With Jerry Hariston Jr. coming to town, who goes??

Please be Counsell.
Please be Counsell.
Please be Counsell.
Please be Counsell.

Your guide to the stretch run Part 3, St. Louis

With a little over 2 months left in the season the NL Central appears to be headed for a four team race. Here is your handy cheat sheet for the teams and their corresponding cities. You decide who has the advantage.  Up next St Louis.

Part 1, Pittsburg(h)
Part 2, Cincinnati

St. Louis Cardinals  

• No longer a football team
• Originally the St. Louis Browns
• Realized a team named the Browns would never be successful
• When will Cleveland figure this out
• Changed from Browns to Perfectos in 1899
• Party like it's 1899!!
• Changed to Cardinals a year later
• Perfectos is a stupid name

Doug Melvin strikes again

Brewers traded minor league catcher Wil Nieves to the Braves for cash considerations.

What could he possibly get??  Jokingly when I hear stories like this I think to myself "what 50 cents??"

Not our Doug Melvin!!

Your guide to the stretch run part 2, Cincinnati

With a little over 2 months left in the season the NL Central appears to be headed for a four team race. Here is your handy cheat sheet for the teams and their corresponding cities. You decide who has the advantage.  Up next Cincinnati.

 Part 1, Pittsburg(h)

Cincinnati Reds

• Original name was Red Stockings.
• I'd rather be the Alleghenys
• They kinda won the 1919 World Series.  
• That other team might have might have tanked to make some money.
• Baseball's first professional team
• Won first game 45-9 
• Went 57-0 in their first season
• Well they were the only pro team
• The competition stepped up in 1870 when they actually lost a game to the Brooklyn Atlantics
• And I thought Alleghenys was a stupid name

Your guide to the stretch run, part 1 Pittsburg(h)

With a little over 2 months left in the season the NL Central appears to be headed for a four team race. Here is your handy cheat sheet for the teams and their corresponding cities. You decide who has the advantage.  First we look at Pittsburgh

Pittsburgh Pirates

• Loveable America's darlings
• Last time they were relevant I didn't have a driver's license yet (19 years ago)
• Had the first home run in World Series history (Jimmy Sebring)
• Lost the first World Series in 1903 setting the stage for the next 108 years
• Won the World Series in 1909 1925 1960 1971 and 1979
• There was no steroid testing in 1909 1925 1960 1971 and 1979

It's go time

The longest road trip of the year is finally over.

It was bad but it could have been worse. Going into it 5-6 would have been an ok outcome, especially after the 12-3 and 4-0 start in Colorado. After the series opener in San Francisco we maybe thought of a winning road trip. Ok, didn't happen.

Division status: 3 way tie.

Coming home to start a 9 game homestand and 18 straight division games. It's time to take control of this division. Six games at home against the bottom feeders Cubs and Astros and 3 with the Cards then returning the favor at Houston and St Louis followed up by a much welcomed visit to Milwaukee by the Pirates.

This is it.

This is when the Brewers need to establish themselves as the team to beat in the NL Central.

Let's go boys!!


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This whole aggressive baserunning thing

Can we knock it off??

Yes when Ron Roenicke was hired he vowed to be aggressive on the basepaths and manufacture runs by taking extra bases.

It isn't working.

Yes, the stolen bases have been good at 61/81, over 75% no problem with that.

The rest of it is garbage. Saturday night's game in San Francisco showed just how bad this team is on the bases. Rickie Weeks thrown out at home. Casey McGehee falls for the fake throw to 2nd and gets picked off at 3rd. MLB.com hilariously describes this as Casey McGehee caught stealing home which would be even worse. Seriously that play never worked when I played little league many moons ago. 11 year olds don't fall for that. Nyjer Morgan tries to take 3rd with Braun at the plate and 2 outs.

Ok, enough.

Enough with the "aggressive" baserunning. Feel free to tell the guys to stay put Ed Sedar. This team has a good enough offense, stop giving up stupid outs running the bases.

Some interesting notes on Jonathan Lucroy

Previously I've dug into the offensive problems of Casey McGehee and Yuni B and most recently Craig Counsell (again, sorry Craig).

I was doing some numbers for a different potential post and got stuck looking at Jonathan Lucroy.

Lucroy isn't a bad hitter by any means in fact over the season he's crushing last year's numbers. .284 7 HR 39 RBI, and he's certainly been better than those other 3 with the exception of Yuni lately (I know right!!), but some things jumped out at me.

Guillermo Mota still pitches in the majors??

How is this guy still pitching??

As if this incident wasn't bad enough let me remind you of this.



Thankfully Kendall was there to hold him back.

goodbye Gomez, hello Brett Carroll

Other than the day he was traded to the Brewers for JJ Hardy, I've never been a huge Carlos Gomez fan (and I've already admitted I was wrong about that). On the other hand I did think he was a valuable member of the Brewers and did not want to see him break his clavicle and likely be out for the year.

The explosion that was Nyjer Morgan in Milwaukee left Gomez standing in the shadows of T-Plush but he was still a big part of this team. The catch he made that likely ended his season saved a run and who knows maybe the game. His speed as a pinch runner helped win a game against the Reds a couple weeks ago.

Does Counsell need to go??

I hate writing this. I love Craig Counsell. Everyone loves Craig Counsell, and not just Brewers fans. The cheer from the Diamondbacks fans was impressive over the radio call.

He had the walk-off sac fly in a game I was totally at but aside from that he has been horrible.

Again, this is painful for me.

He'll be 41 next month.

Remember the last time he had a hit?? It was June 10th. That would be 33 official AB's ago and 40 days ago.

I'm taking full credit

• 5 home runs.
• 2 by Yuni B (!!) along with 3 hits and 4 RBI.
• 3 hits for McGehee and Lucroy as well.
• every starter sans Prince with a hit (he'll come around).

Sure it's only been 4 games since I suggested a lineup change but 3-1 with only a dominating performance from Josh Collmenter Monday resulting in a loss.

Ok ok, 4 games isn't enough of a sample size to be all that meaningful but it's worked so far.

On the down side, the next post is going to be about Craig Counsell...and it's going to hurt to write.

am I a genius or am I a genius??

um, yeah who called for a lineup change like 2 days ago

yeah me, 2-0 since I suggested dropping Weeks to 5.

I know right, I'm pretty awesome.

Some former pitchers get together

scene:  a dive bar in Beloit.

A sad Seth McClung is already there drinking.

What's the matter red??

I got cut from the Rangers Doug.

damn that sucks Seth. Did you hear I got signed by the White Sox. Apparently they liked what they saw when I killed it on the north side 1-7 6.50 ERA.

good for you

Change the lineup....or not

I'm going way out of the box here.

Another road loss, a shutout even. 16-31 on the road. That is 2002 quality sucking.

I was going to do an update on home/road numbers then I came across an interesting article on fangraphs about wOBA.

As a Brewers fan one singular number stood out.

Around the Infield Episode 2

Scene: our trusty gang of infielders gathers for an All-Star party.

Thanks for hosting the party at your place Craig, sweet taco dip

No problem Casey, glad to have you guys over.

Yeah sweet spread bro.

Agreed, thanks Craig

welcome K-Rod

Ok so we're all happy that the NL won the all-star game led by MVP Prince Fielder and then the real news dropped.

Brewers trade for Francisco Rodriguez

Whoa!!

Is it just me or did this come out of nowhere. Yes the Mets want no part of his 2012 option (more on that later) but 2 players to be named and we get a suitcase full of cash??

Wow.

I'm no expert on the farm teams but I can't come up with 2 names that wouldn't be worth adding K-Rod.

So why are the Mets dumping him??

My Brewers game in pictures

as previously reported I made it to Miller Park Sunday for the first half finale.

Like a 12 year old on Christmas I was up at 6:30 and ready to go.

Seriously.

I recapped the game in letters and numbers earlier, here's the recap for those of you that don't like words (I know right!!) and would rather see pictures.

Let's go!!

A day at the ball park

We take a break from our regularly scheduled Yuni bashing for actual baseball coverage.  I made my annual trek to Miller Park for the first half finale for the Brewers and Reds on Sunday.  It started off poorly with Randy Wolf giving up a run in the first without giving up a hit.  Then it was back and forth runs for the next couple innings before things calmed down and Wolf and his counterpart Dontrelle Willis settled in for a few scoreless innings and a lot of LOB's (8 for each team) and a lot of walks (10 plus 2 HBP).  Then the 9th happened.  I was prepared to go into the break on a loss either tied or a game back of STL and a respectable split with nemesis Reds.

first half grades

Since I will be gone this weekend attending my first (likely only) Brewers game of the year Sunday afternoon let's get the cliched first half grades for the Brewers.

Position players first

Around the Infield, Episode 1

Welcome to a new series here at Brewers in 11, "Around the Infield" where we catch up with the wacky gang inhabiting the left side of the Brewers' infield.

scene: Casey McGehee enters the clubhouse, appears upset.

What's up Casey

I'm getting sick of everyone judging me, ok I've been in a little slump who hasn't??

Yuni's been in one since AAA

Shut up Counsell, you're not exactly lighting it up either

yeah but I provide valuable experience and leadership