crewcrazy

Very nice job by Suppan getting into the 6th inning after it looked like he'd be lucky to get far into the 5th. Stetter continues to be excellence out of the pen. Let's get a few more runs. http://forum.brewerfan.net/images/smilies/wink.gif Let's try to keep the discussion in this thread on the game. Any debate on the IGT guidelines/game over declarations from this point should probably be posted in the Issues forum.

There is something on this in the Fan Forum Etiquette guidelines under "What kind of discussion is not allowed?"

And that's why it's pretty foolish to start posting "game over" messages after 3 1/2 innings. Gamel's swing is a thing of beauty...two of his three homers are against the Cards.

Intentionally walking Thurston to let Wellemeyer sac bunt is starting to look really bad here...ugh. Hopefully they can stop the bleeding and get a guy on to start the bottom of the 4th.

Reason number 1,267 why leadoff walks really stink. Hopefully Suppan can get out of this with the score tied.

I <3 free runs, especially when it's Kendall in the batter's box. Hopefully Suppan stays out of a double play now.

If Cat can follow up a walk with a base hit 4 times tonight, I'll take it. http://forum.brewerfan.net/images/smilies/wink.gif

Mat Gamel lives! I do wish he'd hit more in the top half of the order, but we'll take baby steps and just be happy he's in the lineup tonight. http://forum.brewerfan.net/images/smilies/wink.gif Here's to hoping for a repeat of Wellemeyer's May 17 outing against the Brewers, when he walked 7 Brewers. I'm loving the Suppan picture. It's almost like he's saying "Relax, Brewerfan. Everything's going to be a-ok."

It should also be noted that Roy Halladay has 10/5 trade rights, so even if the Jays can find a deal they like, it's no guarantee that he's going anywhere. I believe Halladay has even said that he has no interest in changing teams right now, so all this discussion might be moot. Still fun, though. http://forum.brewerfan.net/images/smilies/wink.gif If the Jays are looking for a Teixeira-to-Atlanta return, I don't think the Brewers could possibly compete. I heard a compelling case for the Phillies, though, based around guys like Kyle Drabek.

Considering discussion has turned away from the the original point of the thread -- Braun's comments and the fallout afterwards -- and shifted towards the team's pitching, I think it's safe to say this thread has run its course. If anyone still feels like discussing possible trade options, I'd like to direct those proposals to the various threads in the Trade Rumors/Proposals forum.

Wainwright's on an incredible roll right now...I'm mildly surprised that LaRussa took him out. Disappointing result tonight, but at least Pujols wasn't the one doing the damage. I'll take my chances with Ludwick and everyone else every day of the week. Hopefully tomorrow Ludwick won't be shocking everyone with opposite field homers. Elsewhere in the division, the Cubs lost to Atlanta, the Reds beat Philly, and the Pirates beat the Astros. There's going to be a lot of shuffling within the division heading into the break.

It's frustrating, but really the Brewers only have to finish ahead of either the Cubs or the Cards, not necessarily both. There's nothing wrong about taking the wildcard route, and with the way the entire NL East has been playing lately, it's looking like the Brewers will only have to outpace the Central foe that doesn't finish in first and the second place team in the West. I'm not entirely confident in the Giants' ability to stick around in the race, so I'm still feeling good about the Brewers' wildcard chances. Then again, it seems like I'm more optimistic than most.

He's talked to Atlanta about Javy Vazquez and Arizona about Doug Davis/Felipe Lopez, so I don't know if he's exactly sitting on his hands. Not making a deal yet doesn't equate to not trying to make a deal.

Yeah, I'm definitely a bigger fan of TH's Twitter than his in-game blog updates. Just one of those nights where Yo can't get his curve in the strike zone. Hopefully the Brewers can get someone across this inning. They've managed to actually hit Wainwright pretty well, but have been a bit unlucky by hitting him so hard that they can advance extra bases.

Don't pitch to Albert Pujols. Ever. I don't care if the bases are loaded -- give him the Barry Bonds treatment.

Hopefully this story can finally die with that statement. I'm not thrilled about the half-apology ("I was just answering a question, I was taken out of context, but I realize I need to be careful", etc.), but hopefully it'll appease the media and everyone can just shut up and finish the first half strong.

I was also impressed with the TV push, specifically the ads saying "x many people watch the Brewers every night! If everyone goes to brewers.com and votes their 25 times for the Brewers, your favorite players WILL make it in!" I thought it was a clever strategy to build the campaign around, and it definitely seemed to have a big effect considering how many votes guys like Hall and Kendall got.

There's been no indication lately that Ben Sheets will be able to pitch in 2009, and there's a possibility he might not even be 100% until midseason next year. There are even teams reportedly interested in him that say he won't be pitching at all this year. It would've been nice to have that option, but it doesn't look like it could've been a possibility, even if bridges weren't burned.

On the Baseball Tonight before the Cubs/Braves game tonight, Peter Gammons picked Yo as his biggest all-star snub. Listening to Peter Gammons trying to pronounce "Yovani Gallardo" is a ton of fun...I believe his pronunciation was something like "Oh-vanny Gay-er-doe."

One thing that I didn't come across until after I gave the review to Brian was the scouting in the June draft, which is maddeningly inconsistent. It seems that most times, no matter how much money you pour into amateur scouting and how good your scout's ratings are, they'll severely overrate some players which makes hitting on your first round pick nearly impossible if you just go with your scout's recommendation. If you're playing with scouting on, I'd suggest comparing your scout's ratings with the ratings provided by OSA, which acts as the average of every scouting directors' reports. If your scout's ratings are astronomically higher than the ratings provided by OSA, chances are he's the one screwing up the average ratings and the player isn't as good as he thinks he is. Even then, your results will be mixed, but it might be something you want to try if you're picking in the 20's and there aren't many quality players left to begin with. If you're trying to rebuild the Nationals and are constantly picking in the Top 5, though, it can be extremely frustrating and you may end up setting your organization even further back. Nothing sucks more than taking a stud prospect 2nd overall with plus-plus power potential, only to realize once you get to your transactions screen that he'll be lucky to get higher than AA in his career. There's always the option of going into your settings and switching off the scouting system for the June draft, revealing the "real" ratings (with scouting off, the OSA ratings are the player's true ratings) for the purposes of the draft, and turning them back on afterwards, too. Some people feel like that's cheating, so it's completely up to the player. If anyone playing the game has questions/concerns/comments about the game, the community at http://www.ootpdevelopments.com/board/ is generally very helpful, and sometimes the developer even pops in to answer major questions. I'd recommend using the board's search feature before signing up and posting questions, though, because they do tend to get a lot of repeat questions that could simply be answered by looking at older topics. The mods subforum is also really cool -- plenty of custom add-ons available for free there, including everything from real team logos (in a variety of different styles, just click around) to full photopacks of every player in the game.

Today's loss makes that crappy walkoff walk call sting even more. They pitched well enough for a split, which is probably more than what most of us expected when the pitching match ups were announced. As someone else said, at least the Brewers should have the guys pitching really well going against the Cardinals, which is good. Should be an interesting series, to say the least. I do hate losing day games, though, especially day games before an off day...too much time to dwell on what went wrong. The Brewers could rectify this by just sweeping the Cardinals and helping us forget this series ever happened. http://forum.brewerfan.net/images/smilies/wink.gif

Yeah, that's part of the reason why I'm trying not to get too upset over the results of this series and the upcoming Cards series...they'll have another chance to make up any games they lose this week. Of course it would've been nice to play a little better in this series, but the only way these series will have a drastic effect on the division race is if teams start sweeping each other. As long as they hang around first place in the division (and the wildcard), I'm going to try to not let my blood boil when Derrek Lee hits another meatball out. http://forum.brewerfan.net/images/smilies/wink.gif

Considering most were pegging this team for 84-85 wins at the start of the year and that's what they're on pace for after winning the "halfway point" game yesterday, I guess I just have a hard time considering this team a disappointment. The schedule in the second half looks to be quite a bit easier, so I don't doubt that they'll be in the wildcard race until the final couple weeks, even if they don't make a move. The Cubs do have the most talent in the division, but we knew that going into the year. For them, it's a matter of playing up to that talent level, and they weren't doing that, even with Ramirez in the lineup. The Cardinals have Pujols playing out of his mind and Rasmus starting to come around, but how long can Carpenter stay healthy and Franklin continue his unlikely success as the closer? Each team in this race has some pretty big question marks to deal with, even when they're at full strength.

Guys like Todd Wellemeyer might disagree. I also think we probably see Parra again, and probably Bush's return from the DL before we see a trade. Burns hasn't been spectacular, but the games he's pitched haven't been complete lost causes, either. I don't think we can say the same for McClung. Edit: Well, not until now with Burns, anyway. I still think he probably gets another start based on his work against the Mets (and the Twins, to a lesser extent).

And they can keep booing until 2014. http://forum.brewerfan.net/images/smilies/wink.gif Hearing Soriano and Bradley getting the Bronx treatment this series has dulled the pain a bit. Only down a few...Lilly's prone to giving up home runs, so hopefully they can get a couple guys on and have someone hit one out.