs I consider to be good, so what we're really hoping for here is to hoodwink someone? For the most part the impact talent we have left in the system is pitching, and as I've stated numerous times, I don't believe we can trade pitching for pitching and get ahead of curve, and we certainly can't trade pitching for hitting and get there. You're pretty new around here, but if you're suggesting that I'm one of the people who's unrealistic about a given player's tools, then I'm sorry but you really have no idea what you're talking about. That's a nice theory, but where's the practical application of it? The Marlins? Much has changed in baseball since they made that model work 6 years apart. Reyes doesn't make the Brewers a WS team all by himself, and isn't WS series talk for a team that's below .500 a little premature? I've very wary of ever claiming that we're "1 player away", sports are too unpredictable for that kind of certainty. At any rate, I'm much more concerned with building a strong organziation with a constant cycle of impact talent than I am perpetually selling prospects every year hoping to catch lightening bottle and get lucky in a single season. I'm absolutely fine trading prospects, but only for the appropriate targets. I believe that starting pitching > hitting > bullpen, but also believe that Greinke type deals will cripple a small market like the Brewers in the long term. I'd much rather be trading prospects for prospects than trading 4 prospects for any one MLB player. Don't get me wrong, now that Greinke is here I want to him succeed, but that doesn't mean that I agree with the premise of his acquisition at all, and I've been beating the pitching drum longer than most.

I forget it if was last year or the year before, but there was a big thread about pitching abuse or maybe a couple threads? At any rate, I pointed out that everytime Yo posts an absolutely studdly gamescore, it's followed by 4-6 pretty average to poor starts. I hope at some point in his career he'll find more consistency, but he's never been very efficient with his pitch counts, going back all the way back to AA, he just wasn't efficient enough. He'll get back on track, or at least I hope he gets back on track soon.

The Betancourt thread isn't terrible in the way that many of the other threads are that have been immortalized around here. Many, many of the threads that have led to posters getting banned haven't had any semblance of a well thought out argument in the entire thread. The circular debate in the Betancourt thread is tiring, but the arguments are not epically futile or indefensible like some of the threads of ole... I'll say this, anytime a single poster seems to have every other post in a thread I'm going to start skipping past what they are saying, it's just not worth reading the same thing over and over.