2009 Milwaukee Brewers Discussion

If Gallardo and Parra can be as good as they've looked, the Brewers have a chance...an even better chance if one of the "plus four-500" guys (Suppan, Bush, and Looper are all the same dude - ERA well over 5, record around .500) plays above his head.

It's nice to have a REAL fucking manager for the first time in 20 years or so.

I'm a little optimistic, partly because I expect the Brewers to have the wherewithal to make an impact trade, the minor league system has some good depth, early ticket sales are good, and I expect it will be a buyer's market this year.

They still need a lot of things to go right. They need a full year out of Gallardo and Parra needs to show more endurance over the year. Bush needs to finally have a full season breakthrough. Weeks has to live up to his potential. Hart, Hall, Fielder, and Braun have to have better years. The offensive core is still young, so that's not far fetched and I do expect the team to be better offensively this year. Enough better to offset the decline in the starting pitching? I don't know, but if they're over .500 come mid-season, I expect them to pursue Halladay or at least someone significant. If they're not, I could see the Lorenzo Cain era in CF, Angel Salome at C era, starting early.

Halladay is in a contract year. You really want to lose whatever farm system you have for a rent a player when your team is worse than last year? Braun and Gallardo are the only ones off limits. Trade the rest. Esp Fielder.

Halladay's contract year is 2010. And the point was, go after Halladay if the team is in contention as the final piece, not go after Halladay so the team can contend.

More to the point, despite some wild overrating, the Brewers have plenty of good prospects, but not anyone who's an elite prospect. J.J. Hardy is a top 10, maybe top 5, SS, and Alcides Escobar is an elite fielder, but may be weak with the bat. Mat Gamel might be as much a butcher as Braun was at 3rd and doesn't have the offensive upside. Unless Hardy moves to third, which is guaranteed to make Hardy unhappy, the only way that Gamel and Escobar will likely play in Milwaukee is if both Fielder and Hardy are traded. It's quite possible to, say, trade Escobar at the deadline and Fielder in the offseason, and completely offset the loss of a top prospect with the haul from Fielder. (Essentially trade Fielder for Halladay in the big picture.) Or, trade Gamel at the deadline, and Hardy in the offseason, and perform the same trick.

Or, even, acquire Halladay for the stretch and trade him in the offseason while he's still under contract. You might not get all you gave up to acquire him, but I'd bet you'd come relatively close. Ask the Red Sox for Lars Anderson, for example, and I'd bet they'd say yes.

Also, the Brewers have two upper level catching prospects, Salome and Lucroy, and trading one may make sense in the long run since both can't play at the same time. Grindl and Gillespie project as marginal starters. One top prospect and a couple of interesting complementary pieces seems to be the going price, that's what Sabathia cost and, for that matter, Johan, and the Brewers probably are able to do that without hurting their team longterm.

The key word to the Brewers farm system is depth. Much of which will be replenished with 5 early draft picks in June, 1 first, 2 sandwich round, 2 second. They have options to explore either way. If they're not contending, it will be exactly right to ship off Mike Cameron, Trevor Hoffman, and possibly Kendall, if anyone wants him, at the deadline, call up some youngsters, and add a ton of depth to the system between the draft and trades. They're in a middle region where they have several options to explore without necessarily hurting the long term health of the organization.

It's nice to see Suppan and Bush starting out in mid-season form.

Anya, I'm sure all Brewer fans are touched by your concern for how best to manage Milwaukee's roster...I see a lot of that from Chicago fans. Such big hearts....

Last night was a good reminder of just how good Gallardo can be. It's also why I'm moderately optimistic about the year. The Brewers were contenders BEFORE they traded for Sabathia, basically with Sheets and without Gallardo. There's at least the possibility that they can contend again with Gallardo and without Sheets. Especially since I think most projection systems would factor in a falloff for Gallardo after the trade deadline.

I think it's clear that they'll have to make a move or two if they really want to contend. That said, I think they could be good enough where that type of move makes sense and they do have enough parts in the minor leagues to make something happen, especially if this year turns out to be a buyer's market.

Also, I'd rather face Kendall at this stage of his career than Gallardo. Gallardo actually has some power. That really looked like a manager on autopilot last night.

Wow, what a way to win the home opener.

Nice game by Weeks. Many people had him pegged as a "breakout player" for this year; he sure looked the part today.

Series to the Cubs.

Suppan has to fucking GO. Whatever he had, he's lost it.

3-8. Ugh. Plenty of games left and the Brewers have at least been competitive, but it looks like a significant early-season hole is being dug.

I can't say I'm impressed with the early returns from Ken Macha. Sure, he seems much quicker to tamper with the bullpen rather than repeat Yost's endless fascination with Derrick Turnbow, and that's good, but I worry that it's also a sign of rushing to judgement based on small sample sizes.

The bench looks pretty darn weak. I don't know how much is Macha and how much is Melvin, but honestly I think Yovanni Gallardo is a better hitter than some of the stiffs on the bench. There's no early season heroics from Gabe Kapler on this bench. It frustrates me to no end though to see Kendall bat late in games when the team is down. When did the idea that you can't pinch hit for the catcher come around? Macha isn't the only one that does it, apparently there some sort of absurd fear that it will be deadly embarrasing for a manager if the strategy works but the backup catcher gets hurt later exposing the team. Apparently it's less embarassing for a manager to lose a game in 9 innings.

They have to get Parra pointed in the right direction. He's not giving the Brewers much of anything. And Suppan back to his old, mediocre self. I've no complaints about Gallardo, Looper, or Bush so far.

The bats will come around. I've little doubt that Hardy and Fielder will start hitting and even Kendall isn't this bad. And there aren't any better options in the meantime. Hoffman will help too. It would be nice if they won today though to at least have a decent road trip against tough opponents.

A mediocre Suppan would be a step up from what he did last year.

Parra, I don't know...I've seen some suggestions that he needs to spend a bit more time at AAA to mature.

And they won with some style. Hopefully the last two games (not to mention the starting pitching in the last week overall) is a sign they are getting around the corner.

Four in a row. Nice.

Yovanni Gallardo is a stud. Reason #1 why I think people have underestimated the Brewers chances this year.

I was hoping that after that homer he went back to the dugout and said "ya know what, fuck off - I don't need ANY of you assholes!"

Was at the D-backs game last night - a guy sitting behind me had a bad case of Wisconsinitis (def - the inability to draw happiness or satisfaction from anything other than being miserable over something). I'm sure that the second loss in the last 9 games, with a huge part of it being a blown call, will have all the naysayers in a tizzy.

5-2 homestand on the heels of a 5-4 road trip.

They've dug themselves out of that early-season hole.

The lack of O in the D-backs series was troubling, though.

Wow, what a great win tonight!

I have to say, the Brewers are impressing me because they're sort of failing to impress - it seems like they haven't quite been able to put it all together, yet they're still on a healthy 11-6 run.

5-1 homestand.

The Brewers just seem to keep racking up wins while flying completely under the national radar.

The top of the NL Central is really strong so far this year. The Pirates are in for a very long year. Probably the Astros too.

If Weeks is finally having his breakout year like it appears, the Brewers chances for the post-season are much stronger than pre-season prognostications.

How big would a severe injury to Weeks be?

If he's out for a short time, I have no problem with the artist formerly known as the Human Out filling in somewhere down the lineup and at 2B, but longer than a few weeks, you get to wondering.

As far as the Brewers lack of press, whatever. I don't have that Wisconsin inferiority complex, so I kind of like the fact that the team is rolling along right under the radar.

Well, except in St Louis, where they are crying because Ryan Braun celebrates after hitting big homers and the Brewers untuck their shirts after wins. Waaaahhhh!

Weeks gone for 4-6 months...so essentially, "the season" unless he recovers on the quick end and makes a postseason cameo.

I don't like Counsell as a long-term replacement, that's for sure. I think Weeks, at this point, even assuming his production would have tailed off, is a pretty tough guy to replace.

Ideally, the Crew winning series against the Scrubs and Tardinals will become a yawner of a story over the next few years.

"Oh, the Brewers swept the Cubs again. Booo-ring."

Eh, I'd be loathe to move Hall to 2B when he's finally settled in at 3B. Especially since he's been money with the glove so far, never mind his solid O.

Losing Weeks is a big blow. No question about it.

I'd probably just go with Counsell, at least to start with. You'll get solid D, which Looper and Suppan absolutely require to remain effective, and enough OBP that you can live with. You want to mix in Gamel slowly, great, but no real reason to rush a decision in the meantime.

Who appointed St. Louis etiquette police, anyways?

Yeah, all celebratory rituals are silly on some level. But, geez, the untucking is about the mildest thing I've ever seen. It's nothing compared to the NFL, where every routine play gets a celebratory gesture of some kind.

My whole take on the Cards is that LaRussa's managing persona is that of utter douchebag. Anything he is currently whining about is probably 1/4 as bad as stuff he's condoned (or ordered, if we're talking about throwing at batters) over the years.

He just clucks and whines and then whines some more. But because he's Tony Genius LaRussa, the press just gobbles it up. I fucking hate the guy.

Ahhhhh, how sweet it is.

Yes, it's May; yes, the Cards ARE missing some big bats....but is it ever a bad time to sweep a Tony LaRussa-led team?

Rhetorical question, BTW.

Due to lose one...and the Crew even turned the loss into a bit of a nail-biter with the tying run up to bat in the bottom of the 9th.

NOT due to shit the bed vs the Twins over the weekend - what the heck happened there?

The suh-weet Memorial Day win vs Tony LaDouche-a and the Cards doesn't exactly make up for it but it's a soothing salve on the wound.

Parra sent down to AAA.

I wish I knew what the guy's issue was. I think Macha may have erred in a couple ways by not giving him a shot with Rivera catching him.