MessiahRp

When was the last time they regretted a big deal they gave out? Julio Lugo? Edgar Renteria? The Sox have admitted their mistakes in the past and Theo's missed on a few guys. JD Drew, aside from being pretty good in 2007, has been pretty much a bust as well. Rp

If the Brewers signed Duch, I would buy season tickets immediately. I am only hesitating currently because of finances but I'll find extra money if he gets Duch because I truly think that's the arm that gets us to the playoffs. I think Wolf is an upgrade from Looper, I think the Bullpen looks better with Hawkins.. but Duch would be the final piece to really nail this down. http://forum.brewerfan.net/images/smilies/smile.gif Rp

Yeah I was going to point out http://twitter.com/#search?q=%23jasonkendallfacts HILARIOUS cracks on Kendall. http://forum.brewerfan.net/images/smilies/smile.gif Rp

Invader3K- I would probably say to pull Coffey out and swing Soriano over to Boston. Boston's interested in Soriano anyway. For the Braves, they dump over half of Lowe's contract and get a young OF who has tremendous upside. For Boston, it's mostly about dumping Lowell but getting a reliever back is a win for them. For Milwaukee it's all about an extra veteran arm for a couple years.

Igor67: I like your idea... except if we get Soriano, the Sox would have to get Coffey back. They want a salary dump on Lowell for sure but don't want to give him away free... So if we tweaked it to go like this: Red Sox get: Coffey Braves get: Hart Suppan Brewers get: Lowe Soriano Lowell I mean yes the Brewers are going to spend a decent chunk for Lowe but probably not too much more than another FA pitcher signing of Lowe's caliber would cost and Soriano's only inked for one year. Lowell and Suppan even out. And I'm of the belief that when healthy Lowell is still a very good player. Not MVP caliber like a few years back but a considerable upgrade to McGehee whom is probably a one year wonder and Gamel whom we don't even know if he can hit at the big league level yet. My only concern would be finding a decent bat at corner OF to replace Hart (Matsui for a year?). Rp

From what I've read they seem very eager to try to lure Jason Bay over so that could handle the LF situation rather quickly and give them some serious pop in their lineup. I'm still thinking Griffey's going to get that DH job until he gets hurt or plays so horribly that they have to bench him so I don't see them signing another player to DH. Rp

Honestly I'd like us just to cut Rivera loose and use a Zaun/Kotteras combo while Salome/Lucroy play in AAA. I was actually thinking Zaun would make for an interesting fit for the crew last week so I'm not at all unhappy about the signing. If we're $1 million away from signing a major free agent and the Brewers ownership balks it will be them being cheap, not signing Zaun that is the major problem here. Rp

My issue is that if we pocket it, its not as if we're going to stash it away until next year and then use it. Next year's financial numbers will likely be related solely to next year, not what we saved this year and that's where pocketing it will probably be useless to the competitiveness of this team down the road. Especially if by not making attempts at free agency they appear as if they have given up and casual fans jump off the ticket buying bandwagon... then you will have cost yourself revenue to use for next year as well. Rp

Stevo- I agree with you that I am not sold on McGehee as the 3B of the future, what about Taylor Green down the pipe? I don't know if he's any better than Gamel defensively but with him and Heether being around you would think they would see if Gamel is an option at other positions. (1B in case Prince leaves?) Rp

It definitely does seem like he's intent on at least making it seem like he's trying...even things as simple as talking with John Lackey's agent go a long way. I wasn't expecting Looper back, even when McCalvy and Haudricourt seemed to think it was a lock the Brewers were going to pick up the option, but I do wish he pitched better while he was here. I didn't mind the signing too much when it was announced, and it's not like this was a big dollar mistake signing...he was an average guy making average money that just happened to pitch poorly for a season. At least he wasn't locked into a multi-year deal. I pretty much agree with this sentiment. By the time Melvin fished for a FA Pitching acquisition Looper was pretty much the best of what was left. For next year though the last thing we need is to be saddled with more Suppan types in this rotation. Having one is enough. Retaining Looper or obtaining Davis or Washburn on what will be overpriced deals for too many years will only hurt the team beyond this year. We need some guys with upside. I'd prefer us to make runs at Duchscherer and Harden. Harden wasn't hurt when the Cubs shut him down at the end of last year and wasn't sure why they did it (obviously based on injury history). Duch should be very close to all the way back. Both when healthy have ace like stuff and with a healthy Dave Bush you have a 1-4 that can beat anyone. Even if you only get 175 innings from both of those guys that's 175 quality innings versus 200 Suppan innings where we are praying to get to the 5th inning and be in the game still. Plus because of the injury scare neither would command Lackey money or cripple the team on a huge long term deal. Parra can start in AAA and he can be injury insurance... provided he figures everything out himself. Rp

See that argument doesn't mean much to me. At the time even most people thought the Twins got ripped off in that Santana trade and waited too long to pull the trigger with other teams that had offered more. Just because a guy was traded for a big name doesn't mean he's has some sort of additional value. Many times it's just a poor evaluation by the GM that made that trade that gets that guy put in there. How about the guys we got when we continuously traded our big stars in the 90s? When they flaked out with us did a team that acquired us say, "That guy was the centerpiece of the Gary Sheffield trade so he must have value!"? I think not. Horrible trade for the Crew. We get zero pitching essentially and lose a ton of pop out of two positions. And I am not convinced that the cost savings will be spent wisely on pitching because to this point aside from Gallardo, Melvin's team has not been good at identifying real quality pitching that can help us for a full season. Rp

I never recalled anyone saying he was a defensive liability, in fact most articles I read on it praised his defense (some discussed his .995 Fielding PCT which is a flawed stat obviously but I doubt he was a liability). Seems to be a nifty easy tag to throw on people when we want to diss them. They're a defensive liability. Unless they are majorly special at a position that's a hard tag to disprove so you get your jab in there effectively. Fact is, Hermida still has upside, is still relatively cheap, the Sox didn't give up much for him and I wouldn't have been upset if the Crew had picked him up because he's a million times better than Gerut and if Corey Hart keeps playing poorly he might exceed Hart's ceiling as well. Rp

I don't know that there will be a lot of interest in him from those teams to be honest. And besides we're going to be in the same boat next year pitching wise so he'd be playing for a rotation spot for 2010 as well, which I doubt a contender could offer him.

I think we should still pick him up for this year. He's still a higher upside warm body than Vargas and when Smoltz left Boston he was lights out in his first outing in St. Louis. The NL Central is much easier to pitch against than the AL East. Rp

Yeah I just noticed the deadline rule... still you'd hope that he gets it done. After all a few million is better than none.

Aaron Crow didn't sign again? Every year he enters, the next year he's drafted lower. Did these guys not learn the lessons of Matt Harrington? Rp

Does anyone know where to find a list of all the draft picks and if they signed or not? I'm sure this list exists somewhere, I just need someone to point me in the right direction. Thanks! Rp

JJ Hardy's fall has been pretty epic. Also I don't know who kidnapped Carlos Villaneuva but I want that guy back and not this replacement dude. Rp

They get a bad rap because they usually deserve it. After going to the last series of the year versus the Cubs last year, I don't think I ever want to go to another Cubs game again. I happened to go to the game we lost and I have never seen a bigger group of jerks. Seriously. Every strike they got up and taunted Brewers fans. It was 3 hours of hell. I can't imagine being that brash at an opponent's stadiums unless I was looking for a beatdown. Do you think Yankees fans would get in the faces of Sox fans on every pitch at Fenway, or vice versa at Yankee Stadium? Sure, there's some fun ribbing but outright taunting for an entire game... and not just from one guy... our whole section was littered with these guys... just pure classlessness. I expect nothing less from the most ridiculous fanbase in sports.... where else could your team not win squat in over 100 years and you think you have the right to taunt other teams' fans like you're a perennial dynasty? Rp

Frankly I want JJ to play every day. We sort of have to hope he catches fire so that his trade value increases dramatically. Before this year JJ alone would have likely netted some decent pitching (by decent I don't mean Halladay, so let's not overstate this). With the way he's been playing we have to tack a bunch of players on to make that work. If we had decided that this was a sell year we could have moved some hitters (Hart, Hardy, maybe Prince), got some quality pitching prospects in return and brought up some guys like Gamel and Escobar to get regular ABs this year and learn MLB pitching in hopes for a quality 2009 from both of them. However we held onto our cards and now we're going to be looking at another year next year like this one unless we somehow magically free up a lot of money and make some runs at some free agent pitchers. Rp

USA Today says Kotchman is not a FA until after 2011... and at $3.5 million he's not an overly pricey role player I suppose. Plus with Lowell's injury history they may be eyeing Youk at 3rd on a more permanent basis. Martinez I think was mostly brought in to be Tek's replacement. Though they'll want him in the lineup everyday so they can shift him to 1B and DH based on everyone else's playing time to make sure he keeps getting ABs and Tek gets some starts.

I agree. Anybody who was living off the kool-aid before the season and thought the Brewers really could compete with this staff has to be getting a cold dose of reality right about now. I remember people saying this rotation was going to be better than last year's and that Gallardo was better than Sheets and Parra was going to improve and basically we wouldn't really miss Sheets or even CC who apparently didn't count because he was a late season acquisition. The reality was we didn't know how Parra would respond after he burned out last year and Gallardo has never been stretched out for a full season. Looper is an average pitcher at best and Suppan is pretty much done. We knew all of that yet many here ignored most of that because their Brewers' Rose Colored Glasses sort of led them to believe the bats would be able to overcome mediocre pitching. I think we now know this not to be the case. We have a decent number of talented position players coming through the system but we are pretty much pitching poor down there. Jeffress is looking to be a bust and there aren't really any AAA, Major-League ready guys to look towards. I think we're at a point where we need to Sell Now and acquire some serious top level pitching prospects. And I am willing to sell on Hart, Hardy and Prince to do this. Prince has been amazing but we can't afford to keep him all that much longer and the longer we go without serious young, talented, affordable pitching the more we are in a spot where we need to talk about CC or Halladay and overpaying for them every year. Stockpile some good young arms now and let's bring up Gamel and Escobar to play out the year and learn major league pitching. I don't see it so much as giving up on this year as I do consider it contending for the next 5. Rp

Here is the link. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/31/sports/baseball/31doping.html?_r=1&hp So the original source is the NY Times? Color me skeptical if only because it's definitely not beneath NY Newspapers to try to smear the Red Sox since after all they are the arch enemies. Rp

He's hitting .229 now but no way is he going to stay at that level and he's much better defensively than Green or Lugo have been. Once he heats up he'll be fine and I'm sure most GMs aren't thinking this will be his normal production level at this point (or we better hope they don't or we're going to be screwed in trying to move him and will have to hope and pray he is Type A once we let him walk). Rp

I am of the belief that getting Halladay would cost us way too much especially with the fact that he has a no trade clause and part of his contract is that if he is traded he can demand a trade at the end of the season in which he was dealt. Considering he gave Toronto a discount, I'm sure that enticing him to break the no trade revolves around giving him a pricey extension. That being said I think our best deal is with Boston. They have so much pitching both in the Majors and the Minors that even giving up a Buchholz doesn't damage their top tier that much. Also Hardy would be a major upgrade over Nick Green at SS and would allow the team to move Lowrie to 3B while Mike Lowell recovers (Boston's front office is worried Lowell might be completely done if he can't recover quickly from his current hip strain). I know everyone thinks we should be able to pull in a lot for Hardy but Clay along with Yo would give us two front end long term aces we control for a while and would be incredibly inexpensive. It would open a spot up for Escobar to come up and play SS. Also diminishing Hardy's trade value is that he's going to be up for a real contract in the not so distant future which could get expensive and at the moment he's in the midst of a slow start this season. Still I think this would be one trade we could make and years down the road be happy it was made because we obtained a long term piece to our rotation. What do you guys think? Rp